While discussing the difference between religion and spirituality, my nine-year-old asked me a profoundly philosophical question: “If Heaven is paradise, with nothing bad in it… how can anyone appreciate it, and know that it’s good?” Several weeks removed from that afternoon, her question still hangs with me. The fact is we define reality indirectly, by comparing objects, experience, and events to their opposites. We know “up,” because we understand “down.” Good as it relates to bad, pleasure to pain, hot to cold, and so on. Therefore, in order to comprehend or appreciate Heaven, one must simultaneously experience Hell. A condition wholly unattainable while one exists in a state of blissful paradise. Essentially, the concept of Heaven through its own design negates itself.
This theory has been brought to you courtesy of my daughter; “The Sage.”
25 comments:
Unless Heaven is the condition of being able to experience something without fearing (or hoping for) its opposite.
Actually, this question is no more no less that the beggining of seing heaven and hell are one and the same.
And then - I find it obviously - that is not something to be found after the end of life, but is this very life.
Dave, find a way to record one way or another all this chats with your child. At least a short resume of and bold those "unespected" questions - like this one.
Trust me, there will be a time when she will be gratefull to you for this.
Valentin
ps : two post bellow, Dave, the one you ended with Imagine by J. Lennon ... hope you`ll "like" the link I inserted into comments :-P
PitS,
For that to be the case, along with our physical bodies, we would also need to relinquish all cognitive function as we currently know it. We wouldn't just be losing fear and hope. Love and hate comes to mind. An eternal existence of numb mediocrity in the blandest sense.
In that regard, the concept of Heaven as reward is flawed.
Val,
I agree. Heaven and Hell can only be defined by the living, and they are concepts that can only exist in the "here and now."
That's a good idea. We have boxes and more boxes full of her art and school work, but nothing documenting her evolution of thought. Maybe I will write about her more through this blog, and she can someday look at it here.
I believe we would experience heaven in contrast to our earthly experience.
However, that is based on how I look at the concept of Soul and Spirit. further, within the Christian tradition, we don't hang around heaven too long anyway, we come to a new earth ruled by Christ.
I'm just saying...
Adam,
Interesting, never heard it said that way. The brand of Christianity I was raised with (Baptist) used to teach that your spirit went to reside in Heaven. A place of golden palaces and pure bliss.
@Dave:
I understand. I often talk to Christians who are not clear on what the Bible communicates about "Heaven". Scripture indicates, that at best "Christians" reside in Heaven (the Home of God and the angelic host) for a short time (after a Christian's death until the final judgement) after which Christians the return to earth in perfected physical bodies and live in the "Kingdom of God".
Heaven's glory in Judeo Christian terms is that because of the presence of God, sometimes the Biblical writers spoke of the grandeur of heaven in reference to Gold streets, etc., however, that may have been hyperbole of the author to try to contrast Heaven from Earth.
Heaven is primarily the abode of the Most High God and His host, not really an equivelent to a place of paridise and reward per se.
Anywho...
See, I didn't mean Heaven as a reward, but Heaven as an existing, but hidden state of mind. I meant the idea that once we learn to ignore opposites and embrace all the possible results of our actions we can experience Heaven. And the reward of finding Heaven is inner peace rather than getting to live on a cloud after death with a bunch of naked dudes playing harps.
Adam,
Weren't the authors in direct communication with God while they were writing the bible? It is supposedly "the" word of God. Not sure hyperbole or metaphor would be possible, if that were true. Unless the metaphors were coming directly from God, because It figured that the human mind was not capable of fathoming directly.
If Heaven is not described as a place of paradise and reward, something one works towards in life, how do you define it, Adam?
What of the other religions that promise eternal reward? The Judeo-Christian faith is not alone in this. Throughout the evolution of religion there have been certain concepts central to them all. Consequence and reward, "Hell and Heaven"...
You're the first person I've ever heard assert that Heaven is not a reward.
PitS,
I like that idea, very much! That is similar to what I've been trying to explain to my daughter. That spirituality and religion are separate. That somewhere along the line spirituality was abducted by religion, and twisted to suit the needs of those who would seek to control the masses through pre-fab ideology. This connects to what Adam is saying about how religious texts should not be taken literally.
@Dave:
The Bible contains Hyperbole, Metaphor, simile, narrative, etc. Unless the author says "Thus saith the Lord" it generally isn't a "word for word" per se from God. It really isn't as complicated as some folks would like to make it, the Bible is to be taken literal, when it is saying something that IS literal, however many things are not to be taken literal and are communicated in a way that makes that pretty clear (often people ignore that).
The ideas and information often shared with humans is through humans in a way that humans can understand, so you may be correct in saying that perhaps God wanted humasn to undertsand things in terms they could grasp. Jesus often used Metaphor to give the APostles and others an understanding of what he was saying when it was in essense "beyond" them at a given point in time.
Our reward as Christians is eternal life in the Kingdom of God on a New earth, Heaven is the place where God dwells and the angelic host, and until the judgement, the spirits and souls of Christians who have died reside there (as I understand it from my reading or Revelation).