Dear David,

<<Krishna, the Indian god, was also was born of a Virgin (Devaki) and in a cave, and his birth announced by a Star. To destroy him a massacre of infants was ordered. Everywhere he performed miracles, raising the dead, healing lepers, and the deaf and the blind, and championing the poor and oppressed. He descended into hell; and rose again from the dead, ascending into heaven in the sight of many people. He will return at the last day to be the judge of the quick and the dead.>>

Krishna was a man, said to be an incarnation of an aspect of God (Vishnu), but otherwise no more God than you and me. New archaeological evidence indicates that he actually exited (http://jayasreesaranathan.blogspot.com.au/2009/01/krishna-reality-archeological-proof.html).

Krishna was the 8th son of Devaki and her husband Vasudeva, so Devaki wasn't a virgin. He was born in a prison-cell, not a cave. There was no general infant-massacre as attributed to Herod: Devaki and Vasudeva were imprisoned and king Kamsa killed their first six children (Krishna's brothers) each the day they were born (the 7th escaped by being replaced with a baby-girl). Krishna raised only two dead (one the son of his teacher, for which he descended to Yama's realm of the dead to fetch back his soul, the second was his unborn nephew, Parikshit). Krishna is not known to heal lepers, deaf and blind, but only one hunchback woman. Krishna did not ascend to heaven in the sight of many people (perhaps you confused him with Rama, an earlier incarnation of Vishnu who did), but was alone when shot in error by a hunter.

<<Apparently the Jesus narrative has been conflated with the narratives of the pagan religions extant at the time of the invention of Christianity.>>

Apparently we are occasionally blessed to have extraordinary people who either factually perform what we call 'miracles', or more importantly lead such a pure life, providing such example that inspires others to tell such stories about them.

As for virgin birth, if pregnancy occurs without the slightest thought of lust, that should qualify as great miracle.

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Dear David,

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“Duality is not observed in nature. Human perceptions give nature a duality.”
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I get your point and agree that nobody can be sure that his interpretation of reality is exact.

I do, however, consider, rightly or wrongly, that there is a reality, independent of myself as an observer, which includes me.

The sequence of events is that following my initial “perception” of the phenomenon of “duality in nature”, I subsequently “observed” it attentively, “contemplated” it, “examined” it, “analysed” it, and” integrated” it into my understanding of the “reality” of nature.

It did not seem unreasonable to me at the time to consider that such common, distinctive signs, as male and female, day and night, left and right, life and death, etc., may not only be “perceived” but also “observed”, “contemplated”, “examined”, “analysed” and, to a some degree, “understood”.

Apparently you consider that what I thought I was doing was simply an illusion.

I also deduce from your remark, and am surprised to learn, that the scientific community considers Newton’s third law of motion (for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction) to be a simple “human perception” and not, as I naïvely imagined until now, an “observation” of a particular phenomenon of nature.

Perhaps you will be kind enough to explain to me why you consider that “duality is not observed in nature. Human perceptions give nature a duality.”

I am curious to hear your arguments.

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Dear david f and Banjo,

Thanks to both for your thoughts, especially to david f for his essay on evil, which, of course, also Christians and others can talk about without its personification in Satan or the Lucifer.

There are many things that come in pairs, and many that come in triples (and numerology “sees” correlations between also other numbers and observed or imagined realities). However, I think not EVERYWHERE where two “things” appear is the application of the Yin-Yang complementarity insightful. The same for Plato’s triad of the categories of beauty, truth and goodness (perhaps in a different order) that some people correlate with the Christian idea of the Trinity. See also http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=9292#150621.

I cannot see the Yin-Yang complementarity (that somehow should reflect our intuitively grasped female-male complementarity) meaningfully applied to natural-supernatural, the binary system of 0s and 1s, plus and minus, beauty and ugliness, truth and untruth, good and evil etc.

The same about Plato’s triad (or Christian Trinity), although I know of a pious physicist who sees manifestations of the Christian Trinitarian model of God in all sorts of physical entities - or rather concepts in our physical theories - of which there are three kinds. I think that is silly, although Plato’s trinity is a “prism” that I find useful to look through at many aspects (but not all triples) of reality, especially where humans are involved. The same for Yin-Yang.

Well, in http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=8316#131871 I admitted to you:

“Maybe you are right, prism is a wrong metaphor. … In my original writings (not in English) I used the split-image focusing in (old) SLR cameras: the camera that is used to depict reality is neither part of the observer (not “subjective“) nor part of reality (not “objective“) but a mediating tool. So perhaps “lens” might be a better metaphor to describe what I have in mid with the triad aesthetic-rational-ethical, or the pair Yin-Yang… “

Phew, I am not sure I made myself comprehensible.

