The impulse and motive for divine creation

Kristor at the Orthosphere has written a post in response to mine of yesterday and others by Francis Berger - that asks several questions. These seem to require and deserve a more extensive elucidation than can be done in comments, including an expansion of underlying metaphysical assumptions; so here it is. 

This procedure distorts my metaphysical views, because they are being expressed in response to Kristor's framework of ultimate assumptions - so that, even when I try to elucidate - means that my account is fragmentary and seen from an alien angle. But maybe this is the best that can be managed in the circumstances. 

(Obviously, I usually and by preference express my metaphysical ideas in their own terms, trying to make a model or paint a picture of how reality is structured and proceeds.)

 

From Kristor is in italics - edited by me; my responses follow BC: 

The situation prior to creation that Bruce describes is already a world: a disharmonious congeries of eternal conscious selves, purposive beings who suffer affects, who feel, want, act, and so on, 

BC: That is a correct description of my views

who relate to and influence each other (so that they can love, or not), all more or less ordered to a good, which apparently they can all more or less recognize, and to which they are more or less attracted. 

BC: No. Before creation there is no such interaction or harmonization. 

They are from eternity past together in a temporal – and so, presumably also spatial – milieu, in which they have and prosecute lives, but only messily. 

BC: Sort of... but before creation there is no comparison by which their autonomous lives can be called messy. 

Thus they can apprehend each other, and God, and his creative plan; they can find it attractive, can want to participate in it, and can then actually do so. 

BC: No. I regard the above description as happening after creation has been initiated. 

The question then arises, what is the reason of this world that was running along from eternity past, all on its own, before one of its constituents got started on his creative project – or after, for that matter? If we answer that there is no prior reason it is what it is, that its eternal existence is a brute fact, we have admitted that it is fundamentally unintelligible; for, what has no sufficient reason to be what it is cannot be reasonable, either in whole or in part: for, brute facts are utterly inscrutable, in principle, thus even to themselves. 

BC: Correct. Before creation there can be no reasons, except internally - "privately", within beings. Things Just Are.  

What is not reasonable cannot be a world, or for that matter any such thing as the items we find all around us, and in us. It can be rather only just stuff happening for no reason: the chaos of Democritean atomism, but with the atoms all sentient, solipsistically. 

BC: Yes, pretty much a correct summary- except that having sentient beings/ "atoms" makes all the difference. Divine creation is (pretty much) the transformation from solipsistic to ongoing-creation - insofar as creation has happened (which changes through time, because creation is linear and sequential).  

If we say that this world prior to creation has no cause because it is necessarily what it is, then every detail of it must be necessary; in which case there is in it no freedom, for it is a spatiotemporally extended block, in which nothing really moves or acts, or therefore is. 

BC: No, this is wrong. "Necessity" does not come into it when things Just Are. Things really "move" but only within beings, not between beings. 

What we end up with then is either the pure chaos of brute unintelligible fact, and no world, or else the wholly determined motionlessness of universal necessity. 

BC: No, neither of these alternatives; because they are regarding the primordial beings as if unalive. Starting with beings rather than "things" makes all the difference. 

There is of course a third option: the classical metaphysics of Nicene Christianity, in which God as uniquely eternal and necessary is the sufficient reason for all being, including his own: not a brute fact, but on the contrary the perfectly intelligent and thus intelligible fact, in whose light all other things are intelligible, at least in principle, so that knowledge is possible; and in which creatures are not eternal, but rather contingent upon God, so that as contingent they can change, act, suffer, move, love, learn, grow, understand and be understood, and so forth. 

BC from now onwards: 

This leads on to consider God's motivation for creation.

If God is a unity, there can be no motive for anything. Such a God Just Is. 

But my understanding is that God is a dyad of Heavenly Parents - Heavenly Father and Mother. My understanding is that it is the love between our Heavenly Parents that is the motivation for creation - in a way closely analogous to the spiritually-understood way that love between two (ideal) loving human beings may lead to the choice of initiating pro-creation - that is having children who are loved; and beginning what may be an extended family.

(Of course, mortal human parents are born as already part of an extended and (ideally) loving family. But I am here talking about how this all began.) 

Creation is therefore a concept that arises from love, and includes procreation as well as all the other many ways in which loving relationships between beings of all kinds may become.  

To put matters very simply: there is a Timeline for creation. The primordial situation of autonomous and not-relating beings becomes creation as a consequence of our Heavenly Parents meeting, becoming mutually aware, and committing themselves to eternal love. 

Our Heavenly Parents thus became God, and creation began by God's "interventions" on primordial reality; and to the extent that primordial beings opt-in to live by love. 

This was not the original situation of reality, there was a time when it happened, and it might not have happened. 

Furthermore, beings are usually only partly capable of love; and presumably some beings are incapable of love (and therefore do not participate in creation). 

Thus God's primary creation is a mixed state of love, and not-love. 

And it is this deficit in primary creation that led to the need for Jesus Christ and the Second Creation, "needed" because Jesus completes the work of creation by enabling Heaven which is the eternal situation of beings living by love; leaving-behind other and evil motivations at resurrection.

**

By Contrast: Orthodox-traditional "Nicene" Christianity perhaps needs to posit a motive for creation - a motive for God creating rather than not; and therefore (sometimes) posits an analogous impetus for creation in the love of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost - each for the other. 

It is the differences-between the Trinity that enable the love that leads to creation...

However this explanation is made confusing/ incoherent by also insisting that the Trinity are not only different from each other, but also simultaneously the same as each other (because there is only one God). 

(This is required by the insistence on a monotheistic Omni-God creating ex nihilo - such a God cannot be internally subdivided.) 

And furthermore; ortho-trad theology has it that that the "process" of creation (and of love among the Trinity) happens outside of time - so creation always-was-and-is; so there is no "Timeline" of creation. All that is now, ever was and shall be. 

And this is the point at which orthodox Christianity reaches its particular It Just Is assumption - explanations stop at this point.

All metaphysics must reach this point, sooner or later - the point at which we must make assumptions regarding the ultimate nature of reality. 

The goal (as I see it) is to become aware of where this point is reached, to acknowledge this; and to know that here we are indeed making assumptions... 

Which activity is (I suggest) properly called "metaphysics" 

Is poor concentration and "clouded" consciousness a spiritual problem?

As a young adult and into middle age, I seemed to have an unusually strong ability to focus on a particular theme, and stick with it; in the context of feeling very clear in my thinking and holding to the willed topic. 

That ability has diminished significantly as I moved into old age (later fifties). 

Initially I fought the changes, but gradually realized that there is nothing that can be done about this. Thinking depends on the body and its health and functionality - so its quality is not something that can be changed by will power - will power being, of course, subject to exactly the same changes! 

Given my overall understanding of the nature and purpose of our mortal lives, I assume that these problems - and they are problems, pathologies, because they are dysfunctionalities - ought to become the focus of learning. 

Not as things to be "overcome", because we are mortals in an entropic world and will functionally decline and die; but as stimuli towards a change of purpose. 

In the first place - my thinking abilities when I was healthier and more functional - did not lead to spiritual benefits! 

Indeed, by the early 2000s, I had thought myself into a pretty appalling spiritual impasse of the usual, mainstream type: materialism, positivism, reductionism, relativism, scientism... 

Proving (yet again!) that ability (and power) is a curse when misapplied. 

My sense of things is that when one cannot think with the same clarity and purpose, this signals the need to move towards less strategic, more here-and-now, purposes: in particular awareness, discernment, and repentance. 

In other words, rather than trying to direct and control thinking in pre-decided directions; I ought to be more aware of what is currently happening in my thinking; aware that thinking is indeed (at some point) currently clouded, or perhaps blunted...

That I am Not currently conscious-of and engaged-with the environment (physical and social) and the world of spirit in the ways I want: the ways I regard as optimal (i.e. discernment is needed)...

