I have a new essay on L. Jagi Lamplighter's Superversive Inklings blog.
An excerpt:
Starting with Lewis; we can see that he was the more creative and accomplished writer, and that he was able to express instinctively more than he could (or would) comprehend explicitly. For example, there are depths, there is heart and resonance in Lewis’s imaginative fiction – especially the Narnia stories but also the Planetary trilogy, and also in his imaginative essays such as The Screwtape Letters and The Great Divorce – that are absent from, and even contradicted-by, Lewis’s theoretical and explicitly-Christian writings.
Barfield was a deeper, more rigorous and honest theoretician than Lewis. Indeed, Barfield understood Lewis and Lewis’s writing, better than Lewis understood himself. In this sense, Barfield was ‘larger’ than Lewis – but Barfield could not accomplish what Lewis did – so it could be said that Lewis expressed Barfield better than Barfield expressed himself!
This is why they are complementary.
Read the whole thing...
Sunday, 23 September 2018
Friday, 21 September 2018
Would an ideal parent do IT to a loved member of his family?
This question may be a better, more valid and comprehensible, way of analysing moral difficulties and dilemmas than the more usual method of establishing and assuming some general principles or rules, and trying to reason logically from then to the specific situation - in light of other established and assumed principles... which method rarely seems to work in practice, and rarely seems to convince impartially, except in simple and extreme cases.
Is capital punishment (execution) acceptable - if so, by what method? Is torture acceptable - and if not, then what level of coercion counts as torture? Is it acceptable to charge interest on a loan - and if so how much and under what situation?
Such matters can perhaps be clarified by assuming that you are dealing with a loved member of your family. This is the most relevant consideration because it is the exact situation of God in dealing with Men - we are all, and without exception, loved children of God.
If we can imagine ourselves as an ideal parent, dealing with problems among our children - perhaps we can see what is acceptable, appropriate - and the reverse.
In doing so we need to bear in mind that dealing in a loving fashion with one's children does Not etail letting them do what they want at this moment - especially Not doing what they want To Each Other.
being an ideal loving parent Does entail being tough at times, using coercion at times - it Does entail making the best of an often very difficult situation in which time, resources and effort are all finite. It Does entail often feeling great sorrow for what must be done, what ought to be done.
Tackled in a fashion that combines realism with practicality; I think this parental approach to life answers many, perhaps most, of the moral dilemmas and cruxes I have come across.
Is capital punishment (execution) acceptable - if so, by what method? Is torture acceptable - and if not, then what level of coercion counts as torture? Is it acceptable to charge interest on a loan - and if so how much and under what situation?
Such matters can perhaps be clarified by assuming that you are dealing with a loved member of your family. This is the most relevant consideration because it is the exact situation of God in dealing with Men - we are all, and without exception, loved children of God.
If we can imagine ourselves as an ideal parent, dealing with problems among our children - perhaps we can see what is acceptable, appropriate - and the reverse.
In doing so we need to bear in mind that dealing in a loving fashion with one's children does Not etail letting them do what they want at this moment - especially Not doing what they want To Each Other.
being an ideal loving parent Does entail being tough at times, using coercion at times - it Does entail making the best of an often very difficult situation in which time, resources and effort are all finite. It Does entail often feeling great sorrow for what must be done, what ought to be done.
Tackled in a fashion that combines realism with practicality; I think this parental approach to life answers many, perhaps most, of the moral dilemmas and cruxes I have come across.
Thursday, 20 September 2018
What would losing the culture war look like?
Put aside such notions as the collapse of civilisation, civil war, mass invasion; put aside mass death by famine, plague and violence...
All those might happen yet we could still have won the culture war.
A global totalitarian society, an all pervasive leftist bureaucracy, a society of omni-surveillance and dictated behaviour are all merely mechanisms to advance us towards the real goal of the culture war...
If we truly lose the culture war, we will not be able directly to see the results - because losing the culture wars is about mass rejection of Christ's gift of life everlasting - it is about mass self-chosen damnation.
It is possible that really terrible things may happen to you and me and our world; yet, as a consequence, people may wake-up to the spiritual truth of our situation.
There is no sign of this (that I can discern) at present - but if the demonic forces that rule our planet make an error in their strategy of damnation, then all or some of the terrible things might bring people to clarity, and in that clarity they may directly perceive reality; and from that position then they may choose Good.
So, although the demons are indeed behind the policies and propaganda for global chaos, pervasive fear, group resentments, personal pride and the 'politicisation' (i.e. absorption to evil ideologies) of all human activities from morn to night and cradle to grave... some of these are means, and only one is the end.
Don't forget this - try to remember.
All those might happen yet we could still have won the culture war.
A global totalitarian society, an all pervasive leftist bureaucracy, a society of omni-surveillance and dictated behaviour are all merely mechanisms to advance us towards the real goal of the culture war...
If we truly lose the culture war, we will not be able directly to see the results - because losing the culture wars is about mass rejection of Christ's gift of life everlasting - it is about mass self-chosen damnation.
It is possible that really terrible things may happen to you and me and our world; yet, as a consequence, people may wake-up to the spiritual truth of our situation.
There is no sign of this (that I can discern) at present - but if the demonic forces that rule our planet make an error in their strategy of damnation, then all or some of the terrible things might bring people to clarity, and in that clarity they may directly perceive reality; and from that position then they may choose Good.
So, although the demons are indeed behind the policies and propaganda for global chaos, pervasive fear, group resentments, personal pride and the 'politicisation' (i.e. absorption to evil ideologies) of all human activities from morn to night and cradle to grave... some of these are means, and only one is the end.
Don't forget this - try to remember.
Wednesday, 19 September 2018
How The West was destroyed in four steps
1. Science proves its power and usefulness. 17th to early 19th century.
2. Science establishes itself as the Only valid form of knowledge, 'hence' mode of reasoning. Late 19th-early 20th century.
3. Bureaucracy subsidises, infiltrates, occupies, subverts, destroys science. Middle to late 20th century.
4. Bureaucracy established as the only valid form of organisation, knowledge and thinking - global totalitarian system in place.
Corresponds to: 1. Voluntary collaboration of individuals, 2. Formal institutional structure of individuals, 3. Control by committees/ peer review, 4. Individuals serve abstract processes and procedures.
