Thoughts on what is sacred

Json wrote: ...and I think this could be part of the decline. Is it time we started showing others that there are sacred things out there?

I think there is a great lack of the sacred, even in religion. I grew up a Protestant that always secretly wished our tradition pushed the idea of a home altar, because it made the sacred more tangible in one's daily life. I think there need to be things like that; things we set apart to remind us of the connection of important things.

What do you consider sacred?

Lots of things, really. Mostly my concepts of "the sacred" are limited to things specifically sanctified (set apart for spiritual use), and pure expressions of my two favored elements. It's why there's a standing rule that we do not throw garbage into steamboat's fires.

I dislike the negative connotation that has arisen over something being "sacred". It seems that it is often used as a justification for being mean. I think if your going to call something sacred, you have to allow it for anything else. Maybe the act of defaming your "sacred" altar is "sacred" to the defamer. Perhaps the childish ignorance that brought them to destroy your "sacred' object was the manifestation of yet ANOTHER person's "sacred" mind frame. Warring "sacredness" is what you get unless you accept that ALL things are "sacred" (ALL THINGS going beyond physical limitation, mind you. Ideology, attitude, song etc can all be sacred). Accepting all things as "sacred" one can not really complain if one
"sacred" thing eats another. What we can be left with, however, is a sense of solemnity and respect for ALL THINGS as opposed to a nihilistic cynicism.

On the other hand, if all things were sacred, not only would the label become obsolete (look up what fines means. if something isn't bordered, isn't distinguishable from anything else, it is undefined), but it would also make mutually incompatible things sacred. That would render you incapable of protecting one over another and the sacredness would yet on a second level, again, become a meaningless property. Some things can be sacred. All things cannot. Not to the same person anyway.

By regarding all things with reverence I would be holding all things sacred. Does this mean my deamnor and outlook are pointless because I afford the same reverence to everything?

I didn't say pointless. I said meaningless. If the survival of the starving cheetah is as sacred as the survival of the innocent gazelle, both your action and your inaction will have you violate one of the things you hold sacred. Now, either you hold one more sacred than the other or you really don't care about either. In both cases, the holding everything sacred doesn't quite work. This is a poor example, but you know what I'm saying. If everything is sacred, there will be values both sacred that are incompatible. Not only is sacred a meaningless word in a person to whom everything is sacred, the maintenance of all the sacred things to a remotely equal degree is impossible meaning that your holding of everything as sacred doesn't actually motivate you to do anything at any one opportunity, which, again, means that the label doesn't stand for anything.

" With everyone super no one will be. " - Syndrome

Gisteron wrote: I didn't say pointless. I said meaningless. If the survival of the starving cheetah is as sacred as the survival of the innocent gazelle, both your action and your inaction will have you violate one of the things you hold sacred. Now, either you hold one more sacred than the other or you really don't care about either. In both cases, the holding everything sacred doesn't quite work. This is a poor example, but you know what I'm saying. If everything is sacred, there will be values both sacred that are incompatible. Not only is sacred a meaningless word in a person to whom everything is sacred, the maintenance of all the sacred things to a remotely equal degree is impossible meaning that your holding of everything as sacred doesn't actually motivate you to do anything at any one opportunity, which, again, means that the label doesn't stand for anything.

" With everyone super no one will be. " - Syndrome

That is a really interesting point. I actually find the example quit good and the reference to The Incredibles helps also. :lol:

I guess maybe holding every individual thing sacred could be difficult, but holding concepts sacred could work. Holding nature sacred would allow a person to be concerned with preservation and conservation while still allowing for nature to do it's thing.

I guess maybe holding every individual thing sacred could be difficult, but holding concepts sacred could work. Holding nature sacred would allow a person to be concerned with preservation and conservation while still allowing for nature to do it's thing.

Does it have to be held sacred to be concerned about it? A tangential example would be that many religious people believe atheists cannot be moral, or more to the point, that morals only exist within a religious construct.

It(nature) will do its thing regardless of how you value it.

I would rather think of it in another way - everything is sacred because everything has meaning. You could just as easily say that nothing is sacred because nothing really has meaning. Of course this is a loaded fallacy in nature, but that just points out the truth about this topic. The first is pretty much a subjective stance, the second, would likely have to be objective. The idea of "sacred" is nebulous. It is perhaps more idealistic than anything. (I could be wrong, so correct me if I am please) It is not a measurably existing thing. It is simply a sentimental man-made idea revolving around what something means to us, either as an individual or as a group. If somebody says "everything is sacred", it is not to say "everything is white" or "everything is up". Sacred is not necessarily a polar end to something, unless you put it in a strictly dualistic context of a message. To me at least, it is simply saying "all things have [something] to it" - "something" meaning... that, in the analogy of the entire universe being a big dance, "something" would be a role or a rhythm or a pattern that it plays in that big dance, regardless of how much it affects or doesn't affect something else, which nevertheless, contributes to that dance. It may be just as valid as saying "everything is the Force". Is there a context in which something is not the Force? This is how I (and perhaps others here) am viewing "sacredness".

Its not so much a tangible value but a valuable perspective I'm referring to.

Can meaning be subjective? If so, whether it is or not would be up to the individual?