"From my sixth or seventh year up to my sixteenth I was at school, being taught all sorts of things except religion. I may say that I failed to get from the teachers what they could have given me without any effort on their part. And yet I kept on picking up things here and there from my surroundings. The term 'religion' I am using in its broadest sense, meaning thereby self-realization or knowledge of self. Being born in the Vaishnava faith, I had often to go to the Haveli [extravagant mansions or townhouses] but it never appealed to me. I did not like its glitter and pomp. Also I heard rumours of immorality being practised there, and lost all interest in it. Hence I could gain nothing from the Haveli. But what I failed to get there I obtained from my nurse, an old servant of the family, whose affection for me I still recall. I have said before that there was in me a fear of ghosts and spirits. Rambha, for that was her name, suggested, as a remedy for this fear, the repetition of Ramanama. I had more faith in her than in her remedy, and so at a tender age I began repeating Ramanama to cure my fear of ghosts and spirits. This was of course, short-lived, but the good seed sown in childhood was not sown in vain. I think it is due to the seed sown by that good woman Rambha that today Ramanama is an infallible remedy for me.

Just about this time, a cousin of mine who was a devotee of the Ramayana arranged for my second brother and me to learn Rama Raksha. We got it by heart, and made it a rule to recite it every morning after the bath. The practice was kept up as long as we were in Porbandar. As soon as we reached Rajkot, it was forgotten. For I had not much belief in it. I recited it partly because of my pride in being able to recite Rama Raksha with correct pronunciation. What, however, left a deep impression on me was the reading of the Ramayana before my father. During part of his illness my father was in Porbandar. There every evening he used to listen to the Ramayana. The reader was a great devotee of Rama—Ladha Maharaj of Bileshvar. It was said of him that he cured himself of his leprosy not by any medicine, but by applying to the affected parts bilva leaves which had been cast away after being offered to the image of Mahadev in Bileshvar temple, and by the regular repetition of Ramanama. His faith, it was said, had made him whole. This may or may not be true. We at any rate believed the story. And it is a fact that when Ladha Maharaj began his reading of the Ramayana his body was entirely free from leprosy. He had a melodious voice. He would sing the Dohas (couplets) and Chopais (quatrains), and explain them, losing himself in the discourse and carrying his listeners along with him. I must have been thirteen at that time, but I quite remember being enraptured by his reading. That laid the foundation of my deep devotion to the Ramayana. Today I regard the Ramayana of Tulasidas as the greatest book in all devotional literature.

A few months after this we came to Rajkot. There was no Ramayana reading there. The Bhagavat, however, used to be read on every Ekadashi day (eleventh day of the bright and the dark half of a lunar month). Sometimes I attended the reading, but the reciter was uninspiring. Today I see that the Bhagavat is a book which can evoke religious fervour. I have read it in Gujarati with intense interest. But when I heard portions of the original read by Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya during my twenty-one days' fast, I wished I had heard it in my childhood from such a devotee as he is, so that I could have formed a liking for it at an early age. Impressions formed at that age strike roots deep down into one's nature, and it is my perpetual regret that I was not fortunate enough to hear more good books of this kind read during that period. In Rajkot, however, I got an early grounding in toleration for all branches of Hinduism and sister religions. For my father and mother would visit the Haveli as also Shiva's and Rama's temples, and would take or send us youngsters there. Jain monks also would pay frequent visits to my father, and would even go out of their way to accept food from us — non-Jains. They would have talks with my father on subjects religious and mundane. He had, besides, Musalman and Parsi friends, who would talk to him about their own faiths, and he would listen to them always with respect, and often with interest. Being his nurse, I often had a chance to be present at these talks. These many things combined to inculcate in me a toleration for all faiths.

Only Christianity was at the time an exception. I developed a sort of dislike for it. And for a reason. In those days Christian missionaries used to stand in a corner near the high school and hold forth, pouring abuse on Hindus and their gods. I could not endure this. I must have stood there to hear them once only, but that was enough to dissuade me from repeating the experiment [Gandhi might of even hated what they were doing, but that didn’t stop him from being open minded enough to at least consider them]. About the same time, I heard of a well-known Hindu having been converted to Christianity. It was the talk of the town that, when he was baptized, he had to eat beef and drink liquor, that he also had to change his clothes, and that thenceforth he began to go about in European costume including a hat. These things got on my nerves. Surely, thought I, a religion that compelled one to eat beef, drink liquor, and change one's own clothes did not deserve the name. I also heard that the new convert had already begun abusing the religion of his ancestors, their customs and their country. All these things created in me a dislike for Christianity. But the fact that I had learnt to be tolerant of other religions did not mean that I had any living faith in God. I happened, about this time, to come across Manusmriti which was amongst my father's collection. The story of the creation and similar things in it did not impress me very much, but on the contrary made me incline somewhat towards atheism.

There was a cousin of mine, still alive, for whose intellect I had great regard. To him I turned with my doubts. But he could not resolve them. He sent me away with this answer: 'When you grow up, you will be able to solve these doubts yourself. These questions ought not to be raised at your age.' I was silenced, but was not comforted. Chapters about diet and the like in Manusmriti seemed to me to run contrary to daily practice. To my doubts as to this also, I got the same answer. 'With intellect more developed and with more reading I shall understand it better,' I said to myself. Manusmriti at any rate did not then teach me Ahimsa. I have told the story of my meat-eating. Manusmriti seemed to support it. I also felt that it was quite moral to kill serpents, bugs and the like. I remember to have killed at that age bugs and such other insects, regarding it as a duty [holding the opposite perspective when he became older and wiser as he mentions in a later chapter].

But one thing took deep root in me — the conviction that morality is the basis of things, and that truth is the substance of all morality. Truth became my sole objective. It began to grow in magnitude every day, and my definition of it also has been ever widening. A Gujarati didactic stanza likewise gripped my mind and heart. Its precept — return good for evil — [Matt 5:38] became my guiding principle. It became such a passion with me that I began numerous experiments in it. Here are those (for me) wonderful lines:"

• For a bowl of water give a goodly meal;
• For a kindly greeting bow thou down with zeal;
• For a simple penny pay thou back with gold;
• If thy life be rescued, life do not withhold.
• Thus the words and actions of the wise regard;
• Every little service tenfold they reward.
• But the truly noble know all men as one,
• And return with gladness good for evil done.

— Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments With Truth, Part One, Chapter Ten: "Glimpses of Religion"

"From my sixth or seventh year up to my sixteenth I was at school, being taught all sorts of things except religion. I may say that I failed to get from the teachers what they could have given me without any effort on their part. And yet I kept on picking up things here and there from my surroundings. The term 'religion' I am using in its broadest sense, meaning thereby self-realization or knowledge of self. Being born in the Vaishnava faith, I had often to go to the Haveli [extravagant mansions or townhouses] But it never appealed to me. I did not like its glitter and pomp. Also I heard rumours of immorality being practised there, and lost all interest in it. Hence I could gain nothing from the Haveli. But what I failed to get there I obtained from my nurse, an old servant of the family, whose affection for me I still recall. I have said before that there was in me a fear of ghosts and spirits. Rambha, for that was her name, suggested, as a remedy for this fear, the repetition of Ramanama. I had more faith in her than in her remedy, and so at a tender age I began repeating Ramanama to cure my fear of ghosts and spirits. This was of course, short-lived, but the good seed sown in childhood was not sown in vain. I think it is due to the seed sown by that good woman Rambha that today Ramanama is an infallible remedy for me.

