from an objective perspective judaism is the most believable religion in the world

Thank you Wylted for debating me. And wow it's amazing, for a religion which has about 80,000 followers. I really respect that, you know the truth remains the truth regardless how many people believe it (certainly Judaism doesn't claim to have the most followers). Now down to the discussion. You argue that theosophy is the most believable religion in the world because quote "Theosophy doesn't rely on a person with special knowledge or a divine book. Theosophy gives you the tools to discover the nature of God for your self. When seeking God your own personal revelations should take precedence over that of a stranger's." Now i would have to agree with you that there's nothing like receiving a personal prophecy from g-d, now in the year 2014, but somehow i don't think theosophy is offering that. I don't think you're referring to a strong and powerful emotional connection to the tenants of theosophy, because surely you're aware that there are such feelings in other religions. So i guess what you were saying was that through theosophy one can intellectually "discover" the nature of g-d for ones self, and apply it to ones life accordingly. There's a story told of a student in university who wrote an essay for class. The professor wrote on the top of the paper, great and original ,and proceeded to flunk him, he got a 62. He came to the professor and asked you said it was great and original what's with the mark. He told him, it's quite simple, what was great was not original and what was original wasn't that great it was actually horrible. I think you get what I'm getting at. I've been looking into this philosophy and there"s really a lot of good stuff there but the problem is what's good is not original and what's original is not good. Now what I'll do is go through some of the things you mentioned are the tenants of theosophy, and show at which point Judaism agrees or diverges. Regarding the first two points you mentioned A. the Universe Comes From an Eternal Source B. belief in the Omni -g-d, Judaism (and I think most religions) say this very thing. As to how to arrive at it, there are many ways philosophically how one can arrive at these points. As discussed at great length by all the great Jewish philosophers. (amongst other philosophers) I'll just quote one of the most famous Jewish prayers recited in all synagogues composed in the 11th century. "The Lord of the Universe who reigned before anything was created. When all was made by his will He was acknowledged as King. And when all shall end He still all alone shall reign. He was, He is, and He shall be in glory. And He is one, and there's no other, to compare or join Him. Without beginning, without end and to Him belongs dominion and power. And He is my G-d, my living G-d. to Him I flee in time of grief, and He is my miracle and my refuge, who answers the day I shall call. To Him I commit my spirit, in the time of sleep and awakening, even if my spirit leaves, G-d is with me, I shall not fear." C. This is where I feel you should have elaborated, being that from the little research online that I"ve done, this and the next one seems to be the bulk of theosophy. (Perhaps there's just way too much hocus pocus going on over there, that, would be very hard to prove intellectually, so you would rather avoid the issue.)You just wrote this "the mind is completely different from the body. The mind as understood by Descartes is also the soul and God. Descartes view of the duality of body and mind is compatible with and proves Theosophy." I would prefer for you to elaborate on this doctrine before I write a rebuttal. D. "The universe has consciousness. One argument that can be made is sense we are a part of the universe and conscious that the universe indeed has consciousness. http://m.psychologytoday.com...... http://www.raptitude.com...... The universe through it's own processes has become aware of it's self, and it's growing in awareness everyday." So I checked up the links. They both made the point that since the world was produced through evolution - a point which I don't accept - and how does such a brilliant world get produced by dust particles etc. it must be the universe is intelligent, another point was that that since our minds were produced by evolution (does that fit with C.?) our minds are part of the universe so the universe in intelligent. Obviously if one believes that g-d created the world these arguments carry no weight. Now Judaism believes that g-d created the world and continues to create the world every moment and runs the world. So yes I guess you could say there's consciousness in the universe, but what it is, is the hand of g-d (called divine providence) and yes everything has a soul but that's the g-dly energy within it bringing it into existence. I'll give you a link to a class which discusses this idea; it's discussed in chapter two of the link http://lessonsintanya.com... Now I'll just conclude with pointing out that Judaism disagrees with the whole premise that one can really "discover" g-d and connect to him through meditation and philosophy, or actually in any way. You see a finite being has no way to connect in any way to infinite. Using numbers as an example, a billion and a trillion is not one iota closer to infinity as 1 or 2, finite and infinite just don't exist in the same realm of reality, so no matter how much meditation and philosophy and goodness etc. etc. people do, one cannot become closer to g-d or connect with him in any way. The only way we can connect is when the infinite being makes the connection, if he has a purpose for us, if he decided that were important and he wants something from us, so then so to speak g-d gambled with us, it's in our power to fulfill his desire or not. This is the reason why Judaism emphasizes the action more than anything. Because in the end of the day a mitzvah (commandment) is the way we connect with g-d. Now some of the commandments of g-d are to love g-d, a commandment to fear g-d, to know g-d Deuteronomy 6:5, 10:20. Meaning that g-d wants us to be involved in our minds and hearts in the awareness of g-d. But without belief in a revelation from g-d, religion doesn't really have a place. So in conclusion I don't think that theology's tenants are ones that can be intellectually proven, and therefore does not have the advantage of "personal revelation". Which puts Judaism out of the regular religions (i.e. ones that are based on revelation) as the most believable in my opinion.