Saturday, February 18, 2023

Ernest Hemingway was absolutely positive there was no symbolism in The Old Man and the Sea

 


The novella is a reflection on the human spirit and the struggle to find meaning in life. Santiago's battle with the marlin is a metaphor for the human struggle against nature, and the sharks represent the obstacles that can prevent us from achieving our goals. Despite his hardships, Santiago remains determined and never loses hope. His journey is a testament to the human will to persevere and find meaning in life.
The story also touches on themes of loneliness, love, and respect for nature, and the importance of relationships. Santiago's deep connection with the sea and nature, and his love for his boat and the sea creatures, make his story a powerful reflection of man's relationship with the natural world.
The novella is also an exploration of the concept of heroism and the idea that true heroism is defined by one's perseverance and willingness to keep going, even in the face of defeat. Santiago's determination to catch the marlin, despite the odds against him, is a demonstration of this heroism, and his journey serves as an inspiration to readers.
In summary, "The Old Man and the Sea" is a powerful and moving story of one man's battle against nature and his determination to find meaning in life, which is rich in symbolism, imagery, and themes, written by one of the most prominent authors of the 20th century, Ernest Hemingway.
May be an image of 1 person and text that says 'The old Man and the Sea'
  • Sloan Bashinsky
    In the novel, The Old Man caught the great marlin with a handline, not a harpoon. 
    When I was a boy, my mother, knowing now much I loved to fish, gave me the serialization of the novel in I think Life Magazine. 
    The Old Man and the Sea was part of an American novels course I took as an elective in college. The professor thought there was Christ-like symbolism in the old man's saga. However, in Carlos Baker's book of Hemingway's letters, Hemingway was adamant in a letter to his Scribner editor, Maxwell Perkins, that there was no symbolism: the old man was an old man, the boy was a boy, the sea was the sea, the fish was a fish. That's all there was to it. 
    My professor also said Hemingway was about sticking with something regardless of how tough the going got, grace under fire; and you knew when you met the bad guy in a Hemingway novel, because he didn't drink. 
    I also read Baker's biography of Hemingway, and fancied myself a writer some day, but it was a long time coming. 
    After it came, I was invited to present at a writer's workshop, so I came up with a title for my presentation, "Writing as a mystical experience." Then, out of the blue, it came to me that The Old Man and the Sea, the last novel Hemingway completed, was his unconscious suicide note, despite what he had written to Max Perkins. The great marlin, a phallic symbol, represented Hemingway's manhood, which he was ever intent on proving. The sea represented Hemingway's unconscious and the sharks represented his rejected internal feminine, who came to claim her just due. The boy, whom the old man left behind at the dock, was the young boy Hemingway, rejected by his father. In the end, Hemingway had brain cancer, and instead of succumbing to going totally insane and dying an invalid in a facility, he blew out his own brains with his favorite double- barreled shot gun.
    The audience at the workshop was not interested in my theory, but they very much wanted to know what I did about writer's block? I said I didn't get writer's block. When it was time for me to write, I wrote and could not stop writing. When there was nothing of rme to write, I did something else.
    When later I lived in Key West, I was urged several times to enter the Hemingway look alike contest, because my heard somewhat resembled Hemingway's. I always declined. Sometimes I said why. I didn't drink. The contestants were old, inebriated, white-bearded men in Orvis fishing costumes. They didn't know how to write or fish, and I knew how to do both.
    • Sloan Bashinsky
      The writer's workshop was around September 1, 1990. ln 1992, I completed my first novel. In the fall of 1993, a lot of poetry started leaping out of me. In early 1994, a lot of prosaic verse started falling out of me, one slow word at a time, as if it was being dictated. Here's one:
      "Although he sometimes tries to write fiction, when the tale is told, every character is a character in himself, every plot a plot in him; there are no surprises - only his, to discover parts of himself he has forgotten, lost, thrown away, or never even knew were there."

sloanbashinsky@yahoo.com

The pen is mightier than the sword, thus the sword defends the pen

posted this below into The Order of Pen, and after some people had commented, I joined in.

The Order of Pen
Sloan Bashinsky 
The pen is mightier than the sword, thus the sword defends the pen.

Cody
Yet, it is the sheath and cap which keeps it.

Dave
The pen is mightier than the sword because the sword, unlike the pen, does not and cannot lie.

Ammar
Nether the pen is mighty nor the sword,
Mightier is the hand holding it .

Damon
Not entirely true at all. Both the pen and the sword wield a power of their own. Let's say that some written words teach, inspire, help, guide, heal, direct, instruct etc etc millions of people around the world for thousands of years? I'd say that's far more powerful than what a sword can do. I have mastered both just for good measure, and I wield them both in an honourable way !!!

