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[-] merde@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

You joust t have to recognize that any divinity in the universe would be so universal that everything is god

when everything is god, nothing is god.

my question is about the need to "divine". Why is "know yourself", which is already a difficult task, not enough? Why this need to fantasize?

[-] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

You call it fantasizing, but that's dismissive and, frankly, small minded. It'll totally prevent you from understanding what you're asking about.

But, first, remember that you're asking questions from the outside, and I'm answering them from the outside too. Never been Satanist, never will be. So this is meta as fuck here. Don't get shit twisted though, and we'll have a fun conversation about it. You don't have to agree, accept into your own beliefs, anything anyone else does, but if your intent is looking for reasons to dump on the subject, you'll just end up bored and ignored.

my question is about the need to "divine".

Because that's what spirituality is. It's the search for and exploration of a non material aspect of the universe. Everything from monotheism to ceremonial magic to zen meditation is a pursuit of something intangible.

That pursuit may or may not be something that changes anything in a concrete way, but when pursued consistently it changes the way people think. It isn't something you can dismiss as fantasy because fantasy doesn't and can't change anything other than one's imagination.

What that change is, in spiritual pursuits, varies. But it's the goal. People looking for the divine in themselves and the universe are seeking to be other than "just" a part of material life. The rat race, the grind, the orphan crushing machine, the empty and draining toil that is survival. People want life to be more than that.

Divinity is the opposite of materiality. It's the spark of sentience and sapience. The mind of the universe that peers out at itself from inside everything. At least, that's the general purpose version rather than religion specific one. Looking for that externally has its benefits, as adherents of the various theisms will point out. But looking for it inside the self does too.

In seeking the inner divine, the individual seeks to become closer to it, to live closer to it. To seek the divine in the self is to seek expressing that divinity. The closer you get to god, the more the light of god can shine through you. You reduce the more primitive drives and embrace "higher" ones that are about being a source of positive change, a source of goodness (though I'm dubious the goodness exists as a discrete face of reality personally).

That's why the divine. The divine is just a code word for a better state of being. It's an expression of seeing an underlying connection in all things and venerating that connection.

Know thyself, when pursued to its natural extent is the pursuit of the divine self. When one knows oneself fully, one ceases to be in bondage to the physical self, and gains the perspective of a "higher" self.

Now, I don't necessarily think that the physical is lower or lesser than the spiritual or mental. Kinda the opposite, in my own little world view. But most forms of spiritual pursuits do at least handle the physical as being a state to escape, suppress, or overcome. Pain, fear, greed, anger, all the unpleasant stuff that goes along with the material world seems like something to escape, so you run into a lot of systems of spirituality that throw the baby out with the bathwater. At least, that's how I look at the rejection of the physical entirely.

Anyway, with that tangent aside, "when everything is god, nothing is god" is exactly the same thing as "thou art god". When one sees divinity in all things, one realizes that there is no external deity. Thou art god. I art god. My chicken art god. We aren't separate, unfathomably disconnected things, we art one. That's the whole point of it.

Thus, spirituality seeks to embrace that lack of disconnection. To bridge the gaps between.

That isn't fantasizing. It's a pursuit of self development.

[-] merde@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

my question is about the need to "divine".

Because that's what spirituality is. It's the search for and exploration of a non material aspect of the universe. Everything from monotheism to ceremonial magic to zen meditation is a pursuit of something intangible.

does this "nonmaterial aspect" need to be divine? The word "god" has an enormous baggage. It's charged and it's not as 'innocent' as you make it to be.

it's more often an organisation of all that's 'tangible'

you'll just end up bored and ignored.

i was, but out of respect for the time you took to write that comment, i went out stared at the stars for an hour, ruminating your comment.

It isn't something you can dismiss as fantasy because fantasy doesn't and can't change anything other than one's imagination.

gods are fantasies that changed the whole world.

But it's the goal. People looking for the divine in themselves and the universe are seeking to be other than "just" a part of material life.

Why?

"Material life" is full of wonders.

can't "people" cherish it without "divine" filters?

The rat race, the grind, the orphan crushing machine, the empty and draining toil that is survival. People want life to be more than that.

If what you call "material life" could speak, what would they say about "what people want"?

There was a praying mantis behind me. I'm surrounded by a dozen spiders. Some others are getting eaten alive while i write these. What do these divine spirits want?

What do they want, those waves crashing at a distance?

Divinity is the opposite of materiality. It's the spark of sentience and sapience.

how did you get there?

Materiality isn't the opposite of anything. You unnecessarily put it there.

Spark of sentience and sapience

:)

You reduce the more primitive drives and embrace "higher" ones that are about being a source of positive change, a source of goodness (though I'm dubious the goodness exists as a discrete face of reality personally).

i'm glad to see that "higher" in quotation marks. You 'nailed' it.

That's why the divine. The divine is just a code word for a better state of being. It's an expression of seeing an underlying connection in all things and venerating that connection.

Let's use another "code word" for it then, if it's "just".

"A better state of being"… "an expression of seeing an underlying connection in all things and venerating that connection." Fine, let's do that without staining it with divinities.

Anyway, with that tangent aside, "when everything is god, nothing is god" is exactly the same thing as "thou art god". When one sees divinity in all things, one realizes that there is no external deity. Thou art god. I art god. My chicken art god. We aren't separate, unfathomably disconnected things, we art one. That's the whole point of it.

"i am god" has, again, some historical baggage, among others.

if it's that simple then why not write "You are your own chicken. Act like it." When you choose to write "you are your own god" in all capitals, that's not as innocuous as you sound it to be.

We aren't separate indeed. We are "one" and an egg.

[-] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 0 points 23 hours ago

Ah, I have trouble parsing this kind of comment. Dyslexia kicks my ass sometimes, so forgive me if I don't respond as well as one might hope, because you definitely put in effort that deserves the same in return. It's a me thing, totally.

Tangent: I am but an egg, but I seek to grok being god ;)

Second tangent: taking time to enjoy the night sky is such a wonderful thing, I'm so glad you did so. I forget sometimes to do just that.

If I'm reading right, I think what you're getting at is the word choices more than the concepts. You have a solid point that the words "god" and "divine" have weight. That's part of why framing spirituality in those terms is still useful. There's a goodly portion of humanity that seeks a form of growth away from the baggage that traditional religion, particularly monotheism, has.

One of the first steps in that path is recognizing that God as a concept is not necessarily something one has to find as some kind of deity. That God can be a god, and eventually that god and gods are constructs used to filter what the universe "throws at us".

Side note: I didn't find anywhere that I capitalized god in my previous comments. I certainly didn't intend to do so if it happened. I tend use ALL CAPS in limited ways, and none have yet been useful here. If I'm mistaken and did so, please just ignore it as a typo, because that's what it would be

In terms of fantasy as a term in this situation, there's a difference between fantasy and myth. Largely one of time and construction, where myth is built over time as an attempt to relate to the unknown and the difficult to process. It isn't usually something one just imagines and then launches whole into the consciousness of humanity.

Gods as fantasy is fine as far as that goes, as anyone that doesn't believe in them as an objective reality (and neither of us seems to) can safely use myth and fantasy interchangeably. But it is dismissive to anyone that does believe. I would argue that gods as fantasy did change the world, and that's what makes them more than simple fantasy. It's what makes the concept relevant to a y discussion of spirituality as a whole.

I gotta cut this short, and I know I didn't hit everything. Sorry for that, I intend to come back tomorrow, just have meatspace stuff that needs my attention.

this post was submitted on 25 Aug 2026
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