₦airaland Forum

Dtruthspeaker:
When will the people learn that all the things of God are spirit and not physical or earthly?

Just as Dettol or Dove Soaps can not wash away your sins, so also the laying of charcoal or tar upon thy head or body does not mean that thou are contrite and penitent.

As The Lord said

Matthew 23:26
"Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also."

The ash is put on their head in spirit. If they thought it would cleanse them they'd put it all over their body and inside it too.

cooltola:
Na wa o, everyone is entitled to his or her beliefs.

So long as they keep them to themselves, but when you shout them out for others to hear expect stupid to be called out.

shadeyinka:
I think it doesn't mean literal knowledge of good and evil, for Adam knew it wasn't good to eat of the fruit (evil).

BassReeves:
Most things in the Bible, of course, are polysemous, however as for the 'Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil', what does 'Good and Evil' in 'knowledge of Good and Evil' from 'Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil' symbolises and stands for?

You are both using complex words to confuse yourselves. Perhaps step out of the religious box and look at it anew. For instance, if you want to be a medical doctor you must learn science first, then study branches of knowledge about medicine in university, and qualify when you pass the test on the tree of Knowledge of Medicine.

The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is like studying the Godly way to be which involves knowing what is good and knowing what is bad so you can separate the wheat from the chaff. For as Eve found, "the tree was good for food, and it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise".

It is after you learn to be wise that you will "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground" and eventually be empowered to say "let there be", and there is.

Basically, "you will become like us".

cooltola:
I notice one thing, a man is going to believe what he already believed. it is pointless to argue with folks who belief system are fixed. It is waste of time and it is waste of energy. Have you met a person who still believe the earth is flat?

Yes. I introduce you to EMILO2.

https://www.nairaland.com/5508076/earth-flat-not-globe-part

https://www.nairaland.com/5458081/been-lied-earth-flat-not

He is an example of believers being ignorant and refusing to become as a child and abandon beliefs so he can learn as I have repeatedly mentioned here.

First, an apology for the length of this. I was serving a ban for rule 6 in travel so had much time to prepare my response. Consider the time it must have taken as a sign of how much respect I have for you. Please bear the following in mind as you read on. It is Gospel to me.

www.nairaland.com/attachments/13152958_notable02547_jpeg2a552f1e40eee3947fd578e6e174c42e

Martian:
Given that interpretation of an allegory is dependent on the knowledge, experience, and bias of the interpreter, why do you seem so certain that your view is the correct or appropriate one? How do you interpret it as slavery? The owners of the myth have never interpreted it as slavery and the counterfeiters did not either, yet you seem so sure.

I don't, Martian, seem so certain my view (understanding) is the correct or appropriate one, though it is the correct and appropriate one for me. Consider just the text in question. A man and woman are placed naked to work in a Garden with a Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil they are forbidden to eat. At some point they eat it and their eyes open and the owner of the Garden is pissed off and kicks them out of the Garden. Does that not sound like what Boko Haram is doing to people, keeping knowledge from them so they can be slaves? Its what American slave owners did, keeping knowledge away from their slaves so they would not rebel. Or are you not aware that knowledge sets one free? Yes, I am absolutely certain that if I remain ignorant and do not learn I will be a slave to those who know better than I do. Do you disagree? Would words like "subjugation, destruction of cultures, imperialism, and colonialism" not apply to me if I do as you suggest, Martian?

Martian:
In Jewish tradition, the Tree of Knowledge and the eating of its fruit represents the beginning of the mixture of good and evil together.

"In Jewish tradition" and "Christian tradition" and "Catholic tradition" would work if I had no brain inside my own head and can not read and need Jews and Catholics and Christians to interpret text for me, but I think I would be subjugated, destroyed, imperialised, and colonialised and a stupid brainless mumu slave to boot if I allowed others to brainwash me instead of using the brain inside my.own head. That same book talks about Jesus Christ who turned Jewish tradition on its head and I think I'd be stupid not to learn from him and do the same. Besides, how about Gnostic tradition, and Hermetic tradition and Kaballah tradition and the very many other ways of interpreting religious text including buda's tradition, do they not count too? Are you suggesting I allow myself to be told what to believe as if I have no brain inside my head to think and reason for myself? Do tell, what would be the point of reading a book and thinking and reasoning for myself if I use it to enslave myself in stupidity and brainwashed ignorance? By golly, after secondary school, one is not even supposed to read a Physics or Maths or any other text book without applying ones own mind to reason about what one reads, which is how one learns unless you think just knowing facts is learning (have we not been here before Martian?), so why would I stupidly do such a thing with a book that can and has been interpreted in thousands of ways by billions of people over decades and ignore my own understanding? Are you suggesting I buda should think so little of myself that when Moses is going up the mountain to see God I should wait at the bottom with Aaron and Ahibu and the 70 because I am unworthy instead of saying fuq off I'm coming up too? I can only suggest you have no idea what buda is like and laugh that you'd even think such nonsense of me! I mean, it says in the book that you should not rely on your own understanding, but if you read me carefully you'd realise I'm asking you to pluck and eat the forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and find out if it is true that you will die or if your eyes will actually open! Or perhaps you do not understand the relationship between the tree and the Word in John?