Corresponds to: Scientists as Christians, Scientists brought up as Christians, Scientists as atheists, 'Scientists' as careerists.
2. Science establishes itself as the Only valid form of knowledge, 'hence' mode of reasoning. Late 19th-early 20th century.
3. Bureaucracy subsidises, infiltrates, occupies, subverts, destroys science. Middle to late 20th century.
4. Bureaucracy established as the only valid form of organisation, knowledge and thinking - global totalitarian system in place.
Corresponds to: 1. Voluntary collaboration of individuals, 2. Formal institutional structure of individuals, 3. Control by committees/ peer review, 4. Individuals serve abstract processes and procedures.
Corresponds to: Scientists as Christians, Scientists brought up as Christians, Scientists as atheists, 'Scientists' as careerists.
Tuesday, 18 September 2018
Monday, 17 September 2018
We are dreaming all the time - and need to become aware of the fact
As I have mentioned before in this blog; I believe that we are dreaming all the time that we are awake - underneath waking life, we are continually dreaming. And sometimes, when we are napping, we may dip into and out-of this continual dreaming.
In dreaming, we are in contact with divine, presumably angelic, influences; which is why dreams are a mode of archetype and myth. Ancient man lived always in this kind of dreamlike state, and we all lived this way as young children. Thus human history and our personal development was a process of becoming more alert, awake, conscious during waking life - but also a process of becoming cut-off from unconscious and pervasive divine influences.
So, for modern Man dream is our last vestige of that old mythic consciousness; but our task and destiny is - consciously and by choice - to return to a state of contact with divine beings. My understanding is that this was supposed to happen in The West from the late 1700s, at the time of the Romantic era.
In terms of dreaming while awake, we were supposed to become aware of it; become aware of the nature of the angelic influences from that mythic, archetypal undercurrent. However, this did not happen, Instead, Western man took the path of atheism, materialism; and embraced a metaphysics which regards God, angels, soul, myth, destiny, ultimate purpose and meaning (etc) as not-really-real. These were all relegated to the world of subjective imagination. Real-reality - the objective - that is the public realm of discourse upon which law, morality and policy are based, excluded all such matters by assumption.
The result is that we are self-blinded to the continual influences of waking dreams, which we experience only as 'gut-level' instincts, impulses and urges. Because we will not acknowledge their true nature and origin; these influences can be (and are) pervasively, systematically misinterpreted by public discourse. Thus divine destiny has been perverted in many ways, and turned to harm and evil.
An example is the sexual revolution. We all experience a divine impulse towards a different, more personal, less group-based, relation between men and women. Properly, this ought to signal a development towards our ultimate divine goal of an eternal loving and creative married union - a creative dyadic relationship.
But this has, in multiple ways, misinterpreted as a gut level instinct for personal gratification in this world - leading to all sorts of harms such as (via the public policy, the mass media and arts) mocking, maligning and subverting marriage and the family; promoting casual and lust-based promiscuity; dividing men and women into interest groups, set against each other; and the enforced promotion of same sex activity and wholesale delusion and contradiction about sexual identity. This has led to misery and suffering in this world, contributed to a pervasive atmosphere of resentment and selfish short-termism, and most significantly anti Christianity and the embrace of self-damnation.
My understanding is therefore that we must become aware of our waking dreams, or else be destroyed by them.
Currently, we are blocking our own awareness - so what we must do is to stop doing this. Stop it by whatever works, whatever means tends-to that end.... But first by acknowledging the problem.
In dreaming, we are in contact with divine, presumably angelic, influences; which is why dreams are a mode of archetype and myth. Ancient man lived always in this kind of dreamlike state, and we all lived this way as young children. Thus human history and our personal development was a process of becoming more alert, awake, conscious during waking life - but also a process of becoming cut-off from unconscious and pervasive divine influences.
So, for modern Man dream is our last vestige of that old mythic consciousness; but our task and destiny is - consciously and by choice - to return to a state of contact with divine beings. My understanding is that this was supposed to happen in The West from the late 1700s, at the time of the Romantic era.
In terms of dreaming while awake, we were supposed to become aware of it; become aware of the nature of the angelic influences from that mythic, archetypal undercurrent. However, this did not happen, Instead, Western man took the path of atheism, materialism; and embraced a metaphysics which regards God, angels, soul, myth, destiny, ultimate purpose and meaning (etc) as not-really-real. These were all relegated to the world of subjective imagination. Real-reality - the objective - that is the public realm of discourse upon which law, morality and policy are based, excluded all such matters by assumption.
The result is that we are self-blinded to the continual influences of waking dreams, which we experience only as 'gut-level' instincts, impulses and urges. Because we will not acknowledge their true nature and origin; these influences can be (and are) pervasively, systematically misinterpreted by public discourse. Thus divine destiny has been perverted in many ways, and turned to harm and evil.
An example is the sexual revolution. We all experience a divine impulse towards a different, more personal, less group-based, relation between men and women. Properly, this ought to signal a development towards our ultimate divine goal of an eternal loving and creative married union - a creative dyadic relationship.
But this has, in multiple ways, misinterpreted as a gut level instinct for personal gratification in this world - leading to all sorts of harms such as (via the public policy, the mass media and arts) mocking, maligning and subverting marriage and the family; promoting casual and lust-based promiscuity; dividing men and women into interest groups, set against each other; and the enforced promotion of same sex activity and wholesale delusion and contradiction about sexual identity. This has led to misery and suffering in this world, contributed to a pervasive atmosphere of resentment and selfish short-termism, and most significantly anti Christianity and the embrace of self-damnation.
My understanding is therefore that we must become aware of our waking dreams, or else be destroyed by them.
Currently, we are blocking our own awareness - so what we must do is to stop doing this. Stop it by whatever works, whatever means tends-to that end.... But first by acknowledging the problem.
Sunday, 16 September 2018
How to become a 'spiritual' (Direct) Christian...
Christian writers and teachers have generally been happy to focus their advice on what Christians do - and to assume that right-thinking will follow right-doing. CS Lewis is a good example of this - he has a tendency to favour action over thought; practical Christian living over the mystical or spiritual tradition.
But, while this works for some people some of the time, this is unsatisfactory for many reasons; the most important of which is that - ultimately - thinking is more important than action. I won't rehearse why, but this blog has argued the point over the past several years, from many angles.