Just about this time, a cousin of mine who was a devotee of the Ramayana arranged for my second brother and me to learn Rama Raksha. We got it by heart, and made it a rule to recite it every morning after the bath. The practice was kept up as long as we were in Porbandar. As soon as we reached Rajkot, it was forgotten. For I had not much belief in it. I recited it partly because of my pride in being able to recite Rama Raksha with correct pronunciation. What, however, left a deep impression on me was the reading of the Ramayana before my father. During part of his illness my father was in Porbandar. There every evening he used to listen to the Ramayana. The reader was a great devotee of Rama—Ladha Maharaj of Bileshvar. It was said of him that he cured himself of his leprosy not by any medicine, but by applying to the affected parts bilva leaves which had been cast away after being offered to the image of Mahadev in Bileshvar temple, and by the regular repetition of Ramanama. His faith, it was said, had made him whole. This may or may not be true. We at any rate believed the story. And it is a fact that when Ladha Maharaj began his reading of the Ramayana his body was entirely free from leprosy. He had a melodious voice. He would sing the Dohas (couplets) and Chopais (quatrains), and explain them, losing himself in the discourse and carrying his listeners along with him. I must have been thirteen at that time, but I quite remember being enraptured by his reading. That laid the foundation of my deep devotion to the Ramayana. Today I regard the Ramayana of Tulasidas as the greatest book in all devotional literature.

A few months after this we came to Rajkot. There was no Ramayana reading there. The Bhagavat, however, used to be read on every Ekadashi day (eleventh day of the bright and the dark half of a lunar month). Sometimes I attended the reading, but the reciter was uninspiring. Today I see that the Bhagavat is a book which can evoke religious fervour. I have read it in Gujarati with intense interest. But when I heard portions of the original read by Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya during my twenty-one days' fast, I wished I had heard it in my childhood from such a devotee as he is, so that I could have formed a liking for it at an early age. Impressions formed at that age strike roots deep down into one's nature, and it is my perpetual regret that I was not fortunate enough to hear more good books of this kind read during that period. In Rajkot, however, I got an early grounding in toleration for all branches of Hinduism and sister religions. For my father and mother would visit the Haveli as also Shiva's and Rama's temples, and would take or send us youngsters there. Jain monks also would pay frequent visits to my father, and would even go out of their way to accept food from us — non-Jains. They would have talks with my father on subjects religious and mundane. He had, besides, Musalman and Parsi friends, who would talk to him about their own faiths, and he would listen to them always with respect, and often with interest. Being his nurse, I often had a chance to be present at these talks. These many things combined to inculcate in me a toleration for all faiths.

Only Christianity was at the time an exception. I developed a sort of dislike for it. And for a reason. In those days Christian missionaries used to stand in a corner near the high school and hold forth, pouring abuse on Hindus and their gods. I could not endure this. I must have stood there to hear them once only, but that was enough to dissuade me from repeating the experiment [Gandhi might of even hated what they were doing, but that didn’t stop him from being open minded enough to at least consider them]. About the same time, I heard of a well-known Hindu having been converted to Christianity. It was the talk of the town that, when he was baptized, he had to eat beef and drink liquor, that he also had to change his clothes, and that thenceforth he began to go about in European costume including a hat. These things got on my nerves. Surely, thought I, a religion that compelled one to eat beef, drink liquor, and change one's own clothes did not deserve the name. I also heard that the new convert had already begun abusing the religion of his ancestors, their customs and their country. All these things created in me a dislike for Christianity. But the fact that I had learnt to be tolerant of other religions did not mean that I had any living faith in God. I happened, about this time, to come across Manusmriti which was amongst my father's collection. The story of the creation and similar things in it did not impress me very much, but on the contrary made me incline somewhat towards atheism.

There was a cousin of mine, still alive, for whose intellect I had great regard. To him I turned with my doubts. But he could not resolve them. He sent me away with this answer: 'When you grow up, you will be able to solve these doubts yourself. These questions ought not to be raised at your age.' I was silenced, but was not comforted. Chapters about diet and the like in Manusmriti seemed to me to run contrary to daily practice. To my doubts as to this also, I got the same answer. 'With intellect more developed and with more reading I shall understand it better,' I said to myself. Manusmriti at any rate did not then teach me Ahimsa. I have told the story of my meat-eating. Manusmriti seemed to support it. I also felt that it was quite moral to kill serpents, bugs and the like. I remember to have killed at that age bugs and such other insects, regarding it as a duty [holding the opposite perspective when he became older and wiser as he mentions in a later chapter].

But one thing took deep root in me — the conviction that morality is the basis of things, and that truth is the substance of all morality. Truth became my sole objective. It began to grow in magnitude every day, and my definition of it also has been ever widening. A Gujarati didactic stanza likewise gripped my mind and heart. Its precept — return good for evil — [Matt 5:38] became my guiding principle. It became such a passion with me that I began numerous experiments in it. Here are those (for me) wonderful lines:"

• For a bowl of water give a goodly meal;
• For a kindly greeting bow thou down with zeal;
• For a simple penny pay thou back with gold;
• If thy life be rescued, life do not withhold.
• Thus the words and actions of the wise regard;
• Every little service tenfold they reward.
• But the truly noble know all men as one,
• And return with gladness good for evil done.

— Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments With Truth, Part One, Chapter Ten: "Glimpses of Religion"

"One thing only is needful: the knowledge of the simple and clear truth which finds place in every soul that is not stupefied by religious and scientific superstitions — the truth that for our life one law is valid — the law of love [seen in the sense of things like the laws of physics], which brings the highest happiness to every individual as well as to all mankind. Free your minds from those overgrown, mountainous imbecilities which hinder your recognition of it, and at once the truth will emerge from amid the pseudo-religious nonsense that has been smothering it." - Leo Tolstoy, A Letter to a Hindu, December of 1908 (roughly two years before his death)

"I was listening to an illiterate peasant pilgrim talking about God, about faith, about life, about salvation, and knowledge of the truth was revealed to me. I became close to the people as I listened to his views on life and faith, and more and more I came to understand the truth. The same happened to me during a reading of Chetyi-Minei and the Prologues; this became my favorite reading. Apart from miracles, which I regarded as fables to express thoughts, this reading revealed to me the meaning of life." - Leo Tolstoy, Confession, Chapter Fourteen

Confession

What I Believe

The Gospel In Brief

The Kingdom of God Is Within You

To Tolstoy, knowledge is knowledge no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since its been revealed and labeled. He ultimately believed that a more objective interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount - Matt 5-7 and its precepts, including to "not take an oath at all" (promising to believe things as unquestionably or absolutely true would be an example of an oath), holds the potential of becoming a kind of constitution for our conscience so to speak — for our hearts, as a species; but without the power or authority aspect.

There's believing in a God, and then there's what we now call "religion." A religion isn't necessary to hold the belief in the idea of an unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind — in fact, it was science that led me back to the idea of a God(s), after 15 years of the Sahara that is atheism, one that wants you to do good, even suffer for it, if one's willing; not only for the sake of yourself, ultimately — in this life, but especially for the sake of everything else. By good, I mean doing things to others that you would want done to you. Would you want to be considered an "abomination" for being sexually attracted to the opposite sex? Of course not. How would you feel if a bunch of men or women told you, you couldn't do something because of your sex? Case closed.

The Unnecessary Seperation of Our Knowledge of Morality

"And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.” - Mark 2:22

What would be the "wineskin" we use to hold the wine of the knowledge of everything we've ever presently known as a species? Observation. If we look at our world around us, we can plainly see a collection of capable, conscious beings on a planet, presently holding the most potential to not only imagine selflessness to the extent we can, but act upon this imagining, and the extent we can apply it to our environment, in contrast to anything — as far as we know — that's ever existed; God or not.

