Evil is a subtype of Entropy, in this Pluralistic-Animistic divine creation

I have often written about the twin ultimate-problems (ineradicable insufficiencies) of this, our mortal life; under the headings of Entropy and Evil. 

My understanding of reality is that its fundamental divisions or units are eternal Beings, i.e living-Beings; such that (to modify the title of William James's book) this is an Pluralistic Animistic universe; i.e. there are many fundamental entities (not one); and these fundamental entities are alive, purposive, with agency and other attributes of Beings.  

Because things began with many Beings; God's divine creation (that we inhabit) is the primary source of cohesion: in a crude sense, by creation God imposed harmony on pre-existing and originally autonomous Beings. 

For creation to be sustained (insofar as it is sustained) there must me harmony/ cooperation/ cohesion etc between the Purposes and motives of the many Beings which constitute creation. 

Otherwise, divine creation will tend to fall apart - with different Beings pursuing different goals, or living by different values.  

It is this tendency for divine creation to fall-apart into a chaos of competing directions and behaviours that is the essential cause of the tendency named Entropy: i.e. the tendency of all life, order, organization, forms, functionality etc to decline towards chaos, with time. 

The primary source of Entropy is therefore the disharmony of Beings.

Therefore we need to stop thinking of Entropy abstractly, as if it was a branch of physics, as if it was some kind of force (or anti-force) that broke-up stuff... 

Instead, we should think of entropy as a consequence of the fact that the Beings of divine creation are imperfectly aligned in their nature and purposes. 

Our situation is that we may find ourselves loving God and experiencing profound desiring to live in harmony with divine creation; but we simply cannot do this in reality as we experience it, in this mortal life - because of our innate nature, because of the way we are (and have been) eternally.  

We may want to live in harmony with divine creation, but we cannot. 

But not all Beings want to live in harmony with divine creation, and some Beings hate God; and these are Beings that have chosen (or, at least, are currently choosing) Evil.

So, Evil can be defined as a kind of chosen Entropy; when the inevitable disharmony between our-selves and divine creation is made into the positive choice our-selves to oppose divine creation.  

From this perspective we can see that Evil is a type of Entropy - in a sense a worse type of Entropy: a positive decision to pursue negative outcomes. And worse than non-evil-Entropy; because Entropy is universal and unavoidable, whereas Evil makes the personal choice to oppose divine harmony....

Motives for Evil are various, but perhaps some kind of resentment or grudge against God and the imposed aspect of divine creation, might be the most basic motivation.  

Aims of Evil, too, are various. 

Perhaps the aim is to exploit divine harmony in pursuit of personal gratification or other selfish benefit; perhaps (more extremely) to oppose divine harmony simply from a desire to see it destroyed, taking spiteful pleasure in the destruction. 

This was the unavoidable human condition, blighted by ineradicable Entropy, and worsened by chosen Evil; and the situation for all Beings, until the advent of Jesus Christ. 

Jesus was a mortal Being, incarnated into this world of imperfect harmony between Beings - but Jesus himself loved God wholly; and was himself (at least, at the time of his ministry, after his Baptism by John) wholly-aligned with divine creation. 

Jesus was himself mortal: which is to say he was subject to Entropy. And Jesus was subject also to Evil. However; because Jesus was perfectly aligned with God and creation he knew that after death he could (and would) be remade as himself but "perfectly" - in other words, resurrected into eternal life, freed from Entropy. 

Resurrection takes our aspiration to live wholly in harmony with divine creation, and rebuilds us from that basis.

Furthermore, Jesus knew that if or when others had followed him into this eternal (because wholly-aligned, Entropy-purged) state of resurrection - which remaking process would be guided by Jesus himself - then a world of such persons would be a world without Evil.

In eliminating Entropy, resurrection also eliminates Evil, as a subsidiary effect. 

And this wholly-harmonious and wholly-God-aligned post-mortal world would be Heaven: in which the deepest and ineradicable problems of this mortal life are eliminated; and free and creative Beings live spontaneously in harmony (loving God and each-other), and from common aims and motives. 

 

Does History unfold according to a plan?

Does History unfold according to a plan?

I think not. 

But History does have a direction, and this direction is a bottom-up kind of thing: I mean the shape of History is a consequence of the cumulative development of individual Beings. 

And that development of Beings is a matter of increasing consciousness. 

God does indeed want Beings to increase in intelligence, because it is one motivation of God that Beings should come up to God's creative level (to become "divine friends", and "colleagues" of God, in the work of creation) - and that entails increased consciousness. 

Beings begin as mostly spontaneous, relatively un-conscious, and with largely-automatic behaviours in response to stimuli (like those Beings we usually classify as "mineral", and that people usually claim are are non-alive). 

However, all Beings have embryonic free agency and consciousness; as the basis for what comes later. 

But as each being develops, matures - awareness and freedom and choice can only increase - in the spiritual realm this is obviously true.

This; despite that in this mortal incarnated sub-set of The Spiritual which we term the material - everything tends towards destruction - i.e. entropy.

 

The development of consciousness gives direction to history because it is ultimately irreversible: once there has been development, it cannot be undone - a Being cannot revert to an earlier stage of its development 

A baby can become a child, a child can (and in the long term does) tend to develop towards adolescence and maturity... This directionality may be slowed, but cannot be stopped and the process is cumulative, irreversible. 

Once a development of consciousness has happened in a Being; that has-been permanently added, and cannot be subtracted. 

Such directionality true even in the temporary conditions of mortal life - despite that the developments are lost to disease, degeneration and eventual death. An adult who has lost the developments of consciousness, intelligence, freedom may be a sick adult; but does Not thereby become a child. 

So History, the shape of History; is an accumulation of the effects and interactions of more and more Beings, getting more and more developed, with effects that are irrevocable. 

What History is Not; is a top-down shaping of the lives and experiences and learnings of Beings. 

We, as individuals, are Not being fitted-into History - on the contrary, History is emerging from the multitude of our lives.  

And that is a clue to how we can, and ought to, influence History. 

Entropy is Not a part of evil - these are two separate problems

The problem of entropy is one that presses upon us the average mortal life perhaps more strongly than evil. 

By "entropy" I mean the universal tendency for beings to experience cumulative adverse change with time: dysfunction, degeneration, disease - and the ultimate manifestation of entropy is death. 

All of these are unavoidable, are universal. 

Traditional Christian theology usually conflates entropy with evil; indeed entropy/ death is usually subsumed within the concept and causes of evil. 

For example, the traditional interpretation of the Adam and Eve story is that they began as good and immortal beings; free from both evil and death. 

With The Fall they chose evil, and at the same time necessarily became mortal - subject to entropy and death. 

(In traditional theology) with the salvation from Jesus Christ we are allowed to return to the primal situation of Adam and Eve - saved from our self-caused punishment of both entropy and evil. 

After their fall; A & E and their descendants also needed to toil in order to live - in effect toil was needed to overcome entropy. 

Because (in effect) entropy meant that, over time, our minds and bodies and the environment are all against us: we must make efforts every day, we need to toil simply to remain alive and functional, but all such efforts are temporary palliative: will inevitably be overcome and will fail.

(In this sense, entropy is a more pervasive problem than evil.) 

And ultimately all of this bad stuff supposedly happens because of The Fall! 

Everything bad is down to an evil choice of ancestors, and its ramifications. 

This is very difficult to comprehend or believe. There seems a gross disproportion between the events described in Genesis, and thousands of years of billions of people's suffering and toil, disease and dying in fighting - and failing to defeat - entropy.   

Well, be that as it may; traditional theology regards evil as primary, entropy as a part of evil: evil is the ultimate cause of entropy. 

Therefore trad-theol has it that we overcome entropy by overcoming sin, where "sin" is understood to mean the manifestations of evil. 

