I admit "ultimate goodness" is a vague term. But I'd say a universe without an eternal torture chamber is, at least, "not ultimately evil". In my view, we emerge from The One, the Ultimate Source of Existence, and eventually return to it. But The One is often said to be beyond good and evil so perhaps "ultimate goodness" isn't entirely justified.

Are you familiar with Clifford Geertz? If so what do you make of his definition of religion?

Got ya. Thanks.

I admit "ultimate goodness" is a vague term. But I'd say a universe without an eternal torture chamber is, at least, "not ultimately evil" — Art48

Or perhaps just evil (do we need ultimate?).

It sounds like you might be recovering from a harsh form of Protestant Christianity and, like many others, are trying to salvage part of the story by reframing some notion of the divine within an ethical system you can fully accept. If not, I apologise for this assumption. Not all Christians have believed that hell entails everlasting punishment. As David Bentley Hart reminds us (That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation), there were many strands of early Christian thought that held a universalist view: that ultimately all are saved, and that hell functions less as retribution than as a process of moral purification or the re-acquisition of virtue.

The Christianity I grew up with described hell not as a place of torment, but as a state or condition defined by the absence of God. We were taught that the Bible is largely a collection of pre-scientific myths and narratives, best understood allegorically rather than literally.

I was never able to accept or comprehend the idea of a god. From the moment I first encountered it, I completely lacked any sensus divinitatis, as Calvin might have it. The idea doesn’t help me with sense-making or everyday living, but I still find it very interesting.

The One is often said to be beyond good and evil — Art48

'Beyond the vicissitudes' is preferable. On the plane of born existence, all goods have their opposite - pleasure and pain, life and death, good and bad. But the One is said to be 'the good that has no opposite.' Paired with that is the doctrine of 'evil as the privation of the good': evil has no inherent reality but is the consequence of privation of the Good. Realising the 'good that has no opposite' is, in philosophical spirituality, the end of the search.

Maybe the word ultimate is the problem. — Tom Storm

I think you are correct. Just look how problematic ultimates like infinity are still in math and logic.

What is good and what is bad? You and I may agree on individual examples, but we also may not. The answer depends on us, it is a subjective answer.

No objective information just what reality is will answer this. So what's the solution for this that humans have come up with? That there's an ultimate subjective: God. How do you accept this then? By faith.

It's quite simply they're trick fucked by the grammar of the language they use that forces "BEING" in a world of "BECOMING." Being, and thus The True Form are empty fictions. Hence you have YOUR way, and I have MY way, but as to THE way, it does not exist.

Recent posts have made more of "the universe is ultimately good" than I ever expected.
The phrase in my mind occurs in the context of faith.

There's a faith that is fearful: if I don't do (or believe) the right thing something bad (perhaps very, very bad) is going to happen to me. So I'd better believe what I'm told about God, etc. and not question and not think too deeply about it because that might lead to questioning.

And there's a faith that has more confidence "in the inherent goodness of the universe" where the person questions, thinks for themselves, and isn't afraid to call out (or, at least, privately disbelieve) obvious B.S.

Here's a video that discusses those two types of faith.
32 – A Clean, Well- Lighted Place https://vimeo.com/1135111091

Here's a video that discusses those two types of faith.
32 – A Clean, Well- Lighted Place https://vimeo.com/1135111091 — Art48

:up:

Deus, sive natura (Tat Tvam Asi)

Deus, sive natura (Tat Tvam Asi) — 180 Proof

Sub specie aeternitatis, too.

But who are these originators? Can you actually sketch the process because it seems a bit vague? The founders are not generally in this vein: the Buddha, or Jesus (if he was a historical person), were not empire-builders. If we take Christianity, who exactly are the originators to whom this claim is meant to apply.

The originators of spirituality were ordinary folks seeking answers to unanswerable (with the level of knowledge at the time) questions. But my original commentary pertained to organized religion specifically (as opposed to spirituality). So the goals of those who parlayed individual beliefs in the metaphysical into an institutional heirachy (which, they would lead, naturally) centered on the topic of spirituality, is what you're seeking. My guess is those folks sought personal power and wealth. I'm not so cynical to not acknowledge they didn't also personally believe they were leading society to a better place and individuals to eternal life etc. Rather that they were pursuing both goals.

Individuals who make cold lemonade from scratch in their kitchen do it to quench thirst. Those who create bottling companies, do it to make a profit, regardless of their interest in quenching the thirst of their customers.

Not all Christians have believed that hell entails everlasting punishment. — Tom Storm

Abbe Arthur Mugnier, a French divine, was asked if he believed in hell. He replied, "Yes, because it is a dogma of the church -- but I don't believe anyone is in it."

Nice quote.