That I repent this state of mind, and regard the situation as sub-optimal at best, and often evil in terms of being wrongly-motivated - e.g. seeking comfort, pleasure, rest, relief from suffering; rather than being creatively orientated to reality with love and in freedom.  

I assume that what I can do, is also what I most need to do - here-and-now, at this point in the proceedings: i.e. to clarify my self and my intentions and attainment in an honest and accurate way. 

And to be clear also about what, behind the unavoidable but superficial constraints of the mortal body and entropic/evil world, I most want...

Even though I cannot usually make myself want it - in the present time and circumstances!

The nature of Primal Chaos: God or Chaos versus God or Nothing (continuing a dialogue with Francis Berger)

The background goes back some way, but could be regarded as a post by Francis Berger discussing the nature of freedom, and comments from Kristor Lawson of the Orthosphere. The theme then became the nature of God, as God ought to be understood by Christians - in particular whether, on the one hand, God created absolutely everything from absolutely nothing ("ex nihilo"). Or on the other hand; whether  God created from something pre-existent - in particular "beings" (living, purposive, conscious to some degree, self-sustaining etc) that had always existed, coeternally with God. 

Bruce Charlton comment (edited by me): 

Kristor comments: "Because he is subultimate, the Mormon God is unnecessary, contingent, and dependent (like Zeus or Thor)". 

This is interestingly wrong, in part; because it reveals several of the assumptions into which philosophy came to embed mainstream Christian theology. Perhaps the key term is contingent - in that the desire of classical theology is to describe a state of affairs that could not be otherwise than it is. 

If that was true then (by my understanding) there can be no real freedom. Freedom has been excluded by assumption. 

"Unnecessary" is related to the desire to escape all contingency: to insist that things cannot be other than what they are, however this also also entails that nothing can really change. 

But when there is life/ consciousness/ being - there is change, and change is directional and sequential - and this is something that everybody is born already knowing. 

The Mormon concept of God (and IMO the real God!) is indeed "necessary" in the sense that God is the creator, and without God there would be no creation. So it is a case of God or Chaos. 

But the philosophy (expressed by Kristor) that (IMO) captured Christian theology, wants it to be that there must be God, now and always, and nothing would be without God. 

This is a case of God or Nothing. 

Well, that idea of necessity is a very particular view of God. Most gods/Gods throughout history and the world (including some descriptions of the God of the Old Testament, it seems clear enough) do not conform to this idea of necessity. 

Indeed extremely few people - now or ever - could even conceive of a God in that sense, and could not express it if they did. They would not want or see reason to posit such an entity. 

What is strange to me is that so many Christian theologians (from very early in the Christian church) seem to have decided to make the assumption that only such an abstract entity is a "real" God, or deserves to be considered a God.

It is strange because of Jesus Christ. If Christianity had been a pure monotheism, this dogmatic assumption would be comprehensible; but given the incarnate nature of Jesus the Man, Son of God, who was born, grew, lived "in time", who died etc etc... 

Well, it is just plain strange for Christians to make an insoluble problem from Jesus - just because of their pre-existing philosophical convictions. And having made the nature of Jesus such a Big Problem, but not so strange to pretend that all questions have been answered but at a level of abstraction so remote that all contradictions dissolve into each other! 

**

Francis Berger then wrote a post amplifying on some of the above concepts (edited): 

In his comment, Dr. Charlton refers to two disparate cases concerning the nature of God and Creation—the first being the conventional conceptualization of God or nothing and the unconventional view of God or chaos.

The first case posits God as the ultimate creator of everything and argues that there would be nothing without God. The second case envisions God as a primary creator who shaped and formed Creation from pre-existing “material” (for lack of a better way of putting it) that was chaotic and purposeless. God or nothing and God or chaos is another angle from which one can view the old creatio ex nihilo versus creatio ex materia debate.

The God or nothing approach insists upon the absolute necessity of God for the simple reason that without him, nothing could exist or be. God not only is—he absolutely must be, for without Him, there would be nothing but a void of nothingness.

In other words, I am must be because there is literally nothing on the other side of that thunderous I am. Every being needs God, but God needs no other beings. No being is utterly necessary but God.

This absolute necessity of God relegates everything in existence or being to the state of contingency. Every being in existence is utterly dependent on God in every way imaginable, even when they exercise their God-given freedom to reject God altogether.

However, the God-given free rejection of the Divine Creator does not negate God’s thunderous I am declaration. The creatures he created from nothing can never return to the nothing from whence they came. They either come to know and worship him or suffer the consequences of their free rejection, the capacity for which God created from nothing.

The God or chaos case envisages God as the primary creator. Without God, there is no Creation, only chaos. God can still say I am, but his necessity takes on an entirely different hue.

The creatures he shaped existed in some form before entering Creation, so he is not necessary for their core pre-existence as beings but crucial to their existence in Creation. They come to know him and attempt to understand why they are Creation, or they may reject him and, perhaps, choose to return to the chaos from which they emerged. ​ Since God did not create the freedom driving such a choice, it remains authentically free. 

**

Me, now: 

Deriving the nature of God from a "God or Chaos" distinction, seems to be a useful shorthand of the the paired alternatives that arise from the metaphysical assumptions that I share with Francis Berger. 

His comment stimulated a few further clarifications. God or Chaos could be re-framed as Love or Chaos - since creation derives from Love. 

Furthermore, it is vitally important that God creates from "beings" and not from "materia" - by my understanding, God did not start with inert, unalive, "stuff" but already alive and conscious, purposive beings. That pre-creation reality was of beings is essential to the reality and nature of freedom. 

If pre-creation reality was not already-alive and already-conscious - by their nature and from-eternity, then the problem of "where freedom comes from" remains unanswered. Because, ultimately, freedom just isn't something that can be made or gifted.

(And the same applies to life, or consciousness, or purpose - these are attributes of beings, and cannot be bestowed upon no-beings, "things" or "material".)  

Therefore, Chaos should not be pictured scientistically as some kind of Brownian motion of dead-molecules. Instead, Chaos should be understood as a situation in which beings are self-centred in their purposes and methods, autonomous in their world view... 

So, this debate is not a re-run of creatio ex nihilo versus creatio ex materia - because the starting point is an already-alive ("animated") universe, but one in which living beings are "uncoordinated" - each pulling in a different direction, all with with different motivations. 

Creation is therefore understood as the incremental and progressive harmonization and direction of a multitude of already-existing living beings by Love: that is, by Love of God (which provides ultimate coherence), and of each-other (without which creation would break-down). 

In other words; the "Two Great Commandments": first to love God, then to love our "neighbour", fellow Men (and by extension all other beings).  

Chaos is a collection of unharmoniuous beings, each "doing his own thing", wholly self-motivated, un-loving and indifferent to other beings (and perhaps unaware of them). It is this kind of situation, upon-which God initiates the process of creation.

But, this was only the beginning of creation - because it led to a mixed world of continuing chaos and ("within" this) an expanding divine creation. Creation exists insofar as love motivates; but love is (at best) incomplete in any being. 

So far this is monotheism, not Christianity. The completion and "perfection" of creation, into a wholly good world - i.e. Heaven - required the later intervention of Jesus Christ. This is therefore The Second Creation.  

 

Faeries and ETs - appeal to different kinds of person

An "alien" disguising itself as various faeries

Many have noticed that there is a generic similarity between reports of sightings and contact with faeries and with Extra-terrestrials (ETs) - and this has been variously explained in Jungian terms, either with or without some objectively real +/- perceptual basis. 

In other words; at some deep level (whether psychological or physical), faeries and ETs are "the same phenomenon" that manifests superficially in very different forms. 

But the kinds of people who are interested by (and report) faeries versus those interested in ETs, seem quite different in terms of their general stance and motivations.