Other problems are that modern Christians, even when they follow Christian rules, generally think in the same materialist leftist way as the mainstream secular world - and over time, the wrong-thinking subverts, erodes and overthrows the 'right' practical aspects - as we have seen in all the major Christian churches. So that the meaning of acts becomes, in many cases, reversed. We get churches who say the same old things, but means by them the opposite - Christian forms with materialist-atheist content.
However, there is a big problem for those (like me) who advocate that Christian living ought to be rooted in Christian thinking - which is the question: How to change thinking?
People know how to change for the better their behaviour, their actions, what they do; but have no idea how they might set-about changing their thinking. The answer to What should I do? is not obvious.
The usual, but unsatisfactory, answer involves some kind of training of thinking, usually by some kind of meditative or prayer practice. But this leads to a kind of 'bootstrap problem' of how to use thinking to change thinking. How can we get a purchase on unwanted thoughts, adopt one sort of thought over another?
Furthermore, it may well be that meditation or prayer is (in practice) just another type of change of behaviour, without change in the mode of thinking. Using words like God and Jesus, but in the same mundane way we would discuss politics, law or holidays.
Also, it generally doesn't work...
By contrast; the way I would advise setting-about changing thinking for the better is to examine you metaphysical assumptions; bring to conscious awareness the basic assumptions you make concerning the nature of reality and all fundamental matters... in particular those that are most important to you.
This is simply a matter of honestly and rigorously questioning yourself why you think something, and following the answers through until you reach something that is a basic assumption, without any further reason for it.
Then examine these basic assumptions.
I have found that this leads to some assumptions that I regarded as wrong, false, or something I did not really believe; and that when these were revised that the whole of thinking - the superficial ideas and thoughts that had previously been supported by these wrong deep-basic assumptions, would begin to change.
So, conscious thinking is used to bring-out unconscious assumptions. And change in false or incoherent deep beliefs is used to reshape and re-order the great mass of surface thoughts.
The stream of thinking is not tackled directly, by trying (usually failing) to use one set of current thoughts against another. Instead, the focus is on bringing-to-conscious-awareness. The trigger for change is that what was unconscious and implicit, becomes conscious and explicit.
It is a matter of redigging the foundations, and then the old building will collapse and a new building will - spontaneously - become constructed upon the new foundations, simply in the course of everyday living and thinking, experiencing and learning.
And because the foundational assumptions are different in form, they are the basis of a different kind of thinking. If the new foundations include deeper depths and wider possibilities, then so will the new daily thoughts deriving from them.
And when we find these everyday thoughts have drifted back into mainstream materialism (as they will...); we can respond by reflecting consciously on our deep assumptions; and from them a new and better kind of thinking will emerge.
Note added: It might very well, and quite reasonably, be argued that if the transformed thinking of Direct Christianity is indeed our task at this time, and if such Direct Christianity necessarily requires the kind of metaphysical reflection I recommend... then there are going to be very few people who will actually do what is really needed. I suspect that this is likely to be correct.
But, while this works for some people some of the time, this is unsatisfactory for many reasons; the most important of which is that - ultimately - thinking is more important than action. I won't rehearse why, but this blog has argued the point over the past several years, from many angles.
Other problems are that modern Christians, even when they follow Christian rules, generally think in the same materialist leftist way as the mainstream secular world - and over time, the wrong-thinking subverts, erodes and overthrows the 'right' practical aspects - as we have seen in all the major Christian churches. So that the meaning of acts becomes, in many cases, reversed. We get churches who say the same old things, but means by them the opposite - Christian forms with materialist-atheist content.
However, there is a big problem for those (like me) who advocate that Christian living ought to be rooted in Christian thinking - which is the question: How to change thinking?
People know how to change for the better their behaviour, their actions, what they do; but have no idea how they might set-about changing their thinking. The answer to What should I do? is not obvious.
The usual, but unsatisfactory, answer involves some kind of training of thinking, usually by some kind of meditative or prayer practice. But this leads to a kind of 'bootstrap problem' of how to use thinking to change thinking. How can we get a purchase on unwanted thoughts, adopt one sort of thought over another?
Furthermore, it may well be that meditation or prayer is (in practice) just another type of change of behaviour, without change in the mode of thinking. Using words like God and Jesus, but in the same mundane way we would discuss politics, law or holidays.
Also, it generally doesn't work...
By contrast; the way I would advise setting-about changing thinking for the better is to examine you metaphysical assumptions; bring to conscious awareness the basic assumptions you make concerning the nature of reality and all fundamental matters... in particular those that are most important to you.
This is simply a matter of honestly and rigorously questioning yourself why you think something, and following the answers through until you reach something that is a basic assumption, without any further reason for it.
Then examine these basic assumptions.
I have found that this leads to some assumptions that I regarded as wrong, false, or something I did not really believe; and that when these were revised that the whole of thinking - the superficial ideas and thoughts that had previously been supported by these wrong deep-basic assumptions, would begin to change.
So, conscious thinking is used to bring-out unconscious assumptions. And change in false or incoherent deep beliefs is used to reshape and re-order the great mass of surface thoughts.
The stream of thinking is not tackled directly, by trying (usually failing) to use one set of current thoughts against another. Instead, the focus is on bringing-to-conscious-awareness. The trigger for change is that what was unconscious and implicit, becomes conscious and explicit.
It is a matter of redigging the foundations, and then the old building will collapse and a new building will - spontaneously - become constructed upon the new foundations, simply in the course of everyday living and thinking, experiencing and learning.
And because the foundational assumptions are different in form, they are the basis of a different kind of thinking. If the new foundations include deeper depths and wider possibilities, then so will the new daily thoughts deriving from them.
And when we find these everyday thoughts have drifted back into mainstream materialism (as they will...); we can respond by reflecting consciously on our deep assumptions; and from them a new and better kind of thinking will emerge.
Note added: It might very well, and quite reasonably, be argued that if the transformed thinking of Direct Christianity is indeed our task at this time, and if such Direct Christianity necessarily requires the kind of metaphysical reflection I recommend... then there are going to be very few people who will actually do what is really needed. I suspect that this is likely to be correct.
Saturday, 15 September 2018
Father William Sirr (1862-1937) by John Fitzgerald
At Albion Awakening, John Fitzgerald discusses an English Anglican monk, hermits, Narnia and the needs of these times...