Kelvin
✍

Sloan Bashinsky
Author
When that little verse fell out of me in 2000, i was homeless and I knew it was a knockoff of what others had said down through history. I was getting up each morning and going to a public library and getting on one of their online computers and writing something provocative about local politics, which seemed to write itself as fast as I could type it, and then I printed a dozen copies and delivered it to local government official and private citizens. I felt the verse was a message to me from above that I would be protected. Little did I then know that my daily writings eventually would be read by a lot of people in that community for many years. I upset some powerful people, and though there were some serious close calls, I was protected , sometimes in just barely the nick of time.

Anna
Yes

Jessica
The sword is Sharpest, Thus cutting deepest!! 
THE PEN  ONLY SCRIBBLES OF THOUGHTS NOT ACTIONS

Sloan Bashinsky
Author
Jessica Often that is true, not not always. The American Declaration of Independence was both thoughts and action; its signers knew it was their death warrant, if they were caught by the British; and many of the signers wrote their names very small, hoping to hide who they were. I have seen writings that really got under people's skins, stirred them to action, or to retaliate against the author. I have seen my own writings do plenty of the latter and perhaps some of the former.

Jessica
Sloan Bashinsky it’s your story… 
You write it

Jennifer
Sloan Bashinsky Very brave - and a lot more difficult than causing problems for people who disagree with your pov - Kudos to you

Jennifer
Jessica Thinking is much more dangerous than any sword.

Jessica

Jennifer


 Jennifer 

Jessica Let's write a book - that survives centuries and changes the lives of millions of people

Jessica
Jennifer it won’t prosper for you… but yes go ahead! Do my work for me.

Jennifer
Jessica Prosper by violence? That would never be my style - First of all, that kind of win/lose mentality is not healthy

Jessica
Jennifer first of all you don’t even know me
And 2nd of all nobody said violence… just because a sword is referenced does not mean I wish violence

Jennifer
Jessica  You seemed to be saying that the use of the sword was preferable to use of the pen - You stated that the pen would not prosper - (as if the sword would?)

Jessica
Jennifer you seem to assume you know everything alot

Jennifer
Jessica I thought the sword was a weapon?

Sloan Bashinsky
Author
Jennifer Heh, in the Gospels was a man whose thinking and words got him in deep doo doo with the establishment, and look at how history remembers him today. Also, a man today called The Buddha. And quite a few others, whose thinking and words and lifestyles altered human history.

Jessica
Jennifer but I thought your brain was most dangerous?!

Jessica
Sloan Bashinsky accurate but had it not been for the efforts put forth through their own thought… would they ever have been as historically monumental?!

Sloan Bashinsky
Author
Jessica Of course, first they had to have a thought, or thoughts, but if they had not spoken or written or put that into a poem or song, and if they had not preserved with it, no matter what kind of blowback or flack they caught, we'd never have heard of them. 
 
I'm a mystic, and because of that I have experiences not recognized by human conventional thinking. Here is Wikipedia summary of the Akashic records, which cannot be proven to exist, but exists nonetheless. 
 
"In the religion of theosophy and the philosophical school called anthroposophy, the Akashic records are a compendium of all universal events, thoughts, words, emotions and intent ever to have occurred in the past, present, or future in terms of all entities and life forms, not just human. They are believed by theosophists to be encoded in a non-physical plane of existence known as the mental plane. There are anecdotal accounts but no scientific evidence for the existence of the Akashic records."

sloanbashinsky@yahoo.com

Thursday, February 16, 2023

survival of the fittest won't include Republicans who abolish the federal income tax and the IRS

This meme was posted on Facebook by The Order of Pen:

I replied:

A retired lawyer friend and I batted around the other day the Republican Party notion of abolishing the federal income tax and the Internal Revenue Service. Some of our conclusions were, there would be no money to fund such things as the US Military, FEMA hurricane, flood and other disaster relief, and maintain and repair US highways. And it would doom churches and private schools, which depend heavily on federal tax deductible donations.

When I shared that with a friend who had taught economics in several colleges, whereas I only had majored in economics in college, he agreed, and we added to the casualty list: non-profits off all kinds; the U.S. Congress and Supreme Court and Department of Justice; NORAD, NASA, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, CDC, NIH, CIA, NSA, FBI, Secret Service, DEA, Border Patrol, Coast Guard, Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) and air traffic controllers, farm subsidies, etc.
He said the other way the federal government gets money to pay for itself and all of the above and more is by borrowing money, which will greatly increase if there is no federal income tax. I said, imagine no federal farm subsidies. Imagine massive food shortages in America. Imagine a whole lot of starving Americans- unless they become cannibals in a zombie-like apocalypse, as the rest of the world watches.