TRYING TO MAKE SENSE OF
THE TRINITY THING..its just always sounded wrong

i can get..say mother father child=3
or water/ice/gas..or hot cold neither..

or even the simple binary..off or on

on joachim..from wiki.
..<<....According to Joachim,..only in this third Age..will it be possible to really understand the words of God..*in its deepest meanings,..and not merely literally.>>..

never the less an interesting find

http://www.uleth.ca/dspace/bitstream/handle/10133/2538/von%20Heyking%20-%20Brague.pdf?sequence=1

not to the 3 thing
but such..is the joy of discovery

<<Central to our confusion is the way modern assumptions..fracture law from counsel and turn it into a form of command.

According to Brague,..law and counsel are unified in the medieval Jewish, Islamic, and Christian minds..because..law, as a “dictate of reason”.(Aquinas)..directing human beings to the good,

..it takes..*the form of counsel
..out of what is owed..to human beings as rational creatures.

In modernity, law and counsel are disconnected
from the good,..as is fitting for beings..whose reason is now seen as instrumental.

Instead of law and counsel being united,
counsel became self-interested cunning, and law became command.

The subtle reasoning behind the extrinsic nature of the law and its movement upon the human intellect and will found among
the medieval thinkers..was spliced into Machiavellian cunning..that
needs to be controlled by the strong sovereign..who stands above
the realm and exerts his will upon it.>>

but back to trying to discern
the trinity from the binary

cause process affect
means way completion
plan act result

the wholly ghost?

ie the life force..spirit
[in every living thing][matriarchal feminine][good god]

the lord..[or the father]..satan

the son..[the fruit]..how about the 6 6 6 thing
i thought6 straight lines/6 triangles/6intersecting points

[i..visualize it..but not sure
of the intended meaning]

6 intersecting sects
6 straight shooters
6 self contained isolated spaces

never was good at numbers/..unless they..are in word
but i get due-ality..its just the three thing..seems incongruous

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Dear George,

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« Phew, I am not sure I made myself comprehensible.”
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It does sound a bit wobbly, George, but don’t worry. I get the message.

Like Plato and Christianity, the Chinese and a number of other cultures also include a third element in their world view.

Perhaps something similar to Plato’s goodness and Christianity’s holy spirit is the Chinese qi (chi) or life force which continuously animates matter such as, for example, at molecular, atomic and sub-atomic levels.

In Japan it’s called “ki,” and in India, “prana” or “shakti.” The ancient Egyptians referred to it as “ka,” and the ancient Greeks as “pneuma.” For Native Americans it is the “Great Spirit”. In Africa it’s known as “ashe” and in Hawaii as “ha” or “mana.”

According to Australian aboriginal culture, spirit ancestors possess supernatural powers and breathe life and energy into their descendents. Spirit ancestors govern and determine Aboriginal people's ritual activity, imparting a specific meaning to every step of a dance, every verse of a song and each pattern in a painting.

I am not very well versed in the South American cultures but I understand that the concept of life-giving energy was associated with tobacco in many indigenous cultures. For the Incas of Peru, Viracocha was the creator god, the one source of power, aided by servant gods, the most important of which was the sun god, Inti. The huaca, was a magic and holy object or spirit, something similar to Christianity’s holy spirit.

I see this third element, life energy, as a human concept, independent of the duality (yin and yang) observed in nature, while those who believe in the supernatural, no doubt, associate it with whatever happens to be their concept of deity.

In other words, until David persuades me I am wrong, I see the duality in nature as objective reality and the third element, life energy, simply as a human concept.

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Dear Banjo,

Well, we probably do not understand each other:

You are probably right, that if you see Yin and Yang as “forces” you can add a third one to them, the “life force”. Here “force” is probably the best translation of the Chinese concept.

However, what I had in mind was more the PRINCIPLE of the Yin-Yang (female-male, passive-active) complementarity as an epistemological tool that can help us to understand some aspects of a perceived piece of reality. This principle is not "in nature" since no physical theory deals with it (unless you want to associate with it any pair). Hence my metaphor of split image focusing as a tool to see the object in focus. Those lenses are neither part of the observer nor of the observed "nature", they just help us to see the picture in focus.

I think that in some situations also the triad of aesthetic, rational and ethic - corresponding to the three Platonic ideals of beauty, truth and goodness - can similarly serve as an epistemological tool, although this is less common than the use for this purpose of the Yin-Yang complementarity.

This has nothing to do with deities or Christianity, although Plato can inspire Christianity as well as many other Western cultural achievements.

>>I see the duality in nature as objective reality and the third element, life energy, simply as a human concept.<<

As my metaphor of the split image focusing was trying to say, I see the Yin-Yang principle or that of the Platonic triad as neither being part of “nature” nor as being purely subjective, a “human concept” (anyhow, what would be non-human concepts?).