The Law of Direct Knowing: or, why book recommendations are (mostly) useless and best-friends non-transferable

Have you ever noticed, as I did even in my teens, that your best-friend's other best friends were usually people you found to be distinctly... underwhelming. Sometimes, I even disliked them. And my own best friends often did not get-along very well - lacking any genuine affinity. 

This might be supposed to be due to jealousy, or that that each friend represented a different aspect in me; but I think the reason runs deeper.

Something similar applies with authors that I regard as mentors; my absolute favourite writers: those with whom I had a strong relationship, and whose influence on me has been significant. 

It is natural to seek further such mentors by tackling those who my favorite author regarded as his favourite authors... 

Yet this was typically a blind alley. No matter how deeply I admired and empathized with writer X; I nearly always discovered writer X's favourite, most significant, influences were disappointing; and often completely unappealing.

Furthermore, books recommended me by friends who liked the same things as I did, were often duds; and my own recommendations of the "you will love this" type, typically fell upon stony ground. 

The same applies with classical music, and indeed folk music - an exploration of the "influences" behind my favourite artistes and composers was almost uniformly unsatisfying.     

Such instances can be put-together; and a lesson drawn from them to make a kind of law: The Law of Direct Knowing.  

This is: We can only truly-know a person or personage in a direct and dyadic fashion.

We can - in other words - only truly know in terms of a meeting of just-two minds; and this applies whether in everyday-life or in our intense imaginative thinking-life. 

Thus; friendship and influence must alike be directly inter-personal - without any degrees of separation. 

Indeed; it strikes me that with the Law of Direct Knowing we are perhaps confronted here by a fundamental principle of divine creation - because (as I understand it) creation is rooted in love: and, more exactly, in dyadic love - love between "twos".

Love is both what holds-creation-together; and what gives creation its dynamism: its motivation and direction. 

Creation originated (I believe) in the love of our Heavenly Parents to constitute that which we term God; and divine creation began with God's love of all the Beings of reality - each individually relating back to God, via love, in a dyadic fashion. 

Creation then proceeds by multiple (and overlapping, interlocking) instances of dyadic love between the Beings of divine creation - to make the whole of creation bound and motivated by many mutual links.

What this means is that our evanescent mundane love/ relationships are -- in their partial and often temporary ways; and while continually being un-done by the depredations of entropy and the motivations of evil -- instances of that "power of love" which make creation. 

This mortal world is therefore a dynamic equilibrium - which may be strengthening or else falling-apart, at various scales - between the binding and creative powers of love - and that-which opposes love.  

And (at least, for Christians) Heaven can be understood as the place where such dyadic relations are permanent and pure in their nature - such that creation becomes wholly positive and progressive...

So that more-and-more of Heaven, is always being bound more-and-more strongly, by the direct knowing of dyadic love. 

 

Married relationships - Patriarchy, Feminism or Dyadic (the Mormon experience)

Yesterday I was re-reading this-blog commenter 'Lucinda's excellent 2015 article from the Mormon Blog - Millenial Star. I certainly agree with the substance of what Lucinda says, but I noticed that there was a 'hang-up' in the comments about nomenclature.

For example, disputes about about the 'real meaning of Patriarchy; or (elsewhere) I have seem 'complementary' used as a synonym for 'de facto feminism'. I don't intend to quibble over this - but will make my meaning of these and other terms clear, as we proceed.

My general stance is that there was a long history of Patriarchy in human society, but around about 1800 there was a change in Western human consciousness (or human instincts) concerning the ideal way that men and women ought to relate - particularly in marriage.

This was a part of the Romantic movement in thought - and I regard Joseph Smith and the Latter Day Saints (beginning with the production of the Book of Mormon and the formation of what became the CJCLDS in 1830) as part of this Romantic movement.

My belief is that this Romantic movement in thought ought to have led to a new kind of dyadic (or complementary - in the original sense of that word) relationship between men and women. Mormonism bases this upon the solid metaphysical assumption that men and women are incomplete parts of the 'whole' human being; and that the divine ideal of the complete (i.e. fully divine) Man is a 'celestial' (i.e. dyadic and eternal) marriage of a man and woman.

This divine idea, then, ought to be reflected in our earthly ideals. However this has not yet happened.

