Most people, regardless of race, religion or culture, believe they are immortal.

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Most people, regardless of race, religion or culture, believe they are immortal. That is, people believe that part of themselves — some indelible core, soul or essence-will transcend the body’s death and live forever. But what is this essence? Why do we believe it survives? And why is this belief so unshakable?

A new Boston University study led by postdoctoral fellow Natalie Emmons and published in the January 16, 2014 online edition of Child Development sheds light on these profound questions by examining children’s ideas about “prelife,” the time before conception.

By interviewing 283 children from two distinct cultures in Ecuador, Emmons’s research suggests that our bias toward immortality is a part of human intuition that naturally emerges early in life. And the part of us that is eternal, we believe, is not our skills or ability to reason, but rather our hopes, desires and emotions. We are, in fact, what we feel.

Emmons’ study fits into a growing body of work examining the cognitive roots of religion. Although religion is a dominant force across cultures, science has made little headway in examining whether religious belief-such as the human tendency to believe in a creator-may actually be hard-wired into our brains.

“This work shows that it’s possible for science to study religious belief,” said Deborah Kelemen, an Associate Professor of Psychology at Boston University and co-author of the paper. “At the same time, it helps us understand some universal aspects of human cognition and the structure of the mind.”

Most studies on immortality or “eternalist” beliefs have focused on people’s views of the afterlife. Studies have found that both children and adults believe that bodily needs, such as hunger and thirst, end when people die, but mental capacities, such as thinking or feeling sad, continue in some form.

But these afterlife studies leave one critical question unanswered: where do these beliefs come from? Researchers have long suspected that people develop ideas about the afterlife through cultural exposure, like television or movies, or through religious instruction. But perhaps, thought Emmons, these ideas of immortality actually emerge from our intuition. Just as children learn to talk without formal instruction, maybe they also intuit that part of their mind could exist apart from their body.

Emmons tackled this question by focusing on “prelife,” the period before conception, since few cultures have beliefs or views on the subject. “By focusing on prelife, we could see if culture causes these beliefs to appear, or if they appear spontaneously,” said Emmons.

“I think it’s a brilliant idea,” said Paul Bloom, a Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Yale who was not involved with the study. “One persistent belief is that children learn these ideas through school or church. That’s what makes the prelife research so cool. It’s a very clever way to get at children’s beliefs on a topic where they aren’t given answers ahead of time.”

Emmons interviewed children from an indigenous Shuar village in the Amazon Basin of Ecuador. She chose the group because they have no cultural prelife beliefs, and she suspected that indigenous children, who have regular exposure to birth and death through hunting and farming, would have a more rational, biologically-based view of the time before they were conceived. For comparison, she also interviewed children from an urban area near Quito, Ecuador. Most of the urban children were Roman Catholic, a religion that teaches that life begins only at conception. If cultural influences were paramount, reasoned Emmons, both urban and indigenous children should reject the idea of life before birth.

Emmons showed the children drawings of a baby, a young woman, and the same woman while pregnant, then asked a series of questions about the child’s abilities, thoughts and emotions during each period: as babies, in the womb, and before conception.

The results were surprising. Both groups gave remarkably similar answers, despite their radically different cultures. The children reasoned that their bodies didn’t exist before birth, and that they didn’t have the ability to think or remember. However, both groups also said that their emotions and desires existed before they were born. For example, while children generally reported that they didn’t have eyes and couldn’t see things before birth, they often reported being happy that they would soon meet their mother, or sad that they were apart from their family.

“They didn’t even realize they were contradicting themselves,” said Emmons. “Even kids who had biological knowledge about reproduction still seemed to think that they had existed in some sort of eternal form. And that form really seemed to be about emotions and desires.”

Why would humans have evolved this seemingly universal belief in the eternal existence of our emotions? Emmons said that this human trait might be a by-product of our highly developed social reasoning. “We’re really good at figuring out what people are thinking, what their emotions are, what their desires are,” she said. We tend to see people as the sum of their mental states, and desires and emotions may be particularly helpful when predicting their behavior. Because this ability is so useful and so powerful, it flows over into other parts of our thinking. We sometimes see connections where potentially none exist, we hope there’s a master plan for the universe, we see purpose when there is none, and we imagine that a soul survives without a body.