What would happen if the wine of our knowledge of morality was no longer kept separate from the skin we use to hold our knowledge of everything else: observation, and poured purely from the perspective of this skin? Rather than poured into the one that it's always been poured into, and that kept it separate at all in the first place: a religion. There's so much logic within religion that's not being seen as such because of the appearance it's given when it's taught and advocated, being an entire concept on what exactly life is, and what the influences of a God or afterlife consist of exactly, our failure to make them credible enough only potentially drawing people away from the value of the extremes of our sense of selflessness — even the relevance of the idea of an unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind; only stigmatizing it in some way or another in the process.

"One thing only is needful: the knowledge of the simple and clear truth which finds place in every soul that is not stupefied by religious and scientific superstitions — the truth that for our life one law is valid — the law of love [seen in the sense of things like the laws of physics], which brings the highest happiness to every individual as well as to all mankind. Free your minds from those overgrown, mountainous imbecilities which hinder your recognition of it, and at once the truth will emerge from amid the pseudo-religious nonsense that has been smothering it." - Leo Tolstoy, A Letter to a Hindu, December of 1908 (roughly two years before his death)

"I was listening to an illiterate peasant pilgrim talking about God, about faith, about life, about salvation, and knowledge of the truth was revealed to me. I became close to the people as I listened to his views on life and faith, and more and more I came to understand the truth. The same happened to me during a reading of Chetyi-Minei and the Prologues; this became my favorite reading. Apart from miracles, which I regarded as fables to express thoughts, this reading revealed to me the meaning of life." - Leo Tolstoy, Confession, Chapter Fourteen

Confession

What I Believe

The Gospel In Brief

The Kingdom of God Is Within You

To Tolstoy, knowledge is knowledge no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since its been revealed and labeled. He ultimately believed that a more objective interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount - Matt 5-7 and its precepts, including to "not take an oath at all" (promising to believe things as unquestionably or absolutely true would be an example of an oath), holds the potential of becoming a kind of constitution for our conscience so to speak — for our hearts, as a species; but without the power or authority aspect.

There's believing in a God, and then there's what we now call "religion." A religion isn't necessary to hold the belief in the idea of an unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind — in fact, it was science that led me back to the idea of a God(s), after 15 years of the Sahara that is atheism, one that wants you to do good, even suffer for it, if one's willing; not only for the sake of yourself, ultimately — in this life, but especially for the sake of everything else. By good, I mean doing things to others that you would want done to you. Would you want to be considered an "abomination" for being sexually attracted to the opposite sex? Of course not. How would you feel if a bunch of men or women told you, you couldn't do something because of your sex? Case closed.

The Unnecessary Seperation of Our Knowledge of Morality

"And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.” - Mark 2:22

What would be the "wineskin" we use to hold the wine of the knowledge of everything we've ever presently known as a species? Observation. If we look at our world around us, we can plainly see a collection of capable, conscious beings on a planet, presently holding the most potential to not only imagine selflessness to the extent we can, but act upon this imagining, and the extent we can apply it to our environment, in contrast to anything — as far as we know — that's ever existed; God or not.

What would happen if the wine of our knowledge of morality was no longer kept separate from the skin we use to hold our knowledge of everything else: observation, and poured purely from the perspective of this skin? Rather than poured into the one that it's always been poured into, and that kept it separate at all in the first place: a religion. There's so much logic within religion that's not being seen as such because of the appearance it's given when it's taught and advocated, being an entire concept on what exactly life is, and what the influences of a God or afterlife consist of exactly, our failure to make them credible enough only potentially drawing people away from the value of the extremes of our sense of selflessness — even the relevance of the idea of an unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind; only stigmatizing it in some way or another in the process.

"Whenever you set out to build a creative temple, whatever it may be, you must face the fact that there is a tension at the heart of the universe between good and evil. Hinduism refers to this as a struggle between illusion and reality. Platonic philosophy used to refer to it as a tension between body and soul. Zoroastrianism, a religion of old, used to refer to it as a tension between the god of light and the god of darkness. Traditional Judaism and Christianity refer to it as a tension between God and Satan. Whatever you call it, there is a struggle in the universe between good and evil.

Now not only is that struggle structured out somewhere in the external forces of the universe, it's structured in our own lives. Psychologists have tried to grapple with it in their way, and so they say various things. Sigmund Freud used to say that this tension is a tension between what he called the id and the superego. Some of us feel that it's a tension between God and man. And in every one of us, there's a war going on. It's a civil war. I don't care who you are, I don't care where you live, there is a civil war going on in your life. And every time you set out to be good, there's something pulling on you, telling you to be evil. It's going on in your life. Every time you set out to love, something keeps pulling on you, trying to get you to hate. Every time you set out to be kind and say nice things about people, something is pulling on you to be jealous and envious and to spread evil gossip about them. There's a civil war going on.

There is a schizophrenia, as the psychologists or the psychiatrists would call it, going on within all of us. And there are times that all of us know somehow that there is a Mr. Hyde and a Dr. Jekyll in us. And we end up having to cry out with Ovid, the Latin poet, 'I see and approve the better things of life, but the evil things I do.' We end up having to agree with Plato that the human personality is like a charioteer with two headstrong horses, wanting to go in different directions. Or sometimes we even have to end up crying out with Saint Augustine as he said in his Confessions, 'Lord, make me pure, but not yet.' We end up crying out with the Apostle Paul, 'The good that I would I do not: And the evil that I would not, that I do.' Or we end up having to say with Goethe that 'there's enough stuff in me to make both a gentleman and a rogue.' There's a tension at the heart of human nature. And whenever we set out to dream our dreams and to build our temples, we must be honest enough to recognize it.

In the final analysis, God does not judge us by the separate incidents or the separate mistakes that we make, but by the total bent of our lives. In the final analysis, God knows that his children are weak and they are frail. In the final analysis, what God requires is that your heart is right." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Thirty-two, "Unfulfilled Dreams"

King's Thoughts on Nietzsche, Gandhi, and the Fundamental and Liberal Interpretations of Christianity: https://lemmy.world/post/43175379

"Whenever you set out to build a creative temple, whatever it may be, you must face the fact that there is a tension at the heart of the universe between good and evil. Hinduism refers to this as a struggle between illusion and reality. Platonic philosophy used to refer to it as a tension between body and soul. Zoroastrianism, a religion of old, used to refer to it as a tension between the god of light and the god of darkness. Traditional Judaism and Christianity refer to it as a tension between God and Satan. Whatever you call it, there is a struggle in the universe between good and evil.

Now not only is that struggle structured out somewhere in the external forces of the universe, it's structured in our own lives. Psychologists have tried to grapple with it in their way, and so they say various things. Sigmund Freud used to say that this tension is a tension between what he called the id and the superego. Some of us feel that it's a tension between God and man. And in every one of us, there's a war going on. It's a civil war. I don't care who you are, I don't care where you live, there is a civil war going on in your life. And every time you set out to be good, there's something pulling on you, telling you to be evil. It's going on in your life. Every time you set out to love, something keeps pulling on you, trying to get you to hate. Every time you set out to be kind and say nice things about people, something is pulling on you to be jealous and envious and to spread evil gossip about them. There's a civil war going on.

There is a schizophrenia, as the psychologists or the psychiatrists would call it, going on within all of us. And there are times that all of us know somehow that there is a Mr. Hyde and a Dr. Jekyll in us. And we end up having to cry out with Ovid, the Latin poet, 'I see and approve the better things of life, but the evil things I do.' We end up having to agree with Plato that the human personality is like a charioteer with two headstrong horses, wanting to go in different directions. Or sometimes we even have to end up crying out with Saint Augustine as he said in his Confessions, 'Lord, make me pure, but not yet.' We end up crying out with the Apostle Paul, 'The good that I would I do not: And the evil that I would not, that I do.' Or we end up having to say with Goethe that 'there's enough stuff in me to make both a gentleman and a rogue.' There's a tension at the heart of human nature. And whenever we set out to dream our dreams and to build our temples, we must be honest enough to recognize it.