That is; the repentance of evil/sins, leads also to the escape from entropy: leads to eternally healthy and vigorous - and happy - life in Heaven.

I have described elsewhere my understanding that entropy and evil can and should be distinguished, and that they have different causes. 

Entropy is intrinsic to this creation, the one we inhabit now; to the original or primary Creation by God - this creation that we are born-into. 

Heaven can be conceptualized as the answer to entropy; by a second and opt-into creation (i.e. the creation made possible by Jesus Christ) - with resurrection conceptualized as a voluntary re-making without entropy, as leaving-behind entropy. 

So, while traditional Christian theology regards entropy-death as secondary to evil - and regards Heaven as the answer to entropy-death because, in repenting moral sins and having the effect of sins removed by Jesus, we also and simultaneously eliminate entropy. 

But instead; I regard entropy and evil as ultimately distinct concepts: (in this creation) entropy is unavoidable, while evil is a choice. 

However, the confusion and conflation of entropy and evil among Christians seems to be a consequence of the fact that the answer to both entropy and evil is the same: i.e. resurrection and our "escape"/ progression-into eternal, wholly-good life in Heaven; by following Jesus Christ.

In a nutshell: entropy and evil are different problems with different causes in this-world, but both problems are cured by the same treatment: following Jesus Christ to Heaven.

And otherwise they are not cured. One who does Not follow Jesus to Heaven; has thereby chosen to continue to live with entropy and evil. 

 

Note Added: The difference is that:

Entropy is intrinsic to the nature of God's creation - the First creation. 

Evil is about a specific-Being's attitude towards creation: positive, or negative, affiliative or hostile. 

Is the planet of Kolob (i.e. the Mormon Heaven planet) in principle discoverable in outer space?

Reading Laeth's latest aphorisms, he reminded me of a 2019 post from Wm Jas Tychonievich about whether or not the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith was, in principle, correct to posit an actual planet (assumed to be orbiting a star that Mormons term Kolob) as the place of God's (usual) residence; thus the physical, material location of Heaven. 

I made a comment at WmJas at the time; and find I have further notions now that I have thought further about heaven in relation to entropy, creation, and love: 

I mean that I now understand resurrected (i.e. incarnate, physical, material) eternal life to be possible in a situation where all the Beings have committed eternally to be wholly motivated by love. 

It is this living from love that "abolishes entropy" (to express it as a double-negative!) - or, differently expressed; enables all of resurrected creation to be eternal, eternally developing, eternally living.

Heaven happened when this became possible (during Jesus's ministry, I assume); and began to be populated when humans (and other Beings) made the choice and eternal commitment to love, and began to be resurrected.   

Thinking about the possibility of something like the planet of Kolob, and whether it would be discoverable as a place in this universe - somewhere that might theoretically be travelable-to; I realized that it seems relevant that resurrected Human Beings are (apparently) to be able to visit and function on this earth and in mortal affairs - e.g. some of the Beings people call Angels are resurrected humans.  

This would mean that eternal Human Beings can exist on earth, and in an environment where nearly everything else (or, indeed everything else) is mortal and subject to entropy, decay, death. 

And it seems that Angels are not usually recognized as such; and indeed (at least in the modern West) Angels are regarded as impossible nonsense.

My notion is that even if mortal Human Beings were capable of travelling to a Heaven such as the planet of Kolob is supposed to be, and even if these people were allowed to "enter into" this Heaven (e.g. to investigate and study Kolob) -- then it is quite possible that these mortal Human Beings would not recognize or realise that they were in the place of Heaven. 

It is, in deed, easy to imagine that modern Western Men would even deny vehemently that Heaven was Heaven if told the fact, even if these people actually were living "in" Heaven! (i.e. were present as mortal-incarnates in the situation of Heaven, but were not resurrected-incarnates) 

This self-blinding to Heaven is, after all, no different from our mainstream and official on-principle/by-assumption/ and absolute denial of even the possibility of paranormal, supernatural, spiritual, and/or divine phenomena.

As Tolkien showed in literary form: evil cannot comprehend good; likewise those who reject and are unfit-for Heaven, cannot even perceive Heaven.  

Note: I should be clear that Kolob does Not play an active role in my own theological metaphysics - indeed I have not even considered the matter for some years. But I don't see why Heaven, or God the Father's dwelling place - should be one particular planet, or  The reason I write here is that those who reflexively reject the idea as absurd, insane, or stupid - could probably benefit from thinking more deeply about their reasons for doing so.  

How to escape the reductive-corrosive "So what?"

Although an irritating affectation among adolescents; there is more to the "So what?" attitude than is first apparent. 

To respond to information thus is a form of reductionism; and reductionism (aka. scientism, materialism, positivism) has been and is the ruling reality of our civilization - hence the world. 

"So what?" expresses the conviction - and the fear - that nothing really matters; with the possible temporary-exception of how I personally feel in the here and now...

But actually that doesn't really matter either; because how I happen to be feeling is brief and unstable, and a matter of indifference to the mass majority of "Who cares?"  

"So what?" encapsulates the characteristic, all-but inescapable nihilistic-hedonism and hedonic-nihilism of the modern West - manifested as pessimistic selfishness and immersive distraction - occulted by vast, soaring, ineffectual abstractions; such as universal altruism, planetary peace, cosmic environmentalism... 

From inside; the attitude expressed by "So what?" finds that the two extreme replies of "Everything what - i.e. everything matters, or "Nothing what" - i.e. nothing matters; are equally un-tenable as a basis for living - which is all about discernments, choices, motivations and the like. 

In practice, the problem of answering the "So what?" question is ignored, because of its difficulty. The difficulty is that any valid answer would, itself, need to be stable to the repeated question of "So what?" - and this is very difficult to achieve, even to our own satisfaction (leaving aside the impossibility of finding an answer acceptable to "other people")!

The fact is that in this mortal life on earth, everything material is subject to entropy, to death; and therefore is easily dissolved by "So what?". 

If we desire to answer this question, we must move beyond the material world, we must consider the world of "spirit", and tackle the questions of "eternity"... Indeed, we must consider whatever will lead to an answer. 

For most people, such philosophical questions are regarded as irrelevant, unanswerable - indeed meaningless. 

But in this matter, if we decide to seek an answer; our civilization provides no help. Indeed it is the basis of the problem. 

Worse than this; we find inadequate, misleading assistance by looking behind our civilization into the past. 

We find answers that are incoherent, based in arbitrary or dubious values; and we find possibly-helpful answers to be packed inextricably with all kinds of other stuff that is said to be mandatory. 

And we find the modern people who assert these old answers, actually are assimilated to modern values - so the traditional answers seem to be little more than just-another lifestyle option.   

In sum: we cannot find anybody to tell us a good answer to "So what?" If we want an answer, we will have to find it for our-selves. 

So our civilization (and nearly-all of its members) is self-trapped in a down-spiral of compulsive distraction and underlying futility; trapped, on the one hand, by its own assumptions...

And, on the other side, doomed by an overmastering mental laziness.

Rather than admit that it is important for each one of us to be able to answer "So what?" - each to our own solid satisfaction; people find it easier to pretend either that the question is trivial and does not need answering, or else that the question is un-answerable - hence best left-alone. 

But who suffers from such a dishonestly slothful attitude? 

The answer is that every-single-person suffers, who has not found an answer.

He suffers necessarily; because for people like us, in a society like this; the question of "So what?" will not go away, and is inescapable.  

Should we be spiritually engaged at all times and in all situations? Or stick to a schedule?

From the classical and Medieval eras, during which Christianity was established, the ideal was an overall religious basis for society, with a religiously approved monarch - but in practice life was divided between religious and secular activities.