In mainstream secular Western culture, we have instead had materialistic feminism; which is an incoherent, Leftist (hence destructive, evil motivated) perversion of the truth of the underlying spiritual ideal. Yes, we had the impulse for a New relation between men and women; but No - not feminism - which foments perpetual resentment and (even pragmatically) simply does not work. So not feminism - then what?  

What of Mormonism? My interpretation is that Mormonism was diverted by adverse circumstances first briefly into polygamy under Joseph Smith (multiple spiritual, not physical, spouses for men and women - intended to bind the Saints into a single extended family); then (under Brigham Young) into several decades of Patriarchal polygyny (plural wives for the senior Mormons) - and from about 1900 the current pattern of an ideal of eternal monogamy.

Current Mormonism is regarded as highly 'Patriarchal' by comparison with current secular norms; especially because only men are priests and there is an ideal of men as leading the household and women being mothers and homemakers. But spiritually there is a strong element of dyadic complementarity to Mormonism, which is evident by comparison with Conservative Evangelicals.

And ultimately this is related to the Evangelical concept of God as a man; while the Mormon God is a Heavenly Father and Mother. But the womens' role in the CJCLDS has always been much more important than in traditionalist mainstream Christian churches; with the Mormon Relief Society a very early feature, and a full range of 'parallel' women's organisations (and significant local, national and international positions of responsibility) within the church.

Thus, the true underlying position of Mormonism is that men and women are complementary 'partners' in their marriage. When this is made into a regulatory generalisation, into official guidance, it comes-out very much like Patriarchy; since on-average this broadly reflects the situation for the majority of men and women.  If we must have 'laws' then these must be 'patriarchal' - because the feminist alternative is much worse.

But in an ideal situation, the dyad of earthly spouses would be able mutually to find their own, perhaps unique, complementary compatibility; based on their own specific natures and dispositions, and the way that an individual marriage evolves over time - with age, with fortune, how many children or their absence, with diseases and disasters etc.

In this sense, all solid and lasting marriages on earth must sometimes be complementary, when circumstances dictate; but for the Romantic view of men and women this is the ideal, not just a regrettable necessity. 

Dyadic marriage, with each man and woman forging a flexible and complementary, permanent and committed, relationship, is - I believe - the proper and truly Romantic ideal for modern men and women; on earth as we hope it shall be in Heaven.

Heavenly Parents and the dyadic/ one-creator God - an update

As I have often written, but not recently, I believe that God is dyadic - consisting of a Heavenly Father and Mother, a man and woman who are (in some sense) incarnate and not spirits. 

This is the Mormon understanding, and reading about Mormon theology was where I first came across it. 

I am not trying to persuade other people that I am right; but I shall here consider why I personally believe this, and what it is that I believe. 

In the first place it is due to what might be termed intuition; in the sense that when I first encountered this idea, my heart seemed to jump and warm; as if I was discovering something true, good and with great possibilities of more-good. 

There was an immediate and positive sense... not so much that this was true, but that I wanted this to be true - this came before my conviction that it was true.  

Following this I read more about Mormon theology, and realized that the dyadic, man-woman nature of our Heavenly parents was just part of an entire metaphysical understanding of creation (including procreation - the creation of beings including people) as something dynamic, interactive, developing, evolutionary, open-ended, and expanding. 

In other words, that creation itself was creative (and therefore creation was not, as I had previously assumed, a done-thing, a closed accomplishment, a finished totality - once-and-for-always.) 

I then began to explore the implications of these ideas for myself; using concepts I got from William Arkle (and his reflections on God's motivations for creation); and Owen Barfield, including Barfield's accounts of the 'polar' philosophy of ST Coleridge. 

I was also building on a longer-term fascination with 'animism' - with the (apparently innate and spontaneous) tendency to regard the world (the universe) as consisting primarily of beings - all of whom were alive, purposive, conscious - albeit in different ways, at different scales and timescales etc.

The motivation for creation, and why God should have created this kind of creation, was something I had found difficult to grasp (none of the usual explanations made much sense to me). But when I conceptualized God as the loving dyad of a man and woman, then it seemed obvious why such a combination would have wanted to create - including others who might eventually become like themselves.   

