Meaning of Sky/heaven in religion.

[Darwin]

This thread is about "above" and why it matters.

Besides religions as christianity,which do place emphasis on this,heavens (namely sky) and where whatever gods are located at,this phenomena seems to be evident in varying religions.
Ancient Chinese had some sorts of religion,as an example,which encompassed worshipping the sky and I´m sure these easily predate dominant religions of today.

I was just wondering what this might be about,sure there have been beliefs which make predictions about things "on earth",which might be considered to be closer to us.
Anyways,it´s all speculating but I wonder whether they felt there is something mysterious about skies,perhaps thunder,snow and rain falling down was considered a divine act,there is no way they could have understood it.
Additionally,sky was obviously outside of their reach,not being able to fly and therefore might have been considered a mystery of some sort.

I do not know,anyone care to share their thoughts on this?

[thaiboxerken]

Not sure, but it seems that the higher something is, the more awe it seems to inspire. The clouds and stars are something were unreachable, so that could be the reason why the religions made that sky the reward. The ground seems to be something that everyone touches most often, so it's just a common thing.

I know in Thailand, the closer to the ground something is, the more "dirty" it is considered. Show a Thai the bottom of your foot and you're insulting them. It could be because the ground is where many animals biological trash goes.

[Dancing David]

one of the many elemental classifications usually includes air, sky.
The others usually being earth,water, fire, and sometimes wood.

I think there is a facination with the sky that there is for all elements. Smoke and breath seem to rise into the sky. The sun is in it and the stars and moon. Unlike the earth it is always changing.

Peace

[Yahweh]

The sky has always had a great influence on a good majority of religions around the world. Its always up there (except in those rare instances where the sky falls... ???). The sun, moon, stars can always be seen but to primitive man they dont have an explanation, so clearly they are of higher order. And possibly because of that it was assumed that the Earth was a lower plane, when you die you ascend to the heavens. Personally I've always had a fixation on the moon... not any type of spiritual one but I just really really enjoy the moon (because its made of cheese).

[Yahweh]

Another one of those quirks about religion is the emphasis they put on song, chanting, gospels, rhythm, etc... music tends to be just as important in religion as the heavens.

[Darwin]

Thank you for your replies.

[Monketey Ghost]

Yah. It's pretty much because of the obscuring clouds, and the ancients couldn't get up there to see what was going on, so the imagination came up with allsorts of wacky ideas.

"There are superbeings with magical powers up there! They live on top of the clouds, etc."

Some Chinese would say that man is between heaven and earth, because his head goes up, and his feet are on the ground, and because we get air from above and food etc. from below.

-Who

[LeFevre]

Originally posted by Whodini
Some Chinese would say that man is between heaven and earth, because his head goes up, and his feet are on the ground, and because we get air from above and food etc. from below.

-Who

What about eating birds?

Originally posted by LeFevre


What about eating birds?

In general, we get food from below. Most birds we eat are ground birds anyway.

-Who

[BeholdTheTruth]

Perhaps the God's honest truth about how a kind of sometimes kindly 'god' got to be in a kind of heavin :-) ...

Once upon a time, when Humanity was still young, a rich & righteous man came upon a large extended family that was living in a midst of a great plain. And he said, 'If you hew for me a great stone pillar and raise it upright, I will pay each of you twelve pieces of gold for your labors, your men and your woman and your youngsters. But only upon the rightful completion of this task.' And as he had proven trustworthy in the past, they all accepted his offer. And for week this family hewed the stone.

And then after they'd carefully squared it off, its members slowly began heaving it skyward. And after many more weeks of great effort spent in heaving it (because it weighed the equivalent of several of our tons), they had put in a very large portion of the effort necessary to eventually have it standing upright on its own. But not yet enough.

Then tiring of this work a young member of the family said to the other members of his family, 'You may continue to work towards your reward, but as for me, I'm leaving off my labors and asking for partial payment before continuing further.'

And he went to the rich & righteous man, and said, 'Lord, I have been working for many weeks on this task, and I now want to be paid for my labors so far.'

But the rich & righteous man said, 'If we had agreed to be bound by a rule of partial reward for partial effort, I would honor your request. However, the deal I have made with you and the rest of your family is one of wholly giving in order that you might wholly receive. The time for your reward has not yet come. Go now back to your labors and if you and your family wholly expend what is productive, and sufficiently avoid what is counter-productive, in order to fully expend what it completely takes to heave up that stone to an upright position, then surely you shall wholly receive the total reward you deserve.' And the young man reluctantly rejoined his family in heaving further their heavy burden.

Inexperienced in Stone Raising, the youth assumed that they would get their reward many days later -- after they had heaved their heavy stone up to its full height. However, as soon as this heaven-bound stone reached an angle with the portion of the earth they were standing on (where a modern-day physicist or mathematician would say, 'a perpendicular dropped from the stone's center of gravity to the earth had just passed the stone's base') something 'miraculous' happened -- miraculous at least to anyone unenlightened by the laws of Newtonian mechanics.

For, out of the blue sky above them, the giant 'Hand' of the unseen 'God' (that these childish savages believed was always there hidden in plain sight) suddenly seemed to them to reach down from its heavenly abode always right above their heads.

And, as if to reward this family for sufficiently expending the required amount of right effort in the right direction, their 'Source of all Goodness' appeared to complete for them the final heaving up of their rite's stone to an up-right position.

Get It? Good/God; Heaven, heavin'?