Category: Philosophy

Modern Christianity has gone far astray

For the past four months, I have been answering many questions on the platform Quora stemming from much confusion in modern Christianity. This effort has earned me a Top Writer Award for 2018. It is good that there is an open platform for people to pose their questions and receive a wide range of answers from different perspectives. I have been adding Origen’s wisdom to the answers often only answered by right wing Christians or by atheists. By adding Origen’s wisdom, I am trying to give a very different perspective from the two aforementioned.

I would like to share one of the exchanges I have had with a leader of right wing Christian movement called MPowered Christians and here is the link to the full discussion.

There are few things that I would like to point out.

  • I see many claims that the text we have today is the perfect Word of God, with no errors and no room for discussion.
    • At the same time, the prophets admonish the priests and scribes for corrupting the word. See Malachi 2:7-9, Jeremiah 8:8-9, and Ezekiel 2:1-7 for examples.
    • The councils are well documented as to the changes that were made to the bible in the New Testament also.
  • There seems to be a very rigid interpretation of the bible, in places where there are very specific conflicts in the text.
    • One example is the claim that Jesus is God. The text is not clear at all on this point. Jesus says many times He is not God, yet there are other passages where it seems like He contradicts this.

 

Letter to the editor of Y-Jesus.com

Dear Dave,
Thank you for getting back to me and for having a look at Origenes2000.org. I also read the link you sent with interest and this may be a good place to start with the list of problems with your website. You seem to be discounting the value of original writing over the opinions of modern theologians and other modern witnesses. Your analysis does not take into account the impact of the Roman empire on the modern view.
Please read Nobel Laureate Erwin Schrödinger’s work “Nature and the Greeks” to understand this huge problem with our modern view. During his work on quantum theory, Schrödinger discovered a major flaw in modern science and traced this flaw back through time in order to discover its origin. Like Galileo before him, he went back to the founders of science and philosophy (Love of Wisdom). He found that the Roman empire had split knowledge into two categories: materialistic observable knowledge and belief (which they could control through doctrine). This transition from one single world view from the likes of Socrates and Euclid to the modern opposing views of science and religion was completed by the Emperor Justinian in 543 AD. Modern theologians who do not understand this impact are not qualified to speak on the validity of the bible.
Origen of Alexandria is a very important person in the history of Christianity becuase he fulfilled the promise of Jesus to send the teacher or the spirit of truth.

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.  He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. (John 16:12-14 NKJV)