When later I posted the above in The Order of Pen as an original comment, it was automatically deleted, because it contained political views, which might offend some people.

Another comment tread inspired me to join it:

Charles
My survival is in the hands of God, the holy spirit and Christ, my saviour!! Amen 

Patrick
Charles well, what if he doesn’t exist ?

Charles
Patrick He lives in me because I have whole heartedly accepted him!! My choice!! Take it or leave it

Patrick
Charles I left it

Charles
Patrick your choice

Patrick
CharlesI have no Proof god doesn’t exist.
Could you please provide me with proof of his existence. Thanks in advance.

Charles
Patrick with your permission, I may have nothing to teach you ,but,I know there is just no true atheist !! This is so because life has a beginning and an end guided by a super natural force beyond science!! I call this force God's spirit that has and control the undying essence of the human being called the soul !! His spirit is equally manifested in the wonderful natural environment he has created!! I have the honour most respectful to plead with you to listen to your heart honestly and God will not only bless you, but will use you as his messenger on this earthly pilgrimage!! May God bless  my humble opinion.

Patrick
Charles well, we partly agree on one thing. God is nature and the environment and we are guided by science.
There is no tooth fairy god, no ghost in the sky looking over us. We determine our own lives. Good luck with yours. 
 
Charles
Patrick ok, you win, good luck also to you 
 
Sloan Bashinsky
Charles Hmmm, are you sure God is a he? I was born into the Southern Baptist Church, and my mother took me with her to the Episcopal church, and back then and even today the Christian Trinity is all male, which causes me to wonder how do that Trinity reproduce? As for whether or not God exists, in early 1987, I had my first experience with beings from another realm, who slowly took me under their wing and stood me before many mirrors in stages and turned me every which a way but lose and upside down and inside out. Later, I came to know them as Jesus and Michael, the archangel. Later, they were joined by Melchizedek, and then the going got really rough. I no longer believed they and God exist, I knew. Yet, talking with Christians about what I was experiencing was sort of like what I imagine an ET talking with them would feel like. I was not on the same planet, nor in the same universe with them any longer. I thought, and still think, if they were getting treated to the same refurbishing I was experiencing, then they might wish they had never heard of God, Jesus, angels known in the Bible. I'm 80 now, and it's still in progress. It seems what "they" think is really important is how we iive, behave, relate to other people, experiences, and the planet. They promote existential spirituality, versus theoretical. They do not dis atheists, but instead look at how atheists live, same as how they look at how Christians live. At how Muslims live, and Buddhists, etc. Meanwhile, here's a soul drawing that fell out of me maybe 20 years ago, called "Feather Talk."

sloanbashinsky@yahoo.com

Wednesday, February 15, 2023

Existential spirituality versus theoretical

For me, after wading though various religions, practices, beliefs, phenomena, etc., spirituality boils down to how we live and behave in the grist mill of life on Earth, and it is very easy to get sidetracked.

This below was posted yesterday into an online spirituality group. I read the various replies under it and replied as Puzzleheaded. Everyone uses a fake name. A group member going by Existential replied to me, and we had some discussion.

Posted by Explorer

If time has no beginning and souls are eternal, why are there young souls?

Philosophy 
If there is no beginning, if time is eternal transformation and metamorphosis, why are there extremely young souls and extremely old souls?
Where were those young souls when the old souls were already "operating in life".

Not born? Then are souls not eternal?

voter
"Old souls" is an erroneous concept. When people refer to an old soul they are likely sensing someone who has walked a bit further down the path than others. As sparks of The Source, souls were all created at once.

bitters
Look at a tree in spring.
Some buds blossom sooner than others. You could say that those leaves or fruits are "older" in comparison to buds that blossomed later.
But really, they're all part of the same tree.
Souls are similar. In the physical world, we see our bodies as separate. But the metaphysical realm, we're connected by the same roots.

Blessing
"Old' can also refer to experience rather than just age. An old soul may just be one that has had more lives on earth than another. They may seem to have wisdom or insight beyond their years simply because they've done this before

get
Seems nobody is clear on the answer here.
Everything is changing, often cyclic in a way. When we say eternal, soul isn't part of what is unchanging. The world is reborn, and so are souls. It is all part of the variety of existence.
In term of human lives however, this is too vast to really comprehend.