Faeries are a focus for people with a range of New Age and esoteric interests; those who I would characterize as seeking a reversion towards the ancient and early-childhood consciousness of "Original Participation". 

In other words such people seek an escape from the cut-offness and alienation of modern consciousness; and desire immersively to integrate with a living (animated) world; that includes faeries along with animals, plants and landscape. 

Thus, faeries seem to serve as an intermediary between Man and Nature - or Man and The Earth more generally.  

By contrast; ETs are of interest to people with an alternative ("conspiracy theory") political stance. The idea that alien species from outer space have an interest in the earth, a presence among Men, a desire for contact with Men - and they desire to exert an influence of some kind on this world... 

ET enthusiasts therefore usually "place" ETs into a world view that is "mundane", and indeed primarily socio-political. ETs are variously regarded as either/or/both benign and malign in their intentions for the organization and goals of the Earth. 

Sometimes ETs are interpreted as intending to protect the earth (eg against catastrophic pollution, or against the possibility of nuclear war) - and also sometimes other kinds of ET are understood to be among or influencing the Global Establishment in their sinister plans to enslave and exterminate Men and the planet.  

So, maybe their is some kind of common basis for experience of faeries and ETs; but if so, differences in personality and ideology/ spirituality lead to a different ascribed function, motivation, and human-role for these beings. 

Tam Lin - a "strong female protagonist", folklore faeries, and low magic - in the Scottish Borders

We recently visited Carterhaugh and "Tamlane's Well" in Eskdale, in the Scottish Borders west of Selkirk - which is the location for one of the most famous of the supernatural ballads: Tam Lin.

(Note - the above are not my pictures.)

While Thomas the Rhymer is a high magical ballad, dealing with matters of elves as a third kind (neither Men nor angels) death and prophecy - and a possible source of insight and enhanced power; Tam Lin is much more of a folkloric depiction of faeries: beautiful yet dangerous because alien. 

And the ballad of Tam Lin is a love/lust story, focused on the need for human courage and ingenuity in dealing with the Fair Folk.

While the most famous recording of Tam Lin is by Fairport Convention; I personally don't much enjoy it, nor any of the others I have encountered except for the incomplete version by The Pentangle, used in that weird, flawed, but somewhat interesting, 1970 movie. 

Tam Lin continues to exert a fascination across recent decades, especially for women singers; probably because it may be taken as a prototype of a currently dominant narrative trope of a spunky heroine who falls in love with, and redeems, a dangerously attractive Bad Boy.

...Although naturally; being a traditional and orally-transmitted poem (with many, and contradicting, variants!) the original Tam Lin does this now-clichéd trope much better than modern Hollywood!

Stephanie Beacham as Janet, Ian McShane as Tam ("Tom") Lin, in the 1970 movie - depicting her "Have I just made a terrible mistake?" moment. 

Fakers and frauds can be very clever and industrious (as well as the opposite)

Not by Vermeer

I recently attended a lecture on frauds in the world of fine art, especially painting - the more notorious examples of those who pass-off their own work as that of famous, prestigious, expensive painters from the past. 

My take-home message was that the world of fine arts is rife with fakes, the "experts" are easily fooled (and indeed an integral part of the scam), and some of the fakers are not just skilled but very clever in marketing their forgery by indirect and non-obvious means. 

I also read more about a notorious and very successful Welsh literary faker called "Iolo Morganwg" (Edward Williams) - who was so skilled, industrious and clever that his frauds have become inextricably bound-up with Welsh literary history (and the history of revived neo-druidry). 

My own reading has led me to consider an influential twentieth century mystic called Wellesley Tudor Pole; and the eventual conclusion that he was essentially (but, of course, not wholly - successful examples never are) a fraud and liar - also clever, capable, industrious, and charismatic. 

It is not exactly Big News that the world of esotericism and mysticism has many fakers and frauds, but perhaps it is more surprising that some of the most feted instances of art are (at least I believe) fakes. These are fields in which the basic set-up makes it easier to be fraudulent. But nowadays the same applies everywhere of which I have insider knowledge, such as science (and especially medical research - as became blazingly obvious in 2020!)  

One difficulty in acknowledging this, is that people underestimate the industriousness and strategic thinking of frauds; another is that they underestimate the degree to which truth can be distorted or inverted by "seeding" broadly correct information with a few key falsehoods; another is to underestimate the importance of theory as compared with "facts". 

But a further difficulty relates to motivation. What motivates the faker or fraud. 

"Normal" people are not only too lazy to be seriously fraudulent, but they lack sufficiently strong motivation. Some frauds seem clearly to be after money, or sex, or status - which are pretty normal motivations.  

However, not all fakers and frauds are impelled by normal motivations, or else their "normal" motives are so extreme as to become abnormal. Normal people are too normal for them to realize the strangeness of motivations in the kind of people who do become successful frauds. 

I include myself here! The motivations of some people can be so strange as to be utterly obscure, and this fact strongly protects Frauds and Fakes (F&Fs) from detection.

This can be such a strong block on understanding, that even solid and certain examples of fraud tend to be neglected, ignored, or forgotten - because thy just don't "make sense" to people, and can't be integrated into their ideologies and schemes of understanding.  

All of this is extremely important in terms of someone seeking "the meaning of life"; and addressing ultimate questions. Because it is quite likely that the "experts" and "wise men" that we encounter in our searchings will - no matter in what domain we are searching - include some (perhaps many) frauds and fakes. 

And yet the evidence suggests that these F&Fs are not detectable by any feasibly attainable level of expertise and specialized knowledge - and with the time and energy we have available.  

So what can we do, in practice?

In my experience, the best guide - and maybe the only guide - is when we have a genuine intuitive conviction that some kind of fakery and fraud is afoot...

(Shomething Shurley Wrong - Shomwhere!)

When the "alarm bells" go-off (often subconsciously, at first; or subtly) at the time we encounter a person or work - a sense that somebody is "...up to something", and not "what they seem" - or, more exactly, not what they are trying to make us believe. 

Yet a great deal of modern culture is (for obvious reasons!) dedicated to inducing us to ignore, systematically, such intuitive promptings - and to induce other, alternative, external, cultural, "fake intuitions" - especially that somebody or some-thing that is actually-good (true, beautiful, virtuous) is instead untrustworthy. 

"They" want us to reject as F&F exactly that which we most need and would most benefit us. 

Therefore, even in terms of what seem to be our own intuitions of validity, we need to apply our best-possible and deepest intuitive awareness; and to become aware of the difference between a real intuition, and something that has been artificially - perhaps subtly and deviously - implanted; including implanted in exactly the strategic and indirect fashion that fakes and frauds pass-off their work. 

(Sometimes - I find - all that needs to happen, is that we seriously consider that some-thing, some person, some-event may be an F or F; then immediately to realize that Of Course! Obviously it is.)

This may sound superficial, but isn't - at least not if your metaphysical assumption is that we really do have a real - eternal and potentially divine - self; that can form a genuine bottom-line for our knowledge. 

Did Jesus make a better world?

So many aspects of Christian theology seem to take it for granted that Jesus made a better world. That the world after Jesus was better than the world before Jesus. 

If this was truly so, then the world should have undergone a very obvious transformation in or around 33AD. 

One would expect massive disagreement as to why this had happened, and even disagreement about whether or not this massive change had been for the better or worse. But that this had happened - that the world (indeed the universe) had been transformed at this time would - presumably - have been so obvious as to require no argument. 

Yet that is not the case. Nobody seriously argues that the world underwent an unique and qualitative change around AD33. 

I regard this as a powerful argument against this-worldly interpretations of Christianity - and this-worldly interpretations of Christianity were those that I nearly always came across when I was an atheist. 

