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Fnord
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21 Jul 2018, 7:55 pm

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No Hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today


Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that in the first verse, John Lennon tells us to imagine that there is no such place as Heaven...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace


... and in the second verse he describes what Heaven must be like?


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cubedemon6073
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21 Jul 2018, 8:11 pm

Fnord wrote:
Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No Hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today


Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that in the first verse, John Lennon tells us to imagine that there is no such place as Heaven...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace


... and in the second verse he describes what Heaven must be like?


I think what he is saying is let's quit focusing so much on heaven in the sky and let's create one for ourselves on Earth.



Fnord
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21 Jul 2018, 8:20 pm

cubedemon6073 wrote:
Fnord wrote:
Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No Hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today


Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that in the first verse, John Lennon tells us to imagine that there is no such place as Heaven...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace


... and in the second verse he describes what Heaven must be like?
I think what he is saying is let's quit focusing so much on heaven in the sky and let's create one for ourselves on Earth.
Then it's a Good Thing for us that John Lennon didn't die for our sins and rise from the dead on the third day.


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techstepgenr8tion
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21 Jul 2018, 8:49 pm

I think he demonstrated that he's not a psychologist, not a sociologist, not any sort of profound political thinker, and that he's never had responsibility for running or safeguarding any complex system. He demonstrated that he's just a musician putting musings to song and music. If you say something that enough people are feeling though it'll resonate, it'll stick, and since most people to some degree are naive - the more naive the thing you say the more likely it'll strike a chord in more people.


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Fnord
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21 Jul 2018, 8:51 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
I think he demonstrated that he's not a psychologist, not a sociologist, not any sort of profound political thinker, and that he's never had responsibility for running or safeguarding any complex system. He demonstrated that he's just a musician putting musings to song and music. If you say something that enough people are feeling though it'll resonate, it'll stick, and since most people to some degree are naive - the more naive the thing you say the more likely it'll strike a chord in more people.
Spot on!

("... strike a chord." Good one! :lol: )


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kraftiekortie
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21 Jul 2018, 9:11 pm

He was just some guy from Woolton, Liverpool who made it big.

I don’t think he thought of himself as some “great guy.” He knew he had faults.



Magna
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21 Jul 2018, 9:55 pm

It seems the majority of WP members are not religious. The lyrics of that song, imagine no Heaven, no Hell, all the people "living for today" do remind me of a saying something like: "One of the devil's greatest achievements--convincing people that he doesn't exist."

The Beatles is one of my favorite bands.



naturalplastic
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21 Jul 2018, 10:19 pm

John Lennon was advocating atheism (the elephant in the room that no one acknowledges though its plain as day in the song), and is saying that we could have peace if only we stopped clinging to causes like ideologies, countries, and religions to fight about.

The lyrics are pretty damned obvious.



techstepgenr8tion
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21 Jul 2018, 10:30 pm

naturalplastic wrote:
John Lennon was advocating atheism (the elephant in the room that no one acknowledges though its plain as day in the song), and is saying that we could have peace if only we stopped clinging to causes like ideologies, countries, and religions to fight about.

The lyrics are pretty damned obvious.

TY for decoding that for us.

Sincerely though that may help some people who didn't see it and this is an aspie forum so its quite possible. I think those of us who did see it went past that and tackled its value in the scheme of things - my own vote, not much.


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21 Jul 2018, 11:07 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
naturalplastic wrote:
John Lennon was advocating atheism (the elephant in the room that no one acknowledges though its plain as day in the song), and is saying that we could have peace if only we stopped clinging to causes like ideologies, countries, and religions to fight about.

The lyrics are pretty damned obvious.

TY for decoding that for us.

Sincerely though that may help some people who didn't see it and this is an aspie forum so its quite possible. I think those of us who did see it went past that and tackled its value in the scheme of things - my own vote, not much.


Right.

Its not that you missed the obvious. You just skipped the obvious to go on to the next point. And you were just too negligent to preface the next point with "here is the obvious, before I go on to the next point". Lol!

We all believe you. Lol!

But actually .. "Imagine" is saying "lets make an ideology out of...giving up all ideologies". So it is kinda self contradictory.



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21 Jul 2018, 11:23 pm

Giving up ideologies, countries and religions would mean then that humanity would then put its arms around each other and sing a collective Kumbaya (secularly speaking of course). No more greed. sarc

An ideologically utopian pipe dream.



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21 Jul 2018, 11:25 pm

It's a link I've touched on before. Atheism often leads to worldly utopianism (the opiate of the atheist "intellectual"), the attempt to create Heaven-on-Earth. That it often swiftly leads to Hell-on-Earth is a lesson that apparently never sinks in.


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techstepgenr8tion
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22 Jul 2018, 12:45 am

naturalplastic wrote:
But actually .. "Imagine" is saying "lets make an ideology out of...giving up all ideologies". So it is kinda self contradictory.

Well yeah, it's a bit kitsch and whimsical. That tends to be the appeal though.


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22 Jul 2018, 12:56 am

Fnord wrote:
Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No Hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today


Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that in the first verse, John Lennon tells us to imagine that there is no such place as Heaven...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace


... and in the second verse he describes what Heaven must be like?


The song is clearly calling for social anarchism … or something like that.

John Lennon was one Hell of a dreamer. He had himself pointed in the right direction, but his world will likely take centuries to create. It probably won't even be finished in my lifetime.


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techstepgenr8tion
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22 Jul 2018, 1:15 am

Mikah wrote:
It's a link I've touched on before. Atheism often leads to worldly utopianism (the opiate of the atheist "intellectual"), the attempt to create Heaven-on-Earth. That it often swiftly leads to Hell-on-Earth is a lesson that apparently never sinks in.

I'm starting to think that may have more to do with just the current cocktail of atheism with reductive materialism compounded with unacceptable suffering. You also do have a lot of people who think of the world very narrowly, ie. their own story over all others by any means necessary, and that's a temptation for all of us that either gets conditioned out early or takes a lot of discipline to overpower.

Atheism, in the proper sense, is simply the lack of belief in deities and there are a lot of potential vitalistic concepts or ideas that would likely be too scoped to fit the definition of a god or goddess properly. In that sense I don't see where atheism is fundamentally obliged to reductive materialism going forward.


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22 Jul 2018, 3:50 am

I think the point is we should create it ourselves. No heaven above means all you hypocrites don't get a special place to go regardless of how much you hate and judge others. There is no special perfect place for you...and the real goal should be peace on earth. Not being a false yuppie lennon fan who never even listened to a single one of his songs but thought it was 'hip' to wear a shirt of him because they heard 30 seconds of Imagine.


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