Life, a Curse or a Blessing? (PHI-214)(4-2)

Comment by Roman Kozlowski on November 22, 2009 at 7:43am

According to the bible, sin is a genetic flaw perpetrated by Adam and allowed by God to develop and affect the entire human race. See Romans 5:12.

Comment by Jeff H on November 22, 2009 at 12:41pm

Actually, scripture teaches that children are all heaven bound and that there is an age of accountability later towards adolescents. (Without going into detail, David's 1st child by Bathsheba which died, and David said he couldn't bring him back but would one day go to later amongst other teachings)

Roman- If you're going to point out the curse, point out the cure too :-)
Romans 5
Peace and Joy
1Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we[b] rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him! For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Death Through Adam, Life Through Christ

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come.

But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! 16Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.

The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Comment by PH214 Youstbi Djuanvat on November 22, 2009 at 4:56pm

Dear Jim G,

I really like your reply, I will dig deeper to the Buddhism links you gave me; and I agree with you about a common circle among all religions. Buddha once taught about the middle way (I am not a Buddhist), I like Buddha's view on 2 absoluteness—we ought to choose a point of no extreme in between.

When many pastors did wrong in our current world, like in my home state of Colorado—the biggest church pastor committed same-sex adultery with a man (while he aggressively preach against adultery AND homosexuality). We forgive them, with one logic, even they are men who have the inspiration of God and Holy Spirit—still, they are not perfect thus they can make mistakes.

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul—and many prophets and authors of the bible were men, just like many pastors who do wrongs today—they aren't perfect. Their works weren't either, they were still human even with Holy Spirit inside them.

Siddharta Gautama (Buddha), Mohammed (pbuh), Joseph Smith, Jr., Dalai Lama, Moses, Abraham, Mother Teresa, Brigham Young, Rev. Billy Graham were and are not perfect either. By the way Rev. Billy Graham in Larry King told us that Christians are not the only ones who will go to heaven (Graham is a man who preach to most people in modern history of our world, yet he is not an exclusivist christian leader). All the people I mentioned are not perfect thus their works weren't perfect. If Jesus wrote the Bible himself, it would have been perfect, but it wasn't Him.

Comment by Jeff H on November 22, 2009 at 5:54pm

That Pastor doesn't hold the office of Apostle The word used to describe how God "moved" the writers to pen what they wrote is a nautical term which was used of a ship driven before a storm. It has no control of its own destination. God used the personality's of the writers, but the words are as if He has penned them himself.

Comment by david thurman on November 22, 2009 at 9:26pm

Jim I want to correct you a bit
forgot to respond to the suicide part. Brain "disorders" can do that to a person. I have bipolar disorder myself .

bipolar disorder is incorrect. Split the words apart, We can see bipolar is true in regards to genetics. the disorder word is a prejudicial word Bipolar is a genetic spectrum location in regards to the entire spectrum of everyone on this planet. So Since everyone is not on the same genetic spectrum i say that is clearly false and as soon as they figure out that EVERYONE is a slave to their genetics and biology and that we function across a spectrum then the word disorder is going to be seen as purely absurd.
Jim you are Bipolar, whether you are disorderly or not is to a major degree very much up to you just like it is for everyone.

Comment by david thurman on November 23, 2009 at 6:44am

I have my own story Jim. we all do to one degree or another. How we deal with it determines who we are. Some people don't deal, or just can't deal, some people make the effort to educate themselves and invariably every person that I know that has done this, heads right for the middle path. Concepts in Eastern Philosophy always seem to pop up it's all about balance it's the body/mind as one.

Comment by Jim G on November 23, 2009 at 8:50am

I think also David that mental illnesses are not one size fits all. And this may go hand in hand with your mention of one spectrum we are all on, with some people farther along the spectrum than others. For instance, I was diagnosed Bipolar Disorder I, which is the most severe classification of Bipolar Disorder. But I do not fit the usual case where I continue to be severe. I only experienced one week of severe high, and an ensuing number of months of a severe but steadily improving low. Some bunny hills up or down since then. And even more stabilization after that period of some bunny hills. Experiencing more as chronic unipolar depression which was a diagnosis I had a few years before the bipolar depression diagnosis, fixed to a considerable degree with one of the newer anti depressants, Wellbutrin XL, which costs me $170 for 30 pills, a one month supply (no insurance.) It's worth it's weight in gold. But the natural stuff above mentioned, and religion (which I sort of forgot until now in a way, or I got rusty or something,) and expensive treatments if you can afford it like psycho therapy or counseling, accu puncture (I tried with Chinese doctors who hooked up the needles to electric current and it worked as an anti depressant, I just couldn't afford to go 3 times a week as it only lasted a few days.) Actually the chinese doctors said they were trying to jump start my chi (energy flow,) so perhaps I should have stuck with it for a few months. (I tried a few different things after the diagnosis.)

At any rate, for the ones who didn't get better, it's definately a disorder, as they consider it to be a living hell (I've discussed with a bunch of folks with BP on BP support forums.) To tell them otherwise would be pretty insensitive. But for my fortunate case it does not come across as ignorance based on not experiencing BP bu thinking you know what a BP experience is.