On the other hand, if we take Jesus as his own word in the Fourth Gospel; then his work was not about this world, but the next world: not so much about what happens in life, but instead mostly about what happens after death. 

Therefore it is unsurprising if the world did not change in any obvious way during or after the ministry and death of Jesus. 

I put this forward as an instance of the way in which Christians need to be careful, much more careful than they generally have been, about how they describe the faith, and the aspects that they emphasise. To advocate Christianity as a means to the end of a better life or a better world, seems like a good idea in the short term - but it is fundamentally false and alien to reality. And, sooner or later, this tactic will - and rightly - discredit Christianity.  

Just because some of Them hate a person, does not mean that he is Good; because the Western Establishment is increasingly divided into warring factions

Just because some of Them hate a thing or a person, does not mean that the thing or person is Good; because the totalitarian Establishment is increasingly divided into warring factions. 

(Tow wrongs don't make a right; a double-negative is not a positive; when somebody-you-hate hates a person - that doesn't imply that you ought to like him; after all, your enemy's enemy may be your enemy as well!) 

Whereas in 2020, the mass media and world leaders were globally united in their evil strategy rooted in the birdemic response; now the Establishment is divided - and indeed early signs were evident in the antiracism-fuelled anarchic violence late-summer in that year. 

Such engineered outbursts distracted-from and broke-up the new "social conventions" (intended to become permanent) of lockdown, distancing, masking, dehumanization, alienation etc. 

Especially since early 2022; the global consensus has split into The West and The Rest. 

Furthermore; within The West the two motivations of advanced demonic evil: Ahrimanic and Sorathic - that is the bureaucratic-totalitarians and the spitefully destructive warmongers - are engaged in increasingly vicious infighting behind the scenes. 

This factionalism leads to tactical zig-zags, conflicting statements in the mass media, and prolonged policy indecision and drift; as can be seen especially with the Fire Nation and Arrakis wars - which veer between attempts at profiteering and pragmatism (to benefit plans for Agenda 2030 and the Great Reset); and reckless escalations and provocations (with massive destruction of people, resources, property, farmland etc). 

One surface manifestation of the war between the elites is when hate-campaigns break out against people and things - which ought to be interpreted as fuelled by increasingly bitter infighting among those with power, wealth, influence and status. 

A topical example is the US Presidential candidate DT. He is loathed by the globalist totalitarian bureaucrats, as he always has been; and these "mainstream leftists" are as histrionic and unrestrained in their fear and denunciation of DT as they have been since 2015. 

But another faction of the ruling class see DT in terms of having potential to accelerate the already spiralling chaos of inter-national war and intra-national violence. 

Whether this faction would prove  correct in their belief is, of course, unpredictable - but that kind of "support" from within the structures of power, is surely the reason why DT has not been eliminated from competing in the race, and why he may be allowed to win; despite the electoral "machinations" of the bureaucratic totalitarians.    

It is important to recognize this, or else you (like so many I have read online) will be misled by the wild, insane and evil attacks on DT and other people and things; into assuming they are therefore a genuinely probable force for Good. 

Socio-political optimism is merely an estimate of probabilities - not a virtue (Christian hope is "not of this world")

Socio-political optimism is merely an estimate of probabilities - not a virtue. 

The Christian virtue of hope is properly "not of this world". It is directed beyond death, beyond resurrection  - towards Heaven.  

So, an optimistic estimate of this-worldly (including socio-political) probabilities may be honest or dishonest, objective or manipulative, well-informed or blind, rooted in joy or in fear.

On the other side: pessimism about this world, including pessimism regarding the future socio-political situation, is neither a virtue nor a sin. 

In and of itself, pessimism is just a different estimate of future probabilities. 

What makes pessimism a virtue or a sin, is the true motivation behind a declaration of pessimism.  

In these times, one besetting sin is to despair existentially; to despair of salvation and God's loving creation; because of our personal (incomplete, biased) understanding of the events and probabilities of this-world. 

Another besetting sin of these times is optimistic despair... A Micawber-like clutching-at-straws type optimism; motivated by the reality that someone cannot psychologically tolerate the reality of a pessimistic evaluation. This is a refusal to face fear - therefore itself a species of despair; driven by lack of faith in Christian hope.

Whereas; it is virtuous (albeit a fine-line to walk) genuinely to be a joyous, hope-filled, pessimist!

 

Initiation-transformation versus training in habits

During my work years (and looking back a few of decades) I saw a great change in the conceptualization of a doctor.

The original idea was a scheme by which a doctor was "made" by transforming a suitable young Man via early apprenticeship (at medical school) that implicitly led to initiation as A Doctor. One the doctor had been made, he was essentially left to his own devices. 

By the time I retired, this conceptualization has almost vanished, and A Doctor was seen as somebody who did a particular job, and was subject to particular regulatory procedures. The implication was that what made a doctor was a training process, intended to develop and maintain particular desired habits.

So the doctor went from an initiated and transformed person who was self-motivated to do the right things from then-onwards; into a generic employee with the right habits - habits that were generated and sustained by an externally-devised and -controlled system of training and regulation. 

Most of this change was motivated by evil: by the Ahrimanic desire for a totalitarian, dehumanised world; in which behaviour controls thinking, and thinking is controlled by system. 

But part of the change came from an inner recognition that people were not (or not any more) genuinely transformed positively and lastingly (if not "permanently") by initiatory procedures: that modern people were not genuinely self-motivated, but were in fact externally controlled (especially by the mass media and propaganda). 

This was evidenced by the irrationality and rapid changeability of fashions in "everything"; fashions that were simultaneously dysfunctional yet (somehow, at-the-time) irresistible at the mass level. 

What happened could be (and was) explained in terms of what "worked" in a stable society, and was appropriate for that; was unsuited to an unstable and rapidly changeable society. 

But that did not really make sense; because the actual outcome was simply to convert medicine to generic-bureaucracy linked to the totalitarian ideology - which situation is utterly dysfunctional and without even an incentive for functionality. 

Totalitarianism aims at surveillance and control and Man as a generic unit; and its total-nature means that dysfunctionality can be and is denied, hidden, and inverted into pseudo-desired outcomes. This happens by a vast range of monopolistic propaganda, public relations, advertising, "education", and by psychological manipulations.   

Yet, the pervasive and apparently irresistible nature of these changes is consistent with an underlying development in human consciousness. What used to be genuinely lastingly transformative and a true "initiation", progressively lost its effectiveness.  

People changed - so that what once worked, no longer worked. 

I am not suggesting a socio-political solution or answer to the current evil dysfunctionality; because in current socio-political terms there is none. 

So long as we live in a system (and ours is vast, multi-national, and includes all major institutions and corporations) - then we are inhabiting an essentially totalitarian world view; an ideology by which any genuinely self-motivated (and/or God-motivated) individuality is regarded as a danger to be ignored, suppressed, or eliminated.

But conscious, explicit, understanding of what is - is a necessary first step towards its transcendence. 

And, after all, in ultimate terms we are not alive-and-here in order to make a "better" (ie. more prosperous, comfortable, enjoyable) world. 

We are alive-and-here in order to learn from our personal experiences - and to learn in ways that may not be transformative initiations in terms of this earthly and mortal life; but may well be just exactly that when it comes to resurrected eternal life. 

The Dyadic Holy Ghost

Since I regard God the Creator as dyadic, our Heavenly Parents, Father and Mother (actual, and presumably eternally incarnate, persons)...

And since I regard Jesus Christ's marriage to Mary of Bethany (Mary Magdalene) as a vital and transformative aspect of His work of the Second Creation...

Then it seems to follow - and has a intuitive rightness - that the Holy Ghost is also dyadic, and a consequence of the eternal commitment of Jesus and Mary in love (their "celestial marriage"). 

I think this is necessary because ultimate creativity comes from the eternal dyadic love of our Heavenly Parents (that is, the concept of creation includes (and/or arises from) love, as it includes freedom and agency - as distinguishable but inseparable aspects).  