Martian:
In a haste to support your view, you skipped over Noah, Abraham, Isaac, etc. just to jump to Moses. There is no evidence or record supporting the Moses/Exodus story, so it’s probably mythology, allegory or legend. If you don’t consider it as factual or legendary, do you consider it to be myth/allegory? If it’s myth/allegory, why do you have a straightforward interpretation? I mean, why do you take it prima facie unlike the story about the Tree?

I could have used the entire book to point out that it is not meant to enslave anyone but to free people from ignorance. I could even go further back to pre-Bible to its origins in Egypt to state my case, but I'm sure you are aware I am not writing a book here and therefore understand the brevity which makes me limit my examples.

And yes, it is mythology and full of allegory that has been sanitised over time and is nothing like it originally was. Even that which could be called original is not original as it was cobbled together from myths collected from all over the place. Makes me wonder why you'd think I take any of it "prima facie" as you claim. Is it because you have not bothered to read enough buda perhaps and take buda prima facie? If I take it prima facie as you claim there would be nothing like a buda tradition or interpretation, and if there is a buda tradition or interpretation then there sure can be a Martian one too, or can't there be? Do know that you are not required to accept buda's interpretation if it makes no sense to you. I am not some religious person who requires you to believe a word I write because I would rarher you not be a slave but a free user of your own mind to think and reason and understand by yourself just like buda does.

I'd state here just so you aware that I know, that many ideas in the Torah came out of Egypt and is a debased (or sanitised, depending how you wish to see it) form of Egyptian religion that had evolved over thousands of years. Those who wrote it had no idea of this fact and evidence for its origin has been edited out over time. I am however not asking you to take my word for any of this but if you care to know, go study some ancient Egyptology and it would become obvious to you.

Martian:
His alleged moral teachings are not unique nor were they novel when he’s said to have proclaimed them, so what is so special about him? What “slavery” of ignorance was Jesus freeing them from?

Say my name, Martian. It is made up of two names, buda a teacher and atum one of the oldest Egyptian Gods. Read my signature at the bottom of my posts. Click on the link in it. Note where it refers to. All teach the Golden Rule of love your neighbour, so I can't understand why you'd assume buda thinks it is novel to Christ. That said, is it not the truth that the majority of Nigerians only know it from the teachings of Christ and some from their understanding of the Quran? Is it not also true that we Nigerians have a long way to go to learn to actually practise it? And is this not because we are actually not sufficiently knowledgeable to see the benefit of loving our neighbours? Perhaps travel some and see how far some nations take love your neighbours before condemning its teaching by Christ. Some nations go so far with it that it is policy to care for you if you are sick or hungry or homeless, which we do not exactly do in Nigeria. Funny thing is those countrys have evolved past Christ as we know it, and have assimilated the teaching and abandoned the actual Christ bit. Go check most European countries if you want to know what I mean.

Martian:
However, the book as a whole was/is a tool of subjugation, destruction of cultures, imperialism, and colonialism. Not saying imperialists or colonialists wouldn’t have used whatever tools available, but the historical depravity of Christianity/Europeans was/is enabled by multiple stories in that book, which are open to interpretation.

Now, this last bit was exactly what the post you responded to was addressing, and is a view that can only be held by those who do not know their history.

It is not the Bible that is responsible for the "subjugation, destruction of cultures, imperialism, and colonialism", that you claim it is, though it has been used in that way. I mean, it is a fact that some play God in their Garden of Eden and deprive others of the Fruits of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, but that same book introduces the serpent who tells you that it is not true that if you eat you will surely die, but become like us knowing the difference between Good and Evil. If you refuse to use your own brain to understand what you read, then yes, you will be a victim of "subjugation, destruction of cultures, imperialism, and colonialism" because others will prey on you. But if you eat of the Fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, your eyes will open, you will clothe yourself, and instead of being a slave in some other person's farm, you will till you own land to produce your own food like a free person would. Perhaps see the Bible as a gun. Some kill others with guns while some hunt for food and protect themselves with guns. If I shoot you with my gun I hope you will be intelligent enough to say I killed you and not my gun killed you as you seem to have claimed with the Bible. Books do not do what you claim here, Martian. People do, and I am claiming they accuse the book in error.