In the final analysis, God does not judge us by the separate incidents or the separate mistakes that we make, but by the total bent of our lives. In the final analysis, God knows that his children are weak and they are frail. In the final analysis, what God requires is that your heart is right." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Thirty-two, "Unfulfilled Dreams"

King's Thoughts on Nietzsche, Gandhi, and the Fundamental and Liberal Interpretations of Christianity: https://lemmy.world/post/43175486

This is essentially my "self-realization" or "knowledge of self" — my religion therefore, as Gandhi defined it in the "broadest sense of the word."

"Vanity of vanities; all is vanity." - Solomon (Breath of breaths; all is as temporal as breath, vapor, and therefore, spirit. Achievement of achievements; all is an aspiring to achieve. Will of wills; all is will. Doing of doings; all is a doing "under the sun", a "striving after wind", and a "vexation of spirit" or, of will, that is.)

"Morality is the basis of things, and truth is the substance of all morality." - Gandhi (Selfless and selfish consciousness are the basis of things, and our unique and profound ability for truth is a consequence of all mankind’s acting upon this great potential for selflessness and selfishness all throughout the millenniums; the extent we've organized ourselves and manipulated our environment that’s led to our present as we know it.)

If vanity ("breath" or "spirit," thus, a temporal aspiring to do or achieve; a will), born from morality (selfless and selfish consciousness), is the foundation of human behavior, then what serves as the basis of morality? Here's my theory so far; each category more or less feeds back into the one before and after it:

Sense Organs+Present Environment<>Consciousness<>Imagination<>Knowledge<>Reason<>Logos<>Influence<>Desire<>Morality<>Truth<>Spirit ("Spirit:" The will that's fueled by ones faith or, will to believe in a truth, thus, breath or vanity that's "done under the sun.")

• Spirit is determined by truth,
• Truth is governed by morality,
• Morality is fueled by desire,
• Desire stems from influence, 
• Influence is given life by logos,
• Logos is shaped by reason,
• Reason arises from knowledge,
• Knowledge is made possible by our capacity for imagination,
• And our imagination depends on the extent of how conscious we are of ourselves and everything else via our sense organs reacting to our present environment.

There's a place for Soul here somewhere; perhaps it's woven within each category, giving color to them all, so to speak. Defined more as ones "personality." Some cats have even a phobia for water, others will jump right in; some cats love their belly rubbed, others will claw and bite at you for going anywhere near it, etc.

Sense Organs + Present Environment: It all begins with our sense organs reacting to whatever our present environment consists of. Without our sense organs, we humans (conscious capable beings on a planet) wouldn't be able to be as aware as we sure seem to be to whatever our present environment is made up of; no sense organs, no degree of consciousness. However, without an environment for our sense organs to react to, what good would they be? What would be the outcome of a human that was born into and lived in nothing but a small, empty room? Nothing; it wouldn't know squat and wouldn't grow to be anywhere near as conscious as you and I sure seem to be — knowledge being what governs over ones level of consciousness. As we age and gather more knowledge of the experience or simply information for example, the more and more conscious we become; I wouldn't be anywhere near as conscious or aware of the vastness of the universe without gaining that knowledge first, for example. Unfortunately, there's living proof of exactly this — a poor little girl was locked up in a cellar by her father at twenty months old until she was thirteen: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jul/14/genie-feral-child-los-angeles-researchers

Consciousness: With sense organs reacting to an environment comes the ability to be conscious or aware of either oneself, or anything else; consciousness can be divided into two — the extent of how much more conscious or aware we are of ourselves, and the extent of how much more conscious we are of everything else. An awareness that gives birth to any degree of selfish awareness or what we call today — "selfishness" and selfless awareness or "selflessness," therefore. Without our ability to be as conscious as we sure seem to be in contrast to any other living thing that's supposedly ever existed, there can't be any knowing of anything. No consciousness, no knowledge; consciousness is what gives life, so to speak, to any degree of knowledge on a planet, and what keeps it living. Even the knowledge that instinct reveals to both something capable of acknowledging its own instinct, and something not capable of coming anywhere close of being able to do so.

Imagination: Consciousness may be what gives life to any degree of knowledge, but its our imaginations that truly make it possible. With no imagination comes the inability to shape knowledge; knowledge needs to be given the form of something to be given life, so to speak. How would we ever be able to reason that combing two things with another two things makes four things without being able to first give those thoughts shape via our imaginations? Would we even be able to reason at all to begin with? Things like Philosophy simply wouldn't exist. Would any knowing of anything exist?

"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.” - Albert Einstein

One's imagination and how "big" or detailed it is, is on a spectrum, akin to what we're presently referring to as "Autism Spectrum Disorder." There's what's called "Hyperphantasia," which is the term used to categorize a human with an above average detailed or "big" imagination, "Aphantasia," to categorize those with little to even non-existent detailed imaginations, and of course average imaginations that can be referred to as simply "Phantasia," this being the ancient Greek word for "imagination." The extent of one's inner dialogue or inner thoughts are governed by how detailed ones imagination is, as well as one's ability to empathize — to imagine in our heads the perspectives of other things and subsequently feel its feelings for ourselves; one of our many more profound and unique abilities we humans posses so much more capacity for in contrast to nature.

Knowledge: This one is the most important in my opinion. Our knowledge of anything — morality, time, the experience, science, history, philosophy, math, and even the influence of the divine to whatever extent that we keep alive or "living" via our unique and profound ability to retain and transfer knowledge in contrast to nature, is a consequence of being as conscious to both ourselves and everything else as we humans sure seem to be. Knowledge is what separates us the most from nature. Yes, we may be mammals, but its our unique and profound ability for knowledge — to retain and transfer it — that allows us to take what our instincts would demand of us otherwise, inherently, and not only deny the more barbaric thoughts and behaviors that are born out of instinct, but even "suffer" to pierce past them, in favor of where a knowledge takes us. There's nothing that comes anywhere close to this unique and profound ability we humans posses; to not only be able to acknowledge our instincts and any more "barbaric" thoughts and subsequent behaviors born out of it, but to even consider, not to mention the great lengths we can push past ourselves in favor of the exact opposite. Instincts (selfishness) demand retaliation, knowledge (selflessness) reveals alternatives that we wouldn't be able to even begin to consider being otherwise absent knowledge. Without knowledge, instincts would completely rule over us as it does lesser conscious, capable beings; knowledge is what makes us free — free from the government of instinct, that is.

"Knowledge is just that: knowledge, no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since it's been revealed and labeled." - Codrus

The greatest of any knowing is knowing the extent of how little you truly know about anything, or anyone. Of course ignorance (lack of knowledge) would come along with our ability to know anything to begin with, especially of the experience — the experience of being poor, starved, collectively despised, or of death, as a few examples. Ignorance is neither an insult, nor is it insulting, it's nothing but an adjective. It's a consequence of consciousness; to know is to not know. Lack of knowledge is at the core of instinct, and instinct is what's at the core of selfishness, and selfishness is what's at the core of all the fear, thus, anger, hate, and suffering in the world; all the "evils" mankind has ever known, and will ever know.

Reason: With this unique and profound capacity for knowledge comes our ability to reason with it; to weigh it; quantify (measure) it; to choose it. Reason takes the knowledge we form or shape via our imaginations and rounds it out, so to speak. We may be able to imagine knowledge, but its reason that gives us the ability to take these more simple shapes and make them into triangles and on to decagons; to evolve two plus two is four into rocket science; to take knowledge and turn it into a book, even of our knowledge of morality; to lead one to stop and think when met with someone who offers their other cheek in return after slapping them accross the other. It's the very creator of what we now call "logic." With our ability to reason comes the ability to take knowledge and shape it into letters and create words thus, speech and language.