Thus the Holy Ghost is both guide and teacher, and comforter; and it may be that these aspects reflect Jesus Christ the man and Mary Magdalene the woman; after their death, resurrection and ascension. 

In other words (bearing in mind these are emphases, not separate domains), the main theme of Jesus Christ in the Holy Ghost is to contribute discernment and purpose in a long-term, strategic way; while Mary contributes immediate help, here and now, in a tactical way. 

Jesus shows us the path, Mary keeps us upon it. 

Of course this cannot (even in principle!) be proved from the Gospels; yet the account of Mary in the Fourth Gospel strikes me as compatible by what I have just said - and from other traditions in Christianity. 

By my understanding, Mary Magdalene makes five appearances in the The Fourth Gospel: 1, implicitly in Jesus's Marriage at Cana (a passage that seems clearly tampered-with, including by deletions), in the resurrection of Lazarus (Mary's brother), the episode of the ointment on Jesus's feet in Bethany, at the foot of the cross and after Jesus's resurrection. 

Mary's concerns in the latter four episodes are very immediate, supportive, "caring" - and indeed it seems possible that Mary had a role in the resurrection of Jesus in a way analogous to John the Baptist's role in the divine but mortal transformation of the pre-baptism Jesus into Jesus Christ*. 

I get this from the hints contained in the reported conversation between the resurrected Jesus, and Mary, when she was the first to meet Jesus after his death, thus.

John 20: 14... she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. [15] Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. [16] Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. [17] Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.  

It strikes me that Jesus may here be talking of their future eternal union - to include the spiritual emanation of the Holy Ghost, available to all who follow Jesus - to happen (only) after Mary's death and resurrection. 

In very general terms - to include Mary Magdalene/ of Bethany in the Holy Ghost is a further development and explication of the deadly rejection of the feminine that afflicted Christianity from early-on (and which I blame of the monotheist philosophers who captures and continue to torment Christin theology!)

The progressively increasing emphasis on Mary the mother of Jesus in Catholic practice, I take to be a theologically-distorted - but nonetheless spiritually very valuable - manifestation of the reality of Heavenly Mother, and the wife of Jesus Christ. 

The fact that the Blessed Virgin Mary is mainly called-upon for aid and comfort in the difficulties of everyday living, fits with my understanding of the role of the divine feminine in general, and Mary Magdalene in her marriage-into the Holy Ghost specifically.   

Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, rediscovered the Christian feminine in God; but the CJCLDS have since neglected and suppressed this aspect of Joseph's revelation - and have chosen not to develop it, while never denying it. 

I am strongly of the view that an explicit inclusion of Heavenly Mother in the fundamental concept of God; and probably too a personal womanly aspect of the Holy Ghost; has (belatedly) become an all-but essential quest or project - for us, here and now. 

This is not something Christians can get off-the-peg or from any external source; but something each needs to work-through for himself - by the usual external and internal means of spiritual guidance. 

*Note added: This is easily (negatively or positively) misinterpreted in terms of divided stereotypical sex roles. I mean much more and almost the opposite; which is that the dyad of a man and woman eternally co-committed in love, can do something that neither can do alone - or, at least, one person can do less, and less well. That is something like a harmony of strategic purposive wisdom with immediate help. By analogy (very approximate) it is a bit like the benefit of being loved and looked-after by two people, a man and a woman, each with distinctive perspectives and capacities, eternally combined in love; who completely share divine purposes and method. This would be better than any conceivable single person, with only a single perspective and vision. That this is two persons creates and sustains a dynamic and growing aspect to the situation - whereas a single person would tend towards inertia and stasis. That this is two persons, rather than more than two, should be seen as an extra gift and potentiality added to the situation of single person - rather than a limitation.   

A question worth pondering: Is consciousness ultimately individual, a matter of class, or universally one?

When consciousness is different; when people do the same things, they get different outcomes.

That is pretty obvious in some contexts - but not in others. It's pretty obvious that when some people read Lord of the Rings they experience a very different "outcome" than do others; and the same replies to other works of art. 

To some extent, the different responses classify the different flavours of consciousness. 

Such differences of outcome related to changed consciousness, extend to differences over a person's lifespan, different cultures, and - maybe less recognized - "generational" differences across time in the lineal culture and among similar classes of person. 

Even within close-knit groups, such differences are evident. For instance, my family (both birth family, and wife and kids) all enjoy puzzles such as logic games and crosswords, board games and jigsaws and the like. But I am almost unable to do so. (This deficit seems to have been inherited from my father.) 

What I am getting at is that differences of consciousness between times, places and persons, are "the norm" - and probably ought to be expected, but aren't. 

When we have a theory of such changes - analogous to the theory of human development from childhood, through adolescence, to adulthood - then variations in consciousness becomes a powerful explanation for understanding changes in the world, and between people.

The first step in such understanding is classification - positing different types of consciousness to different classes of person. 

Classification certainly has some validity - but closer consideration reveals that the lines between classes are unclear; and individual variation may be highly significant. Indeed, we may notice that there are rhetorical wars afoot over consciousness: 

Universal

There are those who try always to emphasise the oneness, universality and similarity of all varieties of human consciousness. These people often desire to "make it so" - by a uniformity of propaganda, uniformity of treatment, and enforcing a uniformity of outcome (including the denial of any apparent differences). 

Class

There are others who focus on classes of consciousness (men versus women, between different races, different classes of personality type or intelligence measures, or by naming and distinguishing "generations". So humanity is distinguished by class - and perhaps then divided by class, in terms of treatment, provision, measurement etc. 

Individual

And there are those who focus on the individual - although such persons in public discourse are nearly always being dishonest about their concern, since a genuine focus on individuals is contradicted by almost all public policy - and indeed is probably incompatible with our kind of civilization (i.e. one which depends so fundamentally on bureaucracy, law, and regulations).

The reality is that oneness, classification, and individuality all have pragmatic value; but at an ultimate and metaphysical - religious or ideological - level, the situation is contested. 

At the ultimate level the consideration is truth not convenience; reality not pragmatism. Either Men are ultimately "all the same", or else divided into classes, or else are individuals. 

We could also frame the question in terms of God's concern: is it with all Men (or all Beings, perhaps) in an equal and undifferentiated way; with Men as particular classes (e.g. a particular tribe, or civilization, or particular-church members); or is the fundamental relationship with God between God and the individual person? 

This is another of those metaphysical assumptions that we all have-already-decided; although we may not be aware of our decision - and we can, of course, change our minds. 

A question worth pondering. 

Things going wrong, or right? In this mixed world of entropy and creation, which is the most amazing?

Of course this world is - well, at least on the face of it - a mixture of things going wrong (degeneration, disease, death and destruction), and things going right.  

There are many ways in which people try to make sense of this. 

Should we be most amazed when things go wrong and life is bad; or is it more accurate if we expect things to go wrong, and are amazed only if anything-at-all goes right? 

Some people - both religious and mainstream-left-secular - seem to have the assumption that everything naturally goes well, and as we would wish - except when deliberately sabotaged by somebody. 

I am not exaggerating - this assumption of virtuous functionality is very deeply embedded in all kinds of people. 

The idea is that "things" are spontaneously good, unless or until interfered-with opposed or wrecked. 

Other people explain the world almost entirely in terms of either "evil" (e.g. various kinds of selfishness - long- and short-term); or as completely random, meaningless, "things-just-happening". 

And there is the conviction of "entropy" (which dominates science), that ordered and functional reality is overall and inevitably, running-down and becoming chaotic. 

And  there are many theories to say why selfishness and the prevalence of evil and/or tendency to chaos produce (or at least give the temporary illusion of) order and functionality (e.g. natural selection purports to explain the evolution of organismal functionality in terms of and underlying entropic tendency in genes). 

