PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pm
Age wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:32 pm
These question did NOT assume this at all.
In fact the very opposite could be said.
Okay. My bad.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 11:48 am
The idea that God could spend all eternity wanting to be listened to, heard, accepted and recognised is common but I can make no sense of it.
This is because you do NOT YET KNOW what God actually IS, correct?
It's because I like ideas to make sense.
Perfect.
You sound like someone I could actually converse with.
From what you wrote here it sounds like you have YET to come across an idea of 'God', which makes sense to you. Is this correct?
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pm'Lack', need, or 'desire' are also NOT what 'want' is.
I also have NOT defined God so as to incorporate any lack, need, or desire.
All is well then.
But what is the person actually recognizing and accepting, et cetera?
Surely if the 'thing', which is being recognized and accepted, was being recognized and accepted for what 'it' Truly IS, then the joy for the person doing the recognizing and accepting would even be HIGHER, correct?
Don't forget that the mystic is concerned with one task only, usually put as 'Know Thyself'. There would be nobody else to know, recognise or accept.
This is very true and correct, in a sense. But, there a words like 'persons', 'selfs', et cetera, and so when ALL of these 'things' are identified and defined properly and correctly, then along with this comes the Knowing of Thy 'Self'.
'Knowing Thyself' brings with it the FULL Knowing and Understanding of ALL these apparent "things", which human beings have put names to and labeled.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 11:48 am
If all 'persons' are God, then is this individually or collectively?
The distinction breaks down in the end. A common analogy is waves on the surface of the ocean. [/quote]
Maybe so. But analogies do NOT actually answer the questions I posed.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pmUnity with God, or union with Reality, may be the EXACT SAME thing. But, recognizing and accepting, or KNOWING what Reality, or God, Truly IS in a UNIFIED manner with and by EVERY one, EQUALLY, would be a MORE joyous and happier occasion for EVERY one, correct?
For mysticism you have to go beyond the idea of knowing and replace it with Being. Knowing God is being God and this would be the only way to know Him.
Well when a 'you' Knows 'God', FULLY and CORRECTLY, then what is recognized and realized is that God, Itself, is CERTAINY NOT the human being anthropomorphized, and gendered, word, nor concept, of a "he".
By the way knowing some thing, and then being that thing, can be two completely different things.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pmBut yes, this is immortality and lasting happiness. Meher Baba sums it up nicely when he says, 'True happiness is Oneness. Wherever there is duality there is trouble'. For the mystic there are not two things, Consciousness is Reality and all relationships evaporate for a fundamental view.
Why do you speak as though these, so called, "mystics", and/or "mysticism", has, and already, KNOWS the answers?
"mystics" and mysticism vanishes when the answers are already KNOWN. As there is NO more mystery.
When does one KNOW they already have the answers, some may ask?
The answer is when ALL-OF-THIS is already CRYSTAL clear and already making PERFECT SENSE. AsIt ALREADY DOES.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pmI am not yet sure of what, so called, "christian mystics" are exactly nor how "they" are supposed to be to "christianity".
If you want te follow this up I'd recommend '
God: A Guide for the Perplexedd' by Keith Ward or
Being. Consciousness. Bliss by David Bentley Hart. For original texts there is the Philokalia. The Nag Hammadi Library, the saying of the Desert Fathers. Plotinus is always excellent. It's an extensive literature.
Okay, but I do not want to follow this up. As I do not read books and because I already KNOW thee actual Truth behind this.
PeteJ wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 12:54 pmLoosely-speaking Christian mysticism is Classical Christianity. the religion of the early church community prior to the Roman Emperor getting involved and turning Christianity into a dogmatic monotheism,
Okay.