Discussions on Theism, Pantheism and “Embryoism”

G – Became a member of a pantheist group here on facebook …. pretty fun and lots of great ideas… and open minded …….. so we were discussing differences in beliefs or opinions
So to name a few …… Atheism – (def) there is no God….. Pantheism – (def) everything is god …… Agnosticism – (def) i dunno for sure 🙂 (of course there are many more concepts…..)

….. so i added one……… if i had a “personal experience opinion”, i would add “Embryoism” – (def) everything is part of some kind of “pre-physical embryo” and the physical universe(s?) rise from it, and return to it……. and we humans live and move and have our being as part of this, and return to it…….

B – Did you claim to be a theist?

G – If being a theist means believing that there is a human being (me) that is like a pot which a potter made, and then there is “Theos” (God) who is the potter, and the potter has no connection with the pot, except that “he” made it, then no………. I am not a theist.

G – I am of the sense that humans are a “part of the universe” which has arisen from and will return to, the “source of all things”…. so we are like a temporary “point DNA awareness” which lives and moves and has its being in that embryo, and then returns to it when its lifetime is complete…………… “like a leaf on a tree.. grows, has its lifetime, turns yellow or red, falls from the tree to become nourishment for the tree to grow a new leaf when the season is right”…… this way of seeing the world, creates a reaching inside to find the source, and not a reaching out. (Reaching outside ourselves always brings disappointment, even when it is looking for God.) So, the concept of Theos (another name for the embryo) isn’t some wrong concept, but creating a Chasm between that Theos and everything else is hurtful, incorrect thinking. But that is just in my opinion….  All humans are in the same boat (including the ones which we claim are teachers), as is everything else in the universe…… sheesh… that sounded a bit preachy, didn’t it….

N – What sounds preachy? Just sounds to me like you’re trying to figure things out and sharing where you’re at so far… Preachy IMHO is when you think you’ve got it all down pat and everyone else needs to step in line and agree…

B – Not sure if I agree with that Gerry. God is not part of the universe, but separate from it. God is infinite but the universe is finite. The human soul, as far as I can gather, is infinite as well. The universe will, at some point, end. The universe is time bound but the spiritual world is not. Thus the human soul is beyond the universe just as God is.

G – Not what I was saying….. I’ll copy it down here….”Embryoism” – (def) everything is part of some kind of “pre-physical embryo” and the physical universe(s?) rise from it, and return to it……. and we humans live and move and have our being as part of this, and return to it……. in fact there are lots of places in the worlds scriptures that say this….. and even early Christianity had hints of this, before it began taking dogmatic positions, and stomping out other perspectives…..

G – There IS evidence (and of course main stream evangelicalism call them “spurious”… because that is how they stomp variant perspectives…) that a far more pantheistic element existed in the early church…. but, just as the Jewish church lost its say in the direction of early Christianity, those other pantheistic elements also disappeared… usually by way of burning their books, and excommunicating those believers, and worse……

G – Its sad and nobody wants to talk about it, but it is true.

G – Early church fathers such as Augustine, and Origen are examples of the “reining in” of other perspectives, and the church councils which created the “creeds” cast the current viewpoint in stone.