Furthermore, it did not seem possible that creation had arisen from any state of oneness of self-sufficiency, since this would make creation arbitrary; nor could creation arise from a tendency towards differentiation, because that would lead to meaningless-purposeless chaos. 

There must (I felt) have been some kind of original 'polarity' - in abstract and physics-like terminology, there would need to be at-least two different kinds of 'force', the interaction of which would be creation. Coleridge (also Barfield and Arkle) saw this in terms of a 'masculine'-tendency for expansion and differentiation; and a 'feminine'-tendency for one-ness and integration.  

But in terms of my (non-abstract) preferred metaphysics of beings and animistic assumptions; 'masculine' and 'feminine' simplifies to just a primordial man and a primordial woman; this would mean two complementary, unlike-but-of-the-same-kind, beings; the love of whom would lead to a desire for creation.  

(In the same kind of way that - in this mortal life - love of man and woman usually leads to a desire for procreation.)

At some point I validated this understanding by means of meditative prayer; by refining and asking a simple question, feeling that this question had 'got-through', and receiving a clear inner response.  

In summary; the above account is something-like the sequence by which I desired, concluded, became-convinced-by, the metaphysical assumption of God as Heavenly parents; by some such mixture of feelings, reasoning, and 'feedback'. 

All this happened a good while ago (about a decade); since when I have been interpreting things on the basis of this framework, and it seems to 'work', so far.

What the real-life, this world, implications are; include a reinforcement of the idea that the family is (and ought to be) the primary social structure; on earth as it is in Heaven; and a clarification of the nature of creation - starting with the primary creation by Heavenly parents and also including the secondary creation of beings (such as men and women) within primary creation. 

This metaphysics has further helped me understand both why and how love is the primary value of Christianity; i.e. because love made possible creation in the first place, and is the proper basis of 'coordinating' the subcreative activities of all the beings of creation.  

And it helped me understand how creation can be open-ended and expansile, without degenerating into chaos; because it is love that makes the difference.

Also, it helped me to understand the nature of evil; and how evil is related either to the incapacity for love or its rejection. Without love, the innate creativity of individual beings is going to be selfish and hostile to that of other beings: non-loving attitudes, thinking, and actions by beings, will tend to destroy the harmony of creation.  

I don't talk much about this understanding, and I often use the generic term 'God'; because it is difficult to explain briefly and clearly that the dyadic God of our Heavenly parents serves as a single and 'coherently unified' source of creation

But God is two, not one, because only a dyad can create, and creation must-be dyadic. 

And the dyadic just-is the one-ness of God the primal creator.  

Note added: It may be said, correctly, that the above does not depend on the Bible; but then neither does the metaphysics of orthodox-classical theology depend on scripture. We can find resonances and consistencies within the Bible - but assumptions such as: strict monotheism - creation ex nihilo (from nothing) by a God outside of creation and Time, the Athanasian Creed descriptions of the Trinity, God's omnipotence and omniscience, original sin... These are ideas that would not be derived-from a reading of scripture - the most that can be said is that someone who already ideas can find Biblical references that can be interpreted as consistent-with these assumptions. They are (apparently) products of philosophically sophisticated theologians who brought these ideas to Christianity from earlier and mostly pagan (Greek and Roman) sources. Also, these kinds of metaphysical assumption are theistic - to do with a personal god - but not specifically Christian. The salvific work of Jesus Christ (principally: making possible resurrected life everlasting in Heaven) was done within already-existing creation, and Christianity is not therefore an explanation of creation-as-such.   

Each birth is a death - and emergence of a new dyadic polarity

(Polarity is a term from Coleridge via Barfield meaning a dyadic relationship between two distinguishable but inseparable complementary elements - it implies that fundamental reality and priority of dynamic process - of creation and procreation. The prime polarity is love of two distinct, complementary, eternally wedded persons.)


Spiritual progression is a sequence of deaths and births.

The conception then birth of Jesus was the death of Jehovah, when Jehovah (who made this earth) became a part of a polar dyad with Man;  Jesus's baptism was the birth of Christ in dyadic polarity with the Holy Spirit; the resurrection of Jesus Christ required his death and a polarity with The Father.

Baptism and Marriage imply the death of a previous singleness and birth of a new dyadic polarity.

