(12-08-2011, 01:10 AM)zenmaster Wrote:

(12-06-2011, 10:00 PM)fr33d0m Wrote: First you spend much of life trying to learn and understand as much as you can. Finally, you realize, you don't need to know or understand anything, and you just BE. Oneness. Love. ...Leap! -The Fool

Problem is, we are not alone here and have a responsibility to ourselves and others to 'be' in a manner that requires learning (about ourselves and others) in order to balance. Whether or not someone still thinks they 'need' to know or to understand as if it were somehow in opposition to beingness, is another issue.

(12-08-2011, 06:30 PM)Observer Wrote: Mystery is awesome!
After all, without mystery we wouldn't have nearly as much literature!
But yes, I do agree with 99% of statements made here. And I thank you all for the great read.

(04-07-2011, 09:32 AM)3DMonkey Wrote: Here is a list of Ra references to mystery and its importance for contemplation and discussion. I tried to shorten it without removing context.

97.9 ... To put this into perspective we must gaze then at the stunning mystery of the One Infinite Creator. The archetypical mind does not resolve any paradoxes or bring all into unity. This is not the property of any source which is of the third-density. Therefore, may we ask the student to look up from inward working and behold the glory, the might, the majesty, the mystery, and the peace of oneness. Let no consideration of bird or beast, darkness or light, shape or shadow keep any which seeks from the central consideration of unity.

28.15 ... it has been impressed upon us by our own teachers that there is a mystery-clad unity of creation in which all consciousness periodically coalesces and again begins. Thus we can only say we assume an infinite progression though we understand it to be cyclical in nature and, as we have said, clad in mystery.

(10-20-2011, 12:50 PM)godwide_void Wrote: I believe when Ra speaks of mystery he simply means that the true processes, essence, and nature of the Creator is unknown. We all grasp that we stem from the godhead, and that it has created a very complex system of Creation, but exactly HOW this is all done remains obfuscated. How can an entity dissipate into trillions upon trillions of individuated aspects of itself? How can all simultaneously be aware, and be assisted, and program various facets of their existence? How does all Creation arise, waltz, coalesce, assimilate itself, and ultimately rebirth itself? Nobody, nobody at all, can accurately describe these processes, we may only acknowledge them as being functions and laws of existence.

I also find it particularly badass when Ra says "All things begin and end in mystery."

(05-03-2012, 11:31 AM)Ruth Wrote: It still fills me with a sense of wonder and awe to watch a seed that I put in some dirt last week, have kept wet and under a grow light, suddenly pops through the soil as a plant that will make food for me to eat.

To me, that is still a mystery!

Do you think Creators thinks of us all as these tiny seeds that can, given the right circumstances, grow up to become something or other (like a squash or a bean), filled with seeds that can repeat that process?

Quote:Infinity

Gregory's second main contribution is his spiritual theology. He is the first Christian theologian to argue for the infinity of God. Origen, often called a major influence on Gregory, had explicitly argued that God is limited, an essential notion in Platonism, since to be limited is to be clearly defined and knowable. Gregory, however, argues that if God is limited he must be limited by something greater than himself; he is therefore without boundaries. The idea had already been developed by neoplatonic philosophers, especially Plotinus, another important influence on Gregory, but he is the first Christian to defend it, apart from some hints in the work of Irenaeus.

Accordingly, Gregory argues that since God is infinite he cannot be comprehended. In contrast, Origen had spoken of the spiritual journey as a progression of increasing illumination, as the mystic studies Scripture and comes to learn more about God.

Stages

Gregory speaks of three stages of spiritual progression: initial darkness or ignorance, then spiritual illumination, and finally a darkness of the mind in contemplation of the God who cannot be comprehended. (See apophatic theology.)

Like earlier authors, including the Jewish Philo of Alexandria, he uses the story of Moses as an allegory for the spiritual life. Moses first meets God in the burning bush, a theophany of light and illumination, but then he meets him again in the cloud, where he realizes that God cannot be seen by the eyes. Ascending Mount Sinai, he finally comes to the "divine darkness", and realizes that God cannot be known by the mind either.

It is only through not-knowing and not-seeing that God can, paradoxically, be known and seen. This notion would be extremely influential in both Western and Eastern spirituality, via the mystical writings of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. Thus he is a major figure in the history of apophatic theology and spirituality.

Epektasis

Related to this is Gregory's idea of epektasis or constant progress. Platonic philosophy said that stability is perfection and change is for the worse; in contrast, Gregory described the ideal of human perfection as constant progress in virtue and godliness. In Gregory’s theology, God himself has always been perfect and has never changed, and never will. Humanity fell from grace in the Garden of Eden, but rather than return to an unchanging state, humanity's goal is to become more and more perfect, more like God, even though humanity will never understand, much less attain, God's transcendence. This idea has had a profound influence on the Eastern Orthodox teaching regarding theosis or "divinization".

Gregory also taught that while it cannot be known whether or not all humans will be saved, as Origen speculated, faithful Christians may hope and pray for the salvation of all, even after death. He thus presents a hopeful alternative to those theologies, such as that of Augustine, which state that at least some, of necessity, will be eternally condemned to hell.

(OrthodoxWiki)