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11438735 No.11438735 [Reply] [Original]

Other than the Bible, what's the best book to learn about God?

>> No.11438748

Dionysus Divine Names

>> No.11438754

>>11438735
Summa Theologica, by Aquinas.
the problem is it is fucking hard, I didn't even finished a book
but its good

>> No.11439204

>>11438735
Lewis' Mere Christianity

Kempis' The Imitation of Christ

>>11438748
>>11438754
these two books are way too advanced for a beginner (which I assume you are, no offence)

>> No.11439210

The Kingdom of God Is Within You

>> No.11439212

>>11439204
not the first post, but the best post

>>11438735
kempis.

>> No.11439226

The Quran

>> No.11439258

>>11438735
My diary desu
because it's basically the Book of Job :(

>> No.11439261
File: 45 KB, 381x540, fee566eab1910bb4ae6c05cb4f203034.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11439261

>>11438735
The Brothers Karamazov

>> No.11439693
File: 20 KB, 256x300, lao_tzu.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11439693

The Dao De Jing attributed to Lao Tzu

>> No.11439703

>>11439693
WHAT IF
*TAKES FAT TOKE*
THE TAO THAT CAN BE SPOKEN
*RIPS THE BONG?*
IS NOT THE REAL TAO

>> No.11439708

>>11438735
Read life of the saints, to see some examples of the righteous path.

>> No.11439713

>>11439703
You're only harming yourself with such an attitude.

>> No.11439717

>>11439703
What if
*Acne intensifies*
Le epic strawman

>> No.11439728

>>11439713
>>11439717
I actually love the Tao Te Ching. I just wanted to shitpost

>> No.11439743

>>11438754
>>11439204
read either summa contra gentiles, made for us mere mortals (specifically non-belivers aka gentiles, obviously) to understand or concise summa, written by st thomas himself, a 400pg summa theologicae
jumping straight into a 5000 pages, extremely dense theological text as a intro is suicide

>> No.11439861

Saint Augustine’s Confessions duh

>> No.11439953
File: 25 KB, 331x550, dumitru-staniloaie-cel-mai-mare-teolog-roman.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11439953

>>11438735

An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith
by St John of Damascus

Theology and the Church, by Fr. Dumitru Staniloae

This is fantastic^^^STaniloae is a genius and understands other religions and non-christian philosophies extremely well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumitru_St%C4%83niloae

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsDk0M-AE1k

For practice, devotion and purification:

The Philokalia (mandatory)
The Pilgrims Way
Imitation of Christ
Abiding in Christ, by Andrew Murray
Purity of Heart, by Kierkegaard

>> No.11439977

The Bhagavad Gita

>> No.11439980

>>11439708
This

>> No.11440085
File: 5 KB, 225x224, 1516430224539.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11440085

>>11439977
Brahman is just the hellenic impersonal Monad with some nonsensical fan-fiction imposed on it.

>>11439693
Impersonal, indifferent voids aren't God.

>> No.11440115

a history of god by karen armsrong

>> No.11440317

>>11439953
best in this thread

>> No.11440414

>>11439258
You haven't suffered anything close to what Job did. Get on your knees and praise God; stop writing about your petty problems in a diary.

>> No.11440423

>>11438735
The Greeks and it's gods not God.

>> No.11440452
File: 92 KB, 1280x720, Satania 30.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11440452

No book can teach you about the FUTURE DEMON KING SATANIA MUHAHAHAHA

>> No.11440535
File: 245 KB, 1200x920, liber novus.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11440535

The Red Book
>You lived your own life, but men fail to do so; instead they pray to you and make demands on you and forever remind you that your work is incomplete. Yet your work would be completed if men managed to live their own lives without imitation.
>The time has come when each must do his own work of redemption. Mankind has grown older and a new month has begun.

>> No.11440577

>>11438754
The problem with the summa is that although it's for Christianity, it's especially for Catholicism, and so alienates Eastern theology.

>> No.11440591

>>11440085
Brahman precedes hellenic culture and was influential on it. See: alexanders conquest of asia minor and pyrrho's plagiarism of the srmana. In my opinion books are the wrong way to go.

>> No.11440595

>>11440577
>>11438754
it is specifically western,and therefore extremely brainlet

>> No.11440986

>>11438735
>>>/x/

>> No.11441324

>>11438735
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Part 6, Stone Ocean
Although you ought to read the first 5 parts for better understanding.