Logos: The ancient Greek word being — incorrectly, in my opinion — translated as "the word" in John 1. It's our unique and profound ability to make symbols into what we now call "letters," and to combine these symbols together in various ways to make what we now call "words," and subsequently speech and language. What would reason be without words to give life to it? What would thoughts be without words to give life to them? But not all knowledge requires words to be given life. Instinct is a great example of this. It's a knowledge we'd be able to recognize without the need of a single word to do so.

Words are indeed suppositions — the word "red" that we've invented to describe and label the color red isn't absolute, it's just the present combination of what we now call "letters" we're using to give that knowledge life and definition. Imagine everything you're presently surrounded with not having a dedicated "word" we've invented for it at some point in the past. This is why I like to say "what we now call" things like religion, for example. Because at one point in time that combination of symbols and it's stigma didn't exist, it was just what knowledge is despite the stigma that man surrounds it with ever since its conception.

But what simply comes as a consequence of a conscious, capable species' capacity for words, thus, knowledge? Our incredibly unique and profound ability for divine revelation to any degree. Everything from God is a paperclip to it's "our Father" and it can't help but love us as much as it loves itself. It's the stigma of what we now call religion that's given this unique and profound ability a bad rap. If it wasn't for this Everest sized stigma that's surrounded our ability for logos then we'd be seeing and believing in the divine influence in a similar way people like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and even Albert Einstein did.

"I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal god is a childlike one. You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth." - Albert Einstein

But what would logos be without the overwhelming influence of other people? Rounding out our capacity for logos into what we as a species know to be true to whatever degree today. We wouldn't even be able to communicate without all the knowledge of the influence of all those that have come before us, that we presently take wildly for granted.

Influence: Would you know all that you know now without the knowledge of the influence of all those that have ever surrounded you? What would you know of even tying your shoes? Without influence, well, there wouldn't be a whole lot to know would there? If you were the only human on Earth that's ever existed, you'd be absent the knowledge of all that we presently know and have ever presently known, you and I presently at the pinnacle of the "present."

Without influence, Plato wouldn't ever have known all that he knew; he wouldn't have possessed the knowledge to express what he knew and he wouldn't ever have gained the knowledge of what Socrates had to share without his influence; Peter or Mary Magdalene would've just kept living their lives without the influence of Jesus. Would we know all that we know now of the relevance and logic of loves ability to overcome hate if it wasn't for people like Socrates, Jesus, or Gandhi going to the great lengths they did to point it out? If someone hadn't pointed out and yelled "watch out!" How would the group of people be aware of what's about to fall on to them and destroy them? How would they be able to save themselves therefore? From their inherency to themselves in Jesus' or Gandhi's case. To become a "sign" (Luke 11:29) or an influence upon their contemporaries for them to even be able to consider love and selflessness over hate and selfishness; to walk the more difficult, less convenient, narrower path that knowledge reveals to us over the more inherent, far easier and more convenient, wider path that instinct demands of us, that we're otherwise more inherently drawn to. Without the influence of your parents for example, would you value what you presently do as much as you would without their influence? Would one simply become a racist along with their families and/or contemporaries as another example? How could one know of the woes of racism and the woes of not questioning or wrestling with the truth as its presented to them via the overwhelming influence of our contemporaries, without knowing of the value of doing so beforehand?

Desire: Without the influence of knowledge to whatever degree, what would we desire? How can one desire ice cream without first gaining the knowledge of the experience of its profound taste? Way back when we weren't aware of sex, to what degree did we desire it? If the influence of our contemporaries didn't consist of sex in any way whatsoever, would we desire it as much as we do today? Obviously, instinct would say the desire would still persist, but to what degree in this context in contrast to our present conditions? Where sex is not only encouraged, but it's even "cool" and culturally "adults" participate in it in droves, so therefore, you being an adult too means that of course you should desire it to the same degrees right? Wrong. We may very well be what we've been surrounded with, but of course we are also what we repeatedly choose to think and therefore, do.

"If one, Ponders on objects of the sense, there springs Attraction; from attraction grows Desire, desire flames to fierce Passion, passion breeds Recklessness; then the memory — all betrayed — let's noble purpose go, and saps the mind, till purpose, mind, and man are all undone." - The Bhagavad Gita

Desire stems from our sense organs reacting to our environment; without this reaction, what would sex be but simply procreation? If sex didn't feel as good as it does, would anyone even desire to procreate? Or would it fade away as walking to our destinations has in favor of vehicles today for example?

It's desire that leads one to will and act for the sake of itself (selfishness), or anything else (selflessness), and potentially leads to a level of passion that holds the capacity to undo or "defile" a humans mind, to the point of even murder or suicide, via the passions that are flamed by our knowledge of both hate and love.

Morality: With desire comes our inherency to measure the good or evil; right or wrong; the truthfulness or falsehood within any doing born out of desire. Morality may be subjective, but just like our knowledge of time for example, via our ability to acknowledge, measure, and organize it, we've always been able to find degrees of objectivity within our knowing of anything, like the laws of physics for example, we've come to find this "law of love" - Tolstoy, or whatever any group of humans have come up with to measure and organize our knowledge of things like time, morality, or the experience as a few examples, at any point throughout mankind’s history. By our inherency to empathize, (the law and the prophets as a whole that were meant to be fulfilled, in my opinion of course - Matt 5:17, 7:12, 22:40), we're able to make the most accurate measurement to determine what most people would agree to be "good" or "bad," just as we're able to determine what time it presently is for most people. Of course it would still be very circumstantial and dependent on the situation, person, culture, day in age, etc, but generally, using the most accurate tool at our disposal, we can find degrees of objectivity within the sea of subjectivity that is our knowledge of morality.

Any vanity born out of desire — by considering its origins, or what’s at the core of it — can be categorized as a doing for the sake of oneself (selfishness), or for the sake of anything else (selflessness). P.S. subjective morality wouldn't exist if morality was a "spoof" or didn't exist due to its subjectivity; no morality, no subjective morality.

Truth: To be capable of reasoning with morality is to be able to comprehend what's presently revealing itself to be more or less rational and thus, what's subjectively "right" or "wrong" and with that, true or false. It's by this ability that allows us to take the shapes of knowledge we conjure via our imaginations and ability to reason and turn them into a truth; the truth of wearing clothes for example. It's our ability to reason or "wrestle" with truth and subsequently live by or deny the outcomes that determines who or what we ultimately become the product or reflection of. We are what we've been surrounded with; we're all products of our contemporaries, however, we are also what we repeatedly choose to think, and therefore, do. If I either knowingly or unknowingly decide that becoming a manager of a clothes store is what's presently revealing itself to be the most rational decision, and subsequently live by it, I will ultimately become a product or a reflection of that doing; of that knowledge.

It's truth to whatever degree (questionable or unquestionable; absolutely or not so absolutely true) that's always guided mankind throughout the ages and into our present as we know it.

"The Spirit of truth." - John 16:13 (the will that comes from our unique and profound ability for truth.)

Spirit: With our ability to acknowledge, measure, and give life to knowledge of morality and therefore, truth on an Earth comes the doing of any desire, thus, the vanity, spirit, or will of it; if we didn't desire anything, what would we aspire to do? If nothing was good or bad, right — and therefore rational — or wrong, good or evil, true or false, then why desire anything? Is it, what we call today, "instinct" that demands we quench our thirst when suffering from the lack of it? Or is it that inherent demand for ourselves born out of consciousness and our knowing of morality coupled with our inherency to measure it in relation to ourselves specifically? A knowledge, therefore; an awareness. Just as most nature is conscious enough to share that inherent demand for itself, so we humans just can't help but possess the same. The difference being of how much more conscious we are of ourselves and morality in contrast, hence the extent of how much more angry we become (its very difficult to lead a pet to gain a grudge towards its owner), or sad, to the point of even "crippling" ourselves.

