Michael said:
Perhaps the universe is eternal.
Everything needs a beginning, a cause. Everything except nothingness. If the universe existed without a cause it would be illogical. Can you imagine all this existing without reason/cause?
Perhaps this universe has began a million times before and ended 999 thousands times before.
A million is not enough. And if the universe was eternal, it couldn't begin and end.
Nevertheless, you seem to prefer a “beginning” with consciousness attached to it.
The universe begins and ends in the present moment, and it exists in the past memory. The goal of the universe is nothingness. That goal causes the universe. If you have a goal in your life, you have much energy. That's why the universe has so much energy, it has an eternal goal.
I say if we take away the consciousness that you have anthropomorphically attributed to the initiation of this universe, then perhaps we agree after all.
Consciousness does not initiate the universe, nothingness first creates separation between its infinity (in the present moment). Consciousness is a separation between inner and outer, between "me" (nothingness) and the "universe" (infinity).
Nothingness does not just mean emptiness, it also means infinite possibilities.
There is no reason to attribute consciousness to a purely physical phenomenon – such as the beginning of this universe.
The universe is not physical (separate from consciousness), it is mental/spiritual.
There is no more reason to suggest there is one consciousness over say three or 800 million. There is no reason to suggest that even if there were 800 million consciousnesses that caused this universe, that you will get to live after you die.
There is only one consciousness, in infinite bodies.
After all, that is the crux of it. The fear of your own consciousness ending.
It's not my fear, it's my love. The end of my consciousness is my dream and goal.
If consicousness could end, I wouldn't be here now. I've always been here, telling you that I've always been here, but you always forget. We're forever travelling towards the goal which can never be reached, because it already is, and always "was".
However, it's rash to suggest God is nothingness and then assume that everything came from nothing ergo there is a God and if I supplicate said God then I get to live on after my death.
If you're dead, you're nothing, but if your body is dead, you will still exist, because you're not things themselves, you're the consciousness of things.
Death does not exist, it's an illusion. Even though we apparently see everything around us die, the existence (self, life) has never died. Leaves fall from trees, but only those empty covers, the bodies, not life. Life is there forever.
Christ is God, he said: I am life. When God breathes outwards the leaves, trees, planets and galaxies are reborn. When he breathes inwards, the leaves drop from the trees, the trees die and so on.
Nothing.
I would also suggest that as there is "existence" then "nothing" does not exist.
Nothingness is the only real existence.
Imagine that you zoom inside atoms, infinitely. You'll never discover a "particle" which can't be zoomed inside. Everything can be divided. There is space between everything. The universe consists of space. Space is the only absolute reality because everything else can be divided, so that it reveals more space.
Space is the only thing we can be sure of, and then there is this apparent "something". People call it something because no one knows what it is. Nothing but nothing has ever been known. -Everything- is relative, nothingness is absolute.
Only the present moment exists. Because the present moment has no duration, no universe exists in the presence.
What is this existence you talk about, this universe? What is it made of? If it's made of matter, explain what matter is [made of], and so on.