In essence; there was a prescribed (minimum) ritual and ceremonial religious life; and the rest of a personal and community time was de facto engaged in all the other necessities of living. The proportions of secular and sacred varied, but the division was necessarily present (in practice) even in monasteries. 

This division was also (usually) reflected in terms of individual subjective experience. In general, people strove, and were perhaps often able, to achieve a properly spiritual, devotional attitude during daily prayer and formal church services and the like; but accepted that this level was impossible to sustain.

And indeed, from whatever combination of character and circumstances, it was often impossible to be spiritual at all. The main thing was to "do it" in the prescribed times and places. 

Indeed, as the centuries passed, it seems that even the minimum frequency of experienced religious participation was increasingly difficult to achieve. People could conform to all requirements in "the letter", yet "the spirit" became feebler...

More and more often, "the spirit" was altogether absent. 

Against this backdrop of enfeebled faith and increasing apostasy; were those (from the late 1700s, but much more so later) who advocated (and sometimes claimed to achieve) a continuous and unbroken spiritual life. 

They claimed, indeed, to strive for what they saw as the real possibility of living all life (from waking to sleeping, and ultimately even during sleep) in a state of devotion, spiritual awareness, religion. Conversely, they poured scorn on the ideal and reality of "Sunday Christians" - who switched-off religion, in between their required church attendances. 

Such people included Christian revivalists of various kinds  - and often these claimants were not Christian. Often enough they were atheists (spiritual but not religious), or neo-pagans of a wide range of types. For instance a serious Buddhist told me that a Zen Masters' whole life was one of continual spirituality, even when doing the most routing chores. More generally, it was claimed that this could happen by the continuous and habitual effect of prayer (i.e. a "mantra": this is also one of the expressed ideals of the Jesus Prayer.) 

As of now, in The West, these two religious ideals still dominate:

On the one hand, a Medievally-rooted ideal that aims at serious spiritual participation in relation to a finite series of discrete and pre-specified practices, times, and places; usually of a formal and prescribed nature. 

And, on the other hand, an ideal of qualitative "enlightenment": the idea that a person can break-through to a permanently transformed nature; a life that is always and everywhere spiritual. 

My belief is that neither of these ideals actually work - for different reasons...

But that they don't work just seems a fact of observation. 

Therefore we ought to seek for something that does work. 

We need another ideal for our spiritual life. 

One might be that we try various possibilities, and do more of whatever works for us... Meanwhile monitoring the situation for how things are progressing (with an awareness that any activity or plan may do us - personally - harm, as well as perhaps good). 

Another notion is that we strive for a higher self-awareness, and by this aim to recognize and "seize the moment" for spiritual activities - not to put them off. 

And also we might strive to hold-onto the insight that - whatever we do in this mortal life - it cannot be sufficient; because this mortal life is not, and is not intended to be, The Whole Thing. 

If we are (as I believe) eternal Beings, then we lived (as spirits, IMO) before this incarnated mortality; and also we will continue to exist (in some form, about which we have a choice) after we die mortally. 

This life is therefore a finite phase between eternities. 

Therefore, instead of deluding ourselves that there is any possibility at all of an ideal life during this mortality; our best bet is to regard our task as trying to have the right kind of helpful experiences; and learning the right kind of lessons from whatever actual experiences come our way. 

This mortal life is intended to be transformative; but the intended (and perhaps, in significant ways although not completely,  achieved) transformation is not for this mortal life; nor is eternal qualitative spiritual transformation even possible in this world of change, of entropy and death. 

Therefore, as with any kind of intentional development, such as the following analogy of school or college work; we may realize that:

On the one hand that we cannot always be studying and practicing. And if we seriously attempt this, we will not only be wasting our time - but indeed sabotaging the possibility of that focused and intense (therefore necessarily brief) learning which really works. 

And, on the other hand; that one secret of effective learning is to be aware of any moments when the opportunity for some really special experience has arrived. 

When that moment is here; we should be able to set-aside the routines, plans and programs devised to get us through dull-dry times; and, seizing the opportunity, take the chance, here-and-now.

And learn from it that which is divinely-intended for our benefit. 

If at all possible.  

It was to fix the inadequacy of this mortal life, that Jesus offered resurrection

Jesus's job was to fix the inadequate nature, the insufficiency, of this mortal life on earth. 

This was achieved such that the purpose of resurrected eternal life in Heaven is for there to be a real and accessible state and place, where the intractable and incurable problems (that currently wreck any possibility of a good life) are permanently eliminated.  

If this mortal life was sufficient, or even if mortal life was perfectible; then there would be little benefit in offering the chance of Resurrection after death - because it would obviously be better to have all the good stuff and fix the problems of this world without first needing to die. 

"Christianity" is therefore for those who realize that the core problems of this world and mortal life - i.e. entropy/ death and evil - cannot be solved inside this life and world - because they are of the nature of this creation. 

Because the core problems are insoluble within this creation; our only possible and real hope is for a second creation; for our-selves to look forward to a "second" life, in a world without death and without evil.

And such a world, as a matter of reality, can only exist on the other side of mortal death. 

So; Resurrection is not about "jam tomorrow" or "pie in the sky" - it is not a wish-fulfilment daydream...

Because the truly wishful daydreams are radical politics and utopian schemes - like socialism and "transhumanism" - ideologies that pretend to offer a future that solves the core problems of life... 

Ideologies that pretend to make possible a situation where Mankind (here and now, or soon) will have fulfilment and satisfaction, and escape from fear and suffering - where mortal life will suffice. 

Those who believe such claims are real and possible, are never interested by Jesus's offer of Resurrection into Heaven that is located on the other side of death.  

Also wishful are those religions (including Christianity, in many times and places) that promise a "millennium"... 

That promise their adherents Heaven on Earth, perfected Man, a world purged of evil and death; a second coming, an earthly-saviour - such promises are also in this wishful category. 

Yet, if such things really were possible; there would have been no need for Jesus, and what he offered would be redundant. 

After all; a chance of post-mortal Resurrection to post-mortal Heaven would be a shabby second best to Heaven on Earth accessible without dying.  

The commonly-expressed idea of Resurrection and Heaven as a reward for a Good Life is grossly to under-sell what is on offer. 

This is to downgrade Resurrection and Heaven to a delayed "earthly paradise"... a world and life that is quantitatively better than, but not qualitatively different from, what we already now have.

If quantitative improvement of this mortal life ASAP is that which is most strongly desired; then Resurrection and Heaven are of merely subordinate interest.    

Even worse is to explain Resurrection in terms of the double-negative theology of Resurrection and Heaven as an escape from the default of eternal torment in Hell! 

This bizarrely posits a God who purposively creates a mortal life so-often dominated by evil and entropy, and always terminated by death; after which everlasting pain and misery is the default destination of all...

And then the same God devises Resurrection and Heaven which constitute a delayed and selective escape route from horrors of His own devising. 

If such a creator-God existed, He is not the same Good God as known and described by Jesus. 

So, even before we decide whether we personally desire Resurrection and Heaven; and even before we decide whether Resurrection and Heaven are believable...

We first need to know our present situation, what R&H mean in context of our present situation, what R&H are for: and what they do. 

Unfortunately, the clarity and simplicity of what Jesus did and made possible; is by-now grossly obfuscated by millennia of misunderstanding, misrepresentation, disinformation - and deliberate lies. 

The only viable answer would seem to be for each creatively and actively to work it out for himself - from intuitive-experiential knowing; as it were from "first principles'. With the assurance that God and Jesus Christ will with certainty have made this possible for all Men... Possible if not now, or during mortal life, then for-sure post-mortally.  

Our yearning for a life of continual enchantment

The "romantic" search for an escape from the mundane nature of life in this-world - that is, for enchantment - takes many, many forms; and is pursued by different people in widely varying ways. 

