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The MoA Week In Review – OT 2024-108
Last weeks posts on Moon of Alabama:
Middle East:
Ukraine:
Iran:
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Other issues:
Gaza:
Empire:
Germany:
Use as open (not related to wars in Ukraine and Palestine) thread …
“The Trinity was never even conceived until the 4th Century C.E. Stating anything otherwise is not only entirely interpretive and interpolative, but also a product of known embellishments and…dare I say so…propaganda (before the term was coined).”
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Apr 17 2024 4:59 utc | 146
You are incorrect.
The idea of the Trinity was made ‘official’ at the Council of Nicea in 355 AD whose chairman was Constantine the Great but the idea was centuries old by that time:
“The Trinity is Christianity’s most unique, defining, incomprehensible, and awesome mystery. It is the revelation of who our Almighty Creator actually is—not just a god, but an infinite Being existing in eternity as three co-equal, infinite Persons, consubstantial yet distinct. The origin of the doctrine of the Trinity is the Bible, although the word Trinity is not used in the Bible.
As all orthodox Christians agree, the doctrine of the Trinity holds that God is one essence but three Persons; God has one nature, but three centers of consciousness; God is only one What, but three Whos. Some unbelievers mistakenly call this a contradiction. Rather, the doctrine of the Trinity is a mystery revealed by God in His Word. A contradiction would be to claim that God has only one nature but also three natures, or that He is only one Person but also three Persons.
From the very beginning of the church, Christians have understood the mystery of the Trinity, even before they began using the term Trinity.
For example, the first Christians knew the Son was the Creator (John 1:1–2), the “I Am” of the Old Testament (Exodus 3:14; John 8:58), equal to the Father (John 14:9), and the Judge of all the earth (Genesis 18:25; John 5:22), who is to be worshiped as only God is allowed to be (Deuteronomy 6:13; Luke 4:8; Matthew 14:33).
The first Christians knew the Holy Spirit was a separate Person with His own thoughts and will (John 16:13), who intercedes for us with God (Romans 8:27), proving He is a distinct Person from God the Father—since intercession requires at least two parties (no one intercedes with himself). Furthermore, a human can be forgiven for blaspheming God the Son, but not for blaspheming God the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:32).
“New Testament writers mention all three Persons of the Trinity together numerous times (e.g., Romans 1:4; 15:30; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Ephesians 1:13–14; 1 Thessalonians 1:3–6). The early believers knew that the Father and the Son sent the third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit—“another counselor”—to live in our hearts (John 14:16–17, 26; 16:7). These mysteries were accepted fully by the early church as revealed truth, yet without the label of “the Holy Trinity.”
The Old Testament gave glimpses of the Trinity, and no passage of Scripture contradicts the doctrine. For example, in Genesis 1:26 God says in the plural, “Let us make mankind in our image.” God declares that He was completely alone when He created everything, stretching out the heavens and spreading out the earth “by myself” (Isaiah 44:24). Yet Jesus was the instrument of God’s creation (John 1:1–3; Colossians 1:16), in the company of the Holy Spirit who was hovering over the primordial waters (Genesis 1:2). Only the doctrine of the Trinity can explain it all.”(1)
Further:
“Second-Century
Around 110 AD, a pastor from Antioch name Ignatius (c. 35–c. 110) wrote several letters to various churches on his way to his eventual martyrdom. His trinitarian consciousness was informed by a discernible mix of Old Testament and New Testament writings, though exact quotations were minimal. His affirmation of the Son’s relation to the Father even had a certain hymnic quality. The clearest trinitarian imagery and most profound statements can be found in his letter to the Ephesians. Comparing church unity to a chorus, Ignatius instructs them to “[take] your pitch from God [so that] you may sing in unison with one voice through Jesus Christ to the Father, in order that he may both hear you and, on the basis of what you do well, acknowledge that you are members of his Son” (Letter to the Ephesians 4.2). Noting the trinitarian foundation of the church, Ignatius describes believers like “stones of a temple, prepared beforehand for the building of God the Father, hoisted up to the heights by the crane of Jesus Christ, which is the cross, using as a rope the Holy Spirit” (Letter to the Ephesians 9.1). A few years after Ignatius, Polycarp the bishop of Smyrna (69–156) also demonstrated his trinitarian consciousness before his martyrdom: “I glorify you, through the eternal and heavenly High Priest, Jesus Christ, your beloved Son, through whom to you, with him and the Holy Spirit, be glory both now and for the ages to come” (Martyrdom of Polycarp, 14).
1. https://www.gotquestions.org/origin-doctrine-Trinity.html
2. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/essay/trinitarianism-in-the-early-church/
Posted by: canuck | Apr 17 2024 13:55 utc | 157
@Roger | Apr 17 2024 4:36 utc | 142
Science acts on the basis of non-falsification as the proof of a fact, as the period over which no one can prove something wrong grows its “truthiness” increases until it becomes the scientific consensus.
A scientific theory, any scientific theory, is good as long there is not a proof against. Be it one year old or one thousand years old, be it supported by one guy or by a million guys, it does not matter. Scientific truth is absolute and independent from the opinions of men (and women, trans, non-binary too, in case someone were wondering), thus it is not determined by relativistic features such as consesus or age or authority.