There are people who say the world is unmixed (fundamentally); that the world actually is perfectly good/ functional/ ordered/ as-intended, and that evil is an illusion...

And there are also people who say the opposite: that the world is just-is evil, and deluded ones are those who see any real good in anything (e.g. that all apparent good is explicable as a covert or devious type of selfishness).

Clearly this is - and rightly so! - quite a problem for people to sort-out! I mean this is a real problem, and unavoidable; with real consequences necessarily eventuating from whatever answer we deploy. 

It is a problem for religious people of all stripes; and it is also a problem for un-religious and anti-religious people. 

And the range of answers, and the contradictions between answers, shows that the question cannot be solved by more "information", by observations, "empirically" -- since how we interpret the "evidence" is wholly-shaped by the theories (and structural biases) we use to gather and interpret evidence. 

Yet unless we sort-out this problem to our own (genuine!) satisfaction; then the world is fundamentally alien and incomprehensible, and we will probably live in a state of confusion, fear - and maybe will resent our life and the world. 

The first and essential step (it seems to me) is to become clear and explicit about what it is we actually do believe on this subject!

Few people know this; and many people deny what seems obviously to be the actual assumptions they are living-by. For instance, many people deny they have any assumptions, and assert that they live only by what is obviously and empirically true.

(They get angry and/or change the subject when asked to reflect on their own assumptions.)

After that first and essential step of knowledge; we can then we can explore our own beliefs on the "nature of things"; testing them for coherence, and checking whether "what we say we believe" really is something we personally find believable!

You may then find, as I did, that the things you believe are things that you found profoundly un-believable; things that could not really be true. 

Things you do not actually live-by, and things you do not want to live by. 

And that can be the basis for positive change. 

Because of the vast range of publicly-asserted "answers" to this problem, each with its body of "evidence"; and because these answers all depend (in a somewhat circular fashion) on the theories by which evidence is selected and interpreted - this is a problem that each must solve for himself*.

NOTE: Rather, each person does solve this for himself; indeed each person already has "a solution" to the mixed nature of reality. The difficulty is that the solution by-which they actually live is seldom clearly known to them, and even-more-seldom is their solution acknowledged. Therefore it cannot be evaluated. 

The Texas Sharpshooter rides again...

I have used the Texas Sharpshooter idea  to describe how modern pseudo-science does research that it gets paid for, then uses Public Relations and advertising to convince people that whatever-is-discovered is actually just whatever people most want and need. 

This applies to public policy, in its pseudo-moralistic manifestation. Due to the massive coverage and influence of modern mass/social media; and that so many people are so powerfully addicted to it, such that the media shapes almost-all mainstream public discourse, including among private persons - this kind of this is used to control public discourse. 

Some "issue" - which may be incredibly trivial - is launched as a matter of public concern; and then this is what great swathes of people talk-about, debate, moralize over - and expend ludicrous efforts and energies in wrangling over policy responses*.  

The result is that people are completely diverted from any concern with the human condition, and the nature of the cosmos; and wrangle over made-up mutually-contradictory nonsense, that could not possible make any significant difference to anything significant.

Such is "serious" discourse - especially among the professional, managerial, "intellectual" classes... Any danger of anything fundamental getting onto the agenda of life, is dealt-with by the extreme urgency of todays triviality. 

Examples abound - especially in "modern environmentalism" (i.e. nothing whatsoever to do with the world of nature) which is the subject (along with sex/sexuality) with which the chattering classes are most concerned. 

Recycling is maybe the biggest. Millions of people in the UK spend several hours per week ritualistically fussing over recycling, sorting rubbish into multiple categories, washing and sterilizing rubbish, driving to and from recycling centres with little packets of this or that; and scrapping functional technology for inferior electricity-consuming substitutes. 

All of which is entirely done for self-gratification and status within the community of like-minded. 

All of which Very Obviously has net harmful effects on the natural world - obvious if only people were able and willing to think things through. 

Piddling little environmental campaigns have been propagated across the nation, and taught in primary schools. Campaigns to make it illegal to provide grocery bags without extra charge. Campaigns to replace plastic drinking straws with paper. (An extreme emergency, apparently because polar bears got plastic straws stuck between their toes, or something.)  

Nutrition has become linked with environmentalism and thus with the totalitarian agenda - so that factory-made vegan "food" is now supposed to be morally supreme - seemingly because it enables the world to abolish/ destroy farming, then mammals (insects are OK), and perhaps eventually plants. Which must be a good thing...

It does not matter how trivial or stupid an issue may be, "people" can be made very concerned about it; to the point that it becomes immoral to consider the consequences or the larger picture. 

To "solve" a piddling pseudo-problem, enlarges the Real Big Problems. Just as every measure to "help" some victim group, always and systematically oppresses the whole of society.  

From the perspective of the ruling class; this is a manifestation of the Texas Sharpshooter, because it entails picking-out what They want to do anyway; then drawing a line around it and framing the resultant micro-policy as exactly what most needs to be done - now! 

The strategy is therefore to accumulate one after another such "imperative" micro-issue, towards the overall objective - whether that objective be the totalitarian system of surveillance, monitoring, control; or else the (more recent) destructive agenda working for societal collapse, escalation of war and lethal civil violence, famine, deadly disease, and toxic exposures...

The worst thing we can do is fight these idiocies, issue by issue - because that is exactly Their plan.  

The only positive response is to step back and understand where this is going, and why, and the supernatural (demonic) origins - therefore that the proper response is not "an alternative answer" but a completely different framework of assumptions concerning our-selves, other people, the world, the cosmos...

*This applies to politics, as well. 

Americans are *mental*, when it comes to politics

Americans are even further from the needful awakening than the rest of the West, because they (unlike Europeans or the Brits) continue to be optimistic about the possibilities of politics in general and elections in particular. 

This seems almost incomprehensible, but it does seem to be true - not least as evidenced by the sheer volume of discourse about the current Presidential elections. 

Amazing numbers of people including many commenters who regard themselves as sceptical, hostile to totalitarianism, aware, Red-Pilled - seem to have forgotten that a seventy-year-old DT has already been president once. 

During which term he failed to fulfil his primary espoused slogan-objectives (build the wall, drain the swamp); but instead led the nation and world into the birdemic-peck totalitarianism and the international chaos of "MLB" antiracism...

Culminating in a blatantly distorted and overturned election, after which he caved-in, failed, forfeited his honour.

Furthermore, since 2020 the world now knows, as a solid fact, that the US President does not run the USA. 

Yet all over the internet is expressed the delusional optimism on the self-identified "right" that a 78yr-old DT might - if elected - make a significant positive difference to the US and the world...

Rather than what seems obvious: that if DT is elected, it will be because elements within the global totalitarian leadership class want him elected, and (doubtless due to private deals and pressures) he is regarded as a sufficiently "safe pair of hands" to take forwards their agenda of evil. 

Such optimism, such "hope" is mental - but there it is. 

It seems that things will need to get even worse; before there is any possibility of genuine understanding of the primacy of the spiritual in the simultaneous suicide/ rabid-dog destructiveness of The West generally and the USA in particular. 

Superficial reformative changes "within The System" cannot be positively effective; but "at best" will sustain The System to increase the depth and extent of inflicting its strategic destructive evil. 

When things are bad, then things can only get better in the long term via getting worse in the short term - that is a rule of life - and this entails positive and voluntary acceptance: spiritual benefit cannot be imposed. 

The System is built for evil, and corrupted throughout - in all social institutions; by international and national laws, regulations, mass/social media, and social mores. 

Any genuine hope of positive social change must be led by deep change in individual persons; because there is no other possible source of good motivations. 

Thus from where we actually are, pessimism is simple realism. 