Why obedience and surrender to God's will are wrong descriptions of what God ultimately wants from us
They may have been getting 'carried away' and overstating things for rhetorical effect; but Christian's have quite often stated that obedience and surrender to God's will are the primary Christian virtues. But this is wrong; these are clearly the wrong words, the wrong concepts.
Obedience, surrender, submission to divine will is, indeed, apparently the primary virtue for Muslims; but not for Christians.
Men are sons and daughters of God; that is, children who are intended to grow-up; and, from the work and gift of Jesus Christ, we have the possibility of becoming divine and attaining life eternal.
Christians need to distinguish what is appropriate for children, and early stages of development - by contrast with God's main purpose underlying creation. Ultimately; good needs to be chosen, not obeyed; actively-embraced not passively-followed.
In this, as in most things, Jesus is the example for Men.
God's plan and project of creation needs to be understood, and each needs to affiliate with it. The ultimate aim is a alliance between Man and God; with Man raised to the level of divine. Obedience is, at most, a phase en route to this ideal - a developmental means towards the end of grown-up virtue.
Meanwhile, obedience and surrender to God's will may be necessary at specific times and places - but if it is implied that this is the end as well as the means - then we are misrepresenting the whole divine creation, and making Christianity incoherent - or else implying that the creation is a botched job.
Such incoherence of argument has become very obvious to modern Men, so by over-emphasising obedience (perhaps on grounds of immediate expedience), the cause of Christianity may well be impaired.
This is one reason why theosis - the voluntary development of Men toward ultimate divinity - ought to be given a much greater, central, place in the primary description of Christianity (as it is in the Fourth Gospel).
Obedience, surrender, submission to divine will is, indeed, apparently the primary virtue for Muslims; but not for Christians.
Men are sons and daughters of God; that is, children who are intended to grow-up; and, from the work and gift of Jesus Christ, we have the possibility of becoming divine and attaining life eternal.
Christians need to distinguish what is appropriate for children, and early stages of development - by contrast with God's main purpose underlying creation. Ultimately; good needs to be chosen, not obeyed; actively-embraced not passively-followed.
In this, as in most things, Jesus is the example for Men.
God's plan and project of creation needs to be understood, and each needs to affiliate with it. The ultimate aim is a alliance between Man and God; with Man raised to the level of divine. Obedience is, at most, a phase en route to this ideal - a developmental means towards the end of grown-up virtue.
Meanwhile, obedience and surrender to God's will may be necessary at specific times and places - but if it is implied that this is the end as well as the means - then we are misrepresenting the whole divine creation, and making Christianity incoherent - or else implying that the creation is a botched job.
Such incoherence of argument has become very obvious to modern Men, so by over-emphasising obedience (perhaps on grounds of immediate expedience), the cause of Christianity may well be impaired.
This is one reason why theosis - the voluntary development of Men toward ultimate divinity - ought to be given a much greater, central, place in the primary description of Christianity (as it is in the Fourth Gospel).
Friday, 14 September 2018
Agency is the main limitation and constraint on divine knowledge and power ('omni-science/ potence')
Regular readers will know that I regard the characterisation of 'an omni-God' - that is a God described in terms of abstract absolutes such as omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence - as a wrong, tendentious, harm-tending error of mainstream Christianity. God is not all-knowing, not all-powerful - and one major and vital limitation on God is agency, or Free Will.
God's knowledge and power is rooted in his being The Creator; and the crux of the problem for mainstream Christianity is that if God created Free Will, if he created the 'mechanism' of agency - and because creation is something on-going and continuous (not something done once in the past then left), then God would have knowledge of and power over Free would... But then agency would not be truly autonomous and free: merely just another expression of God's ongoing creation...
To me, the above mainstream Christian explanation is seriously incoherent; and given the importance of Free Will to Christianity, we need to try and do better...
Since (as I assume) agency is real and will is indeed free; then these need to be regarded as Not having been created and sustained by God. But instead, agents with free will are pre-existent to God's creation - already-there when creation began - used-by God in doing creation, but not made-by God.
So; the nature of reality is that God's creation is the means by which he pursues his divine plan, a plan to have children and to raise them to become divine like himself (and this has now been fully accomplished by Jesus Christ - so all Men have a model and method) - working-around the constraint, a 'constraint' which is itself necessary for full divinity, of Man's agency.
Thus we have God's creation, inhabited by living, conscious agents with (various degrees of) Free Will - God controlling many aspects of the situation, but neither knowing nor controlling the 'inner workings' of agency.
In other words the real-self is divine, and opaque to God the creator. God must therefore pursue his goals 'indirectly'. However, this indirectness is a feature, not a bug, since it is only genuine free-agents who can fulfil God's plan.
(The alternative being a universe of unfree, wholly-controlled automata; fake/ simulated persons merely.)
And insofar as reality consists of many agent beings of many kinds - including what we currently (mainstream) think of as minerals, vegetables, and animals; which are alive and conscious to different degrees and in different ways - the nature of reality consists of God setting up situations and responding to the consequences of agency, in a continually purposive but not-predetermined fashion.
It explains why Free Will is a necessary part of the plan; God had to work-around agency in order that the plan could be achieved; and without Free Will there could have been no plan for divinisation.
This description seems to me an exact fit for the nature of reality as I perceive and understand it; which is why I share it here.
God's knowledge and power is rooted in his being The Creator; and the crux of the problem for mainstream Christianity is that if God created Free Will, if he created the 'mechanism' of agency - and because creation is something on-going and continuous (not something done once in the past then left), then God would have knowledge of and power over Free would... But then agency would not be truly autonomous and free: merely just another expression of God's ongoing creation...
To me, the above mainstream Christian explanation is seriously incoherent; and given the importance of Free Will to Christianity, we need to try and do better...
Since (as I assume) agency is real and will is indeed free; then these need to be regarded as Not having been created and sustained by God. But instead, agents with free will are pre-existent to God's creation - already-there when creation began - used-by God in doing creation, but not made-by God.
So; the nature of reality is that God's creation is the means by which he pursues his divine plan, a plan to have children and to raise them to become divine like himself (and this has now been fully accomplished by Jesus Christ - so all Men have a model and method) - working-around the constraint, a 'constraint' which is itself necessary for full divinity, of Man's agency.