Existential
I wrote this as a comment on its own, but you may not see; there is a clear answer:
"Young soul, old soul, is a misunderstanding.
We have been caught in this misidentification with the material atmosphere for either a short time, or maybe a long time.
The soul is eternal."

get
Clarity is subjective though, so even though intellectually correct, how do you identify yourself in the present?

Existential
As an eternal spirit soul, temporarily misidentifying with this biological body; to varying degrees, depending on my level of awareness at any particular moment.
It's a journey toward greater awareness of truth.

Believe
Can you tell me your own definition of time? Just curious about your opinion.

Ability
I think the terminology of old/new soul is in regards to realizing you are a soul. A new soul gets lost in the world and get lured into material things. May not be very spiritual because the world is so new and easily get enthralled in it. Old souls have wisdom because they realize this ain’t their first time around the sun. So it’s not in regards to actual time but wisdom I feel. Maybe not time but life times? Interesting to think about. Great question

Electronic
I’ve been wondering about time and reincarnation too… Dolores Cannon talks about how we sometimes have to repeat lives if we have not learned the lessons we set out to learn in that lifetime. She says you come back with the same people in the same time. So I’m wondering how time works in this regard… I may be reborn again in the 90s? So you kinda time travel?

cotton
Things like young or old souls only exist in relation to our conceptualization of time. In reality everything is happening at the same 🤦‍♀️ time

dirk
Becuase there's no such thing as "old" or "young" souls. It's complete bullshit.

Puzzleheaded
I read all the comments, each has a different explanation. If that is statically-valid market research, then nobody can factually answer this poster’s questions.

Existential
That so many people may be speculating doesn't mean what you're implying here, that 'nobody can factually answer.' It just means that the vast majority are a bit mixed up.

Puzzleheaded
Yes, this is an area where someone cannot factually prove anything, other than to themselves via their own personal experiences.
For example, people who have had a near-death experience know for a fact they had it, but they cannot prove it in a scientific laboratory, court, internet discussion :-).
I have encountered different vintages of sentient souls in the spirit realms, and some take human or other physical forms on Earth or elsewhere, and others don't, and even others do both. 
I'm headed toward 81. I first heard of old and young souls around the time Shirley McClaine's movie "OUT ON A LIMB" came out. I was becoming interested in the New Age, went deeply into it, then ealized it was not solving my problems, nor had being a Baptist, then an Episcopalian, then a non-church-goer.
So one day in early 1987, I made a desperate prayer after realizing I was out of rope and bright ideas: "Dear God, I don't want to die like this, failed. Please help me. (pause) I offer my life to human service."
About ten days later, or rather nights, I woke up in the wee hours and saw two white shift-shaped beings hovering over me n the darkness. I heard, but not with my ears, 'This will push you to your limits, but you asked for it and we are going to give Ito you." I saw a white flash and my body and being were jolted by something electrical. That happened two more times in quick succession. My body was shaking and I sweating, The beings faded away.
That began what I later came to see as my being captured by angels whose names are known in the Bible. They stood me before many mirrors, and turned me every which a way but loose and upside down and inside out, and they are still at it. They have not seemed particularly interested in telling me what goes on in the spirit realms, other than every incarnated soul has a life review after leaving physical form, and there are past lives, and what's important is how incarnated souls live when they are in physical form. The angels also said there is dissension in the spirit realms, regarding what to do with humanity on Earth, and in the more general sense of as above, so below, and as below so above.

They gave me this poem in the spring of 1994, which I still feel sums up the soul questions for me:

Earth-
The sacred prism
through which souls are refracted
into their elemental parts,
purified in Holy Fire,
then one-forged
and sent on their way
to not even God knows where,
simply because they are all
unique emanations of God,
evolving ...

Existential
Hi. Is this something to do with my comment, as you had posted it here as a response? I don't see a connection.
If so, please clarify so I may address it.
Cool!

Puzzleheaded
Yes, it is a response to your comment, and to the post as well. What's important is what people experience and do on this world. That is so whether we are old or new souls. I briefly shared with you what angels, who see, hear and know a great deal more than people see, hear and know, shared and did to and for me (and to and for a few other people I have known). And, I shared a poem angels gave to me, which is about any and all souls on this world, and where they originated at some point in time and in space. God, by whatever name, is Eternal. Souls come out of God, but not all at the same time. Everything came out of God, which is in everything. Religions have put their own spins on God, and made their spins hardened concrete. God, however, is not fathomable, and not even angels fully know God.