Things are probably already lost (many times over) and there can no guarantees of turning around generations of willing and celebrated corruption - and anyway, why should a serious Christian desire to save and strengthen the major source of strategic evil in the world today (or perhaps ever) - the engine and enforcer of global value-inversion? 

In such a context; to be existentially interested and engaged by politics, to grasp at straws of "not impossible" benefits, to pin any kind of hope on elections; is not just childish - but a profound act of irresponsible subservience to demonic powers. 

Life! The existential and the cosmological

Existentialism became increasingly evident in public (and, more, private) thinking through the middle twentieth century, with roots that were probably strongest in Nietzsche. It was a valuable - perhaps essential - consideration of "the human condition", of what it was like to exist. 

Yet it was partial, radically incomplete; because its assumptions were non-theistic, and "the world" was seen as unalive, and life as accidental, uncreated. 

So existentialism could not be made to work but led to pessimism and either despair or else (more commonly) the "bad faith" responses of careerism, intoxication, self-distraction...

"Cosmology" - in the sense of understanding Man's place in the cosmos - is likewise an essential consideration, and was (a few generations ago) a major subject of discourse. 

But, again, this went nowhere, and could go nowhere, because all possibility of purpose and meaning had been excluded by prior assumption: the cosmos was unalive, accidental, happening perhaps by "scientific laws" or regularities - but it had nothing to do with us, beyond providing the raw materials from which we happened to arise. 

Existentialism was mostly a matter of looking at the world from within, cosmological thinking looked at us (when it even considered human beings) from the outside  - and the two activities could not be integrated because their mode of thinking was alien to each other: the one worked from subjectivity as a given; the other took it as evident that subjectivity was something that (maybe?) went on inside people's heads, and had an effect only when it had led to action. 

After featuring in mainstream public conversation, books, media from the 1940s and into the 1980s; as the millennium approached such matters dropped out; and the age of materialism took almost complete control of Men's thoughts in the West.    

What we are supposed to do from here, is recognize the importance of such matters and that we cannot live meaningfully (that is, with a purpose that both comes from within each as an individual, and is harmonious with the purpose of "everything") unless we get such unfinished business back onto the agenda!

The old ideas were much better than anything now; but they all failed - and inevitably - because of their incompleteness - and this radical and insoluble partiality was a matter of fundamental assumptions. 

This is why we need to "start again" in a way that have never previously been necessary. And because of the actual situation we inhabit, this starting again cannot - certainly will not - be a group activity; nor can we get the answers we need from other people; and absolutely not from our actual culture. 

That's the quest and adventure; and that is something new and different in its very nature. 

We are compelled to take personal responsibility - and there are no excuses for failing to do this. 

 

Incipient Sharknado 1899 - by Winslow Homer

This famous painting by Winslow Homer from 1899, has commonly been mistitled "The Gulf Steam", when it is clearly intended to be the immediate precursor to the approaching water-spout (back, right) sucking-up the killer sharks (in the foreground), together with the boat and its oarsman - before spreading the giant carnivores liberally onshore, whence havoc ensues. 

I therefore propose Homer's picture should, correctly, be re-named Incipient Sharknado 1899.  

Laeth on the evolution of consciousness and the Final Participation of Jesus

Edited from this post and its comments: 

...‘wrt. the evolution of consciousness’ and "final participation"...  

The first bit that seems important to me is that [modern consciousness] is not a general state, by which I mean, it’s not defined by the age but it depends on the people. Not every human alive during the European middle ages had a medieval mindset, not every human alive during the axial age had an axial age mindset - but rather, specific places and specific peoples influenced by specific individuals varied greatly. 

And similarly, and more importantly, this is still the case, and is yet another challenge and part of the satanic plan to prevent modern consciousness from emerging from its womb: the majority of the world’s current population does not, in fact, have a modern mindset. 

As moderns we have to deal with this, in several different ways; though of course without the recognition of different types of consciousness, past or present, it is impossible to. 

Equally important, from my perspective, is this: I am very much convinced that the greats of the past and present, be they saints or prophets or artists, operated in a more evolved state of consciousness than their surroundings, and thus their work can help to bring our own consciousness forward. 

On the flip side, in every age there are those who, even though they have a more advanced consciousness, try to pull it back: in our case, the traditionalists are precisely that, and whether they are aware of it or not, and most are not, they are doing the bidding of hell. 

As a paramount and primary example of the positive side, I am convinced Jesus was, not only very well advanced in consciousness compared to his milieu, but really the only man to achieve Final Participation while in this life, and the raising of Lazarus is directly related to this. 

Final Participation will be a sort of synthesis of Original Participation, which was very much an embodied experience, and the disembodied experience of Mind that modernity achieved. so basically, we will have a body of flesh, but also the powers of 'the air', so to speak. 

The raising of Lazarus seems to me to be that: Full Mind raised in Full Flesh. that Jesus was able to do it before he himself resurrected tells me that he had already achieved Final Participation in life, but then went through death to open the door for the rest of us, otherwise he would have to do it personally for each one, like he did with Lazarus, which is definitely not the way. 

Why did he do it for Lazarus then? First because he was his friend and he loved him, and second because, speculating here, he had a specific mission for Lazarus.

**

I would only add, by way of explanation, that the evolution of consciousness can be understood as a development, analogous to the development of a human being from childhood through adolescence to maturity (with this scheme mapping onto human history, and the current "modern" consciousness as the adolescent phase". 

As with the development of a human being, such evolution is not a matter of improvement in goodness. Clearly, many (most?) people are "better" as children, especially as young children, than they are as adolescents. 

Yet we can, nonetheless, see that adolescence is a further ("higher" development than childhood, in terms of becoming more self-aware, which is a step towards higher agency and (however abused in practice) the possibility of greater freedom. 

We could say that a young child is immersed in his environment; and if this is a loving and "good" environment, then the child will spontaneously, passively (ie. by outer-influences) be substantially (but not completely) aligned with divine creation.

In other words, a young child originally "participates" in creation - hence this developmental stage of consciousness is called Original Participation. 

The adolescent, by his greater self-awareness, has the potential for greater independence from his environment; and this archetypally goes to the point of ceasing automatically to accept much of that which he absorbed as a child (good, as well as anti-good: that is, evil).

To become an adult in Final Participation of consciousness, the adolescent should voluntarily and consciously affirm the love, goodness, and truths which as a child he knew only unconsciously. He should, in ultimate terms, voluntarily and consciously choose to align himself - commit himself - to love of God, divine creation, following Jesus Christ to resurrection.

Clearly, this desirable state of affairs is not achieved by everybody, and those who achieve it do so only intermittently and partially - except for Jesus Christ, who achieved it completely and permanently (in the three years of ministry, after his baptism, at any rate).  

Unlike the earlier stages of the evolution of consciousness (i.e Original Participation, and "modern consciousness" - also called the Consciousness Soul); to be-achieving Final Participation is therefore understood as an intrinsically good state. 

Final Participation can be achieved in this mortal life only-when - and always-when - we are consciously and voluntarily motivated by Christian love. This happens permanently after death, by resurrection, for those who choose that path.   

Another way of thinking of Final Participation is therefore that it is the divine mode of consciousness; divine in its many and unique forms of each particular Being (unique because shaped and constrained by the attributes of that Being, at any particular point in time, and its development). 

This is a Much more spiritually-dangerous world than most Christians seem to suppose

Most Christians are aware that this is a spiritually dangerous world, but grossly underestimate the dangers. The dangers of this world are ubiquitous - everywhere and cannot be avoided. 

There are no safe guides and there is no safe path. 

It is impossible to avoid dangerous churches, dangerous religious practices, dangerous writers; and there is no teaching that cannot (easily!) be misinterpreted and turned to evil. 

Therefore we should not worry about trying to avoid exposure to dangers, and should not waste time and energy on trying to construct or pick out a dry, safe path through the swamp of corruption. 