Thus we have God's creation, inhabited by living, conscious agents with (various degrees of) Free Will - God controlling many aspects of the situation, but neither knowing nor controlling the 'inner workings' of agency.
In other words the real-self is divine, and opaque to God the creator. God must therefore pursue his goals 'indirectly'. However, this indirectness is a feature, not a bug, since it is only genuine free-agents who can fulfil God's plan.
(The alternative being a universe of unfree, wholly-controlled automata; fake/ simulated persons merely.)
And insofar as reality consists of many agent beings of many kinds - including what we currently (mainstream) think of as minerals, vegetables, and animals; which are alive and conscious to different degrees and in different ways - the nature of reality consists of God setting up situations and responding to the consequences of agency, in a continually purposive but not-predetermined fashion.
It explains why Free Will is a necessary part of the plan; God had to work-around agency in order that the plan could be achieved; and without Free Will there could have been no plan for divinisation.
This description seems to me an exact fit for the nature of reality as I perceive and understand it; which is why I share it here.
Notes on 'Free Will' (or agency), God and Creation
There are so many incoherent ideas-about and explanations-of Free Will, and yet its reality is so vitally important, that this is something that almost everybody needs to sort-out for themselves (assuming that they cannot ignore the explanations).
For Christians, Free Will is at the heart of the religion; and indeed, when (as has quite often happened) Christians neglect the matter of Free Will then the whole nature and practice of the religion gravitates into something quite un-Christian.
Indeed, when Free Will is taken out of Christianity, we get something approximating to Islam - in which obedience to God's will becomes the central virtue.
Nonetheless, taking Free Will seriously (as I think we must) takes us to places a long way from mainstream Christianity
1. Free Will is about thinking, not about actions. (Necessary to avoid incoherence.) Free Will is not all of thinking, not even most of thinking: Free Will is one kind, and the most fundamental kind, of thinking.
2. Free Will needs to be considered an uncaused cause - that is, the thinking of Free Will cannot be explained in terms of being a consequence of anything else. So we should not try to do so.
3. This means that the thinking of Free Will can be observed only after it has emerged. We cannot, and never could, perceive what is going-on in Free Will: Free Will emerges from a black box. We might observe it as it emerges from the black box, but could never see it being formed.
4. And when I say 'we' could not perceive or observe the workings or causes of Free Will - I also mean our-real-selves cannot do this. The (obvious) reason being that Free Will emerges-from our real-selves. So we-our-selves are in the position of observing thoughts as they emerge from our-selves - we can do so only after they have separated from ourselves.
5. What applies to our-selves also applies to God. God cannot, does not, perceive and know what is going-on where the thinking of Free Will comes-from. God cannot see-into our real selves; cannot analyse of Free Will: nothing can.
6. The 'workings' of Free Will are opaque, even to the creator - the reason is that God did not create that-which from-which Free Will emerges. That entity from-which Free Will (our real-selves) emerges is prior to creation.
7. God's creation works-around this; but Free Will is not a regrettable constraint. Creation is about bringing the Free Will of personal agents into voluntary, loving harmony and further creativity.
Note: What I have done above to is make a metaphysical assumption that Free Will is really-real and really-free (because implied and entailed by Christianity); and to reason from that assumption.
For Christians, Free Will is at the heart of the religion; and indeed, when (as has quite often happened) Christians neglect the matter of Free Will then the whole nature and practice of the religion gravitates into something quite un-Christian.
Indeed, when Free Will is taken out of Christianity, we get something approximating to Islam - in which obedience to God's will becomes the central virtue.
Nonetheless, taking Free Will seriously (as I think we must) takes us to places a long way from mainstream Christianity
1. Free Will is about thinking, not about actions. (Necessary to avoid incoherence.) Free Will is not all of thinking, not even most of thinking: Free Will is one kind, and the most fundamental kind, of thinking.
2. Free Will needs to be considered an uncaused cause - that is, the thinking of Free Will cannot be explained in terms of being a consequence of anything else. So we should not try to do so.
3. This means that the thinking of Free Will can be observed only after it has emerged. We cannot, and never could, perceive what is going-on in Free Will: Free Will emerges from a black box. We might observe it as it emerges from the black box, but could never see it being formed.
4. And when I say 'we' could not perceive or observe the workings or causes of Free Will - I also mean our-real-selves cannot do this. The (obvious) reason being that Free Will emerges-from our real-selves. So we-our-selves are in the position of observing thoughts as they emerge from our-selves - we can do so only after they have separated from ourselves.
5. What applies to our-selves also applies to God. God cannot, does not, perceive and know what is going-on where the thinking of Free Will comes-from. God cannot see-into our real selves; cannot analyse of Free Will: nothing can.
6. The 'workings' of Free Will are opaque, even to the creator - the reason is that God did not create that-which from-which Free Will emerges. That entity from-which Free Will (our real-selves) emerges is prior to creation.
7. God's creation works-around this; but Free Will is not a regrettable constraint. Creation is about bringing the Free Will of personal agents into voluntary, loving harmony and further creativity.
Note: What I have done above to is make a metaphysical assumption that Free Will is really-real and really-free (because implied and entailed by Christianity); and to reason from that assumption.
Thursday, 13 September 2018
God the Father is incarnate - and 'incarnate' refers to a mode of consciousness
Reading the Fourth Gospel ('of John') it is almost incomprehensible how mainstream Christians became dogmatically fixed on the idea that God the Father was a spirit, and not incarnate; given the multiple and clear references to Jesus stating that he and the Father are the same in form.
The Father, we are told, is incarnate, has a body - this isn't in doubt, but the question is what this state of incarnation means.
Part of the prevalent misunderstanding that The Father is spirit derives from the already-existing philosophical idea among Classical pre-Christian intellectuals that God 'must be' a discarnate spirit, because spirit was the highest form. They regarded bodies as matter, and matter as lower than spirit - more restricted, prone to corruption etc...
Another element is that the nature of purpose of incarnation is mis-stated by the word in-carn-ation itself, with its reference to the body - asif that was the most-important aspect of the definition.
But if we accept that the ultimate reality of creation is consciousness, and that God 'thinks' creation into manifestation and sustains it as such, and that it is by our thinking that we may come to be like God... then matters become clearer.
