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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 31, 2010 - 11:31am PT
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Binks wrote
Like or not, some people deserve a punch in the face or worse. After that's taken care "forgiveness" can be more philosophical.
Deserving a punch is not an excuse for delivering a punch. Looking at the childhood of people I know who have been terribly violent, it seems they have had violence done to them. The cycle has to stop somewhere
Peace
Karl
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Binks
Social climber
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Mar 31, 2010 - 01:42pm PT
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New MIT research supports the magical theory I posted:
"A grand unified theory of AI"
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/ai-unification.html
the magic trick is saying, ‘No, no, just tell me a few things,’ and then the brain — or in this case the Church system, hopefully somewhat analogous to the way the mind does it — can churn out, using its probabilistic calculation, all the consequences and inferences. And also, when you give the system new information, it can figure out the consequences of that.”
This is the magical mode. They funny thing is this stuff has been known for years by people who understand magical thinking. The scientists are always playing catch up.
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jstan
climber
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Mar 31, 2010 - 01:51pm PT
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A synergy exists between the Far Right and the Devoutly Religious. It existed even before Richard M. Nixon married the two with his Southern Strategy. In their messianic enthusiasm they both lack the ability to question themselves and lack the inclination carefully to weigh the pro’s and con’s. Their world is utterly simple. Black or white. Right or wrong. No question missing an answer. Doubt has been cast out.
Something as complex as christ’s urging to forgive and to turn the other cheek cannot be grasped. It is a topsy turvy world. Christians become pagans. Pagans become true Christians. A field of stumps becomes a Healthy Forest. And words of hatred are voiced by persons gazing lovingly upward.
It’s insane.
In war, a people can become a mirror image of those they hate. We invaded Iraq and killed Iraqi so that they might have democracy and not be tortured. We were willing to torture them so that they might not be tortured. Before each waterboarding did our people tell their captives, “This is going to hurt me more than it will hurt you”? Had they, for once, it would have been the truth.
It at least seems we have advanced the hypothesis that some persons are able to face a question; are able to face uncertainty. And others are not. That there are two permanently alienated populations and victory must be won. And we must not accept any questions as to the manner in which that victory is to be won.
If we accept this hypothesis, do we not become them?
This concept was voiced 2000 years ago.
It is still true.
Life is messy.
That is the only certainty.
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Binks
Social climber
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Mar 31, 2010 - 01:59pm PT
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The problem is simply dualism. The way out is subversion of both sides. Try other modes of thought like trinity and quadraplicity on for size.
Quadraplicity view of the overly simple contentious dualism of American politics:
"x" Axis: Social liberal------Social Conservative
"y" Axis: Fiscal liberal------Fiscal Conservative
Now we have an analytical mode where you can plot a position in 4 quadrants and thinking become introspective and categorical but much harder to created directly oppositional thinking.
For instance on the x axis I find myself farther to the left, but on the y axis farther to the right. So the dualism of left\ right is destroyed. I find I must manipulate and subvert both sides to insure adequate creative movement forward.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 31, 2010 - 04:21pm PT
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Pate -- "Physical violence is never acceptable in any way."
Next time you're in for surgery tell that to the doctor before he makes his incision.
"A warrior's duty is to protect the citizens from all kinds of difficulties, and for that reason he has to apply violence in suitable cases for law and order."
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go-B
climber
This side of Heaven
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http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons/90-393
Reasons to Forgive, Part 1
Selected Scriptures
Code: 90-393
I want to talk to you tonight and next Sunday night about the issue of forgiveness. It probably doesn’t come up as often as it should in our discussions from the pulpit here because it is a very, very important issue. What makes it an important issue in the church, and we’re talking to believers tonight, we’re not so much talking about God’s forgiveness toward us as we’re talking about our forgiveness toward each other. But it is a very vital and a very essential and a very necessary component of life in the church because the church, even at its best, is a collision of sinners. We all understand that. We are guilty of saying the wrong thing, and behaving in wrong ways. We have all offended people. We have all caused people to stumble. We have all crossed the line of discretion into indiscretion and the way we deal with people and treat people. We have all showed preferential treatment at times. We have all been less than considerate to people in need. We have failed to give to folks what they need at the time they need it. There are many, many points at which sinners collide in the church. And because the church is a very intimate fellowship, only to be exceeded in its intimacy by family, we borrow that image, don’t we?, the image of a family. We are seen as God’s family and the intimacy then throws us together and we crash into each other and our weaknesses are made manifest and so we are guilty from time to time of offending.
It then becomes essential to the ongoing life of the church, the ongoing joy of believers that we be able to deal with those offenses with an attitude of forgiveness...of forgiveness. In the end, what finally destroys every relationship is an inability to forgive. It isn’t the offense that destroys the relationship, it is the inability to forgive that destroys the relationship. Offenses will come. Even our Lord said that. Offenses will come. That’s part of living life in a fallen world and dealing even in the church with the people who have not yet been perfected. How we deal with those offenses is what determines the nature of our relationship. It is that way in a marriage. It is that way in a family. It is that way among friends. It is certainly that way in the church.