A very incomplete list of the themes would include by religions/ spiritualties/ ideologies; through reading, TV and movies; by personal relationships such as intense friendships and sexual relationships; through the appreciation and making of crafts and arts; by meditative, paranormal and supernatural encounters and experiences; via drink and drugs and other derangements; by holidays and travel; pursuit of personal or formal education; from performing drama and music... 

And so on - fully considered, there are only a few people who are not implicitly pursuing the enchanted life. 

All of these methods and others are at-least somewhat effective and may lead to enchantment: for some people, to some extent, and temporarily...

Because with time and the changes in our-selves, all methods and pursuits always lose effect: 

The once-enchanted becomes mundane. 

In other words, in our  failure to become and to stay enchanted; we are here dealing with the ultimate fact of entropy. 

We are up-against the inescapability of entropy in this-world we all inhabit. 

We are up-against this primary creation where all changes, loss is inevitable, and every-thing ends in its death. 

But this-world and primary creation is not all; because (by Jesus Christ) we all have the the opportunity to undergo the transformation of resurrection after death through following Jesus, and move on to the Second Creation that is Heaven: where the state of enchantment is everlasting. 

It is the state of everlasting enchantment in Heaven that Jesus is describing in the Fourth Gospel - when he uses "metaphorical" examples such as water, food and meat - and compared the inevitabilities of their incomplete, temporary, entropic nature in this-life-now; with the eternally present and gratifying fulfilment in the life-to-come:

Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.

Our fathers did eat manna in the desert; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat... but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven... I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever... I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. 

Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you... 

When Jesus says that he brings "life", life-everlasting, eternal-life; people nowadays wrongly interpret this as meaning an offer of (merely) continuing mundane life: the (mere) persistence-forever of life-as-we-now-know-it...

Merely the continuance of this entropic life...

But Heaven comes after resurrection, and resurrection is a transformation by-which not only evil, but also entropy, is eliminated...

Or, to put matters positively; when all the denizens of Heaven have made a permanent commitment to live forever wholly by love of God and divine creation and their fellow resurrected humans (and other resurrected Beings)...

Then this is a situation both of eternal goodness, and also of everlasting enchantment. 

Just as we can now, in this mortal life, know the desire for a wholly good world (without evil); but we cannot attain it. And Christians know that full goodness can only be attained after death and by resurrection...

So also we can know that our yearning for a life of continual and complete enchantment (without entropic change, decline, annihilation) - while impossible to achieve here and now - is attainable.

And/but attainable after our death - and by resurrection. 

Christianity is Not, never truly was, about morality - except secondarily

Over the past eight years; my reading-of and brooding-on the Fourth Gospel (called "John") has had many and profound effects on my understanding of the differences between what Jesus said and did, and the Christian churches that came after. 

In particular, that the core of Jesus's work was to provide Men with the possibility of resurrected eternal life in Heaven. 

This means that the primary concern of Jesus was to save mankind from entropy and death - therefore Jesus's primary concern was not to save us from evil. 

To repeat: For Jesus salvation means from death, not from evil. 

However, most of religion before, during and since the time of Jesus is about morality - about the behaviour (and attitudes) of people. 

Such religion is therefore therapeutic - it is "about" minimizing suffering and/or maximizing human happiness in this world and mortal life. 

That is what all those Laws and rules are about, the propitiations offered to divinity, the abasements and obedience - they are trying to make this world a better place, and ourselves to have a better place in it. 

And this is why all religions have considerable overlap in the approved behaviours. 

But this was Not what Jesus was about. 

Jesus came essentially to save us from death, not from moral sin.

Jesus was primarily against death, not evil - but his cure for death was also a cure for evil. 

For Jesus the problem of death (of entropy) was more profound than that of evil; because in this mortal life and world, death is absolutely universal and completely unavoidable; destructive change may be slowed, but is always at work...

Jesus was necessary and unique because he offered a solution to death; not because of his moral teaching, not because of his moral laws and principles, not because people could make a church from the moral laws and principles. 

This was and is very difficult to grasp; because most people (including most early Christians, including those who formed the Christian churches, apparently) - want morality.

Or else they want immortality Now in this world, and without dying first. 

People do not, therefore, usually want what Jesus actually offered... Or, at least, they think they don't want it; or they do not want it as strongly and urgently as they want other things - such as relief from suffering, or happiness now-or-soon.

But relief from suffering and positive happiness in this mortal life are not the core of Jesus's message - because these are promised for post-mortal resurrected life, not for this life. 

The error of making "Christianity" primarily moral distorted it from very early and has led to its current near-destruction. 

Those who made Christianity continuous with Judaism (including the authors of the Matthew and Luke Gospels, and Paul); tried to conflate the primacy of resurrection with their continued primacy of morality...

Leading eventually to the bizarre concoction of Original Sin - in order to pseudo-explain why Jesus was both unique and necessary. 

In other words, they made Jesus primarily "about" morality; and resurrection was made conditional upon the approved morality...

And morality was made to be why Jesus came, and curing morality was made to be what Jesus fundamentally did...

This-world morality was made of core importance to the Christian churches; and morality was made to come first - such that resurrection was relegated to a secondary status as reward for good-morality.  

But morality is about this-world, here-and-now and before death...

Whereas the advent of resurrection was of cosmic and eternal significance - it is a change in the nature of reality. 

Everybody everywhere has their ideas of proper morals; and this is continually contested. And morality does not require resurrection. 

So morality is both regarded as primary by almost-everybody; yet morality is detachable from the reality of Christianity...

And morality has, in fact, already-been detached-from Christianity! - even (or rather, especially) in those lands historically (or nominally still) Christian. 

As of here-and-now; Christianity is just one of many competing this-worldly moral systems; and gets evaluated in terms of its material "success" in producing good behaviour.  

But if we are talking about Jesus Christ, rather than social institutions and traditions; then this is wrong, a mistake, an ancient error. 

Jesus brought the possibility of resurrected eternal life in Heaven - and that fact should come first and foremost, and be kept at the core, of our Christian discussion and teaching. 

The problem of Life: Do quantitative improvements make a qualitative difference? Ultimately - Not at all

The problems of this mortal life are (essentially) evil and entropy. Those who are honest and give the matter thought, acknowledge that these problems are intractable, incurable - they always have been, everywhere. 

Some people assert that this is good enough, Life as it is and has-been is basically fine... 

But in practice it's "fine" only so long as you don't think about life too hard or too honestly; don't care about other people, animals, plants or the world; and only so long as you are feeling completely happy and healthy at this moment.

Otherwise you will recognise that this mortal life as-is, is not enough, insufficient - which is why it is so easy and frequent to imagine Life being much better. 

It is uncontroversial that Life can be somewhat improved in some respects. 

And it is uncontroversial that such quantitative improvements can make us feel proximately better about Life: that is we feel-about-Life, somewhat better - for a while...

However, no matter how much and how many are the quantitative improvements; the facts of evil and entropy remain in the world, and in ourselves - so ultimately, no amount of quantitative improvement makes an ultimate difference.  

This can be seen in listening to a progressive, radical or reformer - who tries to enlist support by claiming to cure some "injustice"; yet no matter how many quantitative improvements of the kind they want are attained "towards" this supposed-cure... The problem remains always - ultimately - exactly as bad as ever it was. 

Whatever the issue chosen, the pattern is the same.  

A US antiracist in the summer of 2020 regarded racism as a 100% burning and urgent global priority, exactly as much as his kind did in the "civil rights" era of the 1960s; or a century earlier during the abolition, Civil War then "reconstruction" eras of the 1800s. 

Somehow a couple of centuries of quantitative "progress" in the antiracist agenda, also, and at the same time, qualitatively amounted to... nothing at all. 

Analogous scenarios can be constructed for ideologies of freedom, class, feminism (or any other sexual liberation or "rights" issue). That's easy enough to see.  