The facts of Jesus being incarnated (from his pre-mortal state as a discarnate spirit), and that he was resurrected into the same incarnate form as ourselves, ought to show us that incarnation is a higher form than spirit. But it is not the addition of 'matter' or 'solidity' that makes incarnation higher than spirit (matter/ solidity etc. are merely consequences of incarnation) - rather it is the mode of consciousness of an incarnate that is higher than a spirit.
Incarnation is a necessary step towards divine consciousness - towards the form of consciousness of the Father and the Son.
We began as children of God in the form of pre-mortal spirits, immersed-in the divine consciousness. As such we were all happy and good; but in the incomplete, immature ways that a young child is happy and good - by virtue of our environment, not from-our-selves.
Spirit consciousness lacks full agency - a spirit is, to a considerable extent, immersed-in the consciousness of other spirits - the individual is not divided clearly from other spirits, or from God the Father. Therefore, our pre-mortal spirits were passively immersed-in the divine consciousness - we lacked 'free will'.
To fulfil a destiny of becoming fully Sons of God, of the same kind as Jesus became; entails that our consciousness become rooted in itself; and then (like Jesus) chooses (from this state of autonomous agency) to ally with God, with creation.
Physical, material bodies are 'merely' the manifestation, the consequence, of a greater degree of separation, greater self-generated activity, greater agency.
Therefore, mortal incarnation is the first step towards that agency without which we cannot become full children of God. Jesus needed to become incarnate to become fully divine.
When Jesus was incarnated as a mortal - and after he had been baptised by John to commence his ministry; Jesus had the divine mode of consciousness. He was separated from the Father, and could have rejected Him. Thus, Jesus needed to make a choice, an act of will; to Love the Father, to align-with the father's creation. And of course he did.
And after death Jesus was resurrected to a permanent and incorruptible incarnation - but he remained incarnate because it is a higher mode of consciousness; and this Jesus needed to become fully-divine.
What this aims-at, what it is 'about', is divine consciousness; which is consciousness of truth and reality. More exactly; when Jesus was thinking - he thought only and always in truth and reality and with Love for it. And - because Jesus did this; this is what we can now be offered as a choice.
It was this choice and act of Jesus to align with The Father in truth and reality, in his thinking; that made it possible for our-selves to follow the same path. Once Jesus had done it, reality was changed (because Jesus's thought was reality) - now, because reality has been changed, this path and choice is universally available for anyone else to do.
We can know this directly (without any mediation of 'communication'), and for our-selves (regardless of circumstances) by thinking in the divine way; which thinking is made possible by two things: first the fact of us being children of God; and second the fact of the Holy Ghost which will show us the way, if we seek it.
In this sense, consciousness is the centre and unifying fact of the Christian scheme. It was in order that all Men could become fully-divine, children of God, that Jesus did what he did; and it was necessary for Jesus to do what he did in order for Jesus himself to become fully-divine: he needed to become incarnate, like his Father.
By recognising The Father as incarnate, we can therefore quite easily recognise why Jesus needed to become incarnate - and (at least in outline) how the incarnation of Jesus made it possible for other Men to become fully children of God.
(Note: These End Times have the characteristic of locating and amplifying what seem like small errors in Christian theology, to make them decisive in chosen damnation. The error of insisting that The Father is spirit and not incarnate was not very important in earlier times and places; but it has become important now - because it is has become the tip of a wedge that leads to rejection of the goodness of incarnation, hence to the denial of Christ's necessity to Man's salvation.)
The Father, we are told, is incarnate, has a body - this isn't in doubt, but the question is what this state of incarnation means.
Part of the prevalent misunderstanding that The Father is spirit derives from the already-existing philosophical idea among Classical pre-Christian intellectuals that God 'must be' a discarnate spirit, because spirit was the highest form. They regarded bodies as matter, and matter as lower than spirit - more restricted, prone to corruption etc...
Another element is that the nature of purpose of incarnation is mis-stated by the word in-carn-ation itself, with its reference to the body - asif that was the most-important aspect of the definition.
But if we accept that the ultimate reality of creation is consciousness, and that God 'thinks' creation into manifestation and sustains it as such, and that it is by our thinking that we may come to be like God... then matters become clearer.
The facts of Jesus being incarnated (from his pre-mortal state as a discarnate spirit), and that he was resurrected into the same incarnate form as ourselves, ought to show us that incarnation is a higher form than spirit. But it is not the addition of 'matter' or 'solidity' that makes incarnation higher than spirit (matter/ solidity etc. are merely consequences of incarnation) - rather it is the mode of consciousness of an incarnate that is higher than a spirit.
Incarnation is a necessary step towards divine consciousness - towards the form of consciousness of the Father and the Son.
We began as children of God in the form of pre-mortal spirits, immersed-in the divine consciousness. As such we were all happy and good; but in the incomplete, immature ways that a young child is happy and good - by virtue of our environment, not from-our-selves.
Spirit consciousness lacks full agency - a spirit is, to a considerable extent, immersed-in the consciousness of other spirits - the individual is not divided clearly from other spirits, or from God the Father. Therefore, our pre-mortal spirits were passively immersed-in the divine consciousness - we lacked 'free will'.
To fulfil a destiny of becoming fully Sons of God, of the same kind as Jesus became; entails that our consciousness become rooted in itself; and then (like Jesus) chooses (from this state of autonomous agency) to ally with God, with creation.
Physical, material bodies are 'merely' the manifestation, the consequence, of a greater degree of separation, greater self-generated activity, greater agency.
Therefore, mortal incarnation is the first step towards that agency without which we cannot become full children of God. Jesus needed to become incarnate to become fully divine.
When Jesus was incarnated as a mortal - and after he had been baptised by John to commence his ministry; Jesus had the divine mode of consciousness. He was separated from the Father, and could have rejected Him. Thus, Jesus needed to make a choice, an act of will; to Love the Father, to align-with the father's creation. And of course he did.
And after death Jesus was resurrected to a permanent and incorruptible incarnation - but he remained incarnate because it is a higher mode of consciousness; and this Jesus needed to become fully-divine.
What this aims-at, what it is 'about', is divine consciousness; which is consciousness of truth and reality. More exactly; when Jesus was thinking - he thought only and always in truth and reality and with Love for it. And - because Jesus did this; this is what we can now be offered as a choice.
