One of the most difficult aspects of "Christianity" for me is this concept of "sin" - be it "original" or not........ and the dualism of "good" and "evil" it springs from, (or gives birth to). My child's logic found this whole idea a non-starter - and at 65, I still do. Here's why:
If God is real and he/she/it/they made the universe and everything in it, and God is the source of everything, then everything has to be of God, made by God, from God stuff. If there is a substance that is NOT God which God used to make us, then God is not the original source, not the everything, not the totality of life/being. Today from my Buddhist framework I would place that kind of limited god into the category of the "Devas" (gods) on the wheel of samsara (world or life) - which by the way, is where I would today place all the "mythological" gods I had read about and wondered about as a kid like "Thor", "Venus", "Rama", "Ishtar", "Zeus", Osiris", "Bacchus", and my favorites, "Loki", "Hanuman" and "Coyote".
I became interested in all these gods and their stories very early on and by third grade was reading everything about them I could get my hands on (my poor, dear parents had to go into our local library and give them written permission for me to check out mythology books which were in the adult section of the library). I read and wondered, and one day I asked our minister the question, "Why is our God "real" and all the gods of other religions considered to be "not real". Why do we call our stories "Truth" and their stories "Mythology"? I remember getting a non-answer like, "Well, because WE know its true", (I'm sure it was a more sophisticated complete answer than that, but that is how it felt to me then - an unsatisfactory NON-answer).
"But what makes us different minister?"
"Well Karen, Jesus died for our sins, and rose again from the dead promising us eternal life."
"What about Osiris and Bacchus then minister? They rose from the dead too?"
"Well, Jesus was different Karen he was the son of God"
"But minister, wasn't Jesus god too?"
*Sigh* - Growing up, I must have been a real trial for many people. Let me apologize here and now to all of you - *bow* Thank you for your patience!
Anyway, let's get back to why I don't believe in "sin" as something inherently "bad" or "evil", something to be punished for. My understanding of sin came from this same notion that if God is everything, then sin is God too. If God is good, then there must be a "goodness" to sin as well. I think this is why I immediately recognized and accepted the concept of "karma" when I first ran into it. In karma there is not reward or punishment, only cause and effect. For example, if one places their hand on a hot stove burner, then there is pain. The pain is NOT a punishment for the action of touching the parent's "Don't touch that!" stove top. From this perspective I began to consider Adam's and Eve's "sin" of eating forbidden fruit from the tree of Knowledge and began to see the "serpent" as curiosity/wisdom ("Be ye as wise as serpents") and part of the whole "goodness" of creation. It was clear to my 8 year old self that without the "sin" of the "serpent" and resulting "sin" of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, there can be no journey (this by the way is why Devas cannot be enlightened - no serpents in their garden *grin*).
Today the Garden of Eden story resonates for me within the framework of a Buddhist saying originally formulated by Qingyuan Weixin, later translated by D.T.Suzuki in his Essays in Zen Buddhism.
"Before I had studied Chan (Zen) for thirty years, I saw mountains as mountains, and rivers as rivers. When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to the point where I saw that mountains are not mountains, and rivers are not rivers. But now that I have got its very substance I am at rest. For it's just that I see mountains once again as mountains, and rivers once again as rivers."
In the same way I came to disbelieve in the sin of Adam and Eve, I came to disbelieve in the sin of Judas. I SAW that without Judas there can be no Jesus of the resurrection no Jesus of the Trinity, so therefore, Judas must also be "good" and necessary - (I had a LOT of sympathy for Judas as a kid). This notion got me into a lot of trouble too!
Okay, so far so good.......sin could exist in my childhood cosmology, but to be punished by God (go to hell), for doing/being something which had to have come from God in the first place, which had to be in the mind of God before he/she/it/they created us, which had to BE God in its very existence? Well then! That's no God of mine! MY God wouldn't be so mean!!!!! There is a psychological truth that one must be able to conceive of some motivation, intent or action in order to suspect someone else of that intent, motivation or behavior. In which direction did this flow? I ended up somewhere deciding the flow was circular, and therefore part of the whole, and being part of the whole, was "good" and necessary in some way I might not understand.