But this also applies to religions and spiritualties - and that is harder to acknowledge. 

There is same - usually implicit - claim that quantitative progress will make a qualitative difference; that a bigger and better church, a society run on more Christian lines, more devout people who sin less - will amount to something qualitatively better...

Yet it never does! 

No amount of short-term proximate improvement ever makes an ultimate difference!

The best and most Godly people, in the best church of the best religion of the best nation at the best time in history... Such people were always powerfully aware (indeed they were more aware than anybody else!) that ultimately the human condition did not suffice and could not suffice in an ultimate sense. 

Hence the absolute need for what Jesus made possible: the Second Creation: an eternal Life built wholly on Love; therefore a Life without entropy or evil.  

Subfertility is willed biological extinction - an intractable fact. What then?

People are apparently unable to grasp the very simple fact that the "subfertility*" of all the populations of all the developed nations is a strategic choice of biological extinction. 

The peoples of the modern world are willing their own annihilation. 

Of course, the averaged population choice in favour of death is composed of multi-millions of individual choices - which have, presumably, thousands of specific reasons and motivations. 

Nonetheless, if we are talking at a population level, in terms of group averages of reproduction - then the deep psychological (indeed spiritual) problem; is that the population has chosen its own destruction. 

At every level from the family, through the tribe, clan, nation - religion, or ideology. 

This seems to me a far more significant fact than real-but-temporary issues such as an ageing population. It is very solid, biological, evidence of the short-termism and self-focus characteristic of all modern populations. 

This is, in itself, a product of the changes in human consciousness that have happened everywhere - which could be described as alienation, or as the autonomous consciousness. 

In the past, people felt themselves part of a group-consciousness. Much of behaviour was unconscious, automatic, and flowed-into each person from the group-mind. 

The group-mind could be resisted, but such resistance need to be active. 

Individuals did not therefore consciously "decide" to have "at least three children" (e.g. weighing the options, calculating the risks and benefits) - instead it was not experienced as a choice, certainly not an individual choice. 

Wanting children was just "what people did"; and "I" am "people"... so I want it too.  

Modern consciousness doesn't work like that. 

We modern live "inside our heads" - looking-out. 

We often pretend to be concerned about other-people-in-general and in-the-long-term; but endemic subfertility shows that we don't genuinely and powerfully experience such oft-expressed care and concern. 

Ultimately, we don't care about the extinction of our kind; and we don't care so deeply that we cannot even notice or acknowledge that it is happening!

If we don't care about the extinction of our people - And We Don't! - then all the other altruistic and planetary concerns are revealed as puffs of wind! 

This relates to the currently so-evident "wars and rumours of war" - which are also symptomatic of the same underlying spirit**. These wars, and their gratuitous and gleefully spiteful nature, are a consequence of profound facts of human spirituality - here-and-now. 

To be clear - I am not suggesting that we "ought" to be less selfish, more long-termist, more group-minded: the reality of our situation is that these are impossibilities. 

We can in theory ask for them, recommend them, incentivize them - but because people do not want them, they will not happen - just as all attempts, everywhere, to reverse subfertility have utterly failed (but mostly, they are not even attempted). 

These are facts of the human condition in this earthly mortal existence. 

Sins are fact - they cannot be evaded; but that does not free us from the responsibility to acknowledge and repent them.

Why do we find it so difficult - impossible, even - to acknowledge and repent facts which will not be changed? Usually because we do not fundamentally desire to change the facts; or if part of us does want to change - we cannot make ourselves do it.

Why are we so eager to pretend these are soluble problems, why expend such energy in evasions?

Surely this intractability of mortal Life is at the very heart of Jesus's message, and the reason for his great gift (or offer) of salvation? 

What we need to do is something that we think is "too easy" or "not worth" doing...

Therefore we do not do what actually-is needful, and possible for everybody - and thereby reject salvation.   

*Anything less than two-point-something children per woman, on average. The point-something is (approximately) to account for children that do not survive to adulthood, or are otherwise infertile. Biologically speaking, it is very probably necessary to have considerably more than an average of two children per woman to replace the human population - if significant and cumulative genetic damage is to be avoided.  

**The world is breaking down. When that happens the structures of civilisation develop cracks and start to fail after which the normal forces of entropy and decay take over and do the rest. 

Recent wars are the result of a loss of centre. The centre is the spiritual focus of a society, what it is grounded in and what sustains it. When that no longer holds then things do fly apart, as the poet says. 

We have had no centre for a long time in the West which is why we have pitiful replacements such as human rights and democracy but these have no real substance to them. They are feeble ideological substitutes for what we have lost or rejected and they don't really inspire anybody for long. 

Wars come about because of ambition, and that is certainly a factor with the present one. But there is something else going on which is a simple desire for destruction. 

When the world has no meaning, and it has none without a sense of something beyond itself, we can find a crude purpose of sorts through destruction. Destruction is easy and it's exciting. It can stimulate the jaded palate and thrill the mind that has become bored and without a deeper goal.

From William Wildblood

Escapism is a good thing - so long as we follow-through...

Escapism is a good, and perhaps spiritually-necessary, basis for Life. 

The desire to escape, the evaluation that escape from this actual-Life is needed, is an aspect of any person of depth and wisdom... 

Which implies that not to be an escapist is to be a shallow, dishonest fool (and there are plenty of these!).   

To be an escapist is to recognize and to feel that Life - as it actually is - is tragic; such that if there were nothing better to hope for, then we need to escape Life. 

The mass majority of mainstream modern materialists - the people who affect to despise escapism, and who pose as hard-nosed realists that revel in sordid cynicism - are all In Fact and ultimately escapists; but escapists of the worst kind. 

Such people, most people, deny the reality of the spiritual; and want death of their own body to be followed by total annihilation of themselves. 

In other words; such people, and I mean most people, so much fear and loath actual Life, that they desire complete and irrevocable and inevitable escape... Not only complete escape from Life, but total escape from them-selves.  

Thus; even though escapism is "a good thing" (and in a sense an inevitable thing for any honest Being capable of Love); escapism is not necessarily a good thing - consequently; there are bad, because dishonest, because half-baked, forms of escapism. 

Having discerned that escape from Life is desirable; the dishonest escapist then tries to ignore the fact - not to think about it; and instead tries lose-himself in Life by attempts at distraction. 

Yet no matter how strongly distraction is sought (e.g. by wishful-thinking, media immersion, immersion on social interaction or sex, extreme busyness, or obliteration of consciousness through intoxication) - all such are half-baked - because partial or temporary. 

Although common, this strategy is incoherent and self-defeating - because it tries to escape the innate tragedy of life, by attempting total immersion in the business of Living. 

Unsurprisingly; all such dishonest or half-baked escapism gravitates towards the desire of permanent annihilation: that mainstream modern death-wish that underpins the suicidal self-hatred of contemporary Western Civilization: a yearning for death-as-the-end. 

Honest and rigorous escapism - on the other hand - leads the escapist towards God and Jesus Christ... 

Towards acknowledging that we inhabit a created reality, made by a personal and good God; therefore escape from the tragedy of this-Life is both meaningful and possible. 

And towards to the possibility of an eternal and complete "escape" from the innate tragedy of our present mortal Life within creation - an escape by following Jesus Christ to resurrection in Heaven. 

Note added: I am not saying that everybody will eventually choose the salvation of Jesus Christ. For a start, Heaven has no interest for those incapable of Love. And Heaven does not appeal much to those who have some other and higher-priority than the divine principle of "loving-creation" that is the necessary eternal commitment for those Beings who choose Heaven. 

However; I do think that many people who acknowledge the primacy of the spiritual and the need for escape; will choose Heaven, when it comes to the point. 