Truly to be born-again as a Christian is death of what we previously were; the birth of a child is the emergence of a new relationship of parenthood - and the death of our previous state.

An eternal marriage of a fully divine son and daughter of God is a recapitulation of the primal dyad - and the ultimate creative polarity; capable of procreation of new spirit children from primordial human 'intelligences' - as well as of 'normal' creation.

(I presume that marriage was the final stage in the theosis of Jesus Christ - by which he achieved the full nature of the Father; such is - I believe - represented in John's Gospel.)  

Because what emerges is a new polarity, to be Christian it is not a static state - it is the balance of a polarity - and that balance may go in either direction, even a long way towards apostasy, without the polarity being destroyed - so long as repentance is effectual.

(The sin against the Holy Ghost refers to the destruction of this polarity; which is non-viable, and a kind of death. Polar complements cannot be separated without destruction - perhaps into mere abstraction - of both parts.)

So at Christmas we celebrate a birth - which is also a death; complementary to Easter where we celebrate the same process with the opposite emphasis.

A birth is rightly to be celebrated; and for birth, death is necessary - including that death which terminates mortality and opens to resurrection.

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.   

"Masculinity" and "femininity" versus the actual person of Mother in Heaven

While I assume that God is Dyadic (a Heavenly Father and Mother) - this is something I have not really grasped, not does it correspond much with daily experience. 

Partly this may be because we Christians are intended to relate primarily to Jesus, rather than the primary creator; but partly it is because I tend to get "hung-up" on inaccurate and unhelpful assumptions relating to principles, rather than persons. 

An example of an unhelpful/ misleading conceptualization would be that of Coleridge's "polarity" between "two contrary forces, the one of which tends to expand infinitely ["masculine], while the other strives to apprehend or find itself in this infinity [feminine]". 

One such assumption is that habit of thinking of male and female in terms of being specific exemplifications of those abstractions: "masculinity" and "femininity"... Abstractions that are somehow floating unattached beyond time and space, and sort-of imposing-themselves-upon Beings (as it were to make them men, or women)...! 

Really; things must be otherwise. 

Our Heavenly Parents are those two Beings who (in actuality, not by any prior necessity) first committed to eternal love; and on that basis began divine creation. 

It is their two natures, originating as two Beings, that ramify through all of creation since.  

Thus male and female both structure and power creation; but in this personal way - derived from actual living, conscious, developing Beings; and not therefore in terms of abstract metaphysical forces or fields or tendencies. 

As (always?) with metaphysical realities, it is not possible to derive the metaphysics from empirical specifics (such as actual men and women) - nor is it possible to derive any particular empirical specifics from the metaphysical assumptions. 

If the universe truly is derived from a dyadic God; then that universe includes everything that exists, has existed, or could exist - and this reality (this Primary Creation) in which we dwell; includes not just divine creation, but also entropy/death and purposive evil. 

What this seems to mean - among many other things! - is that our experience of Mother in Heaven ought not to be pre-conceptualized in terms of an ideal earthly-mortal Mother, nor any other archetypal female conceptualization. 

Of course, if that is what we have decided in advance that we will find, then that is what we will find - and any female archetype really is there; but only as a selective, hence distorted, part of the reality. 

This stricture applies both to Goddess conceptualizations; and to the Blessed Virgin Mary - whom I regard as ultimately a selective and distorted representation of the reality of the actual person of Mother in Heaven.

(Albeit the veneration/worship of the Mary, Mother of Jesus has - in some times and places - been very valuable as such; and IMO far preferable overall to an exclusively "masculine" conceptualization of God.)

I think the difficulties of you and I experiencing the person of Mother in Heaven are therefore partly due to the nature of God the Creator - who is not personal in this world, in the way that Jesus Christ is personal; partly it is due to the ultimately-dyadic nature of God (and the consequent difficulty of disambiguating Father and Mother, who are necessarily participating-in each-other); and partly due to our usually false expectations concerning what She is like.   

So, what is She like? 

The best answer is: She is like who-She-is. 

...Which can be known - as here on earth - by personal experience, by getting-to-know a person. 

But She is not to be known in terms of exemplifying a list of supposed-female attributes, nor can any list of attributes validly communicate her reality.

