Quote from stu:
"Spiritually made in God's image". I ask again, what do you mean to say by the word spiritually?
It contradicts Genesis 1 and you have to assume contrary connections between - in God's image then - not in God's image - then in and not in God's image at the same time.
"Spiritually", in this case means
by faith.
So man is about as spiritual as a puff of smoke.
But faith in the mind of the Son of God is not without power.
It can make mountains and unmake them, instantly. Just ask
ratboy.
Genesis makes the Son of God look bad because it takes so long to build the world. Six days? C'mon! Only the "devil" would take so long to build something so shabby. Then it wears him out so he has to "retire". Talk about milking it for all it's worth!
The Son of God is able to make this world in a single instant with no more significance than a green flash at sunset. If you weren't looking for it, you wouldn't see it.
Genesis gets goofy because the world is a goofy idea. Taken seriously for a split second, then laughed off as an absurd, tiny, mad idea.
In a single instant, the world of time and all it holds was made
simultaneously. That is the power of faith in the mind of the Son of God.
Sequence of any sort is an illusion. So Genesis is about building the illusion of time within the mind of the "faithful".
It works so well, that no one who believes Genesis believes he is the Son of God. In fact, you can read the entire bible and not "get" that you are the Son who makes this world.
Thus, Genesis is a faith-based accoutrement used for maintaining a world built on faith. It demands your allegiance. It compels you to bow down to an idol.
A book rises to support the idol and give it praise. The book itself is idolized, given lips, and told to speak. It's oracles are all in support of worldly ideals...death, attack, conflict, separation, sacrifice and laws not of God.
The book stumbles upon the truth occasionally...just enough to
really confuse the mind. And why not? It is written by confused minds which contain both truth and illusions within them.
Let it be known that the Spirit of truth is available to anyone with a mind and a pen. I did not give to the apostles anything they did not already have. I "gave" them awareness of it by way of reminder.
Let me remind you that Truth is made welcome in the mind by invitation and welcome. Welcome it by gratefulness.
Truth does not recognize any hierarchy . Truth is not passed on from one hand to another. Truth is
remembered. As such, I am just a reminder. Forgetfulness can never change your status as the Son of God.
Let us not marvel then, that the bible contains both truth and illusion. It is written by the Son of God in his various states of delusion, sometimes breaking through to clarity of thought. Any truth within it is inspired by the Holy Spirit. All else is of the ego, that thinking mechanism that makes this world and embeds it's faith-based patterns in the minds of all men, its robotic toys.
Jesus