For example, some of those who in their earlier lives declare a preference for reincarnation into a future series of mortal lives will change their minds. When a post-mortal spirit looks back at the totality of his mortal life, including the immediate pre-death experiences, and considers the prospect of more-of-the-same - for many people the prospect of reincarnation will be much less appealing than it seemed in their busy and pleasure-dominated early- or middle-lives. The here-and-now prospect of instead choosing resurrected Heavenly life may be much more attractive!

Those who expressed a desire to discard the incarnate body, and become "pure spirit" - perhaps to live in contemplative bliss, or become assimilated into the divine; may feel differently when the alternative is a resurrected body; and when Heavenly life is known to be the escape from both evil and "entropy" (loss/ sickness/ degeneration/ death).  

Similarly for the long-term atheist-materialist. When faced by a choice between on the one hand (apparently) eternal extinction of his self, his consciousness, all potential for experience... And on the other hand the real possibility of a living world of love and creativity; and in a world perhaps inhabited by some of those he most loved and who loved him? 

I am not saying - and I do not believe - that all will eventually choose salvation. Not least because I assume every human (and every other being) is unique. But I do believe that when the prospect of salvation is known to be real, understood, and constitutes a genuine possibility - even lifelong expressions of intention may change.    

Why entropy is inevitable in this mortal incarnate life

Why is entropy inevitable, unavoidable in this mortal incarnate life?

The answer is because, in this transitional phase between a purely-spirit pre-mortal life, and resurrected eternal incarnated life in Heaven; our bodies are made from the substance of other Beings. 

Because ultimately there are only Beings. 

Because these Beings are eternal - the materials from which our bodies are made are only "lent" us, for a while, by other Beings.

Therefore we incarnate by a contingent, always-changing, inevitably temporary, alliance of Beings.  

There are no inert "minerals" - all "chemicals" are actually parts of Beings. 

And of course there are actual Beings incorporated into our bodies - such as many individual cells, for example the phagocyte white blood cells are essentially autonomous amoebae. 

But these (and other cells) exist in a dynamic kind of symbiosis, living and reproducing in the environment provided by our blood; (temporarily) controlled by our regulatory systems, which also include other Beings and parts of Beings.  

So; the innate tendency with time, is for the allied Beings and parts of Beings to revert to the purposes of the Beings themselves.

In other words; for these other-Beings, from-whom are bodies are made, to become autonomous agents with a divine destiny; at some point they must regain that primary agency which has been temporarily suspended in forming our bodies.  

In this Primary or First Creation that we all inhabit; the ultimate identity of Beings has not changed - even when one Being 9or some part of a Being) is "being used" by another. 

This is why entropy is a part of the Primary creation - inevitable, unavoidable. 

And this is why Jesus Christ was necessary to create a form of incarnated existence without entropy, without death. 

We can understand that resurrection entails a re-creation of our incarnate selves, purely from our own Beings. 

And therefore without a tendency for the components to revert to other Beings. 

And therefore we - because of the Second Creation of Jesus Christ - may choose Life Everlasting; without the entropy and death which are intrinsic to this Primary Creation...

A creation formed by the eternal commitment of whole-Beings to live in harmony, by love. 

We can never "know" completely and finally; but can Love wholly and eternally

From Exegesis by Philip K Dick, referring to his novel The Transmigration of Timothy Archer (1982) 

This is a strange ending [to the novel]. 

The will (of Schopenhauer) turns back on itself and is satisfied not to know: This is the form its cessation takes: that he is content not to know, and so is she. Thus one thing is certain: the restless, striving, irrational will is defeated; it has given up. 

If this is how victory is defined, there has been victory. 

If victory is defined as knowing whether Tim Archer defeats Fate through Christ and immortality—it is not victory. 

The final message seems to be: sublime peace - freedom from the restless striving will - is possible, but knowledge - intellectual knowing - is not. 

The heart can know peace but the mind cannot be satisfied; the drive to know, to possess intellectual certitude is doomed to failure.

Sureness is not factual but relational: but a matter between persons, between beings (in the here and now).

What we can be sure about is not knowledge - which is why epistemology, a philosophical search for surety of factual information -  is a dead end. 

"Knowing about stuff" is not the core of reality; because reality is not naturally divided into units, into "facts". 

We can never ever be "certain" of facts because reality is not pre-divided into facts - not factually-segmented - such divisions are imposed, arbitrary, and selective.

(The idea that "scientific facts" are the only thing we can be certain of - is therefore a dangerous delusion.) 

  

What, then, is the core of reality? 

The fundamental and real divisions are those between individual living beings. 

Ultimate reality is therefore to do with living beings and the relationships between them. 

The heart can know "peace" in the context of love; albeit in this mortal world that peace can only be temporary - because of entropy/ death and evil. 

Yet in resurrected Heavenly life, that peace can be eternal.

And love between living beings is a dynamic thing, because life is dynamic; which is why and how love overflows into creating.  

Even in Heaven (even for God the Creator) we will never know finally, nor wholly and eternally - because creation is ongoing, and other-beings really are "other". 

But we shall love wholly and eternally; and it is that possibility which makes Heaven possible. 

 

A big danger is that we will "find" whatever we "seek"

There seems to be a fundamental problem in life, that while passive, assimilative compliance leads (in our society and world) to disaster and damnation -- on the other hand, there is a very big problem when we consciously and conscientiously seek a specific thing. 

This both in physical material terms (as when people pursue a career plan, or a plan to find a lover or spouse) - and also spiritually. 

It seems that many people (including some of the greatest spiritual exemplars) have deceived themselves and fallen into error by exerting their considerable powers by devising strategies to discover and attain some very particular thing. 

Many people seek specific knowledge - and seek it by long-term efforts: the long monastic training by prayer, liturgy, meditation, labour; years of ascetic striving by desert-dwelling hermits; the prolonged initiation of mystery religions, spiritual science, ritual magic (alchemy, astrology, divinations etc). 

The resulting gross divergence in outcomes, results, beliefs, dogmas, rules and laws, practices and compulsions - is evidence that the process was one originating in the defective wilfulness of fundamentally-incapable beings. 

The big problem of all such spiritual effort; is that people do find what they seek - yet what they seek is something that has been decided by their conscious personality-mind, and implemented by the mundane will-power. 

Such people think they know what they need, and they suppose that they know what is good for "other people" and for "the world"...

And mostly by the transformations of themselves that happen because of their sustained and willed efforts; they find... what they seek, only only what they seek... Find this by various combinations of enhanced abilities, diminished intuitive discernment... of actual-finding with self-deception. 

Ultimately Life (at least for a follower of Jesus) ought to be about loving relationships with other people, other beings, with God and Jesus and others... and the creativity that arises from such loving relationships. 

Life is therefore, ultimately, NOT about changing other people for (what we regard as) the better - that is attempted manipulation - which is a psychopathic and selfish thing, even when justified by altruistic theories. 

Relationships are ultimately NOT about us knowing just what others most need, nor about planning other people's lives (For Their Own Good) - whether materially or spiritually. 

Life is ultimately NOT about making a better world for everybody by knowledge, skill and determination exercised over time... 

Because we really have no idea of what that better world actually is - and the attempt to devise and impose a better world lead to propaganda and coercion - justified by "the common good" (and always by "the end justifies the means" thinking). 

The fact that this stuff is inevitable (and to a significant extent) in our mortal world, is because this is not Heaven; and our world is permeated with evil and undercut by entropy. 

But even if inevitable to a degree, this kind of will-directed strategizing should not be our ideal - yet it is, unfortunately, presented as the ideal by most religions and spiritual systems! 

We cannot know what is good in any degree of specific detail; even less can we know how to act and arrange things to "make" good.

To pretend otherwise leads to great and general harm, including (and primarily) harm to Our-Selves. 