Copying from that Buddhist page:

Suffering (or unsatisfactoriness) can be distinguished in three types:
1. Suffering of suffering: this refers to the most obvious aspects like pain, fear and mental distress.
2. Suffering of change: refers to the problems that change brings, like joy disappears, nothing stays, decay and death.
3. All-pervasive suffering: this is the most difficult to understand aspect, it refers to the fact that we always have the potential to suffer or can get into problematic situations. Even death is not a solution in Buddhist philosophy, as we will simply find ourselves being reborn in a different body, which will also experience problems.

I think what you are saying is the first type of suffering, suffering of suffering? Even if someone is genetically susceptible to aquiring a depressive disorder, it's possible the disorder might not have manifested if that person was a practicing Buddhist (or Christian or what have you I presume) from young adulthood and avoided the suffering of suffering, so that there was effectively no tipping point straw on the camel's back. And once it is aquired, suffering of the suffering of the health problem piles more depression on top of the depression. So I do agree with you to a certain extent, although not 100 percent, probably 50 percent, that a mental disorder is what you make of it.

On the larger scheme of things, when you add up all the all health disorders that only 5 percent of the population has, all you need is 20 people and everyone has something. : ) So I also think some folks on the BP forums can be self centric about their health challenge, assuming 95% of the population is luckier than they are. And even if someone has no health problem, they might have been in a serious accident and have a health problem very suddenly come into their life. That may be the hardest to accept as the change from healthy to not healthy happens from one day to the following day. Although my BP I level "nervous breakdown" came as a surprise, I was forewarned a few years earlier, going on Prozac for one year, so it didn't come as a complete surprise.

It would be a good experiment if I were to become a Buddhist monk, to see if the BP changed any. I'm married and more importantly have kids, so that isn't an option for me. I can try to squeeze in daily meditation though and see what happens. In fact I think that should be a necessity for me, as I do believe the ones who need religion the most are the ones who have been faced with some sort of challenge.

I don't think Buddhism are the only ones with the answers. Einstein, a physicist not a holy person, said "The value of achievement lies in the achieving." Which is the same thing as recommending to people not to be attached to the outcome. Or as Landmark (Education) would say, "committed but not attached," I guess.

Comment by Jim G on November 23, 2009 at 9:08am

Perhaps I forgot to add David, severe mental illness is certainly a disorder. My thinking was so disorganized when I came off the weeklong manic episode, which ended with a crash into an equally intense depression, with possibly a "mixed state" during the transition from high to low, I literally could not utilize my brain enough to drive myself to a psychiatrist, my wife had to drive me. And I thought I must have aquired schizophrenia as I did not know what mania or mixed mania/depression was. And for a few months afterward, I could only work two hours a day, as that was all the stress I could take. So I would not tell someone with severe mental illness that didn't have a case where they got better over time that they do not have a disorder.

Comment by david thurman on November 23, 2009 at 9:14am

Excellent insight Jim. I don't want to imply that BP is simply a matter of mind over biology so to speak they are intertwined so to speak. I do find it interesting though that everyone I have talked about in regards to BP and who have made an effort to work through it take a very eastern philosophical take. I think in the west in how we correspond our experiences to the world around us is a major hurdle to over come for most BP's. Eastern philosophy allows us a way of stepping out of culture just a bit get our emotional state philosophically grounded and up off of that begin the process of contextualizing them correctly in relationship to the world around us. I do know people who are cronic, but every person that I have ever talked to that is chronic has never bothered to ground their experiences to any depth. If we have no basis of our experiences that is solid framed in terms of biology the world around us in a framework that can encapsulate the entirety of that then we have serious problems. Every BP that I have talked to that is cronic at some base level their contextualization of their experiences are in contradiction. Breaking that for some is impossible I will agree with that.

Comment by david thurman on November 23, 2009 at 9:38am

I also might add that being self reflective in and of itself is problematic in that it's a biological step of evolution of long term memory development coupled to a very old section of the brain. When the Limbic system is going wacky which is what is happening to bipolars that crossover between different sections is thrown out of whack. In a very real sense our thoughts affect our biology our biology affects our thoughts. The world around us effects or thoughts our thoughts affect how we see the world. So this illusion of self refection or that duality of being self reflective independent observer of self is very very difficult to overcome. Thich Nhat Hanh's comment we are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness is applicable but how is that applicable for the BP,. Now getting there is not easy and takes work and not everyone can this I will agree. But Buddha was right, it's a problem of education as well and much is in the individuals control so to speak of how they walk in this life. I may be imprisoned by my biology, I simply embrace that, in full embrace, and through that I find freedom. So for me BP is neither a curse nor a blessing but an is, and from that point I walk and become both completely imprisoned and free at the same time. I'm the worst determinism evolutionist on the site. Well except for maybe Roman. LOL. This ultimately touches the title of this post. I'm blessedly imprisoned and I'm cursedly free. LOL. .

Comment

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• 3
• …
• 5
• Next ›
• Page