Greetings,

In wartorn Sudan-Kenya-Ethiopa, the Dinka/Sudanese people of their original faith are now wonderring about a main 'fable' of their religion. (In a fictionalized autobiography of one of the early refugees, Val Deng, written in the USA by Dave Eggars.) It makes for an important question for all of us seeking our way to the afterlife.

The fable relates that God originally gave a choice to the Dinka people:
they could choose to live with what God promises will be a good life of verdant pastures, clear water, and plenty of cattle,
OR
they can choose what else is available.
But what is the what?
God won't say.

By the mid 20th century when Val Deng was born, the Sudanese had gradually bartered much of their land to Arabs seeking at first winter pastures, but eventually wanting it all. What follows in the life of Val Deng is the longest nightmare of hell / life than I can ever recall hearing about. Deng becomes one of the 'Lost Boys,'  homeless refugees who were destroyed by starvation, diverse armies and rebels, hungry carnivores, floods, exhaustion, and incessant use as blood donors to wounded soldiers.

I have to include all that gory-implying overview in order to ask the question:
'What is the What"  to you?

Bets

Hard to figure Bets. It's a bit un-God to force a choice like that at all - free will is normally paramount. Either that or (joking) we're imagining it all and nobody gives B******* what we do. (hope not)

Going for 'what' might imply a faith that God or natural goodness will provide - most traditions would say that if we can trust and go with the flow that we somehow get looked after. Which (so far so good, lots of fingers crossed here) so far seems to be true based on my own experience.

Grasping after holding on to something specific like cattle and lands might imply a rigidity of mind and a refusal to engage with flow that's fairly sure to eventually kick back....

Bets,

I appears that  they just like the Adam and Eve myth, God gave them two choices. The moved away from the good that god offered them and wandered down a long road of degereration.

alan

We all have the choice of accepting our present blessings and cherishing them or reaching out for something different. I see the afterlife as no different. In this case, one could go to the happy place that you have described, Bets, or you could explore what the other possibilities might be.

To be together in a happy place sounds attractive. Many people prefer a different kind of stimulation than that. I suppose this can always be seen as "good" or "bad" depending on what your perspective of the situation at the given moment is, and those are valid arguments to pursue....however, what is the human cost?

Who answers for that? The human cost. It somehow demands an explanation, a defense.

I say then, who has explained the existence of the dinosaurs to us? Who has explained the existence of so many who have come and gone? Do we demand that answer? I cannot see it.

love, blink :)

If omniscience holds, then all choices would be contained within God. The true God would know that minor beings simply do not have the extent of consciousness to make a truly conclusive choice between God and something else. Besides, that something else would also be contained within God.

Whoever offered the "what" was probably not a "god".


Desert

Oh You Dearhearts !!!

What a relief!   After reading that nightmare almost straight through, I was immersed in it,  beginning to feel a part of its 'focus level'. I feared that the What being described was a Hell possible for anyone, rather than a consequence of, or catharsis from, a local lifestyle.

But even if there were some truth to that arrangements with the Almighty: "Do it My Way---or discover the consequences," you have shown that potential 'consequences' are lifted by our state of mind and beliefs !!  You say in your own words there is more potential to potential consequences than there are any negatively implied 'consequences.'

:)I don't even know why I assumed consequences werenecessarily negative, because here's the dictionary definition: "result, upshot, outcome, effect, repercussion, ramification, corollary, concomitant, aftermath, aftereffect; fruit(s), product, by-product, end result; informal payoff;  antonym cause."  Those are full of potential, not implying guilt or blame at all  !!

Yay!!  thanks,
Bets