Jesus only had time to teach for three years and the simple people that followed Him we unable to understand everything He wanted to teach them. So after His death He promised to continue sending prophets to teach and to keep His words Alive. Origen of Alexander did this for over 50 years. Read my article if you need to know more about his works. The teachings of Origen in the second and third century threatened the power of Rome so much that they made the core teaching blasphemy, giving the empire power over the immortal soul of its subjects.
Some of Origen’s original writings are still available to get a taste of his genius and understand the scientific approach he took toward the words of the Old and New testaments. But the most important teachings were lost and those books burned. But Jesus’ promise to keep His words alive has brought other prophets to remind us. The latest that I am aware of is Beatrice Brunner who taught for 35 years and all of these teaching are recorded and available to modern theologians and scientists to scrutinize.
Regardless of whether the teachings came from Jesus, Salomon, Socrates, Origen or Beatrice they all are one with God. Not to say that God personally appeared as prophets and as Jesus, but all of these divine spirits came to Earth with One Purpose: Bring the Fallen Home to Heaven.
Specifically on your website, I have the following comments to make. (I have provided to the link to your page in question.)
Either Jesus was who he claimed to be—God in the flesh—or his claims were false.
There are not only two choices. Jesus never said He was God, in fact He specifically says He is not the Father many times. Oneness requires separate personalities. After 1/3 of the angels (us) were cast out of Heaven, the remaining inhabitants (King, Archangels, Princes and all other angels) have been working with One Purpose – getting us back home to our perfect state. Jesus is the King of Heaven who came down from Heaven, took on human form, showed us how to live and conquered Death (Lucifer). He rose back into Heaven and opened the gates for us to be able to join Him once we have regained our perfection.
Origen recognizes three different meaning of the word the word dead. As in the time Jesus said, “Let the dead bury the dead.” How can an immortal soul be dead? Death is separation from the light or God. Lucifer is Death, but he is very much alive. Our physical bodies die, but our immortal spiritual bodies live on – either separate from God (still dead) or heading towards the light. Jesus’ resurrection was just proof of what happens everyday. Modern science has demonstrated resurrection and reincarnation, the incarnation of an immortal soul in a new life on earth. Psychologists have demonstrated multiple past lives which is consistent with the original early Christian teachings, Jesus’ Good News:
  • We are all fallen angels and each of us had some active or passive part in Lucifer’s bid to become king.
  • We all broke our promise to God to accept Jesus as the King of Heaven, therefore, the only way home is accept Jesus as the King of Heaven once again.
  • God is infinitely patient and He wants all his lost sheep back, event the black one (Lucifer). There will be great rejoicing when this prodigal son eventually comes home, but this is a long way in the future. 
  • God created the material world in order to provide a foolproof path for our return. We are not only given many chances to find our way home, but we have all of Heaven pulling for us. 
  • Every person on earth today is on the same road home, but we are at different points on that road. Evidence from the bible and science suggests that this road is long. It seems to require hundreds of years living on earth over many lifetimes.
  • Each life gives each of us the opportunity to learn what we need to in order to advance along the road. Sometimes we do and other time we fall back some, but His Angels are loving and patient and are there to help us along the way.
If you want to bring this viewpoint to your website, I would be happy to help.

Two worlds, two beginnings.

There cannot be two beginnings, so what do they represent and why are they so different? The one in the Old Testament speaks of a time where there is both darkness and light. The beginning in the New Testament is one of just light – no darkness.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was [a divine being]. (John 1:1 – Zwingli translation)

When reading the bible, Origen taught us to look for the spiritual meaning and separate it from the physical meaning. John’s Gospel is so much different from the other three because John wrote the spiritual meaning of Jesus’s teaching. John was Jesus’s favorite because he was the one apostle closest to Jesus spiritually and understood His spiritual references the best. Remember, Jesus only revealed Heaven to John because He felt him worthy and also enlightened enough to understand His revelations. The beginning that John speaks of happened so long ago – long before the big bang was needed. It was the time when God decided to populate Heaven and He created His Only Son to be the King of His Creation.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)

The “beginning” in Genesis is the beginning of the reconciliation to God, after the Fall from grace and the expulsion of 1/3 the angels from Heaven. This was one of the many terrible images revealed to John. (Rev 12:4) Origen teaches of an unperceivably slow reconciliation of all things to God. To comprehend how slow this process is, we can look to science. God created the first opportunity for reconciliation in the spiritual world; a place called Eden in Paradise. (The same place where Jesus went after His death on the cross.) When Adam and Eve failed to remain true to Jesus (the tree of life) and again fell under the influence of Lucifer (the tree of the knowledge of good and evil), a new path needed to be created. In order to achieve the new plan, a physical world needed to be created where Adam and Eve started again to reconcile with God.

Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. (Genesis 3:23)

The story of our reconciliation with God did not even require a new paragraph for the 13.7 billion years it took for God to create the ground for Adam to till. This gives us an idea to the monumental task that God set out upon in order to restore us, His children, to our original state of perfection. The remaining 2/3 of Heaven has worked tirelessly to bring all the Fallen home. Many have been incarnated in a human/physical body to prepare for the coming of the King Himself. In the Old Testament, these Angels sent to teach were called Prophets and Jesus called those who came after Him the Spirit of Truth.