It's our capacity for consciousness; imagination; knowledge; reason; logos; truth, spirit (will; vanity) that leads us to posses an ability no other species comes anywhere close to being able to parallel, born out of our unique and profound ability for divine revelation to whatever degree: To aim and even be willing to consider subjectively "suffering" to push past our instinct in favor of where a knowledge takes us, and to even be willing to give ones life for something that isn't itself; for even the smallest, most insignificant, or most hated of creatures. Also known as, the "Holy Spirit", or, the Holy 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘭. Provided of course your knowing of God(s) doesn't point you back to selfish thoughts and behaviors, as most of what we now call "religions" do today.

With desire comes the ability to aspire to act; to will; to do for the sake of oneself (selfishness), or anything else (selflessness). Upon this inevitable choice, made knowingly or unknowingly, lays the foundation of human behavior and subsequently the extent we've ever and presently manipulated our environment and organized ourselves up until now as a species, and what will, objectively — God or not, forever govern over the future of the tomorrow of the most conscious, capable species on this planet; the ones who posses objectively the most potential for either itself, or anything else.

"Know thyself." - The first of three Ancient Greek maxims chosen to be inscribed into the Temple of Apollo where the Oracle of Delphi resided in Ancient Greece

"When you can understand everything [things] you can forgive anything [things]." - Leo Tolstoy

An Allegorical, More Philosophical Interpretation of the Story of the Garden of Eden: https://lemmy.world/post/44870805

Not on how it's presented please, but on the thoughts and opinions of the philosophy itself. I'm aware of my limitations when it comes to expressing my thoughts and how little it meets today's standards. That said, I'd like to speak on knowledge and its subjectivity, especially morality. I'll try, but more than likely fail, to keep it as brief as possible, sorry.

All knowledge holds or has held some degree of subjectivity. At one point in time there very well may have been large amounts of people that were convinced that 2 + 2 = 3 or 5, just as we see with flat earthers today, revolving their entire lives around it. But ultimately, objectively, it's four. I'm personally not a fan of math but it's impossible not to appreciate its infallibility. Math is hard evidence that absolute, incontrovertible, inerrant, unquestionable truth does indeed exist and humans are capable of revealing it.

Math is the clear winner when it comes to the most objective knowledge. It's subjective until someone comes along and reveals the truth via reason, that of course when we take two things and add two more things to them, we will always, absolutely be left with four things, and there couldn't possibly be any other solution. My focus here however isn't to rank every knowledge and to determine which is more or less subjective than another specifically, but to point out some of the degrees of objectivity we've found so far within the sea of subjectivity that lies within our knowledge of anything. Science: The laws of physics; language and literature: That the shapes we call letters that make up the word we're presently using to connote the word, "word," is "word;" history: How Hitler died — most major historical events; time: it's presently 7:19a for me or we gained our independence here in America on July 4th, 1776; the experience: We can't breathe under water without the proper equipment to do so or that it's more efficient to run with our shoes tied separately rather than tied together.

As we move away from math and into other knowledge things become nothing but more and more subjective; if math is on one side of the spectrum, holding the highest degrees of objectivity within its puny sea of subjectivity, then what would be on the opposite end of this spectrum, as the most subjective knowledge? I've concluded that it's either our knowledge of the divine or of morality, provided of course one believes in the divine, if not, then please kindly disregard it. I say the divine is the most subjective considering its metaphysics, and morality a very close second because at least morality is something we know for a fact exists by the extent we give life to it and keep it living, so to speak, and are the most capable of applying it to our environment in contrast to any other species here on Earth; the knowledge of the divine consists of things no human is capable of producing any degree of objective proof of.

But if morality is, by a landslide, the second (or first if you're not a believer) most subjective knowledge that humans have ever revealed and are capable of producing, then how are we to find any degree of objectivity within what seems to be a veritable ocean of subjectivity? I know it's a stretch, and I'm not saying I'm absolutely correct, it's just a theory, and I know this is going to get a lot of flak due to the source of this knowledge, but one must understand that knowledge is just that: knowledge, no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since it's been revealed and labeled; Jesus — his knowledge and what men ever before and ever since have called "Judaism" or "Christianity" are two very different things. It's what Jesus — who I equate as a profound moral philosopher/activist — thought "the law and the prophets hang to" (Matt 22:40), or, the law and the prophets as a whole: "love thy neighbor as thyself." - Leviticus 19:18

"All things, therefore, whatever ye may will that men may be doing to you, so also do to them, for this is the law and the prophets." - Matt 7:12

Within the midst of this ocean of subjectivity that is our knowledge of morality, we can indeed find degrees of objectivity within it using this as our tool of measurement, as our most efficient, though far from perfect means of measurement: Our unique and profound ability as humans for empathy: To be capable of using our imaginations to imagine the perspective and subsequently the potential thoughts and feelings of anything, even inanimate objects if you remember your favorite toy or stuffed animal as a child, for example. It's the most accurate means for us humans to objectively determine what is right or wrong, good or evil, true or false when it comes to our knowledge of morality. This precept falls apart however if one doesn't love themself; it's dependent upon it. The more one loves themself, therefore, the more capable and even willing they will be to love anything else.

Here's a great example of the whole law and the prophets at work: Imagine you're standing within a large group of people that's facing a puny little girl who's standing next to a very large, strong grown man. Now let's say the grown man wound up to strike the little girl across the face, and did so, and the little girl let out a yelp as she collapsed to the ground, motionless. Out of inherency, at this point in time with Jesus' teaching well assimilated within the hearts and minds of men, whether they know it or not or would like to admit to it or not, I think we can all assume with certainty how the group of people would react.

However, let's try this experiment with a group of wildly uneducated, remote indigenous people, or a group of people from even just two millenniums ago. I'd like to think the reaction would be similar or even the same, and I'm not saying there wasn't and isn't any capacity for compassion and empathy where knowledge at least akin to this precept hasn't become subconscious common knowledge, but unfortunately, prior to the influence of this knowledge, the Romans, for example, would practice things like infanticide regularly. Why? Which knowledge hasn't made its way to become subconscious common knowledge at that point in time? And what knowledge led to such a dramatic social change for the better? Why even consider the abolishment of infanticide as a good thing today? Because how would you like it if you were a baby with a "deformity" of some kind and you were thrown on to the street — the equivalent of garbage? Yes, some people may desire this, as morality is indeed wildly subjective, just as some people would even be willing to kill and die themselves for the idea that 2 + 2 = 3 or 5 due to the "oaths" that they've taken via the overwhelming influence of their contemporaries. But objectively, the vast majority of people, especially children who haven't been destroyed yet by the world's ugly hands getting a hold of them, would absolutely not want to be thrown on to the street to die.

There's good reason as to why the foundation of laws today are built upon this now kindergarten precept, one that we take wildly for granted, because that's just what it is: reason. And the only thing that's rendered it anything else both ever before and ever since Jesus is exactly what rendered it any different in Jesus' time as well: The stigma of what we now call "religion" or "God's Law" that smothers it and gives anyone any reason to consider it as anything else but what it would be otherwise if it wasn't for this Everest sized stigma that's always surrounded it: knowledge.

I'd like to end with a couple verses that I think shine a good light on the alternative perspective Jesus had on "scripture," that God wants love or "mercy" as Jesus specifies in Matt 9:13 and 12:7 when he references Hosea 6:6, not useless external worship.

