no god but God cont...

I found ‘In the Footsteps of Martyrs’ as a very interesting chapter, mainly because it pokes at something that I am extremely interested in and the reason why I am a history major. Throughout the last long time, I have been drawn to the question of morality, and why we do what we do; I strongly believe that our actions are a result of what we have been taught, and are done for a reason, purpose, and I think for most (unconsciously or consciously) for a higher power or being, in our case God or Allah. I find the Karbala very interesting because Azlan says that it “became Shi’ism’s Garden of Eden, with humanity’s original sin being not disobedience to God, but unfaithfulness to God’s moral principles.”[1] What I like about this besides the words ‘moral principles’ is that when I read the creation story and the ‘first sin’ I am drawn to the idea that perhaps when we look at what we call sin, it is to us unfaithfulness to moral principles, which we learn what morality is through the teachings of man but also through the stories of the Old and New Testaments. I guess it just plays with my thoughts on if man can be moral without a ‘god’ figure to provide reason or rewards.

This book is really hard to me to read. I hate and love it. I’m not sure why exactly it bother me, but at times I get really frustrated with theology, for the fact that we need it to interpret the Bible, parables, Jesus, God. I often wonder how Christianity would be different or if it could exist without the Bible. How would we know what is good, wrong, how do we know who God is without it translated for us, is it possible to know him on our own. I just find it hard to phantom that man needs others to translate for them their faith. Maybe it’s good, but I don’t know. The thought that the Karan cannot in its original form be read by man does bother me some.

I think that the Sufi’s idea of the annihilation of the ego, and pushing away from “worldly trappings”[2] is something that we all strive for. The way that they approach this by being concerned with the outer and with society is something I think that Christians miss or forget. I think that we become some focused on with fixing our inner self that we forget about the world around us and I am not sure why, but I do like the idea of a communal religion, I know we try to get this from the church, but it needs to reach father than the church.

This week, I am stoked, full heartedly for Oman. Oh, yes, lets go…
[1] Pg. 179.
[2] Pg 200.