Not only is this matter of forgiveness essential to the cohesiveness of the church, as it is to the family and to marriage, not only is this the path to joy and satisfaction and fulfillment in the family and in the church, that is collectively, but the inability to forgive not only destroys relationship, it destroys the people who don’t forgive. It is not only destructive of relationships, it is self-destructive. And Scripture makes it very, very clear that where there is a lack of forgiveness, there will develop bitterness and out of bitterness come hatred and couple with hatred comes anger and the end of hatred and anger and bitterness is the pursuit of vengeance. Retaliation is sought and retaliation is never satisfied and vengeance is never really appeased and consequently people live with the bitterness and it is deeper and deeper as they live with it longer.
We live in a society that has made a virtue...or tried to make a virtue out of vindictiveness. Three out of every four attorneys on the planet live in America. They have to be here in order to take up all the litigation that comes from angry, bitter people wanting to get every piece of flesh they can get out of anybody who has stepped across the line, into the offense zone.
Even psychologists have said that forgiveness is not healthy. That’s right. Forgiveness is not healthy. You don’t need to carry around that offense. You need to get resolution and the best way to get resolution is to be vindictive. Years ago I read a popular book called Toxic Parents and in this book Toxic Parents the author has a chapter entitled, “You don’t have to forgive.” She says that children who have been offended by the behavior of their parents must not forgive their parents, they must heap on their parents full blame for their present problems because their parents poisoned them by their toxicity. And so she suggests that the new cry should be, “I am the victim, it’s not my fault, I’m not responsible, my parents did it to me.”
Guilt for everything is pushed off on someone else and vengeance needs to be not only exalted but exhausted. However, the price of vengeance is extremely high..extremely high. An unforgiving attitude, a bitterness that runs deep, a desire for vengeance that comes out of vindictiveness or hate, or anger, will do several things. Number one, it imprisons people in their past. This is the price of an unforgiving heart. It imprisons people in their past. As long as people will not forgive, as long as people will not put the past in the past, but continue to seek an unfulfilled level of vengeance, they are shackled to their past. They are shackled to that past event. The pain of that event is fed. It is not only kept alive, it is fed until it becomes larger and larger.
Another way to look at it is, if you don’t forgive things that have happened in the past, you continue to pick at an open sore, you keep it from healing, you enlarge it, you sentence yourself to the future feeling worse than you felt in the past when it happened. You choose to love hate and hate dominates.
This unforgiveness then produces bitterness. It becomes an infection and it is malignant, it harasses, it creates distorted memories which create a distorted view of life. Anger becomes out of control. Emotions become unchecked. People entertain ideas about revenge, every conversation becomes a forum for slandering the people who have supposedly harmed you so profoundly. Every conversation becomes an opportunity for defamation, exaggeration and outright lies.
On the other hand, forgiveness frees a person from both of these categories of tragedy. Forgiveness frees you to enjoy all relationships and to live with peace and tranquility in your own heart. Forgiveness is a very freeing reality.
Now Scripture exalts forgiveness for these reasons and for the one greater reason and that is forgiveness honors God. And I’ll get to that in a moment. But as far as I can tell, in the Bible there are at least 75 word pictures of forgiveness. Relax, I’m not giving you all 75 of them. But there are at least 75 figures of speech, or analogies that are used in Scripture as word pictures of forgiveness. Here are a few.
To forgive is to turn the key, open the cell door and let the prisoner free.
To forgive is to write in large letters across a debt, “Nothing Owed.”
To forgive is to pound the gavel in a courtroom and declare the person, “Not Guilty.”
To forgive is to shoot an arrow so high and so far that it can never be retrieved.
To forgive is to take out the garbage and dispose of it, leaving the house fresh and clean.
To forgive is to loose the anchor and set the ship free to sail.
Again, a few more biblical pictures.
To forgive is to grant a full pardon to a condemned and sentenced criminal.
To forgive is to loosen a stranglehold on a wrestling opponent.
To forgive is to sandblast a wall of graffiti leaving it brand new.
To forgive is to smash a clay pot into a thousand pieces so it can never be put together again.
These are biblical pictures of forgiveness, very instructive. Forgiveness is a marvelous, virtuous, liberating, loving attitude and act. It makes sense to forgive. It is healthy. It is wholesome. It is sensible. It is freeing. It brings peace. It engenders love. That is why Proverbs 19:11 says, “A man’s foolishness is not to forgive. It is folly.”....cond.-part#1
Part#2. http://www.gty.org/Shop/Audio+Lessons/90-394_Reasons-to-Forgive-Part-2
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WBraun
climber
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On the battle field the soldier will forgive after the bullet enters between the enemies eyes .....