"For kindness I desired, and not [animal] sacrifice, And a knowledge of God above burnt-offerings." - Hosea 6:6

“ 'With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?' He has told you, O man, what is good [love thy neighbor as thyself]; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?" - Micah 6:6

Not on how it's presented please, but on the thoughts and opinions of the philosophy itself. I'm aware of my limitations when it comes to expressing my thoughts and how little it meets today's standards. That said, I'd like to speak on knowledge and its subjectivity, especially morality. I'll try, but more than likely fail, to keep it as brief as possible, sorry.

All knowledge holds or has held some degree of subjectivity. At one point in time there very well may have been large amounts of people that were convinced that 2 + 2 = 3 or 5, just as we see with flat earthers today, revolving their entire lives around it. But ultimately, objectively, it's four. I'm personally not a fan of math but it's impossible not to appreciate its infallibility. Math is hard evidence that absolute, incontrovertible, inerrant, unquestionable truth does indeed exist and humans are capable of revealing it.

Math is the clear winner when it comes to the most objective knowledge. It's subjective until someone comes along and reveals the truth via reason, that of course when we take two things and add two more things to them, we will always, absolutely be left with four things, and there couldn't possibly be any other solution. My focus here however isn't to rank every knowledge and to determine which is more or less subjective than another specifically, but to point out some of the degrees of objectivity we've found so far within the sea of subjectivity that lies within our knowledge of anything. Science: The laws of physics; language and literature: That the shapes we call letters that make up the word we're presently using to connote the word, "word," is "word;" history: How Hitler died — most major historical events; time: it's presently 7:19a for me or we gained our independence here in America on July 4th, 1776; the experience: We can't breathe under water without the proper equipment to do so or that it's more efficient to run with our shoes tied separately rather than tied together.

As we move away from math and into other knowledge things become nothing but more and more subjective; if math is on one side of the spectrum, holding the highest degrees of objectivity within its puny sea of subjectivity, then what would be on the opposite end of this spectrum, as the most subjective knowledge? I've concluded that it's either our knowledge of the divine or of morality, provided of course one believes in the divine, if not, then please kindly disregard it. I say the divine is the most subjective considering its metaphysics, and morality a very close second because at least morality is something we know for a fact exists by the extent we give life to it and keep it living, so to speak, and are the most capable of applying it to our environment in contrast to any other species here on Earth; the knowledge of the divine consists of things no human is capable of producing any degree of objective proof of.

But if morality is, by a landslide, the second (or first if you're not a believer) most subjective knowledge that humans have ever revealed and are capable of producing, then how are we to find any degree of objectivity within what seems to be a veritable ocean of subjectivity? I know it's a stretch, and I'm not saying I'm absolutely correct, it's just a theory, and I know this is going to get a lot of flak due to the source of this knowledge, but one must understand that knowledge is just that: knowledge, no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since it's been revealed and labeled; Jesus — his knowledge and what men ever before and ever since have called "Judaism" or "Christianity" are two very different things. It's what Jesus — who I equate as a profound moral philosopher/activist — thought "the law and the prophets hang to" (Matt 22:40), or, the law and the prophets as a whole: "love thy neighbor as thyself." - Leviticus 19:18

"All things, therefore, whatever ye may will that men may be doing to you, so also do to them, for this is the law and the prophets." - Matt 7:12

Within the midst of this ocean of subjectivity that is our knowledge of morality, we can indeed find degrees of objectivity within it using this as our tool of measurement, as our most efficient, though far from perfect means of measurement: Our unique and profound ability as humans for empathy: To be capable of using our imaginations to imagine the perspective and subsequently the potential thoughts and feelings of anything, even inanimate objects if you remember your favorite toy or stuffed animal as a child, for example. It's the most accurate means for us humans to objectively determine what is right or wrong, good or evil, true or false when it comes to our knowledge of morality. This precept falls apart however if one doesn't love themself; it's dependent upon it. The more one loves themself, therefore, the more capable and even willing they will be to love anything else.

Here's a great example of the whole law and the prophets at work: Imagine you're standing within a large group of people that's facing a puny little girl who's standing next to a very large, strong grown man. Now let's say the grown man wound up to strike the little girl across the face, and did so, and the little girl let out a yelp as she collapsed to the ground, motionless. Out of inherency, at this point in time with Jesus' teaching well assimilated within the hearts and minds of men, whether they know it or not or would like to admit to it or not, I think we can all assume with certainty how the group of people would react.

However, let's try this experiment with a group of wildly uneducated, remote indigenous people, or a group of people from even just two millenniums ago. I'd like to think the reaction would be similar or even the same, and I'm not saying there wasn't and isn't any capacity for compassion and empathy where knowledge at least akin to this precept hasn't become subconscious common knowledge, but unfortunately, prior to the influence of this knowledge, the Romans, for example, would practice things like infanticide regularly. Why? Which knowledge hasn't made its way to become subconscious common knowledge at that point in time? And what knowledge led to such a dramatic social change for the better? Why even consider the abolishment of infanticide as a good thing today? Because how would you like it if you were a baby with a "deformity" of some kind and you were thrown on to the street — the equivalent of garbage? Yes, some people may desire this, as morality is indeed wildly subjective, just as some people would even be willing to kill and die themselves for the idea that 2 + 2 = 3 or 5 due to the "oaths" that they've taken via the overwhelming influence of their contemporaries. But objectively, the vast majority of people, especially children who haven't been destroyed yet by the world's ugly hands getting a hold of them, would absolutely not want to be thrown on to the street to die.

There's good reason as to why the foundation of laws today are built upon this now kindergarten precept, one that we take wildly for granted, because that's just what it is: reason. And the only thing that's rendered it anything else both ever before and ever since Jesus is exactly what rendered it any different in Jesus' time as well: The stigma of what we now call "religion" or "God's Law" that smothers it and gives anyone any reason to consider it as anything else but what it would be otherwise if it wasn't for this Everest sized stigma that's always surrounded it: knowledge.

I'd like to end with a couple verses that I think shine a good light on the alternative perspective Jesus had on "scripture," that God wants love or "mercy" as Jesus specifies in Matt 9:13 and 12:7 when he references Hosea 6:6, not useless external worship.

"For kindness I desired, and not [animal] sacrifice, And a knowledge of God above burnt-offerings." - Hosea 6:6

“ 'With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?' He has told you, O man, what is good [love thy neighbor as thyself]; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?" - Micah 6:6

"In my search for the answers to the question of life ["I am a human, therefore, how should I live? What do I do?"] I had exactly the same feeling as a man who has lost his way in a forest. He has come out into a clearing, climbed a tree, and has a clear view of limitless space, but he sees that there is no house there and that there cannot be one; he goes into the trees, into the darkness, and sees darkness, and there too there is no house. In the same way I wandered in this forest of human knowledge between the rays of light of the mathematical and experimental sciences, which opened up clear horizons to me but in a direction where there could be no house, and into the darkness of the speculative sciences, where I was plunged into further darkness the further I moved on, and finally I was convinced that there was not and could not be any way out.

As I gave myself up to the brighter side of the sciences, I understood that I was only taking my eyes off the question. However enticing and clear the horizons opening upon before me, however enticing it was to plunge myself into the infinity of these sciences were, the less they served me, the less they answered my question. "Well, I know everything that science so insistently wants to know," I said to myself, "but on this path there is no answer to the question of the meaning of my life." In the speculative sphere I understood that although, or precisely because, sciences aim was directed straight at the answer than the one I was giving myself: "What is the meaning of my life?" "None." Or: "What will come out of my life?" "Nothing." Or: "Why does everything exist that exists, and why do I exist?" "Because it exists."

