I could understand a hierarchy of complexity, or wonder, or any number of other things, but I can't grasp how a perfect being could create something imperfect - implicit in the perfection of the being is perfect capacity, so anything it created couldn't be flawed. It might have 'drawbacks' - from a given perspective - but those would have to be by design and deliberate or the perfection of that top-tier being is called into question - how could that perfect being, literally, make a mistake?
I don't think it's supposed to be a mistake. I meant that in a hierarchy there would be perfection at the top and whatever comes lower in the hierarchy such as human life can't be perfect - so imperfections in life would be the struggles and challenges people face in the natural world.
At the top of the hierarchy would be the omni capable of perfect justice, and humans are lower in the hierarchy so are less perfect as they have the capacity to do bad things for selfish reasons often because of an attachment to wealth or power or life at the expense of others - we want what we want. The spiritual development could be to try to aspire to be better - e.g. to train ourselves to overcome the self-interest or wanting what we want that might be detrimental to others or it could be to learn to tolerate and accept and be patient in challenging circumstances.
I get the idea that you'd have to take the claims on faith - I don't like it, but logically I can understand it, I can even put aside my scepticism to accept for the sake of argument that the physical life can lead to some sort of 'spiritual' development. That implies, though, that the life on Earth is in some way a price that has to be paid for the afterlife, or a qualifier - which I feel Vlad was specifically suggesting was NOT his take on things. If that's the case, why do some have to pay a higher price, why do some have to suffer more? And if it's a 'trial', why are the rules so opaque, why does Allah permit so many conflicting sets of instruction to persist with equally little reason to support any of them? Why, if Islam is the way, did God wait until the middle-ages to finally give people the 'right' way?
The belief in Islam is that Prophet Muhammed is the last messenger (bringing guidance and revelation) not the only messenger - so in Islamic traditions the same monotheistic message and guidance to overcome unsuitable desires has been given to humans everywhere since they existed and could think and reason and contemplate. What people do with that information is up to them - discard it, change it, follow bits of it and ignore other bits etc. Also, society develops and changes based on environment and circumstances and the way it is led, so presumably the guidance can't be too specific otherwise it becomes unwieldy and so it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that parts of the guidance will be open to interpretation and can change or be revised over time depending on context.
I don't think spiritual development is like Maths or Physics or Chemistry - it's not an exact science with a method and some boxes to tick - it seems more about feelings and individual circumstances and the individual's battle with themselves - hence this battle is known as the major jihad in Islam whereas actual fighting in a real war is called the minor jihad.
In terms of the after-life being a win - I'm not sure how you are using the word "win" but in Islam there is a concept of actions having consequences and a judgement of our choices after death and different grades of reward and punishment for choices made, which takes into account and makes allowances for the individual circumstances people faced. In Islam there is a belief that the perfect being will have perfect judgement and the smallest atom of good and bad and belief and disbelief will be taken into account. I'm not sure we can accurately look at other people and from the brief glimpses we have into their lives, know what they are going through and what they are feeling and make a judgement on who is suffering more than someone else or who is feeling fulfilled or grateful in a way that might not be apparent.
Why can the perfect being not make us already spiritually developed?
Spiritually developed in what way -so we always do the right thing without an inner struggle and no one is in any pain? I guess that character type would be represented by angels, who have no will or desire except to serve and obey. Humans represent something more spiritually / morally complex - maybe it's more noble when someone struggles against themselves to try to do the right thing in the face of obstacles and challenges.
Even if both are just different ways to spiritual development, or perhaps ways to different sorts of spiritual development, it still doesn't give a rationale as to why some people are afforded so much easier a path to that development.
Not sure there is a rationale exactly - but from experience I would say we form a view of ourselves and what is important or worthy and what we are profoundly grateful for by seeing the difference in circumstances between our life and someone else's. I think spiritual development is about being aware of these differences and choosing based on our reaction to this awareness.
I'm interested in religion because it influences the world around me, and if I can start to make sense of its claims perhaps I can better understand the people who are making them.
Fair enough - given we can't know which, if any, of the claims made are right or wrong, it seems worth at least finding out why the people making the claims think the way they do.
And here's where I risk the accusation of hypocrisy a little, having asked all that. If heaven, or whatever the equivalent in Islam, is that removal of pain and suffering... in what way is it life? Can there be joy or satisfaction without the counterpart, do they lose meaning?
I don't know what heaven really is or if it is a metaphor and yes the way it is often portrayed sounds kind of boring to me and I think I prefer life now, and to be honest I would prefer just dying and that being the end. There are people I have loved but no one I desperately want to see again if they died or I died, though it would be interesting if that were possible. I still think about my grandmother most days and she died when I was 9, but I would be ok never seeing her again - if all I ever get are my memories of her, that is still plenty. I have been fortunate in that my children are alive, so I don't know what it would feel like to have an unbearable ache for them or feel almost mad with grief if they were to die. Would I feel I want to be with them again in a heaven? I don't know - right now for me, death feels like it goes hand in hand with life and grief is something that is inevitable and to be endured. But maybe I haven't quite grasped the concept of heaven - who knows.
Sorry, I don't want to put words in your mouth here, are you saying you believe that people have these different beliefs, or are you saying that the afterlife people reach will, or at least could, be dependent upon what they believed in life?
I think it could be dependent on their beliefs in life but I'm not sure we can really know what we believe in or quantify it - at least there are various stories in Islam about a grain of belief being sufficient or an atom's worth of good, which I interpreted to mean that it is impossible for us to quantify or judge belief in some supernatural concept - it's such a nebulous thing - it's a thought or a series of changing thoughts about something which has no defined agreed terms.
Yeah, that concept of 'judgment' I don't really understand, either, perhaps because I can't get past my sense that our sense of free-will is mistaken, but surely the 'perfect' being doesn't need to see us in action to judge? Surely, moreover, that perfect being makes us with whatever flaws or failures we have, so in what sense are we being judged for fulfilling the destinies that we were given? I suppose if free will were viable then you'd presume the perfect being would adequately weight everyone's scores to take into account the trials they faced, but it still doesn't explain why there needs to be such a variation in prospects for people.
Again, my understanding of Islam is limited, is morality subjective in much of Islamic thinking. I know most of the Christians that I'm aware of adopt as stance of absolute morality based on God, but then often conflate immorality and sin, but I don't really know any of the Islamic stances on that.
O.
In Islamic beliefs, the idea seems to be that the perfect being judges us on intentions rather than just on actions and outcomes - did you want to do something good / pleasing to Allah - e.g. was that thought in your head or what motivated you or were you motivated by your own desire for something or to satisfy your own need?
I think our actions and the feelings and thoughts those actions and their consequences create in us has an input on our next thought and action. Like with CBT we can learn to change thought patterns and behaviour. I don't think it would have the same effect on us if it all just happened theoretically.
I guess morality for us is subjective - stories we are told for example is that stealing is wrong, but in times of famine the punishment for stealing was suspended by the Caliph , who was a companion of Prophet Muhammad when he was alive and became leader of the Arab-Muslim empire after his death. Verses in the Quran are open to varied interpretation and were interpreted differently by different Islamic scholars soon after Prophet Muhammad died. Sounds subjective to me. There is a saying amongst Muslims: "And Allah knows best" to indicate that whatever morality we decide upon as individuals, Allah will be the final judge not us.