The discernment must be in our-selves, both in our hearts and in our relationship to divine guidance. The path these will find and direct us towards, is not a path of safety - but path of learning. 

Even on the best possible track; there will be trial and there will be error; and the errors need to be detected, acknowledged, repented. 

It is our-selves that we should be working-on, an inner task, suitable for free agentic beings -- and not trying to build around-ourselves a safe world, that will shepherd us toward salvation; as if we were (and ought to be) externally-controlled entities. 

For instance; we will go too far along a path, and need to turn back - and/or we will fail to take a direction we we ought - and thereby fail to learn a valuable lesson.

This challenging never ends, so long as we are alive... Life is a journey that brings-along situations to which we must respond.  

It is natural to seek safety, yet that is a regressive route that saps our innate strength. 

(And fear is a sin.)

We should instead be existentially-confident that God (who is the loving creator, and our Father) has "placed" us each in a situation where salvation is possible, and where we may learn and develop spiritually. 

Know that success is always possible - as long as we live we shall be challenged, and given chances and choices. 

After which... it is up to us. 

 

Romanticism: ecstatic, intoxicating, magic, enchantment

When a tortured romantic relationship goes bad... Hermione and Birkin from the movie of Women in Love

Romanticism has a bad name among most Christians, probably because it is regarded as being emotional and sensuous rather than metaphysical. 

This is likely due to the fact that we are emotional Beings - indeed, it may be that incarnation is a way of intensifying emotion and making it more effectual. If we consider actual examples of human greatness, from the lives of Saints, through great creators, and the examples of good and loving human relationships - all are bound-up with emotions. 

It is therefore rather strange and sinister when Christians become anti-emotional; but on the other hand it is clearly dangerous, and sooner-or-later evil, if emotion becomes primary: if we become sensation-seekers.

This is a real danger in a godless and materialistic society such as ours - indeed intense emotionalism has been, and still is among the young, probably one of the most alluringly advocated ideologies of these times and this place.  

In my later teens and early twenties, I was very much a seeker of this kind of emotion-seeking romanticism - although mine was of a distinctly highbrow type, focused on music, literature, and drama; as much as upon intense human relationships. 

I was very much taken with the ecstasies of musicians like Glenn Gould or Michael Tippett, the intoxicated prose of DH Lawrence or James Joyce, the magical dramas and poetry of Shakespeare and much else. In life; I was very keen on deep conversation, intense friendships and tormented romances. I sought to live an enchanted life. 

This "worked" as a lifestyle for a while, so long as it was fuelled by the vitality of youth - although the mundane dullness of most "normal" life was a continual problem - and my own energies and motivations were never sufficient to fill long periods or to overcome subjective adversities. 

But as time went by, there was a habituation whereby the ecstasies-etc. (especially the epiphanic intoxications of living in the moment) diminished in strength, I became disillusioned by their incompleteness and brevity and the fact that they led nowhere in particular (nowhere better); and the mundane become oppressive and unavoidable. 

Yet, although materialistic romanticism is a dead-end - it cannot be ignored or suppressed, because our culture offers nothing better. Indeed Christianity offers nothing better - since the deeper into Christianity one goes, the stronger becomes the anti-romanticism: the crushing of ecstasy, and the fear of magical enchantment. 

The idea of Romantic Christianity includes a recognition that we are romantic creatures, because of our incarnation - and that this is a Good Thing, not just now, but forever. 

We ought never to accept, or regard as best, a Christianity that is mundane, disenchanted, dry, dull, anti-emotional - anti-the-physical. 

If we our wise, Christian practice ought to be romantic in its aims - and Christians need to beware of focusing on the supposedly-safe: the comfortable, the friendly, the "ethical", the political. Because (as of 2024) there is no safe way of being a Christian. 

Jesus was himself an intensely romantic, spontaneous, and emotional personage - who lived at a high level of engagement with reality (including spiritual reality) that our earthly attempts can only approach, and only briefly.

When God is depicted as is usual, as an abstract and philosophical entity, defined by attributes, and especially when God's "impassible" nature is insisted-upon (i.e. the assertion that God is incapable of "passions" or emotions) - then we are being dangerously misled (no matter how ancient and venerable such assertions may be!).  

If we accept, acknowledge, embrace our romanticism in a rigorous spirit; it leads towards theosis in this life, and resurrection in the life to come; and it is a partial guide to the deep nature of Christ's message and work.   

More on Miles Mathis

Ron Unz has done an analysis of the Miles Mathis phenomenon, which I considered in a previous post. 

Unz concludes that MM is not a man but a front organization, whose purpose is to discredit "conspiracy theorists" by making absurd claims, and that this organization was probably created, and is run by, the CHOAM secret services.   

I disagree with Unz's conclusions in several respects, which is why I felt stimulated to write this. 

While I completely agree that MM is wrong about most things, and (in particular) very slapdash and inaccurate in both facts and reasoning when it comes to supposed genealogies - 

I will stick my neck out concerning something of which I have no direct knowledge; and suggest that Mathis is not an agency but a real person, and a single person, and is pursuing his own agenda. 

This seems clear to me from the internal evidence of the writing, which has - throughout the vast volume - a very distinct and consistent personality. 

Furthermore; Mathis does say some important, interesting and original things; and demonstrates in the writing itself evidence of a creative and independent thinker - albeit with the kind of "self-absorbed" personality that often goes-with (and indeed generates) such motivated creativity.  

Mathis's basic perspective could be regarded as motivated by the true conviction that most of what we think we know, comes (very much) second-hand and via extremely corrupt (and indeed purposively evil) institutions and media. 

Therefore most of what we think we know (even at a very basic level of "facts") is either completely false and fabricated, or else so profoundly (and calculatingly) distorted by selectivity and suppression to be grossly misleading.    

This message is not just true, but extremely important yet very widely neglected. It amounts to the advocacy by Mathis of a far more autonomous and self-responsible way of relating to the world than nearly-always happens. 

To put forward such a perspective is indeed far more important than even multiple specific inaccuracies of factual assertion - which errors are in any case inevitable when dealing with events remote in time and place. 

One more thing. 

If it is true (and I expect it is true, but not of MM) that in some respects the intelligence organizations of the West are engaged in a strategy of trying to "discredit" conspiracy theories in-general by subsidizing and promoting "far out", false and/or absurd theories (Unz's example is "flat earth") -- then the intelligence services are (I am pleased to say!) making a Big Mistake!

Once somebody has learned Not to trust official and mainstream sources, and think for himself, he has learned something vital; and it does not much matter whether he "goes too far" and makes specific statements that most people regard as (or know to be) wrong. 

In other words, the important thing is Not to avoid being discredited by silly mistakes, but instead Not To Care about whether "other people" regard you as having been discredited*.

After all, it is by its control of public prestige that The System controls so much of intellectual discourse - we absolutely must escape this control, and that can only be done by ceasing to care about what They think of Us.  

There is a primary need for as many people as possible to escape the toils of The System and think things through for our-selves, taking personal responsibility for our understanding - on the basis of what we evaluate to be the most reliable sources of knowledge (and especially on the basis of personal experience from engaging with the world). 

This can be learned from Miles Mathis's example, if we choose to focus on this fundamental aspect of his work; rather than getting distracted by his many, and often wrong and bizarre, conclusions - only perhaps a few of which are genuinely correct. 

It is what he does in general, more than what he says in particular, that makes MM a potentially valuable writer. 

*By "not to care" I mean in your innermost self. The important thing nowadays is to be clear in one's own mind, and to inwardly take responsibility, about important matters. This does Not mean that we ought to be trying to enter the public domain, nor advertise our personal conclusions, nor argue "other people" into agreement with our conclusions. Maybe we should do this sometimes, for particular reasons, but surely not always.