I will add that it is irresponsible to claim the Bible destroys culture. If you know your history, the culture of Egypt was destroyed, as was Roman's, and Greek and Britain and just about the entire world actually. And what destroyed them all was the fact that they did not record it in a book and make it available to the masses like the Bible was. If you do not want a culture destroyed, you write it in a book, you make it available for the masses to read after teaching them how to. It is this that the peddlers of the Bible have managed to do, and personally, I admire their ingenuity. Perhaps learn from it instead of lamenting that your culture died, because I can bet my top dollar that even the Martian that you are knows more about the Bible culture than you know about the culture on Mars. It will be silly to blame the Bible for your Martian ignorance, I think.

shadeyinka:
It seems you know many things about the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil that I don't know. Do you have another source? May be archeology, books etc that has a direct or close enough timeline?

Always willing to learn sir!

Gained from a lot of reading and reasoning with an open mind I daresay, instead of believing the junk and lies peddled about it. I mean, take how people do wuruwuru to claim Adam and Eve who went on to live like 800 years after eating the fruit died as the God said they would. A child would raise eyebrows if you tell it to believe such a lie I would think, but many grown ups seem to just accept it without thinking. I find such brainlessness unacceptable!

The Kingdom of God is not found in a book, Shade. That's why the scholars in Christ time never found it despite all their study. Christ told a most profound truth when he told you where to seek it once you understand what it is you seek. Just become a child and you will understand.

Below are some links on the subject. If you hold me in your prayers perhaps the Lord God will empower me to write a book about it.

https://www.nairaland.com/6301141/emancipate-yourself-slavery-ignorance

https://www.nairaland.com/4960881/garden-eden-childs-view

We both know your trump loss pains you.
Next time don't back incompetent losers.

MrPresident1:
Mumu, engaging you is like pouring water in a basket, a fruitless venture because you like being deliberately stupid. The spiritual implication of the wall is that your country America is now buttnaked, Donald Trump told us, before he was booted out, that he has completed the wall.

God's own country needs a wall of protection because God is no longer in her, and he is no longer protecting her

Ezekiel 16:14
And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD.

Women should not wait to be given.

We should rise up and take what we want!

budaatum:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drGx7JkFSp4

Now there was a time
When they used to say
That behind every great man
There had to be a great woman
But in these times of change
You know that it's no longer true
So we're comin' out of the kitchen
'Cause there's somethin' we forgot to say to you, we say
Sisters are doin' it for themselves
Standin' on their own two feet
And ringin' on their own bells, we say
Sisters are doin' it for themselves
Now this is a song
To celebrate
The conscious liberation
Of the female state
Mothers, daughters
And their daughters too
Woman to woman
We're singin' with you
The inferior sex, has
Got a new exterior, yeah
We got doctors
Lawyers, politicians too
Everybody take a look around
Can you see, can you see
Can you see there's a woman
Right next to you, we say
Sisters are doin' it for…

Waiter is a low skilled job. Demand is easily filled amongst those on the ground so it would be almost impossible for you to be hired from Nigeria. You already seem to know this or you would be applying to manage the hotel instead of waitering.

First, you travel to the country you want to work in. Then get an even lower positioned job cleaning pots in the kitchen in an hotel to get experience and knowledge you'd use to eventually get the job you want managing the hotel. While you are at it, consider going to school to study for whatever the local equivalent of the National Diploma in Hospitality Management is in the country you emigrate to as they are unlikely to value your current qualification.

An alternative is to ask your employers (previous?) at Radisson Blu and Hilton to let you work in their hotels abroad. That should have been your first option, I would have thought.

Timiofak:
Tucker Carlson don start again ooooo

Now his claims are, joe Biden's relationship with his wife is a PR sham cooked up by political consultants

I just can't stop myself from laughing, it's obvious they have nothing to talk about, nothing.

it's going to be another 4 years of ”Caffe salute”

Tucker Carlson sounds like FFK and Kanu rolled into one.

I can't help wonder if he pays Fox to broadcast him because he sure does them more harm than good.

MrPresident1:
You should get checked for dyslexia, abi is the below not what you said?

You should take your own advise and stop with the flipflops.