Existential
Thank you for sharing; quite an experience.
I maintain that the soul is eternal, and the 'young soul / old soul' thing is not the age, but the amount of time the soul has been misidentifying with the temporary material energy as its self.
Some have been in the wheel of rebirth longer than others, but we're all eternal.

Puzzleheaded
In the sense our souls came out of God, which is Eternal, our souls are eternal. Godspeed

greeneyes
Amazing, Puzzleheaded, that you've lived with this knowledge for this long while watching the world toil in ignorance.
Must've been maddening.
Your story of the mirrors...
I don't wish to cause offense but just to share my thoughts.
To my understanding, the thing going on with the mirrors wasn't them doing something to you but actually just them making you aware of a thing that you were doing to yourself.
I could be wrong but I don't think I am and I thought you might be interested to know.

Puzzleheaded
The mirrors forced me to keep looking at myself, my hubris, demonic twin, character flaws, denial, beams in my own eyes, projections, etc. I was corrected, spanked, adjusted, redirected many times. Even now, age 80, it happens. Perhaps a life review before I cross over. And it will continue then. Imagine every person being given that while they live on this planet. Humanity would be very different. Know also, I had and saw many beautiful things, I was rescued many times from danger of and not of my own making. Some of it was terrifying. Even some of the angel healing of horrible soul wounds was terrifying. I think, if humanity is given what I and a few people I knew well also were given, maybe 50,000 people would survive it.

greeneyes
I believe you and have been given a "taste" of such things myself. It certainly changed my perspective. I can't imagine what the world would look like if it happened to everyone. I don't know if I would have survived a more intense experience... and perhaps that's why I didn't have one.
The things that you're talking about... they happen to everyone (I think) but not in such a rapid and obvious fashion.
More like, they are given opportunities to overcome such things or see it for themselves. It's why people find themselves in the same types of situations over and over again, because they haven't learned the lesson or learned it well enough. It also seems to happen at a societal level, where we all go through it together.
I didn't realize quite the intensity of your experience.
It is for the reasons you said, the forging and evolving of unique emanations. Refining and growing.
Even with what's been said, I wonder if you are holding back on some of the crazier experiences... and that's ok.
Thank you for sharing your story and poem, it's been lovely to hear and think about.

Puzzleheaded
Thanks, based on my personal experience and those of a few other people I have known well, what we experienced was very rare. Literally, we were captured and run by angels known in the Bible. We were not church people, although some us had grown up attending churches. The common denominator for us seemed to be we were desperate enough to try something really different, having no clue what it would entail, and had we known, we might have said no thank you. But once in it, there was no safe jumping ship.
 
 
Yes, I've had countless experiences, which science, 
psychology, psychiatry and even religion do not accept, I've talked and written extensively about those experiences, some of it in this forum, and much more in books, on my blogs, and more recently in a podcast another angel-captured amigo created for me, in which he talks but is not seen, and I talk and am seen. He has put many of my writings into internet libraries/archives, and will put more there. Free reads, no ads, no solicitation. This is an anonymous forum, and I hesitate to provide my name and links, therefore.  
 
greeneyes
I'll tell you one of mine, just because you really seem legitimate and I think you might enjoy it, and perhaps might have a useful or enjoyable comment.
One Christmas Eve, in a church that that I no longer attend, there was a nativity display.
In the place of the nativity figure of Mary, I saw Mary herself. She didn't look at me or say anything... and didn't need to. I understood.
I was allowed to see her because her love of Jesus is such that she also loves those who love Jesus. I know a lot of people say they love Jesus, but there's not a perfect honesty to that if you don't know for sure he exists.
I'm not and never was a Catholic and hardly had ever given much of a thought to Mary... and from this and other things I now understand that I basically know nothing. Whoever and whatever she is, with the ability to appear to hundreds or thousands of people every year, I just don't know. I can't seem to think of her as a ghost or a God.
She just is outside the scope of any concept that I understand.
I had a funny thought at the time, "She's taken becoming a symbol of hope a bit too literally!"

