garyh@crash.cts.com (Gary Hipp) (09/20/90)
[This is in response to Frank Farkas' posting commending the concept of the preexistence of the soul. --clh] Since God the Father is all knowing and He has a purpose for our lives, He knew when we were to be conceived and born into existence, therefore there is no necessity in pre-existence. -- Gary
farkas%qual@sun.com (Frank Farkas) (09/25/90)
In article <Sep.20.04.06.24.1990.19801@athos.rutgers.edu>, garyh@crash.cts.com (Gary Hipp) writes: >[This is in response to Frank Farkas' posting commending the concept >of the preexistence of the soul. --clh] > >Since God the Father is all knowing and He has a purpose for our >lives, He knew when we were to be conceived and born into existence, >therefore there is no necessity in pre-existence. >-- That is a strange conclusion you have come up with. You claim to know what is necessary for God to do and what is not. All of the passages which I quoted are in the Bible. >Gary With brotherly love, Frank
sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Mark T. Sandrock) (09/25/90)
In article <Sep.20.04.06.24.1990.19801@athos.rutgers.edu> garyh@crash.cts.com (Gary Hipp) writes: >[This is in response to Frank Farkas' posting commending the concept >of the preexistence of the soul. --clh] > >Since God the Father is all knowing and He has a purpose for our >lives, He knew when we were to be conceived and born into existence, >therefore there is no necessity in pre-existence. >-- >Gary I don't understand what this statement is supposed to mean! Of course our lives have a purpose, and of course GOD is omniscient, but what ever does that have to do with the question of pre-existence? If we would only take as our starting point and touch-stone, the simple, clear fact that GOD is *perfect*, then the world can really begin to open up before our gaze. We can then see the strict lawfulness and consistency in *every* aspect of Creation as nothing else but the manifestation of the perfect Divine Will. Lawfulness and consistency, however, imply logicalness. That is to say, the truth about Creation *must* necessarily be logical, for there is no other possibility. Even if we don't see the logic, it must still be there nonetheless, and we must have the means to find and grasp it! If for instance, we wish to consider the question of the pre-existence of the human soul, or better said, the human spirit, the simple application of logic to the question can go a long way toward answering our questions... For instance, if we believe that the human spirit continues in existence *after* the death of the physical body, then this idea already implies that the human spirit is *independent* of the physical body, and therefore, by simple logic, must have existed *before* its entrance into the physical body. It would not be logical to imagine instead that transitory, lifeless physical matter could somehow ever give rise to or create something alive and eternal. How much more simple and natural is the idea that the actual human being-- the spiritual part-- simply incarnates and dwells for a time in the physical body, while retaining its spiritual nature, and then goes on its way following the death and disolution of the physical body. In nature, we can observe how many processes take place in *cycles*. Water evaporates, and eventually falls again as rain, completing its cycle. Plants take nourishment from the soil, and eventually return the nutrients to the soil by shedding their leaves, or else when the plant itself dies and decays. So too, if we consider the idea that the human spirit should one day be able to return to Paradise, to the Spiritual Realm, our observation of the cycles in Creation might lead us to consider the likelihood that the human spirit must have originated in Paradise as a spirit-seed or spirit-germ, and then entered into the world of matter for the purpose of spiritual development-- in somewhat of a parallel to the earthly seed that falls into the soil in order to be able to undergo and to complete its development. Furthermore, if the spirit is independent of the physical body, and only enters into the physical body for the purpose of spiritual development, then there is nothing to prevent this event from happening more than once, i.e., there is no *logical* argument against the idea of reincarnation, but rather, simple logic would seem to argue in favor of this great notion. As one person once put it: "The miracle is not that we are born many times, but rather it is the fact that we are born even once!" In fact, given the rather limited amount of spiritual progress most of us manage to make in one earthlife, it would be rather presumptuous to believe that one short earthlife could suffice for the sake of completing the course of our spiritual development, such that we would be able to re-enter Paradise forthwith. Instead, the gradual evolution and development of the human race as a whole, is nothing but a logical consequence of the gradual spiritual development of all the individuals comprising mankind. The Mission of Christ took place solely because the *wrong* development of mankind had reached the point where its entire existence (in the spiritual sense) was at stake. Thus, when Christ spoke of "...this generation shall not pass...", He was referring to the *spiritual* generation, since obviously the *physical* generation of that time has already long since passed away. Best regards, Mark Sandrock -- BITNET: sandrock@uiucscs Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Internet: sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu Chemical Sciences Computing Services Voice: 217-244-0561 505 S. Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801