Chart for the day.

https://wolfstreet.com/2021/02/17/who-bought-the-4-5-trillion-added-in-one-year-to-the-incredibly-spiking-us-national-debt-now-at-27-9-trillion/

SanctifiedSista:
Fasting is NOT a reflection of oneself, that is something u do on a daily basis whether u are fasting or NOT. Everyday listening to the word of GOD weda thru ur Bible,devotional or anointed men of GOD messages helps u reflect on ur mind, cleanse urself and make corrections

Everyday, yes. Fasting is to remind you to increase the diligence with which you do reflect. If you reflect everyday, reflect more over lent and continue doing so with that intensity for the entire year, then increase intensity on Ash Wednesday and keep it up till the next and so on and so on.

That's how you become perfect at reflecting more everyday.

SanctifiedSista:
I advise Catholics not to only fast today but thru out the whole 40 days BUT do it with expectation. Even today, if u are just fasting becos they said u shld fast, stop decieving urself
Go and have that Amala and soup
Again, I warn.ALL fastings and prayer must be done consciously and with expectation from GOD

I take it you are not fasting. Fasting does not only mean refrain from food but reflect on yourself too.

Ash Wednesday begins Lent, a time when we stop and assess how we’re doing in our walk with God. Lent helps us identify spiritual areas in which we can grow and sinful areas that we need to avoid.

You do know that not all wives are the same and that some wives come from decent good families?

It's like not all men come on Nairaland to discuss what their wife talks to their friends about.

Freestainworld:
3rd private jets while millions of poor Nigerians are wallowing in poverty, act what you preach sir

But he is, lol. People feared covid so much they paid him to save them and he used their money to buy third jet!

I mean, if you don't like what he is selling to you why buy and make him rich instead of using your little money to cure your poverty?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drGx7JkFSp4

Now there was a time
When they used to say
That behind every great man
There had to be a great woman
But in these times of change
You know that it's no longer true
So we're comin' out of the kitchen
'Cause there's somethin' we forgot to say to you, we say
Sisters are doin' it for themselves
Standin' on their own two feet
And ringin' on their own bells, we say
Sisters are doin' it for themselves
Now this is a song
To celebrate
The conscious liberation
Of the female state
Mothers, daughters
And their daughters too
Woman to woman
We're singin' with you
The inferior sex, has
Got a new exterior, yeah
We got doctors
Lawyers, politicians too
Everybody take a look around
Can you see, can you see
Can you see there's a woman
Right next to you, we say
Sisters are doin' it for…

Oluromantic:
Prince that married a queen. Both of them are so old and dem no wan die. Ogini?

If na naija, the next family to the throne go don make sure say dem die by now, juju war go come start.

Britain and the whole of Europe went through the similar juju wars, just that they evolved, as we too will someday once we learn how to.

https://www.nam.ac.uk/subjects/war-british-succession

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_succession?wprov=sfla1

MrPresident1:
Donald Trump is the King of America, kings don't become kings by election, they are crowned by kingmakers. Donald Trump was crowned king of America in 2017, abi, did he win any election?

King Donald Trump has fulfilled all the end time prophecies, the only one remaining is the last trump.

King Donald Trump of America will triumph over all his enemies. His victory will be on all levels and this will be trumpeted to the whole wide world

You are a joker.

Some Christians fear the Lord God Almighty, lol.

The read "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding", and they tremble as if they are demons!

I guess the Bible is a big book and we must not pressume all Christians read it.

www.nairaland.com/attachments/11663600_20200604102351774_jpeg_jpeg0a6707a5c919e2761327fab9920679aa

Reminds me of Naija politicians.

"I offered them a loaf of bread to vote for me but they voted for the guy who gave them two loaves, a handful of rice and a litre of kerosine".

That's how that worked.

shadeyinka:
To truely KNOW will be to have COMPLETE information and knowledge]

This bit is so important I'm responding to it separately.

The only thing a person truly knows is that they only know so little. That their information and knowledge is incomplete and that they are ignorant and must constantly be learning to cure their ignorance.

When you think you have complete knowledge you will believe and stop learning and will be truly ignorant. Scripture describes such people as dead!

shadeyinka:
Any knowledge of the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil NOW will at best be INCOMPLETE: It will be full of speculations, insinuations and guesswork.

Or reasoning, you left out, but then, you do not appear to understand the nature of knowledge, or trees for that matter.

Knowledge is never complete. Like a tree, it keeps growing so there's always more to learn. That's why the Tree is used figuratively to symbolize the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The hope being, you will continue growing in knowledge like a tree grows. It's how you discover new things and evolve in understanding.

shadeyinka:
Unfortunately, we don't even know for sure how the tree looks like nor its kind. We can't even be certain that the tree isn't figurative. Too much information is absent!

Which is why you should not give up seeking and lazily believe the little that you know! You keep searching until you find the tree so you know what it looks like, then you study it so you understand.