It was this choice and act of Jesus to align with The Father in truth and reality, in his thinking; that made it possible for our-selves to follow the same path. Once Jesus had done it, reality was changed (because Jesus's thought was reality) - now, because reality has been changed, this path and choice is universally available for anyone else to do.
We can know this directly (without any mediation of 'communication'), and for our-selves (regardless of circumstances) by thinking in the divine way; which thinking is made possible by two things: first the fact of us being children of God; and second the fact of the Holy Ghost which will show us the way, if we seek it.
In this sense, consciousness is the centre and unifying fact of the Christian scheme. It was in order that all Men could become fully-divine, children of God, that Jesus did what he did; and it was necessary for Jesus to do what he did in order for Jesus himself to become fully-divine: he needed to become incarnate, like his Father.
By recognising The Father as incarnate, we can therefore quite easily recognise why Jesus needed to become incarnate - and (at least in outline) how the incarnation of Jesus made it possible for other Men to become fully children of God.
(Note: These End Times have the characteristic of locating and amplifying what seem like small errors in Christian theology, to make them decisive in chosen damnation. The error of insisting that The Father is spirit and not incarnate was not very important in earlier times and places; but it has become important now - because it is has become the tip of a wedge that leads to rejection of the goodness of incarnation, hence to the denial of Christ's necessity to Man's salvation.)
Wednesday, 12 September 2018
Snake eyes and zombie eyes
A while back, I wrote about the snake-eyed ones - the people one meets whose eyes have the hard, calculating, hypnotic, manipulative stare of snakes or lizards (or dragons).
On the whole, these are probably people who are 'demonically possessed' - who have invited evil spirits into their souls, on promise of gaining some worldly goal (e.g. money, power, sex, sadism).
Zombie eyes are another, and probably more common, phenomenon - perhaps especially among women. These are dead eyes, eyes that utterly lack agency, free will, inner motivation.
While snake eyes seem to indicate the presence of a purposive evil being in the soul; zombie eyes seem to indicate something like mind-control. That person's real self has been switched-off, suppressed, buried... and their actions are being controlled...
The dead eyes show that the mind has become a conduit - and has no source of being in-itself. The soul has been bypassed and the body, the movements, the emotions are all externally-driven.
The cause of zombie eyes could be - at the extreme - a mental enslavement imposed on an initially-willing victim; or it could be (in more susceptible persons) simply the result of living in a bureaucratic world at work, and a mass/ social media world during leisure... many people simply open their minds and let the world flow-through.
Such are these End Times... On the positive side, it can be quite easy to identity the as-yet un-corrupted - those (few) who are not the allies, servants or slaves of the demons. One meeting of the eyes may be enough - the open-hearted gaze or smile of a child, for example. How few adults one meets who have that clarity and goodness of soul! - yet there are some.
On the whole, these are probably people who are 'demonically possessed' - who have invited evil spirits into their souls, on promise of gaining some worldly goal (e.g. money, power, sex, sadism).
Zombie eyes are another, and probably more common, phenomenon - perhaps especially among women. These are dead eyes, eyes that utterly lack agency, free will, inner motivation.
While snake eyes seem to indicate the presence of a purposive evil being in the soul; zombie eyes seem to indicate something like mind-control. That person's real self has been switched-off, suppressed, buried... and their actions are being controlled...
The dead eyes show that the mind has become a conduit - and has no source of being in-itself. The soul has been bypassed and the body, the movements, the emotions are all externally-driven.
The cause of zombie eyes could be - at the extreme - a mental enslavement imposed on an initially-willing victim; or it could be (in more susceptible persons) simply the result of living in a bureaucratic world at work, and a mass/ social media world during leisure... many people simply open their minds and let the world flow-through.
Such are these End Times... On the positive side, it can be quite easy to identity the as-yet un-corrupted - those (few) who are not the allies, servants or slaves of the demons. One meeting of the eyes may be enough - the open-hearted gaze or smile of a child, for example. How few adults one meets who have that clarity and goodness of soul! - yet there are some.
Tuesday, 11 September 2018
Useless and actively-harmful intelligence (and creativity, and technologies)
Intelligence is a means to an end - but when the aim to which intelligence is harnessed is a useless, or actively harmful, one... well intelligence simply accelerates the damage.
And that is precisely the situation that has increasingly prevailed in The West for the past 200 years. In such a situation, intelligence becomes a social evil, and extreme intelligence even more so.
Add to intelligence creativity and inner motivation, and you have (pretty much) genius. A genius may be completely ignored - but if attended-to the effect of a genius is sometimes multiplied to an equivalent of hundreds, thousands or even millions of non-genius people.
So, if a genius is evil-motivated, or even simply self-ish and short-termist in his aims (or is appropriated by such people); then he may inflict truly colossal damage on societies. There are also an abundance of examples of this phenomenon over the past couple of hundred years, but particularly in the late nineteen and early twentieth centuries - Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Picasso, Schoenberg...
(After which geniuses began to get rarer - and now they have largely disappeared from public discourse; although some exist, mostly disregarded.)
My point is that the problems of the Modern West cannot be solved by intelligence, nor by geniuses; because of the pervasiveness of evil motivation - especially among the middle, intellectual and ruling classes that contain most such people.
Only when or if there was a Christian spiritual awakening that reorientated people from aiming-at evil towards aspiring to Good; would brains and creativity become valuable.
And what applies to human psychological capacity, applies equally to technological capacity: we cannot be saved but only have our doom accelerated by progress in science, computers, medicine, or any other mechanism or technology.
And this also applies to politics, to administration, bureaucracy, management and mass media.
When the End is evil, better means only make matters worse.
It's Common Sense, really - but easily forgotten.
And that is precisely the situation that has increasingly prevailed in The West for the past 200 years. In such a situation, intelligence becomes a social evil, and extreme intelligence even more so.
Add to intelligence creativity and inner motivation, and you have (pretty much) genius. A genius may be completely ignored - but if attended-to the effect of a genius is sometimes multiplied to an equivalent of hundreds, thousands or even millions of non-genius people.
So, if a genius is evil-motivated, or even simply self-ish and short-termist in his aims (or is appropriated by such people); then he may inflict truly colossal damage on societies. There are also an abundance of examples of this phenomenon over the past couple of hundred years, but particularly in the late nineteen and early twentieth centuries - Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Picasso, Schoenberg...