But we do know enough of such matters to be able to live well-enough to develop spiritually and attain salvation - after which, as eternal resurrected beings in Heaven; we can get on with participating in the world of divine creation. 

But not before. 

We cannot have it by wanting it; because:

What we want (in our mortal selves and world) is not really IT.    

Sturgeon's Law again - or, is Romantic Christianity *necessarily* just-another liberal apostasy?

If Romantic Christianity is an insistence that the individual (rather than any external authority, such as a church or a prescribed-interpretation of Scripture), and his deepest intuition (rather than e.g. "evidence" or "reason"), ought to be ultimately responsible for his Christian belief...

Then is this not just-another version of the kind of liberal-apostasy - just another attempt to create hedonic or socially-advantageous wriggle-room from the obvious and necessary truths of [insert favoured church or tradition]?

The best answer is not-necessarily, but sometimes, yes... it is bound to be. 

Especially when that individual attempts to impose his own personal intuition on "other people" in some kind of general, quasi-institutional, of self-advantaging fashion.

But even when an individual is going his best, the actual practice of Romantic Christianity will sometimes or even mostly be contaminated by the basic nature of this reality we all inhabit: which is undercut by entropy and permeated by evil.    

After all - so far as I can see - some version of "Sturgeon's Law" seems to apply almost everywhere - in the sense that in any category of phenomena involving people: most of that category is "more or less" crap. 

But the proper question is in that word "necessarily": the question of whether Romantic Christianity must be from-it-nature merely wriggle-room liberalizing-apostasy?

Because even if Romantic Christianity is, by the nature of all mortal earthly things, mostly crap; this is compatible with it being at its best actually good and true. 

I would first say that RC does not have to be, ought not to be a liberal apostasy; and that Romantic Christianity can instead be a genuine, positive, really new (and better!) way of being a Christian: a more authentic and divinely-approved way of "following Jesus".

   

Pantheist, Monotheist, and Jesus-centred Christians

It seems to me that the religion of Christianity - as expressed in the major churches (variously, since very early in church history); was formed from people who wanted several different and mutually incompatible things. 

There were "pantheists" who believed in one deity which was everything - so it was vital that the deity was itself everything, or else had-created everything from nothing. 

They were focused on the inevitability of change and death ("entropy") which they saw in all material things; and therefore recognized the ultimate and ineradicable insufficiency of incarnate mortal life on this earth. 

They also believed that consciousness was a false separation from the reality of universal deity, hence a curse. 

These pantheists yearned most for escape from this incarnate, earthly, mortal life and the curse of consciousness; and their hope was to become pure spirit, and exist in a "timeless" state of impersonal bliss. 

There is no essential role for Jesus Christ in this tradition. 

Jesus is either dissolved back-into the unity of deity; or else regarded as a teacher, helper, advocate or some other such...  

(A job that is no doubt admirable, but secondary and dispensable.)  

This pantheistic strand got rolled-up into orthodox/ mainstream Christianity, especially from the pre-existing Neo-Platonists and mystery religions. In its purest form this led to the Christian Gnostics; but it is found in all the main Christian churches today - most of all in the monasticism of the Catholic churches, and least of all in Mormonism - but is present in all to some degree. 

The other main strand of the religion of Christianity was monotheism; which was mainly from the ancient Hebrews, and the Old Testament. 

This emphasizes a supreme and jealous personal God as the only deity; but its focus was on Man's behaviour and happiness in this earthly mortal life. 

The monotheistic concern was with evil rather than with "entropy". Its concern was with forming "God's people" as a group. 

The monotheistic focus was on morality, on the conduct of life - which was conceptualized as a comprehensive and mandatory Law; with many rules - dictating that which is virtuous; prohibiting that which is evil. 

Morality in this-life dictated the after-life; and the major focus of the after-life was Hell rather than Heaven. 

Hell was the default state of eternal torment - while Heaven was both uncertain and vague, and mostly co-opted from the pantheistic tradition. 

In other words, the monotheistic Heaven (in so far as it is thought about at all) is only superficially distinguishable from the depersonalized state of a pure spirit, dwelling in timeless bliss; thus we get the mental-pictures of de-individualized ranks of Heavenly choirs engaged in perpetual cycles of worship, praise, and celebration of the one God.  

Since there must be only one God; the role of Jesus in this monotheistic scheme is very confused, and indeed incoherent. In practice therefore; Jesus is seen as a Messiah whose fundamental task is to abolish evil on earth. 

This means that - for monotheists; the concept of entropy is subsumed within the concept of evil.

The monotheistic strand of Christianity is found wherever law, rule, and authority are primary; and in such situations Christian churches become structurally all-but indistinguishable from other monotheisms - Jewish or Islamic.   

The task of Messiah is to transform earth into Heaven, to immortalize this mortal lie - and purge it of all evil. 

Since this has not happened; Jesus's mortal life was seen as a failure - and he must therefore return in a Second Coming; in a role indistinguishable from that of the one God; to finish the work of Messiah. 

Traditional, orthodox, mainstream Christian churches are composed of various and oscillating admixtures of Pantheism and Monotheism - varying between times, places, and persons. 

Jesus-centred Christians only really exist as individual persons, or small groups - because they (we) are not church-rooted. 

This kind of Christianity is (potentially) described pretty fully in the Fourth Gospel ("John") - when this Book is regarded as autonomous from, and primary among, all scriptures. 

The focus is post-mortal and incarnated - on resurrected eternal life in Heaven; and Jesus is seen as having made this possible - which is a divine act of creation.

Therefore Jesus is fully a God; therefore a God later than, and in addition to, God the primary creator (therefore monotheism is not true).  

For Jesus-centred Christians; Jesus was absolutely essential for those who desire salvation. 

Before Jesus there was no salvation; and without Jesus salvation would not have been possible. 

Jesus-centred Christianity is personal and inter-personal. 

Jesus was and is a person. Men are individual persons in mortal life. Jesus and Men stay persons after resurrection and in Heaven. 

Love is between persons - not abstract, not "unconditional". 

Consciousness is retained after resurrection. Individual natures and purposes are retained after resurrection.  

For Jesus-centred Christians; without Jesus, there would not be any resurrected eternal life, Heaven would not exist; and it is only by following Jesus that Men can make the choice of resurrection into everlasting life in Heaven. 

Note added: In summary; Pantheists and Monotheists fitted-Jesus-into pre-existing religious structures; suitable for church-based religions - a process that inevitably had the effect of leaving Jesus structurally-inessential, if not redundant (despite whatever protestations). [Of course; I presume that many Christians have been ignorant of, ignored, or pushed hard against the official theology and doctrines - and lived what was de facto a Jesus-centred Christianity - which needed no church, and need not be known to anyone else.] If, instead of insisting upon Pantheism or Monotheism; we start with Jesus and what he said and did (according to the most authoritative source) - we get a Christianity with a very different structure and emphasis. 

I am the way, the truth and the light... (Explained)

John 14: [3] And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. [4] And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. [5] Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? [6] Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

My understanding of this report of Jesus's teaching is that he is implicitly contrasting the new dispensation with the old. 

In the old dispensation "the way" was a highly literal "way" - it was single path (the Law) - a single life-pattern of beliefs and behaviour that every man needed to follow if he was to be favoured by God in this mortal life. 

But the old "way" made no difference to what happened to him after death - the ghostly realm of Sheol was the common destination for all Men. 

When Jesus says that he himself is the "way" this is at first a paradox - because a person cannot be a path. So Jesus means he himself is replacing the old idea of a single and specified path-through-mortal-life.  

In future, in Jesus's new dispensation; to "do the right thing", to live well; we ought to think of our relationship with the person of Jesus, because Jesus is now "the way"...