>> No.11441362

>>11441324
OP said God, not gayness.

>> No.11441374

Plato, Plotinus

>> No.11441852

Most related thread I found. I am reading the Gospel of Thomas. It reads at one point:

>Jesus says:
>(1) “Look, a sower went out. He filled his hands (with seeds), (and) he scattered (them).
>(2) Some fell on the path, and the birds came and pecked them up.
>(3) Others fell on the rock, and did not take root in the soil, and they did not put forth ears.
>(4) And others fell among the thorns, they choked the seeds, and worms ate them.
>(5) And others fell on good soil, and it produced good fruit. It yielded sixty per measure and one hundred twenty per measure.”

What is the meaning of those numbers? Is that good, or bad?

>> No.11441956
File: 8 KB, 201x250, numale.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11441956

>>11440986
OP BTFO

>> No.11442004

The Pilgrim's Progress
Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza all talk about God so they might have some interesting ideas for you.
Kierkegaard of course.
St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas (be ready for a hard time unless you read Latin)
recently read a book by one Stace, Mysticism and Philosophy; not directly related to God but Mysticism does have it's place.

>> No.11442184

>>11439728
Well stop

STOP

>> No.11442193
File: 123 KB, 800x1024, DcTi4vQXkAA5fA-.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11442193

>>11442184
no

>> No.11442197

>>11441852
That's the Parable of the Sower and it appears in the real Gospels. The numbers mean nothing. Stop reading Gnostic shit

>> No.11442212

>>11441852
It’s just a figure of speech to say they produced a lot. It’s good. The word of God/truth of esotericism is given to different people, some people can understand it, some can’t. For those who can receive it, it renews their soul and causes great spiritual growth, great growth of inner consciousness.

>> No.11442214

>>11442193
Don’t disrespect the Dao bro, it’ll fuck you up

>> No.11442248

>>11440085
>he didn't read

Shankara was misrepresenting the text.
Gita is STRICTLY PERSONALIST.

read the primary texts yourself brainlet

>> No.11442257

>>11440085
"Unintelligent men, who do not know Me perfectly, think that I, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krishna, was impersonal before and have now assumed this personality. Due to their small fund of knowledge, they do not know My higher nature, which is imperishable and supreme."—Sri Krishna,Bhagavad-gita7.24

>> No.11442328

>>11438735
St. Augustine's City of God
Summa Theologica by Thomas "The Bull" Aquinas
Letters of St. Ignatius

>> No.11442334
File: 175 KB, 500x334, poster-krishna-und-arjuna-nach-der-schlacht-468200.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
11442334

>>11442248
>Gita is STRICTLY PERSONALIST.

WRONG

Gita 7.24

>Unintelligent men, who know Me not, think that I have assumed this form and personality. Due to their small knowledge, they do not know My higher nature, which is changeless and supreme.

Gita 4.6

>Even though myself unborn, of changeless essence, and the lord of all existence, yet in presiding over nature — which is mine — I am born but through my own maya

Krishna explicitly says that he is not the form and personality that he appears to be and that his true nature is the changeless supreme. Heterodox Dvaita-niggers go home.

>> No.11442411

>>11438735
Dostoevsky if you like fiction
Kierkegaard if you like philosophy.

>> No.11442430

Institutes of the Christian Religion

>> No.11442550

>>11442334

I quoted the very same passage here from a proper vaishnava source, faggot.
Shankara was a fucking liar
>>11442257

>> No.11442628

>>11438735
Gravity and Grace by Simone Weil

>> No.11442776

The Tanya by rabbi shneur zalman of liadi

>> No.11442793

>>11442550
avyaktaḿ vyaktim āpannaḿ
manyante mām abuddhayaḥ
paraḿ bhāvam ajānanto
mamāvyayam anuttamam

going by the winthrop sargeant edition, where is "personality" or "Krishna"?

>> No.11442808

>>11442793

avyaktam vyaktim apannam
manyante mam abuddhayah
param bhavam ajananto
mamavyayam anuttamam

SYNONYMS

avyaktam—nonmanifested;vyaktim—personality;apannam—achieved;manyante—think;mam—unto Me;abuddhayah—less intelligent persons;param—supreme;bhavam—state of being;ajanantah—without knowing;mama—My;avyayam—imperishable;anuttamam—the finest.