There are some things that are inherently not open to experimental falsification, for example that there is a God – which is a belief, not a fact.
Exactly. As a consequence the existence of God cannot be proven or disproven by science. That is why, since ancient times, it is called metaphysics (i.e. beyond physics) the philosophy of existence and being. As such atheism is antiscientific, since it misapplies the fundamentals of scientific inquiry, to draw conclusions which actually cannot be inferred through science. The case of atheism is blatant, but there are many more misapplications of science nowadays, by the “scientists” (not the scientists, who are scholars, but the “scientists”, who are the true believers of the Scientist Cult).
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Nearly 50% of Chinese car sales are now EVs, and that share is climbing. Just because the US manufacturers can’t make reasonably priced EV’s does not mean they are a scam. China has also provided incentives to people to scrap old goods, including cars. With every EV China becomes less dependent upon seaborne oil imports, and therefore more able to sustain any US attempt at a blockade.
I think you are mixing up the share of electric cars (BEV) sold in China compared to the global electric car market (over 50% of the electric cars sold in the world are sold in China), with the market share of electric cars in the Chinese market, which was about 25% in 2023 and its growth is slowing in 2024. One has to mind that: there are generous subsidies for the purchase of electric cars in China, the Chinese government is buying a lot of electric cars for its fleet, the scenario of use in China is quite different than that in many other areas of the world, chiefly in Europe. In China they have very large metropolises and megalopolises, with enormous problems of air quality and ubiquitous electric infrastructures (which is obvious for a functional megacity). All that, coupled with the availability of the core commodities for the production of BEV makes the push for electric vehicles not so demented. However the use case in Europe is totally different: there are much smaller cities and towns, a sparser population with sparser infrastructure, many Europeans get on their cars and drive through the countryside to go to work in town, the core elements for the production must be imported. You can’t electrify all the countryside of Europe because you need to push electric vehicles. Not even the Chinese are electrifying all their countryside, they are just using their enormous cities for BEVs.
And yes, even with the share of coal in electricity generation in China, an EV still emits significantly less than ICE vehicle.
Only if you count CO2 as a pollutant, which is not quite true. The CO2 is a colourless, odourless, not toxic nor harmful gas. Putting on equal ground the CO2 with the harmful and toxic materials involved in the production of Li-ion batteries is quite misleading. At very least they present totally different problems, which cannot be directly compared.
Posted by: SG | Apr 17 2024 20:03 utc | 169
Posted by: juliania | Apr 18 2024 2:07 utc | 177
Whilst writing out the previous post I remembered a Buddhist-style text I composed a few years ago to help me meditate in order to help synchronize body and mind and thus return to health. At the time I had extreme cognitive dysfunction due to months of chronic insomnia mainly caused by Lyme Disease brain inflammations (the bacteria like to eat the nerve linings causing all sorts of nasty side effects). To do this I wanted something flowery and playful to lasso the mind – sort of like a colourful cinema display – and ease it into sitting down quietly for a few minutes which, due to the insomnia, I could no longer do. The finished text – which took over a year to fine tune whilst using it every day – takes about 10 minutes to chant out loud – which must be done by design for the desired synchronizing – and the following is an introductory, and by far the most flowery, section in which the Body, Speech and Mind issue is playfully surveyed in semi-poetic style. Note how much it waxes about the Speech principle – albeit in non-theistic language!
Sacred Being, the Basis
All beings in this alive and awake self-dreaming universe present aspects of:
Body – some sort of shape or form manifest in location and terrain;
Mind – some sort of consciousness, awareness or intention;
Speech – some sort of communicative expression of meaningful information singing a
Living symphony of ever forming and reforming clouds and waves of Primordial Intelligence
A marvellous holographic self-mothering Song making itself up as it goes along
Saturated in interconnected living presence pervading all and everything,
Manifesting no end of self-organizing life forms, living creatures imagined into sentient being
With all their coemergent elemental and inanimate phenomena
Comprising luminous intelligence inseparably part of the universal background field
Containing, including and pervading all and everything, micro and macro.
Flowers in their flowering communicate the lovely enlightened language of Flowering Being
With manifold qualities of form, texture, colour, temperature, scent, beauty, sensitivity.
As with flowers so with all, from microscopic universes to macrocosmic spiralling galaxies
Multifarious microbes permeating soil and all life forms, primordially awake plants, majestic
Trees, incredible insects, fabulous fishes, beautiful birds, marvellous animals
Minerals, metals, crystals, silver, gold, jewels
Rainbows, sky, stars, ocean, wind, clouds, rain, sunlight, moonlight, thunder, lightning,
Mountains, valleys, jungles, deserts, farms, steppes, rural, urban, stormy, placid
Earth, water, fire, air, red, green, blue, yellow, purple, indigo;
Visibles, touchables, smellables, tastables, audibles, edibles,
Perfumes, spices, herbs, meats, fats, oils, vegetables, fruits, sweets, sours, fermented,
Wools, cottons, furs, silks, costumes, uniforms, males, females, dressed, naked,
All such forms together weaving karmic spells of interdependent being,
Living languages of meaningful qualities – which some call ‘gods’ –
Continuously broadcast and received throughout this dreamlike experiential continuum
All basically empty, basically luminous, basically workable, basically good.
Posted by: scorpion | Apr 18 2024 14:03 utc | 189
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