These ideas, while nonscientific, are natural and deep-seated. “I study these things for a living but even find myself defaulting to them. I know that my mind is a product of my brain but I still like to think of myself as something independent of my body,” said Emmons.

“We have the ability to reflect and reason scientifically, and we have the ability to reason based on our gut and intuition,” she added. “And depending on the situation, one may be more useful than the other.”

By Barbara Moran / Source: Science Daily

 

Jesus’ Plan of Salvation

 

 

 

Jesus’ Plan of Salvation

Christianity has taken the side of everything weak, base, ill-constituted.
It has made an ideal out of opposition to the preservative instincts of strong life.

F. Nietzsche

 

On of the remarkable aspects about Christianity is how much Jesus has been idealized beyond recognition with the biblical Jesus. Arguably, he is the most overrated personality in human history.

 

Christians, who think of Jesus as a kind loving person, are interpreting him according to their preconception. On examination, I couldn’t find anything likeable about him. He couldn’t find anything that makes life worth living, so he hated it. Maybe, it would be more accurate to say he hated himself. It is remindful of the saying about misery liking company. He hated what he could not change to his way of thinking. So he saw evil everywhere.

 

²⁹“This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of Jonah. (Matt. 12:39, Luke 11:29)

 

¹⁹“Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. (Matt. 19:16; Mark 10:18; Luke 18:19)

 

⁷The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its works are evil. (John 7:7)

 

Jesus obsession for power came at the expense of others. That is he took self righteous pleasure in inflicting pain on others and watching them suffer. Occasionally he was personally violent when he couldn’t get his way. His sense of power came by making false promises of immortality combined with an insistence on a depraved form of personal sacrifice. In a nutshell, Jesus held a pious view, that by believing in him, he can give you everlasting life. In exchange, you must not think for yourself. You must obey. You must not question what he tells you. You must not defend yourself. Do not show your temper. Do not have fun.

 

Suppose a stranger came up to you and made those demands. Would you pay him any attention? Not likely. This is what Jews faced in his day and what Christians face in this day. All Christians have to go on is four anonymously written Gospels, transcribed from hearsay information, at an uncertain time, of a person whose existence can’t be corroborated, who makes outrageous demands. Surely, this is the greatest hoax on earth, and the greatest testament to human incredulousness. Give the Jews their due.

 

If Jesus was truly a God, then the word of God should be paramount to what others say about him. If such a God came as a man to rescue believers from the sin of Adam, it is reasonable expect him to say so. But when this so called God states some other reasons for his mission, we have a serious contradiction.

 

The picture that emerges is that the Gospels do not come close to conforming to the Christian plan of salvation. There is not a word from Jesus about the sin of Adam. There is not a word that he came to die to lay a foundation for the Christian plan of salvation. As the Seven Deadly Sins and The Ten Commandments show, he wasn’t even innocent. As The Ten Commandments also shows, he even denied he was God. In Jesus’ Second Coming, he couldn’t even imagine that the world would be left standing in the twenty first century.

 

So where did the Christian doctrine of salvation come from? Paul’s epistles are a subject for another time, but suffice to say that he shows no knowledge of Jesus’ teachings. The foundation of Christianity rests on Paul’s deceits; Jesus is just a figurehead. The reasons will become apparent.

 

There is another lie that overrides any plan of salvation; and that is the nature of death. It is the most scientifically certifiable fact that death is final; even the sun will die some day. That people believe in an afterlife is something we could expect in Bible days. Why Christians can’t accept the finality of death is a task for psychologists to figure out.

 

Belief in an afterlife causes more problems than it solves. It brings about a worry about one’s fate upon death, whereas the finality of death brings assurance of everlasting peace. When we know death is final, it motivates us to make the best out of life. To spend one’s life preparing for death is depressing and counter productive.