But unfortunately here you are claiming not to even know what the tree looks like and saying "we" as if your ignorance is some collective thing. Instead of you learning from those who seem to know more than you, you want to comfort yourself by claiming we are equally as ignorant as one another as if your laziness is contagious!

I can only advise you come to school Shade, and learn, but I have the feeling, or rather, I have the belief that you would rather believe the little you know. We'll see if you turn up in class. No fees required, note.

shadeyinka:
Your anti- believing stand is probably what had cause my Buda to be so closed minded to admit that as humans, we take many major decisions not by knowing but by believing: for in many cases, it is impossible to truely know everything. Hence we take our chances with the incomplete knowledge we have.

This is you being silly. Is it not the believer who has a closed mind and believes so no new learning can enter? Isn't that what you are doing here? Jesus describes such people as "won't learn, and would not let those who would learn", and Amujale describes your sort here. Read my response to him to know how I view people who think like he has described you to be please. If you know you do not truly know something, why would you stop learning and just believe the little you know?

You said scientists believe in the form of hypotheses. They then test their hypothesis to derive knowledge. If they stop seeking and just believe the little they have discovered, would they learn?

That is how we learn, Shade, by constantly testing our hypothesis and beliefs about life, and every minute of everyday. That is what Adam and Eve is written to have done in the Garden of Eden to free themselves from slavery. Jesus spent his entire life challenging the beliefs of his contemporaries and was crucified for doing so and he asks those who would follow him to pick up the same cross, ergo, do exactly the same as he did and challenge beliefs.

If you just believe you will not grow and Amujale will be correct about you.

shadeyinka:
I hope you will reconsider your vehement opposition to Believing and instead, encourage critical thinking on information and knowledge before taking a position of Believing based on incomplete information and knowledge. Of course, knowledge too should be filtered!

Sounds like you will benefit from my thread on Critical Thinking. It will at least inform you on my view on the topic instead of you ignorantly believing the incomplete information you seem to believe about me.

You really need to stop arguing with yourself. No one is claiming the Bible is history. It is mythology. Go look up the meaning and learn. Neither is anyone conquering you with it. You can read it to oppress yourself if you want to or understand it and free yourself, the choice is yours, after all, you must have heard the adage "know your enemy".

I can't understand how you would read it and become a slave unless you do not really understand what you read. Perhaps you need to be honest with us Amu and confess you never bothered reading it becaise you are afraid it will enslave you. Or perhaps you are the ignorant one here who does not understand that mythology is not history.

That said, the Bible starts off with a story of a tribe freeing themselves from slavery. Adam and Eve were slaves in the Garden of Eden and freed themselves from slavery by acquiring knowledge. It continues with another story about Moses freeing the Israelites from slavery. And it contains stories about a man called Jesus who taught people to free themselves from the slavery of ignorance, a lesson you would most definitely benefit from since you seem to be enslaved by your ignorant understanding.

"Love your neighbours" is not "malicious tools of foreign extremist ideologies", but a lesson taught in most decent societies. You should try it and see how better the world around you would become instead of constantly spewing the vitriol and hatred that seems to consume you. You'd be being the change you want to see if you do try loving those around you.

Amujale:
For the umpteenth time, the Christian bible isn't a history textbook.

In all reality, the Abrahamic religious text are malicious tools of conquerors, manufactured specifically for those reasons.

You obviously don't take to learning well.

One cannot say you're ignorant of the truth, therefore it boils down to the fact that you're content in deceiving yourself, that's on you dude.

When it's all said and done, all those who are privy to the facts and intentionally perpetuate those fakery and falsehood shall be condemned by history.

Instead of you to use all that you ought to have learnt to make our world a better place, you choose to proactively does the bidding of these malicious tools of foreign extremist ideologies.

Op, see as you lie about the date and claimed it is real as if na you take the picture. Shame on you!

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna336881

9jaRealist:
HORRIBLE advice - a single lady turning up at a yahoo boys’ party. SMH
Meanwhile. It’s okay to “look down your nose” at criminals - whether they’re your neighbors or live at Aso Rock!
>

I've borrowed from Tobest94 for you.

Tobest94:
Instead of you calling them to a serious meeting and frankly sort things out..Just say that they are oppressing you by spending your monthly salary in a day

MrPresident1:
You all betrayed your country, you all Biden lackeys

Revelation 12:9
And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

Better than being a deplorable maga with yiur head up Trump 's ass.

www.nairaland.com/attachments/13151758_20200527134643181_jpeg_jpeg25c6aabe635f7f75d0f95919bee5d3c6

Where's your compatriot oladeẹgbu? He's been missing since your messiah trump got kicked out.