We live in the shadows of the Spiritual World, far away from God where we have no memory from where we came. Why? So that we can prove our loyalty again to our King, Jesus. This requires faith and loyalty. Science can give us evidence of God, but never proof. Although a scientific approach to studying the bible and teachings from other spiritual sources is needed to separate God’s Word from doctrine or man’s word.

So what evidence does science provide for the construct above?

Science provides us evidence that each of us is a citizen of two worlds. We have a physical body that serves us for a limited time and a spiritual body with the same form that is immortal, transcending life. The best evidence comes from the works done on reincarnation, past lives and out of body experiences showing how the intellect and character transcends the physical body.

The big bang theory is widely accepted, but there are still significant questions.

The two world model presented by Jesus and reinforced by Origen of Alexandria resolves these big bang questions well. If the material world was created by God from the spiritual world, it would resemble the big bang described by science. And, since the universe is essential an open system, open to beings and energy from the spiritual world, it would be expanding at an accelerating rate with a continuous flow of God’s energy. So-called dark energy is simply God’s light flowing into the material world. Since the spiritual world already existed before the big bang, all the templates of life existed and Earth was populated with life as soon as it was ready to support it.

ChristianAnswers.net

I came across a website called ChristianAnswers and I was surprised at the biblical truth’s that this website is proclaiming. I contacted the editor a few times on specific items, but I wanted to reiterate them here. I know that these are common modern christian beliefs, but to proclaim them as biblical fact goes too far. If they just stated these comments as doctrine I would be happy. Here are three examples.

  1. The website says: “According to the Bible one cannot work their way to Heaven. Salvation is by faith alone – acceptance of God’s gift of salvation and reliance on Christ’s promise of what will happen after our earthly death. Jesus said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life” (John 5:24).”
    • First of all, passing from death into life is not the same as passing into everlasting life. Jesus talks much about death as being separation from God “Let the dead bury the dead.” (Matt 8:22). Just moving from death (separation form God) to life (belief in God) is not the same as entering everlasting life (re-entering the highest reaches of heaven).
    • Secondly Jesus says that only through him can we achieve everlasting life. This website thinks that belief in Jesus is enough, but does not require a Christ-like life in addition as Jesus shows us. He says that we have also repay our debts to the last farthing (Matt 5:26) and tells Nicodemus that a person who could not live a Christ-like life then needs to enter into a new life to achieve this. (John 3:4) It was not enough for Nicodemus at the end of his life to just believe in Jesus. He needed to be born again and live a better life.
    • Thirdly, the bible says that there is joy in heaven when a sinner repents (Luke 15:10), not that only repenting gives us everlasting life.
    • Finally, Jesus says that “everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him will have everlasting life” (John 6:40). But how can we see the Son without elevating ourselves to His level? In order to see the Son we need to walk in His footsteps, and thus must fill ourselves with virtue. So for me, the bible (Jesus) does say that we need to work on ourselves to achieve heaven, besides relying on the Grace of God.
  2. This site also says “The LDS Church does not accept the biblical idea that Christ’s blood was shed on the cross to wash away our sins – present, past and future.” I can find no evidence in the teaching of Jesus or Origen to support this claim.
    • On the contrary, Jesus says that we need to repay our debts to the last farthing. (Matt 5:26)
    • Jesus’ act of redemption opened the gates to heaven to allow those who have earned the right to return to heaven, but we are all expected to follow the Law plus his new law: love thy neighbor.
    • Jesus did forgive sin, but he also told them to sin no more. (John 5:14, 8:11) He never said our future sins are also forgiven.
  3. This website offers a very weak explanation of the common question “Is God biased? Is it fair to save only some?”. Without accepting the gift of reincarnation, there is no logical explanation of God’s fairness in the bible. This website shows how difficult it is to show how it is possible for the 7+ billion souls on this earth to learn the teachings of Jesus and accept him as their savior in one lifetime.  Only multiple lifetimes on earth could allow all souls to have a fair chance to learn of Jesus and accept him.