 

Prerequisites

 

Belief

 

Disassociate yourself from reality. Don’t think; believe. Submerge your sense of integrity; it is not to be trusted. Belief is necessary so your mind does not contain competitive thoughts. Eternal life is the bait that hides the hook. The graveyards are full of people who thought they would have eternal life if they believed in Jesus.

 

¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”
¹⁶For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:15-16)

²⁴“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.” (John 5:24)

²⁵Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,
²⁶and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26)

 

 

Defenseless

 

Jesus demands that you turn yourself into a human punching bag. Don’t judge. Forgive. Appease. Acquiesce. Do not trust your urge to defend. The more you are abused, the better God will take care of you in heaven. It almost means to give up your will to survive.

 

Forgive the trespasses of others, and God will forgive yours.

 

¹⁴For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you;
¹⁵but if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. (Matt. 6:14-15)

Do not judge others, otherwise they will judge you. This is useless; people will judge you anyway. Or in other words, don’t think; trust God to do your thinking for you.

¹“Judge not, that you be not judged.
²For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.” (Matt. 7:1-2)

If someone strikes you on the right cheek, show him the other cheek. Cooperate with your aggressor. Give him more than he asks.

³⁸“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’
³⁹But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also;
⁴⁰and if any one would sue you and take your coat, let him have your cloak as well;
⁴¹and if any one forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. (Matt. 5:38-41)

Love your enemies and pray for your persecutors. Pray for what? Dear God, please send my persecutors to heaven. Or, Dear God, kill the bastards!

⁴⁴But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, (Matt. 5:44)

Make friends with your accuser, otherwise you may wind up in prison. You won’t get out unless you pay for what you did. What he means is that he is your accuser. Isn’t that Satan’s job?

²⁵Make friends quickly with your accuser, while you are going with him to court, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you be put in prison;
²⁶truly, I say to you, you will never get out till you have paid the last penny. (Matt. 5:25-26)

 

Dependence

 

Money gives you too much independence. Don’t work. Give up your worldly possessions and follow Jesus. Considering how far, human civilization has advanced since the time of Jesus, this dictum has been almost universally ignored. The few who haven’t are called saints.

 

You cannot possess money if you are to serve God.

 

²⁴“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
²⁵“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? (Matt. 6:24-25)

Give up everything and follow Jesus.

³⁴And he called to him the multitude with his disciples, and said to them, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
³⁵For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.
³⁶For what does it profit a man, to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? (Mark 8:34-36)

Don’t worry about worldly goods. God will take care of you because he knows your needs. Yeh, sure! (The human race wouldn’t survive a year.)

³¹Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
³²For the Gentiles seek all these things; and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.
³³But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.
³⁴“Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day’s own trouble be sufficient for the day. (Matt. 6:31-34)

Don’t work. God will provide. Become a priest.

²⁷Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of man will give to you; for on him has God the Father set his seal.” (John 6:27)

 

Desolation

 

Jesus likes it when you cut yourself from outside influences. To Christians who think they will see their loved ones in the next life. Jesus says it ain’t going to happen. He doesn’t like family ties.

 

Whoever leaves their family will inherit eternal life.

 

²⁹And every one who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life.
³⁰But many that are first will be last, and the last first. (Matt. 19:29-30)

He came to break families apart. Whoever loves his parents more than him is not worthy of him.

³⁵For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
³⁶and a man’s foes will be those of his own household.
³⁷He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; (Matt. 10:35-37; Luke 12:51-53)

The world hates you. It’s you and Jesus against the world.

¹⁸“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.
¹⁹If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you (John 15:18-19)

You can’t trust anybody. Trust Jesus and he will give you peace.

³³I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

 

Feelings

 

Don’t trust your feelings. It is better to cut them off and trust Jesus. Do not trust your conscience; give deference to Jesus.

Displays of anger and insults make one subject to being sent to hell on judgment day.

