Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

Not sure if it is germane but India has a civilization going back thousands of years before the Romans and the Jews.

I also understand that there's still a debate about the oldest continuing civilization - India or China. But there is no doubt, as far as religion and spirituality, that India has far older roots than other cultures.

Zen is mundane to me Cecil.

After I did my fair share of studying Zen, I feel it's the most 'pure' of any religious/spiritual paths simply because of it's absolute honesty and absence of belief systems. "That is the best I can say for it."

It was written that the bishops present at the council gathered all the hundreds of manuscripts then circulating and placed them under the huge council table, then they prayed together and "besought the Lord that the divinely inspired writings should get themselves up onto the table, while the spurious ones should remain below." And this is apparently how it was done.

It would take more belief than I could ever muster to swallow that one... no wonder religions asks their followers to believe and have faith.

It would take more belief than I could ever muster to swallow that one... no wonder religions asks their followers to believe and have faith

'sgot nothing to do with religion or faith, much less belief. The book was a tongue-in-cheek history of western civ, all properly referenced, footnoted and annotated, in which the "facts" were presented in a somewhat humorous context, in the interest of us not taking ourselves so seriously. Something all of us could stand a little of, no?

Peace,
Barry

faith = belief

belief = faith

synonymous terms

I wrote a paper on the Council of Nicea in 1981, I found a reference to how the books of the Canon were chosen. It was written that the bishops present at the council gathered all the hundreds of manuscripts then circulating and placed them under the huge council table, then they prayed together and "besought the Lord that the divinely inspired writings should get themselves up onto the table, while the spurious ones should remain below."

That sounded so serious to me, Barry, unless the winkie at the end was the give-away..?

to believe - (v)

have faith - (n)

Hmmm... would asking a child to believe in Santa Clause be the same as having faith in Santa Clause? How about the Easter Bunny?

Yes, the winkie at the end was supposed to be the giveaway. And I tagged it onto the end of my paper, as a sort of humorous footnote. The professor emeritus of religious studies got it; he chuckled amiably when he read the paper in class.

Peace,
Barry

Thx, Barry, for the explanation. I needed it! ((obviously))

belief - noun
faith - noun

believes - verb
has faith - verb


just saying... i know it's just semantics but still...

and yeah, the child believes in santa claus
he has faith that this is a real person who will come to his house and give him gifts

same thing as believing you're going to go to heaven when you die because you believe that there was this real guy who really died and was resurrected and did this for you personally so you could live forever 'cause he was god in human form

you have faith that what you believe is true
you believe that what you have faith in is really true

synonyms

Well here I go again. A leap of faith. I have no idea if this relates.
My faith is heretical.
Do you have faith in quarks and neutrinos, do you believe in the "god particle",

"religion says believe and you will understand, science says understand and you will believe"

In one of J. D. Salinger's stories or novels he wrote something like this. "God is the square root of minus one"

My faith is strong: I believe in imaginary numbers and support the teachings

I'm with the Atheists: Imaginary numbers should not be taught in public schools

I'm agnostic on the issue

Do you support the teaching of imaginary numbers in schools

keep the faith that your belief will remain faithful...

I believe in faith. Or was it... I have faith in belief. Or was it... I believe I'll have a cold one? I forget now.. I get those mixed up.

A mind-blower to some extent: "i" =square root of negative one

Imaginary numbers. Yeah, they made me study them one time. Ha. Good point. Seems some things can't stand alone so well in the universe, but fare much better in pairs-- like "i"-squared maybe..

...or betting the over-under... How could I lose? I'm always under the over, and over the under...

I believe I will wake up tomorrow morning.
I have faith in this belief.
But I have absolutely no proof.
It's entirely possible I will not.

I believe there is a supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy.
The "priests" have told me so, showed me readings and graphs as proof, but I have only their word, their collective word, to guide my faith.
I maintain faith in the "priests." For in my culture anything less is both foolhardy and insane.

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own commonsense. --Buddha (563BC-483BC)

That about sums it up for me... folds into a nice little origami swan that fits without a bulge in my mental rucksack as I wander down the holy backroads whistling Morrison's Astral Weeks one song at a time until I come to rest on the banks of my consciousness and pull the swan out and let 'er float, man, let 'er float downstream in that slipstream... the methodology of an Astral Hobo to excrete the chaos from the calm.

Nazz it is good to see you sober for a change

Math is too hard
let's get drunk

Yeah, and it was even Cinco de Mayo yesterday! Imagine that math. People go nuts over Cinco de Mayo in this town. Not sure why.

I did have a cold one though..