(After which geniuses began to get rarer - and now they have largely disappeared from public discourse; although some exist, mostly disregarded.)
My point is that the problems of the Modern West cannot be solved by intelligence, nor by geniuses; because of the pervasiveness of evil motivation - especially among the middle, intellectual and ruling classes that contain most such people.
Only when or if there was a Christian spiritual awakening that reorientated people from aiming-at evil towards aspiring to Good; would brains and creativity become valuable.
And what applies to human psychological capacity, applies equally to technological capacity: we cannot be saved but only have our doom accelerated by progress in science, computers, medicine, or any other mechanism or technology.
And this also applies to politics, to administration, bureaucracy, management and mass media.
When the End is evil, better means only make matters worse.
It's Common Sense, really - but easily forgotten.
Our Ahrimanic computer consciousness
I was rewatching a marvellous video interview of Jeremy Naydler in relation to a review I am writing of his new book on the 'ancient' history of the computer concept: In the Shadow of the Machine.
I should say that I regard Naydler as one of the most insightful people thinking and writing in modern Britain, and this was confirmed when I visited him a couple of years ago. Anyway, at 22 minutes he begins to talk about the Ahrimanic influence on modern consciousness; and how computers and bureaucracy are training/ compelling Men to think like machines.
That's an alternative way to conceptualise the failure of modern consciousness that so obsesses me; the way that Western Man did not take up the true Romantic Revolution around 1800; but instead - for what were basically sin-full reasons to do with the pursuit of worldly pleasures - we embarked on the continuing project of reducing and assimilating the human mind to the machine; with Luciferic, mainly sexual, interludes for R&R.
Jeremy's books and publications are listed at: http://www.abzupress.co.uk/webcat.htm
Everything Naydler writes is at least interesting, and some of it is exceptionally original and important - my favourite is probably The Future of the Ancient World (2009).
I should say that I regard Naydler as one of the most insightful people thinking and writing in modern Britain, and this was confirmed when I visited him a couple of years ago. Anyway, at 22 minutes he begins to talk about the Ahrimanic influence on modern consciousness; and how computers and bureaucracy are training/ compelling Men to think like machines.
That's an alternative way to conceptualise the failure of modern consciousness that so obsesses me; the way that Western Man did not take up the true Romantic Revolution around 1800; but instead - for what were basically sin-full reasons to do with the pursuit of worldly pleasures - we embarked on the continuing project of reducing and assimilating the human mind to the machine; with Luciferic, mainly sexual, interludes for R&R.
Jeremy's books and publications are listed at: http://www.abzupress.co.uk/webcat.htm
Everything Naydler writes is at least interesting, and some of it is exceptionally original and important - my favourite is probably The Future of the Ancient World (2009).
From the comments: Chiu ChunLing on living in the End Times
Tough thinking from 'CCL' in response to yesterday's post on 'strategy' and its current undesirability...
I think that the key thing is that there is no strategy that does not involve the basic and unavoidable evil of war, i.e. collateral damage.
And the collateral damage we must accept to form a realistic strategy at this stage is stupendous.
Essentially, the sacrifice of all civilization and everything that depends on it, saving only ourselves and what we can personally conserve. This would be an evil strategy if the wider culture were viable, and thus had to be actively undermined.
What makes this strategy less evil is that it requires nothing of us but that we individually disengage and stop actively serving the unsustainable evil of the wider culture. But by the token of being a movement of individuals moved by personal conscience, it ceases to seem anything like a strategy at the scale of events we're facing.
Nor is it one, because the larger scale culture is not our concern. What matters is the individual, personal decisions of each of us and our accountability to God for them.
I think that the key thing is that there is no strategy that does not involve the basic and unavoidable evil of war, i.e. collateral damage.
And the collateral damage we must accept to form a realistic strategy at this stage is stupendous.
Essentially, the sacrifice of all civilization and everything that depends on it, saving only ourselves and what we can personally conserve. This would be an evil strategy if the wider culture were viable, and thus had to be actively undermined.
What makes this strategy less evil is that it requires nothing of us but that we individually disengage and stop actively serving the unsustainable evil of the wider culture. But by the token of being a movement of individuals moved by personal conscience, it ceases to seem anything like a strategy at the scale of events we're facing.
Nor is it one, because the larger scale culture is not our concern. What matters is the individual, personal decisions of each of us and our accountability to God for them.
Monday, 10 September 2018
The strategy is that there can be No strategy
We are accustomed to assuming that 'the thing is' to have a strategy if you want to change culture. And certainly one can strategically wreck culture - think of government departments, 'new initiatives', five-year-plans; think of Mission Statements (actually, that's too nasty - you had better not...).
But there is no evidence that culture (or science, or literature, or music, or morality, or virtue - or anything Good) can be improved by a strategy except in the short term (if a system is already good, and resources are thrown at it, then there will initially be an improvement in so far as the good aspects are resource-constrained - before the overall system is corrupted). Indeed all the evidence is that a sustained strategy always wrecks every-thing it addresses.
One reason is that strategy treats of people in the lump, and assumes that individual differences don't really matter. But if every-body really is different from each other in their eternal essence; if we began different and are intended (by God) to end as different - then we ought to give-up strategic thinking at the fundamental level... if we can (it's hard).
This is a place in which traditionalist thinkers are as badly in error as radicals: both envisage a world in which the individual is fitted to the system. But Heaven won't be like that, and it is not what the Christian God wants from the sons and daughters of God (or else he created the world very ill, or is not Good - both of which we must reject).
To give-up on strategic thinking at first induces a sense of despair; because it is how we tend to conceptualise progress. Yet that assumption is itself a corruption of exactly the kind we hope to overcome.
And then, when we continue to reject strategic thinking - and cease to make plans to resist and fight, and plans to expand and conquer, and abandon plans to be better... and more consistently so - there is a great sense of rightness: the heart informs us that we have done-good, that we are on-the-right-lines. That this is truth and based on truth.
Only then may we be able to think properly; to think from our true-self, to think intuitively.
We feel secure, and - in a deep (not surface) sense: indomitable.
Saturday, 8 September 2018
Friday, 7 September 2018
Is this the dawning of the Age of Aquarius?
Would you buy a used spiritual prediction from this man?
In a new post at Albion Awakening, William Wildblood concludes... Well maybe - sort-of - but not in the way you are thinking!
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