 

²¹“You have heard that it was said to the men of old, ‘You shall not kill; and whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.’
²²But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be liable to the hell of fire. (Matt. 5:21-22)

It is better to cut off your offending body parts than to go to heaven. If he doesn’t mean it literally, he means to deny yourself from what is referred to as the “pleasures of the flesh.”

²⁹“If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.
³⁰And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.” (Matt. 5:29-30)

Desire for material things deafens you to God’s word.

¹⁹but the cares of the world, and the delight in riches, and the desire for other things, enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. (Mark 4:19)

 

Ignorance

 

Jesus describes the type of people who would be susceptible to his drivel. They have to be ignorant, stupid, child like and void of unsanctioned prejudice. Jesus does not flatter his prey.

 

He spoke in parables so he could not be understood by those he didn’t want to save.

 

¹³This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. (Matt. 13:13)

God doesn’t want the wise and understanding.

²⁵At that time Jesus declared, “I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; (Matt. 11:25)

You must be like a child to be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

³and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
⁴Whoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. 18:3-4)

 

Obedience

 

Your first duty is to keep the big boss happy. Otherwise you are against him. The big boss puts himself before you. Every screw up he makes, he blames on human disobedience.

 

²⁴“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Matt. 6:24)

²¹“Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. (Matt. 7:21)

³⁰He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters. (Matt. 12:30)

⁴⁰For this is the will of my Father, that every one who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:40

⁵¹Truly, truly, I say to you, if any one keeps my word, he will never see death.” (John 8:51)

 

Temptation

 

If it is fun, it must be something tempting. The more pleasurable it is, the more tempting it is. Jesus is not happy when you are having a good time.

 

Looking at a woman with lust defines adultery. Adultery will land you in hell. This demand is absurd. If taken seriously, it would virtually abolish human procreation. He is advocating self-castration.

 

²⁷“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’
²⁸But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
²⁹If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.
³⁰And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell (Matt. 5:27-30)

Believers think that only Satan tempts; but here, Jesus is asking God not to lead him into temptation.

¹³And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. (Matt. 6:13; Luke 11:14))

Woe to whoever gives into temptation. It is better to cut off your body parts than to land in fiery hell.

⁷“Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the man by whom the temptation comes!
⁸And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to enter life maimed or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire.
⁹And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire. (Matt. 18:7-9)

The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. God made pleasure desirable; now he disparages it.

⁴¹Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” (Matt. 26:41; Mark 14:38; Luke 22:40, 22:46)

 

Who gets in

 

After you strip yourself of everything that makes you human, Jesus says the odds of getting in are almost impossible anyway. Conversely, all others belong to Satan, which proves Satan is more powerful than God.

 

²⁸Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matt. 11:28)

³⁴Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, every one who commits sin is a slave to sin.
³⁵The slave does not continue in the house for ever; the son continues for ever.
³⁶So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. (John 8:34-35)

 

Difficulty

 

The gate is narrow; the way is hard to find for all but a few.

 

¹³“Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.
¹⁴For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few. (Matt. 7:13-14)

Beware of false prophets who lead the elect astray. Who are they? One can never know.

²²False Christs and false prophets will arise and show signs and wonders, to lead astray, if possible, the elect. (Mark 13:22)

Only the elect will get to heaven. Who are they? One can never know.

²⁷And then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. (Mark 13:27)

It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get to the kingdom of God. By world standards, Americans are rich.

²⁴Jesus looking at him said, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!
²⁵For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” (Luke 18:24-25)

You can’t come to Jesus unless it is approved by the Father. And who is the Father? It is Jesus. Go figure!

⁴⁴No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:44)

⁶⁵And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” (John 6:65)

 

Jews

 

Jesus came to save Jews; there were no Christians at that time. This leaves an impassible conundrum. Jews don’t believe in him and Christians aren’t Jews.

 

⁵These twelve Jesus sent out, charging them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans,
⁶but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. (Matt. 10:5-6)

²⁴He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (Matt. 15:24)

²⁸Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of man shall sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. (Matt. 19:28)

 

Final thought

 

Take Jesus seriously and you will wish you were dead. That is the true meaning of salvation.