The existence of HELL

[CellarDweller]

[Jake]

If we continue...

In the novel from Maurice Druon the accursed king, Maurice romance a little the whole situation where Marigny was deliberately delaying the conclave "the process of electing a pope" so he could prove it's innocence to the king, because you understand that the influence of Charles de Valois was too strong on the young king Louis 10th. We have no historical proof that he in fact coerced bishops to delay the election of a pope... but he sure did influenced it and Charles was aware of it and accused him of delaying the conclave alongsides with 40 additional accusations all related to the former administration.

However, there is proof that for Louis 10th needed a pope to be de-married to Marguerite. In the novel Jacques Dueze is presented like a quite old but yet very sharped minded bishop. He is 71 years old, and has been writing several essays on hell and purgatory. He was considered a very eccentric bishop, he knew how to play with monarchs and was adhering to the "I scratch your back, you'll scratch mine" saying. Now you would ask why it took me so long to bring him to the play... Well, because you guys need entertainment right and so do I LOL. I may have many children and a lovely husband but they to do their own stuff... LOL

In the novel Dueze have played a little game to finally be elected... Which pushed me to do further research on him because I found that this was funny; he cons the whole conclave by pretending to be sick and dying so the others would just vote for him and replace him as soon as he died. Basically the whole conclave story of 1300 could also be another novel all by itself. When the conclave screamed Abemous Papal they had no idea that Jacques Dueze was going to be 18 years pope.

In the last years of John's pontificate there arose a dogmatic conflict about the Beatific Vision, which was brought on by himself, and which his enemies made use of to discredit him. Before his elevation to the Holy See, he had written a work on this question, in which he stated that the souls of the blessed departed do not see God until after the Last Judgment. After becoming pope, he advanced the same teaching in his sermons. In this he met with strong opposition, many theologians, who adhered to the usual opinion that the blessed departed did see God before the Resurrection of the Body and the Last Judgment, even calling his view heretical.

When I was a student at university of Paris, I had access to very interesting writings made by Bishop Dueze which Rome never was able to destroy or remove since universities were very good at keeping their own archives.

Bishop Dueze's vision was that when you die you are not immediately presented to God for your judgement, basically he was pretty much saying that it doesn't matter what you have been doing during your life you're not going to be judge for it right away. This means that your soul will be loitering in Limbo until the last judgement occurs. In short, he was going against everything the clergy were trying to teach because Dueze was directly saying that you shouldn't be scared of hell because there's no hell. You do not get thrown immediately to hell for having been a bad little human being.

Now go back to that post where I refer to ZOROASTER, you do realize that Dueze have made several references in its works to it. I will try my best to find one of Dueze's texts, but unfortunately what I have read at University of Paris may have well been a fake. But one cannot be certain. But this just proves that, even the highest representatives of christian faith aren't always following the bible word by words. I could name many others, but Bishop Dueze who appears in my favorite novel happened to be a real character, were the stories was pretty much realistic.

That's it for now.

[MikeW]

History is all Game of Thronsey, ain't it! LOL.

[Jake]

History is all Game of Thronsey, ain't it! LOL.

Hell yeah, I was the only one not sleeping when we had history courses... and well our teacher was young and very appetizing. I was 15 and considered 40 being young LOL I was one odd teenager LOL.

[Bhp91126]

Fascinating reads, Mike and Jake. Thank you very much.

[Jake]

What Is Consciousness?

Now Mike you have opened a very interesting can of worms here and since you are asking the question can you believe you could be hypnotized? and what's your take on it?

[MikeW]

...Before his elevation to the Holy See, he had written a work on this question, in which he stated that the souls of the blessed departed do not see God until after the Last Judgment. After becoming pope, he advanced the same teaching in his sermons. In this he met with strong opposition… )

Thank you, Jake for all you have written. Very intertwining in deed!

I haven't much profound to say about it but I do have perhaps, an odd personal anecdote.

My parents were Southern Baptists but the farm I grew up on wasn't as close to the Baptist Church they belonged to as the Presbyterian church just down the road, in a little (very, very little) town. My two older sisters preferred going to church there not for any particular 'religious' reason, merely social. It's where all the other local girls went. So, as a boy growing up, sometimes I was taken to the Presbyters by my sisters and the Baptists by my folks. But the attitude seemed to be there wasn't much difference so it didn't matter *that much* which you went to, *so long as you went*. Sometimes, too, the whole family would be in one or the other. As kid I much preferred the Presbyters; a bit less fire, and brimstone and guilt tripping the congregation for their sins (and there were many, little did I yet know).

Fast forward a lot of years, past the Baptist Church burning to the ground as I stood astride my bicycle at age 12 on the day I was to have been Baptized, solo. RIght on through to high school age now and beginning to wander far afield in my thinking about religion in general. At some point--the exact circumstances evade me--I find myself having a conversation with the Presbyterian Minister (not the same one I knew as a child, they changed for various reasons at one time and another, this was a relatively new one who didn't know me or my family well). In the midst of this conversation, which was rather meandering, he said something that has always stuck with me. He was talking about this very question, but from a slightly different angle. He was saying that some believed that you were taken to heaven as soon as you died but others believed that all that didn't happen until the Second Coming. I don't remember how he identified these contending ideas, who was right, wrong, or what. What I do remember is asking, "What difference does it make?" -- and the horrified expression on his face when I asked it! LOL

[MikeW]

Now Mike you have opened a very interesting can of worms here and since you are asking the question can you believe you could be hypnotized? and what's your take on it?

Oh, lord, now you want me to get all serious again and I *was* having so much fun. :frown:

Of course, not only *can* we be hypnotized most of us are most of the time one way and another. *Hypnosis* is the actual state of humankind. I don't want to get all "Matrix" on you




or whatever, just saying, even Plato spoke of the shadows on the wall and what the earlier poets and mystics like Parmenides and Empedocles had to say about it is far stranger still. They describe Reality in the ancient tongue of myth and make it clear that what *we* are experiencing ain't it.

I allowed one man to attempt hypnosis on me many years ago. This was in a therapeutic situation and I trusted him. However, in this instance, my mind would not let go. So, it didn't work (exactly) on me. However, occasionally I catch glimpses of how it works in me on a more or less on-going basis. You can think about it in terms of habits, which can also be seen as personal 'rituals'. We engage our attention in things that we find meaningful or pleasurable or both; entertaining. Language itself has hints within it such as the dual definition of the word "spell" (as in casting a spell as well as getting all the little magic symbols lined up in order so they 'make sense'.)

What I'm saying is, I see verbal communication in general (and especially reading the written word) a form of hypnotic entrancement.

[MikeW]

Oh, and since no one is replying right away, I'll add my little motto, garnered from having rubbed elbows a few times with the black-wraparound-sunglases crowd: "Whoever controls your perception of reality, controls you." Fleshing that out a bit… Whatever you believe to be true will be the basis upon which you make your life decisions, whether it *is* true or not.

[MikeW]

Mike and Jake, perhaps the little birds are too busy reading to make much in the way of posts. I know this little bird read quite a bit so far. As well, perhaps the little birds said whatever they had to say. *grins happily*
Chirp chirp!

There is an old folktale regarding this. I'm so lame I won't remember exactly how it goes. Essentially, though, there was a time when the horse-drawn wagons would lumber down the street making all kinds of noises and the birds in the trees would always land in their wake, searching for seed that had fallen from the horses food pouch. As time went on men changed and no longer drove wagons with horses. They still made a lot of noise and the birds still came down to the street to eat but, alas for them, there was no seed.