Asking questions on one side of human science, I received a countless quantity of precise answers to questions I wasn't asking: about the chemical composition of the stars; the movement of the sun toward the constellation Hercules; the origin of species and of man; the forms of infinitely small atoms; the vibration of infinitely small, weightless particles of ether — but there was only one answer in this area of science to my question, "In what is the meaning of my life?": "You are what you call your life; but you are an ephemeral, casual connection of particles. The interaction, the change of these particles produces in you what you call your life. This connection will last some time; then the interaction of these particles will stop — and what you call your life will stop and all your questions will stop too. You are a lump of something stuck together by chance. The lump decays. The lump calls this decay its life. The lump will disintegrate and the decay and all its questions will come to an end." That is the answer given by the bright side of science, and it cannot give any other if it just strictly follows its principles. With such an answer it turns out the answer doesn't answer my question. I need to know the meaning of my life, but it's being a particle of the infinite not only gives it no meaning but destroys any possible meaning.

The other side of science, the speculative, when it strictly adheres to its principles in answering the question directly, gives and has given the same answer everywhere and in all ages: "The world is something infinte and unintelligible. Human life is an incomprehensible piece of this incomprehensible 'whole'." Again I exclude all the compromises between speculative and experimental sciences that constitute the whole ballast of the semi-sciences, the so-called jurisprudential, political, and historical. Into these sciences again one finds wrongly introduced the notions of development, of perfection, with the difference only that there it was the development of the whole whereas here it is of the life of people. What is wrong is the same: development and perfection in the infinite can have neither aim nor direction and in relation to my question give no answer.

Where speculative science is exact, namely in true philosophy — not in what Shopenhauer called "professorial philosophy" which only serves to distribute all existing phenomena in neat philosophical tables and gives them new names — there where a philosopher doesn't lose sight of the essential question, the answer, always one and the same, is the answer given by Socrates, Solomon, Buddha...

• "The life of the body is evil and a lie. And therefore the destruction of this life of the body is something good, and we must desire it," says Socrates.
• "Life is that which ought not to be — an evil — and the going into nothingness is the sole good of life," says Shopenhauer.
• "Everything in the world — folly and wisdom and riches and poverty and happiness and grief — [vanity of vanities; doing of doings] all is vanity and nonsense. Man will die and nothing will remain. And that is foolish," says Solomon.
• "One must not live with the awareness of the inevitability of suffering, weakness, old age, and death — one must free oneself from life, from all possibility of life," says Buddha.

And what these powerful intellects said was said and thought and felt by millions and millions of people like them. And I too thought and felt that. So that my wanderings in science not only did not take me out of despair but only increased it. One science did not answer the question of life; another science did answer, directly confirming my despair and showing that the view I had reached wasn't the result of my delusion, of the morbid state of mind — on the contrary, it confirmed for me what I truly thought and agreed with the conclusions of the powerful intellects of mankind. It's no good deceiving oneself. All is vanity. Happy is he who was not born; death is better than life; one needs to be rid of life." - Leo Tolstoy, Confession, Chapter Six

The simple yet profound meaning Tolstoy found within the many sources of our knowledge of morality: https://lemmy.world/post/44903802

Tolstoy wasn't what we now call "religious," however: https://lemmy.world/post/44866402

"In my search for the answers to the question of life ["I am a human, therefore, how should I live? What do I do?"] I had exactly the same feeling as a man who has lost his way in a forest. He has come out into a clearing, climbed a tree, and has a clear view of limitless space, but he sees that there is no house there and that there cannot be one; he goes into the trees, into the darkness, and sees darkness, and there too there is no house. In the same way I wandered in this forest of human knowledge between the rays of light of the mathematical and experimental sciences, which opened up clear horizons to me but in a direction where there could be no house, and into the darkness of the speculative sciences, where I was plunged into further darkness the further I moved on, and finally I was convinced that there was not and could not be any way out.

As I gave myself up to the brighter side of the sciences, I understood that I was only taking my eyes off the question. However enticing and clear the horizons opening upon before me, however enticing it was to plunge myself into the infinity of these sciences were, the less they served me, the less they answered my question. "Well, I know everything that science so insistently wants to know," I said to myself, "but on this path there is no answer to the question of the meaning of my life." In the speculative sphere I understood that although, or precisely because, sciences aim was directed straight at the answer than the one I was giving myself: "What is the meaning of my life?" "None." Or: "What will come out of my life?" "Nothing." Or: "Why does everything exist that exists, and why do I exist?" "Because it exists."

Asking questions on one side of human science, I received a countless quantity of precise answers to questions I wasn't asking: about the chemical composition of the stars; the movement of the sun toward the constellation Hercules; the origin of species and of man; the forms of infinitely small atoms; the vibration of infinitely small, weightless particles of ether — but there was only one answer in this area of science to my question, "In what is the meaning of my life?": "You are what you call your life; but you are an ephemeral, casual connection of particles. The interaction, the change of these particles produces in you what you call your life. This connection will last some time; then the interaction of these particles will stop — and what you call your life will stop and all your questions will stop too. You are a lump of something stuck together by chance. The lump decays. The lump calls this decay its life. The lump will disintegrate and the decay and all its questions will come to an end." That is the answer given by the bright side of science, and it cannot give any other if it just strictly follows its principles. With such an answer it turns out the answer doesn't answer my question. I need to know the meaning of my life, but it's being a particle of the infinite not only gives it no meaning but destroys any possible meaning.

The other side of science, the speculative, when it strictly adheres to its principles in answering the question directly, gives and has given the same answer everywhere and in all ages: "The world is something infinte and unintelligible. Human life is an incomprehensible piece of this incomprehensible 'whole'." Again I exclude all the compromises between speculative and experimental sciences that constitute the whole ballast of the semi-sciences, the so-called jurisprudential, political, and historical. Into these sciences again one finds wrongly introduced the notions of development, of perfection, with the difference only that there it was the development of the whole whereas here it is of the life of people. What is wrong is the same: development and perfection in the infinite can have neither aim nor direction and in relation to my question give no answer.

Where speculative science is exact, namely in true philosophy — not in what Shopenhauer called "professorial philosophy" which only serves to distribute all existing phenomena in neat philosophical tables and gives them new names — there where a philosopher doesn't lose sight of the essential question, the answer, always one and the same, is the answer given by Socrates, Solomon, Buddha...

• "The life of the body is evil and a lie. And therefore the destruction of this life of the body is something good, and we must desire it," says Socrates.
• "Life is that which ought not to be — an evil — and the going into nothingness is the sole good of life," says Shopenhauer.
• "Everything in the world — folly and wisdom and riches and poverty and happiness and grief — [vanity of vanities; doing of doings] all is vanity and nonsense. Man will die and nothing will remain. And that is foolish," says Solomon.
• "One must not live with the awareness of the inevitability of suffering, weakness, old age, and death — one must free oneself from life, from all possibility of life," says Buddha.

And what these powerful intellects said was said and thought and felt by millions and millions of people like them. And I too thought and felt that. So that my wanderings in science not only did not take me out of despair but only increased it. One science did not answer the question of life; another science did answer, directly confirming my despair and showing that the view I had reached wasn't the result of my delusion, of the morbid state of mind — on the contrary, it confirmed for me what I truly thought and agreed with the conclusions of the powerful intellects of mankind. It's no good deceiving oneself. All is vanity. Happy is he who was not born; death is better than life; one needs to be rid of life." - Leo Tolstoy, Confession, Chapter Six

The simple yet profound meaning Tolstoy found within the many sources of our knowledge of morality: https://lemmy.world/post/44903802

Tolstoy wasn't what we now call "religious," however: https://lemmy.world/post/44866402