From: Leland Jory (ljory@mts.net)
Date: Thu Mar 18 2004 - 22:59:26 GMT
Steve Peterson wrote:
> Hi Leland,
>
> you said:
> ... 'god' is simply a word then you will see there is no point in
> getting uptight about it.
>
> Steve:
> To you and me, God is a concept. To many others, saying so is
> blasphemy. Using the word around such people is dangerous business.
> You're likely to be misunderstood.
That's their problem, not mine. I am more than happy to expound on my
concept of 'god' to them, they choose to ignore it. To paraphrase
Pirsig, the truth knocks on the door and they say "Go away, I HAVE the
truth." And so it goes away.
>
> Equating God with DQ is problematic for still other reasons even in
> our discussion group. The concept of God generally includes the idea
> of an intelligent being who purposefully makes decisions while Pirsig
> resists such anthropomorhization and hypostatizing in his concept of DQ.
Again, this is because of the intellectual loading of the word 'god'
that theologists have done. When you disregard this loading of the word,
you see that it can simply be a term for the transcendent. The reason
god was anthropomorphized in the first place is because humans generally
have a problem conceptualizing abstracts. The heavier the abstract idea
is, the tougher time we have wrapping our heads around it. So, we coin
language to describe it. The problems arise when people treat the
language as the thing being described.
--
Leland Jory :^{)>
Cafeteria Spiritualist and Philosopher
"It is a puzzling thing. The truth knocks on the door and you say, 'Go
away, I'm looking for the truth.' and so it goes away. Puzzling." -
Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
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