Re: Islam and Europe

From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Fri 22 Nov 2002 - 03:53:38 GMT

  • Next message: Jon Gilbert: "Re: Islam and Europe"

    >>
    >>The TRUTH of today's world is a different meme than the TRUTH that comes
    >>to us through religion. Only one of them prepares us to face the world of
    >>the 21st century, and it's not religious TRUTH.
    >>
    >>Grant
    >
    >Your notion of what "religious TRUTH" is, is itself a meme.
    >
    >I would argue, from my memetic constructs, that true religion is the
    >ability to find the truth for yourself with the aid of religious texts,
    >which contain the clues left behind by those who have travelled the path.
    >But if you lack the fundamental question that illuminates the esoteric
    >meaning in religious texts and renders them "alive," then you are
    >interfacing with those texts on an exoteric level that sees them in terms
    >of logic and analysis, comparison and evaluation. Fundamental human
    >experience is the same now as before; that is not to venerate the past, but
    >it is also not to discount the value of wisdom. Life is what you make it,
    >and so are religious texts. When you approach something to discover the
    >truth hidden in it, the contradictions that are revealed are in yourself,
    >not in the text. Then you smile at your own imperfection.
    >
    >Language itself -- religious texts themselves -- do not contain memes.
    >Memes are formed by your interpretation of the text, i.e. the integration
    >of that text into your existing belief-space, related to your existing
    >memetic constructs. Dreams can introduce memes to you; from where do they
    >originate?
    >
    >JS Gilbert
    >
    >"ekei eimi en meswi autwn"

    Then are you saying that memes are not transmitted through language? Or if they are transmitted from one generation to another, how? Where do the memes of religion come from if not through language? Are they recreated by each of us as we read the texts of the past? Is what we get from the texts only from our own minds and not from the people who wrote the texts?

    I'd say it's a bit of both rather than only one or the other. But that's my point of view.

    Grant

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