Powerglide Transformers. This is better.

 

Continue.

That's kind of my point. Pantheistic religions can have divinities, but they're not qualitatively any different from you or I; it's seen as a quantitative difference. (And the idea of "God" is really not useful when discussing pantheism because it's imposing a monotheistic understanding upon it.) Polytheistic religions do distinguish between the mortal (us) and the divine (not us) in a more qualitative way. But even this is malleable; Hinduism is a highly polytheistic religion, and people can become gods or goddesses.... with enough karma, that is.

 

well anyway this all has zero to do with Transformers. :tflaugh

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But arn't all the gods of Hinduism just diferent personas of the same god, Brahman?

That's kind of my point. Pantheistic religions can have divinities, but they're not qualitatively any different from you or I; it's seen as a quantitative difference. (And the idea of "God" is really not useful when discussing pantheism because it's imposing a monotheistic understanding upon it.) Polytheistic religions do distinguish between the mortal (us) and the divine (not us) in a more qualitative way. But even this is malleable; Hinduism is a highly polytheistic religion, and people can become gods or goddesses.... with enough karma, that is.

 

well anyway this all has zero to do with Transformers. :tflaugh

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But arn't all the gods of Hinduism just diferent personas of the same god, Brahman?

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Let's just say that there are "multiple continuities" within Hinduism. :P Part of the reason for this goes all the way back to the Aryan invasion of the Indian subcontinent thousands of years ago. They brought their religious traditions with them, which ended up mingling with those of the indigenous population. So on the one hand you've got these concepts of atman and brahman and karma and nirvana and what not, and on the other hand you've got a bazillion local village deities with their own distinctive personae and history etc. It would matter more, except that Hinduism is not like Judaism/Christianity/Islam in that it is not a religion of "belief" but of "action". That is to say, your dogma is a lot less important than your karma. ;) So yeah you could talk about brahman (which would be something like the "all-spark" in TF lore) and how everything eventually becomes a part of it, but at the same time there's this strong polytheistic current in Hinduism that is much more concerned with keeping the local deity happy so you can get stuff you want.

 

Buddhism is the same way; technically it's an atheistic religion, but yet when you go to local Buddhist temples you see people praying and making offerings to what anyone would instinctively refer to as "deities", though they're really just people who have attained enlightenment. But really, when you're asking a spiritual being to do you a favor, it may as well be a "god". However, using that word is really not helpful when discussing religions like Hinduism and Buddhism, because the very term "god" implies a spiritual being that is qualitatively different from the rest of us, immutably so. That's a Western concept, not an Eastern one. To the Eastern mind, "divinity" is more a matter of degree than anything else.

My History teacher explained Brahman as one guy, how just happens to have a bazzilian multiple personalities, is this correct?

Primus is made by the Transformers in the distant future and then send back to the beginning of time so that he can create them.

My History teacher explained Brahman as one guy, how just happens to have a bazzilian multiple personalities, is this correct?

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Well like I said there's not "one" answer... which may frustrate the crap out of you, but there it is.

 

Some Hindus would say that there are three "big time" Hindu gods; Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahman. One is the creator, one (Brahman) is the sustainer, and the other is the destroyer. (I honestly forgot which ones Shiva and Vishnu are supposed to be.) In this model, Brahman is kind of useless since people are more interested in creation and destruction than just sustaining stuff.

 

But there's also the more philosophical concept of brahman as the "world soul", and each of us has an "atman" (i.e. our own souls) that seeks to be united with brahman. We go through our lives, hopefully gaining enough good karma to be reincarnated as something more enlightened than we are now, with the eventual goal of ceasing the reincarnation process (which is not looked upon as something cool the way it is here; to Hindus, reincarnation is a wearying process and only happens because of failure to attain nirvana). Nirvana itself is what happens when our atman achieves unity with brahman and is assimilated into it. That's the ultimate goal.

 

So I guess you could look at it that way if you wanted to... but again I must stress that "beliefs" are not nearly as important to Hindus as action -- what you do in life. For actions influence karma, not beliefs. Hinduism is not a "religion of the book" and so there's not really that much interest in doctrinal matters, the way there is in the west. Hinduism is a much more fluid and varied religion in that there is no authoritative text per se (there are the Vedas -- ancient Hindu writings -- but they're really not treated in the same way as the Bible or the Koran, nor are all Hindus influenced by them). It's really just about how you live your life; that's how you ultimately achieve nirvana.

My History teacher explained Brahman as one guy, how just happens to have a bazzilian multiple personalities, is this correct?

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Well like I said there's not "one" answer... which may frustrate the crap out of you, but there it is.

 

Some Hindus would say that there are three "big time" Hindu gods; Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahman. One is the creator, one (Brahman) is the sustainer, and the other is the destroyer. (I honestly forgot which ones Shiva and Vishnu are supposed to be.) In this model, Brahman is kind of useless since people are more interested in creation and destruction than just sustaining stuff.

 

 

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If memory serves, Vishnu was the creator and Shiva is the destroyer.

 

I could be mistaken though.  It's been a while since I looked into it.

Hello MODERATOR?? (<_<) (>_>)

 

Seriously guys, if you want to discuss something non-TF, take it to the General Discussions forum - that's what it's there for.

Hello MODERATOR?? (<_<) (>_>)

 

Seriously guys, if you want to discuss something non-TF, take it to the General Discussions forum - that's what it's there for.

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But your not aload to talk about Religion in GD