This is the end of an era for many more reasons than are usually comprehended. It has become a standard view that 2020 marked an inflexion point: things have changed, permanently.
Almost everybody who has thought about it agrees on that - but there is a near-total divergence as to whether this social transformation is a good thing, or a bad thing.
Ultimately, this is a spiritual war between those whose affiliation is to God/ divine creation/ The Good; and those who oppose God/ creation/ Good.
Everybody has taken a side and there are no other sides.
For-God or anti-God is the fundamental division; and for-the-System versus for-God is another way of describing the mainstream conflict.
But... What about those who are against-the-System - who hate surveillance, control, bureaucracy, censorship etc... But who are not on the side of God and divine creation?
Does an 'agnostic', or 'anarchistic' position of being simultaneously anti The-System but Not For-God really exist?
Well, yes such a position does exist. It is the Sorathic evil position; when evil has become its own end, has discarded plans and schemes, and become short-termist and self-centred; destructive rather than constructive; seeking as-soon-as-possible dissolution of all that is created.
So 'universal opposition' is a type of evil.
Because there is no way of being against both God and The System - and yet being Good.
Because Good just-is the creative agenda of God, our Heavenly Father - that is the source and origin of Good, without which there is no Good.
Because, to be against both The System and also God is to be pro-chaos; and chaos = anti-creation. Divine creation was divinely imposed-upon pre-existent chaos, by the 'organization' of what was chaotic: thus chaos is the opposite of divine creation.
Beyond The System (which is only partly evil, and serves as a temporary means to a proximate and partially evil end); the ultimate goal of Satan is negative and destructive; it is to to reduce all of God's creation to a state of meaningless, purposeless chaos - ultimately including the devil himself.
In terms of the alignment system of Dungeons and Dragons ; in reality there is no such thing as chaotic good - because chaos just-is ultimate evil.
I don't know too much about D&D, but I always took "Chaos" in this context to be more about style than substance. So if I replace "Chaotic Good" with "Apparently-Chaotic Good," I think of the archetype of the Fool for Christ. Superficially, he seems crazy and untethered to reality, but he remains true and faithful to all that matters in a more profound sense.
ReplyDeleteAnother reason why Satan is called the Father of Chaos.
ReplyDeleteI fully agree, but I do think there is a genuine type of Chaotic Good. This is not a positive Chaos (implying wilful disorder, which is always evil), but a negative Chaos which has to do with the primordial incomprehensibility of nature, the overwhelming fertility of God's design, which can never quite be captured or contained by our thought, language, systems, institutions, etc. This type - the Chaotic Good - appears often in literature. It's the Holy Fool, the one who consents to appearing mad to ordinary people, in order to wake them up from their mental and spiritual slavery to a false system. It is the counter to the Lawful Evil, the Ahrimanic. You can find it in Tolkien in the figure Tom Bombadillo. Chaotic Good is the main form of the good explored in the oldest texts of Taoism, of Taoist philosophes like Laozi and Zhuangzi, who are always pointing out how the Tao (the Way) is beyond our comprehension, and attempts to capture it into a system end up butchering its real nature. For that reason the typical Taoist hero is the Holy Fool. Apparently, Russian Christianity has always had a special liking for the Holy Fool. St. Paul puts a heavy stress on how Christian wisdom is "foolishness" to worldly people. It's an important heroic type for our times because the Ahrimanic power, Lawful Evil, is so ascendant.
ReplyDeleteThat could partially explain why I always feel like I'm more on the right track when I base my reactions or strategy or tactics to the ongoing evil on love (preferably the divine and God), rather than on my hatred or fear of the system.
ReplyDeleteThat is, if I say, "What is the good right and positive thing I can do here!" rather than, "These evil bastards! I'm going to show them!"
I've noticed that the System's actions are really wearing down everyone, on both sides, who don't have a grounding in God. Anger, frustration with the other side. It's a grind. When you are in a grind, it wears you down if you don't have a source of renewal.
And that source must be spiritual.
I could be wrong, but I sense a time coming when the "grind" will grind more and more out of existence itself due to suicide and despair. There will be no magical "lifting" of restrictions and going back to total pre-corvid normalcy.
@JG and Jack - I would say that you have mistaken my understanding (explained passim elsewhere in this blog). I regard chaos and law/order as a false dichotomy - or rather I regard both chaotic and lawful as evil, although lawful is a lesser evil than chaotic, because lawfulness must contain some virtues.
ReplyDeleteThe Good is neither chaotic nor lawful in its nature, but is instead personal and creative. The fool for Christ - in that type of Christianity which regards monasticism as the highest form of religious life - is really just a matter of personality.
The fool for Christ is (in principle) as devoted to God as any monk; but has a personality type incapable of obedience to rule, and insufficiently conscientious to adhere to the many and complex rituals of monasticism - i.e. he is incapable of discipline.
He would break rules, but not from being chaotic; instead from the combination of a devotion to the divine in a certain personality type.
None of this matters to Christian salvation (which is for all types of personality) - although it does affect social arrangements, such as the possibility of church order. For example, even if a Saint; a fool for Christ probably could not be an integral part of a religious community.
@BC - I only have a "soft and flexible" sense of the D&D categorization, having learned of it from "memes," so I am likely at sea on the precise meaning of "Chaotic." Assuming "Chaotic Christian" is a meaningful concept, I guessed the D&D meaning to be chaotic = "resembling Chaos" - i.e., something which appears to be chaos manifested, in some context and from some (common?) perspective.
ReplyDeleteWhereas you seem to be using "Chaotic" to mean something like "aligned with Chaos itself" (as an ideal or being), and therefore opposed to Creation. Of course, if Chaotic means against-Creation, one cannot be a Christian and "chaotic."
I think any misunderstanding is likely semantical, but perhaps I am wrong?
This may help clarify:
ReplyDeletehttps://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2015/07/law-versus-chaos-and-balance-of-things.html
As far as I understand, good/neutral/evil in dnd means goals, whether the character wants to make the world worse, better, or he doesn't care. Lawful/chaotic determines how much the character is inclined to follow the laws, to work within the system (means). An evil lawful character might be a cog in the machine of an evil empire, while an evil chaotic character would be interested in maximizing evil and chaos. A good lawful will follow the laws of his country and religion and be guided by a specific moral code, while a good chaotic will be independent and do good according to his heart, without necessarily needing an external morality system. Example of neutral good religion is sikhism because it's states that each person have inner god to lead their actions while still have ethical teaching
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