TRANSLATION

Unintelligent men, who know Me not, think that I have assumed this form and personality. Due to their small knowledge, they do not know My higher nature, which is changeless and supreme.
(ya bitch)

>> No.11442821

>>11438735
>God
Which one?

>> No.11442823

>>11442793
Also, git gud

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svayam_Bhagavan

>> No.11442900

>>11442808
>>11442823
hurr, my vaishnavite interpretation is the only right one, look at these vaishnavite sources

http://sanskritdictionary.com/?q=vyakti"&lang=sans&iencoding=iast&action=Search

Your translation omits the first word avyaktaḿ, and the contrast avyaktaḿ vyaktim.

>> No.11442935

>>11439261
Alyosha wasn't blond.
>Alyosha was then the picture of health, a sturdy, red-cheeked, clear-eyed nineteen year old boy. He was very handsome, too, and slender, above average height, with dark-brown hair, a regular although rather long face, and shiny dark-gray wide-set eyes, which gave him a thoughtful and serene look.

>> No.11442957

>>11442900
Gosh, you're right, I should trust shaivas and kaulas to properly translate books which center on Vishnu and Vishnu Avatars. Obviously Vaishnavas would know nothing about their own central text.

>> No.11443009

>>11438735
The book you wrote yourself ;)

>>11440591
The Bhagavad Gita was written in the 2nd century BC. Aristotle died before it was even written.

>> No.11443035

>>11439226
This desu

>> No.11443062

>>11442957
>Gita is STRICTLY PERSONALIST.
>actually there's more than one way of--
>read the primary texts yourself
>but only in my vaishnava translations

i'm not even that guy but how the fuck is shankara shaiva or kaula? you're the one acting sectarian.

>> No.11443071

>>11443009
What is oral tradition?

>> No.11443077

>>11443062
Jesus you brainlet, look at fucking picture of Shankara. He is covered in Shiva Tilak and has a Shaiva Trident.

Advaita is shaiva. Herpy deep dippity durrr

>> No.11443110

>>11443009

The Rig-Veda which is pre-homer describes Brahman, most of the youngest layers of the Vedas like the Aranyakas, Brahmanas and the oldest Upanishads likely underwent a long oral tradition that originated pre-homer before being written down. The following passage from the Rig-Veda (mid-2nd millennium BC) gives a description of Brahman - "All this is He-what has been and what shall be. He is the Lord of immortality. Though He has become all this, in reality He is not all this. For truly, He is beyond the world. The whole series of universes-past, present, and future-express His glory and power; but He transcends His own glory. All beings of the universe form, as it were, only a portion of His being; the greater part is invisible and unchangeable. He who is beyond all predicates appears as the relative universe; He appears as all sentient and insentient beings".

It is true many important Hindu texts were written during classical Greece but the most important philosophical and metaphysical foundations for those were already in place as texts being passed down orally before the fall of the Minoan civilization.

>> No.11443113

>>11443062
Also Shankara was from Kerala, a Tamil southernmost part of India. Tamils are Dravidian, not Aryan.

>> No.11443135

>>11443077
>>11443113
I might as well be arguing with a protestant.

>> No.11443343

>>11438735
The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible
by Michael S. Heiser

>> No.11443703

>>11442212
Thanks

>> No.11443912

>>11438735
You can't learn about something that doesn't exist.

>> No.11443918

>>11443912
1. Put down your fedora
2. Even if God didn't exist, that statement is still incoherent. People get PhDs in mythology and Brothers Grimm, are you claiming those people haven't learned anything?

>> No.11443934

>>11443918
If you do research on, say, Sherlock Holmes, it is not the case that there exists an x such that x lives on Baker Street and x solves crimes and you have an epistemic connection to x, but you develop interpretations on the mythology of Sherlock Holmes and its connection to other social phenomena. Now replace x with God.

>> No.11443936

>>11443918
And the knee jerk fedora response is pretty 2014, grow up.

>> No.11443945

>>11442821
There is only one Gody friend.

>> No.11445079

>>11443912
BASED

>> No.11446117
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11446117

>>11438735
Ravi Zacharias

>> No.11446122

>>11438735
The Quran

>> No.11446149

god's diary desu