I have more "sin" to chew on, digest, and pass on, but for today, I have run out of time.
If God is real and he/she/it/they made the universe and everything in it, and God is the source of everything, then everything has to be of God, made by God, from God stuff. If there is a substance that is NOT God which God used to make us, then God is not the original source, not the everything, not the totality of life/being. Today from my Buddhist framework I would place that kind of limited god into the category of the "Devas" (gods) on the wheel of samsara (world or life) - which by the way, is where I would today place all the "mythological" gods I had read about and wondered about as a kid like "Thor", "Venus", "Rama", "Ishtar", "Zeus", Osiris", "Bacchus", and my favorites, "Loki", "Hanuman" and "Coyote".
I became interested in all these gods and their stories very early on and by third grade was reading everything about them I could get my hands on (my poor, dear parents had to go into our local library and give them written permission for me to check out mythology books which were in the adult section of the library). I read and wondered, and one day I asked our minister the question, "Why is our God "real" and all the gods of other religions considered to be "not real". Why do we call our stories "Truth" and their stories "Mythology"? I remember getting a non-answer like, "Well, because WE know its true", (I'm sure it was a more sophisticated complete answer than that, but that is how it felt to me then - an unsatisfactory NON-answer).
"But what makes us different minister?"
"Well Karen, Jesus died for our sins, and rose again from the dead promising us eternal life."
"What about Osiris and Bacchus then minister? They rose from the dead too?"
"Well, Jesus was different Karen he was the son of God"
"But minister, wasn't Jesus god too?"
*Sigh* - Growing up, I must have been a real trial for many people. Let me apologize here and now to all of you - *bow* Thank you for your patience!
Anyway, let's get back to why I don't believe in "sin" as something inherently "bad" or "evil", something to be punished for. My understanding of sin came from this same notion that if God is everything, then sin is God too. If God is good, then there must be a "goodness" to sin as well. I think this is why I immediately recognized and accepted the concept of "karma" when I first ran into it. In karma there is not reward or punishment, only cause and effect. For example, if one places their hand on a hot stove burner, then there is pain. The pain is NOT a punishment for the action of touching the parent's "Don't touch that!" stove top. From this perspective I began to consider Adam's and Eve's "sin" of eating forbidden fruit from the tree of Knowledge and began to see the "serpent" as curiosity/wisdom ("Be ye as wise as serpents") and part of the whole "goodness" of creation. It was clear to my 8 year old self that without the "sin" of the "serpent" and resulting "sin" of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, there can be no journey (this by the way is why Devas cannot be enlightened - no serpents in their garden *grin*).
Today the Garden of Eden story resonates for me within the framework of a Buddhist saying originally formulated by Qingyuan Weixin, later translated by D.T.Suzuki in his Essays in Zen Buddhism.
"Before I had studied Chan (Zen) for thirty years, I saw mountains as mountains, and rivers as rivers. When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to the point where I saw that mountains are not mountains, and rivers are not rivers. But now that I have got its very substance I am at rest. For it's just that I see mountains once again as mountains, and rivers once again as rivers."
In the same way I came to disbelieve in the sin of Adam and Eve, I came to disbelieve in the sin of Judas. I SAW that without Judas there can be no Jesus of the resurrection no Jesus of the Trinity, so therefore, Judas must also be "good" and necessary - (I had a LOT of sympathy for Judas as a kid). This notion got me into a lot of trouble too!
Okay, so far so good.......sin could exist in my childhood cosmology, but to be punished by God (go to hell), for doing/being something which had to have come from God in the first place, which had to be in the mind of God before he/she/it/they created us, which had to BE God in its very existence? Well then! That's no God of mine! MY God wouldn't be so mean!!!!! There is a psychological truth that one must be able to conceive of some motivation, intent or action in order to suspect someone else of that intent, motivation or behavior. In which direction did this flow? I ended up somewhere deciding the flow was circular, and therefore part of the whole, and being part of the whole, was "good" and necessary in some way I might not understand.
I have more "sin" to chew on, digest, and pass on, but for today, I have run out of time.
In the meantime
:D
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