Puzzleheaded

I believe you had that experience. Either the soul that was Mary, or an angel posing as her, apparently has appeared to many people in that way. But not to me. What I wonder is, why for you personally did it happen?

greeneyes
For one thing, alignment. I was in a state of love and wonder regarding Jesus and his birth which corresponds to Mary's state. A shared experience.
For another, there was no belief forced upon me by such a reveal. For some people, this might convert them to Christianity or something. There was no conflict for me... I'm kindof a pseudo-Christian... you might say a non-denominational gnostic Christian who doesn't take things too literally. Or literally at all, really. Also, the concept of "receiving a vision" or "hallucinating your perceptions" is already how I view all perception.
It's possible that you or anyone might receive such a vision and dismiss it as your eyes playing tricks on you, or your mind playing tricks on you... or rationalize it away by some other means. I was open to such things.
Perhaps most relatable to you, I ask for such things. I seek more knowledge and understanding as well as more mystery. Such an experience fulfills that request.
There are other reasons too. It made me become aware of the seriously crazy number of sightings of her. I had occasion to learn the meaning of her name... which is mother. So saying mother Mary is akin to saying Mother Mother, which is funny to me. The name certainly raises questions to me when thinking about Mary the Magdalene.
Finally, you can imagine that for me... many seemingly random events may not be random at all. Like this conversation for instance, or other conversations I've had about this. The fact that I might share such experiences with people and have them consider their perspectives and perhaps "wrestle with God" might be a reason why I personally would have such an experience.
That I might, and that you might share useful perspective, could be the reason we're even chatting at all. I'm not sure I believe in random coincidence at all.
This is probably incomplete.

Puzzleheaded
The God odds of you and I intersecting were 100 percent. Mary mother of Jesus in the Gospels is a very different being from Mary Magdalene in the Gospels, who was Jesus's wife and bore him a child after the crucification and resurrection (NDE). But he wanted to go east, and she did not wish to leave her culture, and they parted. It became lethal to be a follower of Jesus, and Magdalene went with the child to southern France, where a sect sprung up called the Cathars, who recognized the child as being of Magdalene and Jesus. Eventually, nation states loyal to Rome burned the Cathar churches and libraries. If this is news to you, get a copy of Holy Blood Holy Grail. But that does not resolve for me, and perhaps not for you, the vision you had of Jesus' mother, and I want to sleep on that tonight and perhaps I will be ready to answer you tomorrow, and perhaps tell you more about Magdalene, which was told to me.

Puzzleheaded
Don't think I dreamed about any of this last night, yet I'm glad we met and are having our discussion. I don't meet many people actually having direct experiences with the "God realm", which change their lives. I will share an observation that in the Gospels, Jesus sometimes spoke pejoratively toward and of his mother, and he said he did not come to bring peace, but to divide families, including children from their father and their mother.

In maybe 1993, I went into a trance and this came to me from very far away about Melchizedek, the Christ and Mary Magdalene:

Melchizedek ...

Melchizedek is an order of angel that comes to a planet in trouble ...

Melchizedek comes to prepare a planet to receive the Christ ...

Christ does not come to a planet without Melchizedek ...

Mary Magdalene was of the Order Melchizedek 
 
greeneyes
I had a period, maybe 2 years, where I felt like I was a lightning rod.
It was kinda crazy, strangers mentioning to me my thoughts in the street, other bizarre occurrences, and unending synchronicities.
Actually, weird events have followed me throughout my life though I was blind to them for most of it.
I do understand the "You cannot do this work..." I think. It allows you to build up a "positive charge", attract the negativity, and dispel it. I can imagine that it either feels draining or invokes a beautiful feeling of the joy of giving. Perhaps either or both depending on the situation. If not released and built up enough, I imagine that reality would swirl strangely around you.
We don't have a perfect knowledge of everything in this life. If you asked yourself, "what would I do if confronted with this situation?"... it's not helpful if you already know how things are going to turn out. If you did, you could never really know how the uninformed version of yourself would respond. Almost none of these people thinks that they're supporting nazis, Hitlers, killers, demons, or whatever. They started out as very naive and idealistic spirits who thought that they could overcome any obstacle... but that's so easy to say and think when you don't know what it's like to be in total blind ignorance of the truth. They know "the truth", but not the truth on the ground, so to speak.
A sidenote to that is that nothing is actually predetermined... it's close to predetermined and practically a foregone conclusion but it's never quite completely predetermined. To do so would require the full alignment of all intention. I can't imagine that. Then again, even this conversation is outside the scope of most imaginations. Perhaps I will be surprised.
Having faith and some connection to the divine can clearly and plainly affect your life on the ground. Even just a positive outlook can make a huge difference. The supernatural is just another path, and any path is better than bland materialism. Everyone has their own spiritual gifts and magic... and use them, though they're almost always unaware of it.
I have felt the presence of angels in real life, and spirits. I can't plainly see them, but I prefer to feel them anyways. It's more personal. I met an angel in a dream one time... not at all what I was expecting. The angel's name was written on their forehead, which seemed strange. I've been aware of other entities too.
I don't know anything about Melchizedek or the order, I've never heard of them... though the story of them coming to help the people here sounds familiar and I've heard of such things before but with other names attached.
I'm enjoying this little sharing.
 
 
greeneyes
At first glance, this Melchizedek and the order seem to be attuned to particular aspects of God, namely the energy of justice and righteousness... which in some ways don't seem necessarily strongly correlated to Christian messaging as much as Judaism. Would you agree?
It seems somehow fitting that a Jewish energy would arrive before a Christian one.