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Binks
Social climber
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There are three applicable types combining in different formations. Each one of these would "forgive" quite differently in isolation or in combination.
cop = force for order\morality
hooligan = unregulated energy for its own sake (amoral\disorder)
holyman = can be wise, but is an idealist. largely actionless
So there are two active principle and one passive.
When two of the three become united in consciousness without awareness, it creates oppositions.
cop + hooligan = soldier (force for an order driven by otherwise unregulated energy)
hooligan + holyman = revolutionary (force for change\reorganization driven by idealism)
holyman + cop = gentleman (force applied for an idealogical hierarchy driven by isolation\rejection of those lower on the scale)
Each thing comprised of the other two makes an opponent of the thinking predominating in the remaining third.
Revolutionary opposes Cop. If successful, becomes cop.
Soldier can't stand a pacifist idealist. But after the war is over goes to holyman\idealist for reconciliation.
Gentleman can't stand that hooligan. But the gentleman's garbage which he can't bear to acknowledge is what creates the hooligan.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 28, 2013 - 08:19am PT
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Why do people who have been abused often invite their abuser back into their life? Is it low self esteem? Do they see physical and psychological abuse as attention they are otherwise lacking?
Do they see it as forgiveness?
Forgiveness gone wrong!
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Gary
Social climber
Desolation Basin, Calif.
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Oct 28, 2013 - 11:04am PT
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“But now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony--Forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy?”
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Oct 28, 2013 - 07:04pm PT
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Bravo Karl
I don't buy into the religious bullshit that other people spew, but from an interpersonal and mental health perspective "forgiveness" is very healthy on all kinds of levels.
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Oct 28, 2013 - 07:14pm PT
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Why do people who have been abused often invite their abuser back into their life? Is it low self esteem? Do they see physical and psychological abuse as attention they are otherwise lacking?
Do they see it as forgiveness?
Forgiveness gone wrong!
Hey Jaybro, here's my distillation of what I've learned from various places:
1) We are born with no sense of self. We learn what love means from what we receive from our care-givers at the earliest stage of our lives. Whatever it is that we received becomes the very definition of love.
2) For some unlucky folks, their first programming about what "love" is, well it's pretty messed up: neglect, abandonment, violence, pain, guilt, etc.
3) Some people go through crap and figure out this was all bad initial programming and learn to overcome it and get themselves reprogrammed. Many people don't figure it out, and keep playing the same broken record until the day they die.
4) Take a person deeply scripted in being abused, tell them about the merits of forgiveness ("turn the other cheek"), and you have a recipe for disaster.
That about sums it up.
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WBraun
climber
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Oct 28, 2013 - 07:17pm PT
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Why do people who have been abused often invite their abuser back into their life?
Karma ......
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 28, 2013 - 07:25pm PT
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It can be ! Not so great when it gets you killed, however.....
Where does forgiveness end and submission begin?
Edit; Sadly Werner, I think you're right, a total buzzkill to those of us on the sidelines, rooting for the karmicly challenged team we favor and love!
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MikeL
climber
SANTA CLARA, CA
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Oct 28, 2013 - 07:48pm PT
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They only look different.
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Oct 28, 2013 - 08:42pm PT
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I say submission begins when your inability to accept the circumstances inhibits your sense of joy and happiness.
CASE 1:
A very strong and centered and self-contented person (person A) is treated rudely by another (person B). Person A accepts the behavior of person B with an amused detachment, recognizing the lack of development in person B. Person A loses nothing, and by being patient to accept the crap, they try to teach what is expected of person B, and they give a chance for person B to practice, to recover from their mistake, and change their ways. This is forgiveness. If person B takes advantage of the situation, then person A can forgive them for the trespasses, but would probably avoid being in the situation again.
CASE 2:
A lonely and afraid and needy person (person C) is treated rudely by another (same person B from before). Person C accepts the behavior of person B because they feel powerless to change it, are fearful of something, and the interaction reinforces person C's world view that they are not worth better treatment. This is a pretty negative submission. Person B can continue unchecked in the rude behavior toward person C.
In both cases, the outwardly observable behaviors might be identical in the first interactions, but what's going on inside makes all the difference.
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Oct 28, 2013 - 08:47pm PT
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^^^
Exactly
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Oct 28, 2013 - 08:59pm PT
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There is so much genius in this expression:
grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Such a pithy statement that captures sooooo much, perhaps everything, in relation to this topic.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 28, 2013 - 09:55pm PT
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You nailed it ( what I was talking about anyway) with case #2, nut again!
It's worse though, because person C, in accepting his or her fate attempts to drag down other people, at least some of whom are person A types, down to the c-level of acceptence/resignment. These A-people won't go there, but feeling empathy and compassion for person -c , are collosoally bummed out!
Life is a bitch sometimes!
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 28, 2013 - 10:07pm PT
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I have fantasies like that Tioga, but the non comic book world often does not allow for that.
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