We should therefore have a relationship with Jesus instead of trying to stick to "walking" along a semi-literal, and single, legally-pre-specified, "track" through the choices and chances of this world. 

By my understanding; "the truth" seems to refer to "reality" - or how-things-are with respect to what is important. In other words; our relationship with Jesus is the most important thing, from now...

All this is assuming that we ourselves want what Jesus is offering in his new dispensation; which is described as "the life". 

The life is, in other words, being used here as shorthand for "resurrected eternal life in Heaven"; Heaven instead of Sheol. 

(And also instead of any other other alternative post-mortal situation or state - such as annihilation, depersonalized bliss, or some kind of reincarnation.) 

 

The phrase "cometh to the Father" is less clear, and may (I think) be a later interpolation. 

But "the Father" could be taken to refer to the nature of divine creation; such that "coming to the Father" would mean coming to live in perfect harmony with divine creation which is Heaven - that is to say living by love always and wholly...

Therefore being with the father might be living in the Heavenly state which is by love and without evil; and Life without coexistent death meaning something like "entropy" - i.e. disease, damage, ageing, etc.  

A loving relationship with Jesus, and intention to accept what Jesus offers, is now replacing the old conceptualization of the "way"; it follows that following Jesus is the only "way" to Heaven, there is no other "route" through life to resurrection; "no man cometh to the Father" except by the nature of his relationship with Jesus.   

Note: As background: I also understand that our relationship with Jesus is by "the Holy Ghost" - which is the spirit of the ascended Jesus as we may know it in this world and mortal life. And I also assume that although we can and should commit to love and follow Jesus in this mortal life; the actual following Jesus to resurrected eternal life in Heaven must happen (and can only happen) after death; i.e. post-mortally. 

The lasting influence of alchemical thinking on mainstream modern ideology

[The aim of alchemy was] to hasten the ... processes of nature by precipitating matter through stages of decay and decomposition into a new birth whereby it would become "perfect", in the Latin sense of "completed" or "fulfilled", and having once achieved this state, the new born matter could then be used to heal any sickness in the rest of nature. 

From Wizards: a history; by PG Maxwell-Stuart (2004)

This strikes me as a basic way of thinking that survived long beyond the discipline of alchemy. 

As I understand this passage; "alchemy" could be generalized thus:

This actual world is of-it-nature imperfect - only ever partly and intermittently as it should be; continually assailed by unavoidable evil, entropy, death.

The aim of the alchemist is to transform this actual world into a "perfect" state of fulfilled completion. 

And this alchemical transformation works by controlling and shaping the natural process of dying, death and rebirth.

So that the world (individual people, human society, nature itself) is alchemically-"perfected" by accelerating its "decay and decomposition", through dissolution, and into a new birth.

Imperfect matter is alchemically-transformed to perfect matter.  

The imperfect is therefore deliberately deconstructed, reduced to its fundamentals. 

In effect, it is destroyed.

But... this destruction is justified and idealized (for the destroyer) because that which is destroyed is intrinsically flawed; while the destruction is aimed at a re-made "perfection". Belief in the perfection of the re-made justifies the preliminary destruction. 

If perfection is desired, preliminary destruction must be accepted. 

The re-made, new-born, perfected entity produced by alchemy - which might be a person (New Man), society (New World Order), or an artefact like the "philosopher's stone" - will then alchemically work-upon, transform, and progressively perfect the un-transformed whole.

As I read the above passage; it suddenly struck me how often I have come-across this alchemical way of thinking (and justifying) among the ruling class - or more generally (and in a reduced and materialistic form) among managers and other bureaucrats. 

The idea of perfecting via destruction; of transforming by controlled decomposition and re-making.

This includes the real truth that things can (typically) only get better, via getting worse; and makes of it a universal justification for making things worse.

(Including when the real motive is personal benefit, resentment, or spite.)

Alchemical thinking provides a permanent rationalization for all possible harms inflicted by selfish manipulation or people and the world*. 

And, as I have noticed more recently; this idea of "alchemical transformation" can take the reality salvation from Jesus Christ - i.e. resurrection to into eternal and wholly-loving life in Heaven, on the other side of death - and appropriate it to this-worldly human will.  

Alchemy (thus considered, in its ultimate sense) can therefore be a fundamental alternative to Christianity; and one that has a special appeal to the leadership class of this mortal world.  

 

*I am certainly not saying that alchemical thinking is always or necessarily evil. I don't believe that is true. Plenty of good people, and Christians, have studied or practiced alchemy - which does contain significant truths, especially when regarded as a way of achieving limited, specific, partial goals. But I am saying that - as a general principle, alchemy is mistaken; it is ultimately not reality, ultimately untrue. 

And alchemical thinking actually-is used to contradict one of the fundamental assumptions upon which Christianity is based...

Which is that the evil, entropy and death in this world and mortal life are intrinsic, and cannot be transformed-away; and that the only true-and-real escape from entropy and evil is the salvation of Jesus Christ, on the other side of our personal death.  

Note added: The way to consider the value of alchemy is as a science. Science has been useful in many ways; but science is not just harmful but actually destroys itself when regarded as metaphysics - i.e. when scientific assumptions are regarded as necessary and universal. 

"Being a Christian" is hierarchically-above practicing any specific religion

It seems to me that Christianity - as I understand it, is qualitatively different from "religion".

I regard Christianity as in essence the commitment to accept Jesus Christ's offer of resurrected eternal life in Heaven, through following Jesus post-mortally. 

For a Christian, therefore, life after death involves both a personal transformation (resurrection) and also (implicitly) a qualitatively different existence in a Heaven that is understood in terms of a Second Creation - a creative Heaven entirely motivated by love; and without death, entropy or evil. 

This post-mortal expectation therefore provides a frame for everything else in reality; and especially for this mortal life of ours.

But Christianity does not fill our mortal life. 

Being a Christian does not provide us with a blueprint, rule-book, ethical code, or detailed external and objective guidance for all important matters...

In other words (properly grasped); it seems that "being a Christian" is not really "a specific religion" 

The "religion aspect of life" has been provided by many and various churches through history and today - some of which churches include following Jesus to resurrected life in Heaven as a core element - and these are validly "Christian churches"; but who all in addition offer various and detailed blueprints for daily living. 

Guidance overlaps among validly Christian churches, but it also varies. 

But each church offers, to a significant degree, that specific and detailed life-guidance in terms of principles, practices, necessary obediences etc. which religiously-inclined people seek; and that complex societies and civilizations required in order to function, and be sustainable. 

What I am saying is that "being a Christian" is distinct from being religious; because being a Christian focuses on what happens after we die; while a religion focuses on what we do during this mortal life. 

I am also saying that the relationship between the direct Christianity of what happens after we die, and the "blueprint" religion of what we do in this mortal life; is indirect and uncertain. 

On the one hand; Christianity-itself does not have many very hard entailments -- and on the other hand; most of the multitude of detail in rule-books, ethical codes, and theologies lacks any solid basis in Christianity. 

The true relationship between Christianity and religion is that Christianity comes hierarchically first, above all else, and is the framework for understanding our life and ultimate reality. 

Within that framework of aspiration and faithful expectation; there will inevitably need to be something like a religion.

But the scope and details of any religion, even a genuinely-Christian religion, are-not and cannot-be an entailed consequence of Christianity. 

Note added: This does not mean that all religions, or even all validly-Christian and self-identified-Christian churches, are equally valid. Some will be more Christianity-compatible than others. But it does mean that one could probably be-a-Christian (i.e. by intending to accept the post-mortal offer of Jesus Christ) while practicing a pretty wide range of religions. And this was, of course, the actual situation among the earliest Christians, before a distinct "Christian Church religion" arose - who, after conversion, seem to have continued practicing (for example) their Jewish, Samaritan and Roman Pagan religions.