Puzzleheaded
The thought by many Bible scholars to be anonymous Letter to the Hebrews in the New Testament says Jesus is High Priest in Melchizedek. The letter is addressed to Jews who had followed Jesus, but had returned to their old Jewish beliefs and practices. The letter warns the of the peril of turning away from the cleansing of the Lord, and tells them they should be eating meat and teaching, but they are still drinking milk, and they should return to the discipline. I experienced the discipline and it was horrible, but necessary, and it continues. Jesus said in the Gospels, many are called, but few are chosen; the road to life is difficult and the gate narrow and few enter; the work is great and the laborers are few; his baptism was in fire and he was anxious to get on with and share it. Mainstream Christendom doe snot know that Jesus, whom the Jewish priesthood in that day did not like even a little bit.
 
Jesus's companion, Mary Magdalene, was of the Melchizedek priesthood, as was Judas. The rest of the disciples were clueless about those three's relationship and secret meetings during which they discussed coming events. Judas was the only one Jesus trusted to play the betrayer in that skit, and Judas did what was asked of him, and he was so distraught, he killed himself. Had he not done that, he would have been used by God to carry forward what Jesus had begun, and maybe we'd never have heard of St. Paul. 
 
'I do understand the "You cannot do this work..." I think. It allows you to build up a "positive charge", attract the negativity, and dispel it. I can imagine that it either feels draining or invokes a beautiful feeling of the joy of giving. Perhaps either or both depending on the situation. If not released and built up enough, I imagine that reality would swirl strangely around you.' 
 
I do not think you understand, but consider how Jesus did this work in the Gospels, simply because it was given to him to do, even though there was scant world reward and lots of flack coming back at him. It's a calling. It's really hard work, sometimes very dangerous in human sagas as well as spiritual realms.
In late 1998, I moved back to my home state and was not gotten involved in face to face social, political and religious dramas, but I continued writing to a blog and wrote a book and was on social media, and that all increased, and then came the free ad-free podcast which has an international audience of about 60,000 complete watches per episode. My writings are not in internet archives/libraires and more will be there. Free reads.
Every day, I wake up wondering why iI'm still here, hoping at some level this it the last day, even though I do have stuff going on that I enjoy with people who do not and perhaps never will understand what angels did with me. I have two friends, who know me in that way. One of them was captured by angels, too. He's about half my age. He has so much to look forward to :-).
He built the podcast and figured out how to get it attention, after professionals turned me down. Then, he figured out how to get the writings into the internet archives/libraries. When some Ukrainians in Kiev found the podcast and emailed him, he knew people who knew people, who got them pass ports and into UN shelters and into the Chez Republic or Israel, depending whether they were Christians or Jews. They were fleeing into sewers during missile attacks, because the sewers were softer than the bomb shelters. I learned of that only because one of the Ukrainian Jews emailed me and told me about it.
What manner of idiocy dreams up a shooting war around nuclear reactors?
 
 
greeneyes
Fair enough, there's a lot about your situation that I find surprising and I can only relate the little that I can. Perhaps I don't understand... But to my mind it does sound as though reality swirls differently around you. Wanting a war anywhere at all seems pretty horrible. I wouldn't make much of a soldier. I like to think I wouldn't obey any order that I didn't agree with, which would be most or all of them. Thank you for your service to help the world.

Puzzleheaded
All war is terrible. The nuclear component is exponential. Overall, Humanity is separated from God, its feminine aspect is all but destroyed, it is spiritually cloning itself and devolving, and the demonic realm likes that and herds and the status quo, and is the real “deep state”. Each person must find his or her own way. Jesus in the Gospels provided a formula anyone could use. Christianity doesn’t grok him very well. You found or were shown a path you could take and leave the herd and migrate toward and into what Jesus called the Kingdom of God. A path Jesus said is difficult and few enter the gate. Fortunately for humanity, it’s not be a Christian, or die and burn in hell forever.

Puzzleheaded
I started a new free, no ads, no solicitations blog earlier this year, at which wanders here and there as things wander to me and I wander to them. The newest post comes up first. Unless people are public figures, I don't use their real names. Here's link, if you are interested.
https://ramblingsofbatshaman.blogspot.com/2023/02/if-there-were-no-god-topic-would-never.html

greeneyes
I mean... why wouldn't they know Jesus was? Doesn't it say so in the bible?
Though Magdalene may have been such a priest secretly, I see no reason to think that she was openly.
Of Judas... some gnostic texts I've encountered would make me think he is not... if Melchizedek or Melchisedec refers to Justice and Righteousness as I'm coming to think (although I've also wondered if it means "vessel of the energy of the lord")... I think he may be associated with some other energy.
When I say this... I imagine God or "God-energy" to in some way represent "Goodness itself", to which Justice and Righteousness would only represent one aspect of many. Others might be things like Love, Hope, Liberty, Charity, or whatever. Kindof like a rainbow coming out of sunlight.
The funny part about the milk and the meat is that we still live in that situation today. There is very little "deep" or "adult" about the practice of Christianity in almost any circles today. If it is so in some other practices, I'm not aware of it.

Puzzleheaded
Hebrews, in the New Testament, was written by someone who knew Jesus. I was told Magdalene wrote it anonymously, because it was known then that no man would read or consider what a woman wrote. Melchizedek beings, humans they have adopted and trained, Jesus in the Gospels, the angels known in the Bible, all exist. Just as God is, they are unfathomable to human beings. Yet, you keep trying to define them, which is not possible. I told you Magdalene, Judas and Jesus were a team, who operated in secret as far as the other disciples were concerned. You keep drawing on things you have read, which you interpret, I draw on what I have been told and shown directly. I have known five people who were in similar enough communion with those beings, who understood I was what I was going through and being told. I'm still in contact with two of those people, who are considerably younger than my 80 years. There simply is no way to understand or appreciate what I tell you of my experiences and the angels, and the demons, unless you have been in similar straights, so to speak, to my own. That is not meant as criticism. It is simply how it is.
 
I take no credit for it. It was done to and for me. I was not special, but was desperate enough to be open to whatever might be in store, even though I had no way of knowing just what or how truly difficult a lot of it would be. I sometimes have told people that I was about the sorriest piece of shit the angels could find, and they took me on as an experiment, to see if they could do anything with me. It's a wonder I didn't kill myself many times, and I suppose the angels had a hand in that not happening. Or perhaps I was just too chicken. 
Based on our discussion so far, you have heard nothing from the sprit realms about me, nor what I have told you about my experiences and some of what I have been told and shown. So, I wonder if you are being guided, steered, corrected, redirected by something bigger, smarter and wiser than you? I hope you are, because the other realms are full of opportunistic beings, and also demons, eager to latch onto and use people unawares

greeneyes

I believe you that they exist. I believe in Angels. I know God exists.
I haven't been shown a lot of things directly, but I have seen and participated (peripherally) in miracles.
You're right that I can't see it from your perspective... but that doesn't mean that I will abandon seeing things as best I can from my own. Perhaps one day, I will see it better than you can. Perhaps not. Regardless, I enjoy trying and won't stop.
No prophet was special except in regards to the fact that God was involved with their lives... and yet they were and so are you. They were special to God, for whatever reason... and that's about as special as you could ever hope to be. It seems to me that the angels have done well.
I can relate to your statement about being "a sorry piece of shit"... and that's humility come honestly. I've thought that if I ever joined the body of Christ, I'd be like the pimple on his butt. I've heard that tax collectors may be closer to salvation because they know they're no good... they have no option or ability of getting to heaven on their own... they know they must look to God for that. Most of us believe that we can... that we're good, or at least good enough.
I've been guided many times, perhaps always, but it is somewhat mysterious to me... it's definitely something bigger. I've had some limited interaction with angels (as previously mentioned), Mary, spirits, other beings, and demons.
I don't think you need to worry about me. I appreciate it though.
Thanks for the link earlier, I will definitely check it out.

Puzzleheaded
I hear you.
I don't know where I stand with God, and I fret each day,  hoping I'm on or near the tracks God wants me on.
Here's a link to a somewhat romp of a podcast about ETs my friend and I put up recently, for a change of pace.
Idiot Watch: Biden UFOs, Putin nuclear plant war, Republican fiscal zombie apocalypse
https://youtu.be/_qxHxHQcBQc 
 
Puzzleheaded
Oops, that's a link to the next podcast, which somewhat leaked from the ET podcast. Here's a link to the ET podcast, which the angel Michael told Bob in a dream, we should do.Greetings, Earthlings: ETs exist. Now what?
   
Greetings, Earthlings: ETs exist. Now what?
https://youtu.be/TaH0aSAqFKI
 
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