Metaphysical polarity explained and illustrated

If polarity is to be the basic, fundamental, metaphysical principle of reality (as Coleridge and Barfield have convinced me) - then we need to understand how polarity works; understand this abstractly and also with an illustrative example.

The benefit of a metaphysics of polarity is that it explains both dynamic creativity and novelty - leading to an 'evolutionary' understanding of reality; and also it explains permanent order and the stability of itself.

For creativity there must be dynamism.

For dynamism there must be opposition in the system, opposition of two qualitatively-different forces.

Because they are qualitatively-different - the forces cannot be made one. 

For opposition to be perpetual, neither force must ever prevail.

If neither force ever prevails, this implies that the two opposed forces must be linked - such that strengthening one force also strengthens the other.

If the opposed forces are linked, they may be regarded as one force.

But the one force of a polarity is a two (dyad) that are one in a way that cannot, in principle, ever be unified into a single entity (because that would not be dynamic); nor can the two parts of the dyad ever be separated (because then the two would not be one).

An imaginary, illustrative example of a dyadic system 

A 'double star' consisting of two qualitatively different spheres - e.g. one iron, one copper - which orbit one another, at different velocities - and in orbiting they generate vortices that themselves become autonomous and generate dyadic-dissimilar star systems...

But the double star system has the property that it cannot be broken or combined; such that if the two  stars were to be forced together (to try and make them one) they would merely make a hybrid, an alloy; and if one of the stars was pulled away from its dyadic orbit, then it would be either iron or copper, but not the iron copper dyad.

So the double star can exist perpetually as a dynamic dyad, creatively giving rise to further dyads - and that dyad cannot be unified, nor can it be broken.

Another example - the man-women sex difference

Men and women are qualitatively different; they form a dyad in (ideal, celestial) marriage; this dyad is the whole-human and is creative - that is, generative of new and qualitatively different offspring who are always either male or female.

A man and a woman cannot be combined - if they were 'forced' together the result is a hybrid, or defective (hence uncreative), or neither one nor the other.

If men and women are forcibly separated, the result is not a full human being - but a partial (maimed) deficient entity; kept apart there can be no creative generation of further men and women.

With a man and a woman as an un-unifiable and unbreakable dyad; humankind can be perpetual. 

Reality is a duality - not unity; the duality is personal, not abstract

Is primary, first, reality single, a unity, undivided - yet containing everything: abstract, static, unchanging, no time nor movement; a bit like nothing, a circle, a universal sphere (one God - monotheism, without body, parts or passions)...

Or is reality two-fold, interactive, generative, dyadic, and dynamic; happening in-Time - two forces, a polarity; and abstract: like the yin-yang... 

Or is the primary reality two-fold like the above (interactive, generative, dyadic, and dynamic); but personal, Beings - a man and a woman (Heavenly Parents)...

This is metaphysics, one of the very first assumptions about reality: is ultimate truth one, or more-than-one; is it impersonal-abstract or personal?

Each metaphysical assumption sets-up a different reality, a different starting-point; with different problems and strengths, and tendencies.

Deciding which is a very important decision; and one that each person should make - explicitly.

Spiritual implications of the metaphysical complementarity of men and women

If, as I assume, all persons are either men or women; and this goes back to our primordial origins in the eternity of pre-mortal life and forward to the eternity of post-mortal life; then the consequences are vast - and largely unexplored.

There is no generic human - all individuals are part of a person and unity and wholeness come from the loving dyad of a man and woman.

What seems like (or is promoted as) a battle of the sexes, or vying for domination between sexes, or patriarchy versus feminism, is actually and properly (merely) a process of experiencing and learning. The ultimate reality of the situation towards which divine destiny is tending is the dyadic love of a man and woman true marriage: this is the only completion and wholeness of human life.

Now, when it comes to the situation of an individual in mortal life - this is bound to have some vital relevance; although it may not be (in fact, by design) the most important or prominent aspect of a specific individual's life.

(We each have different and unique primary needs for learning in this life - some lives end very quickly - even in the womb; some lives are constrained by serious handicap or disease or situation; some lives are celibate - more are unmarried; the sexes may be segregated or pitted against one another - or individuality crushed by society; and many cultures have-been and are actively hostile to even an approximation of true-divine marriage.)

Due to the radical incompleteness of each sex, the relationship between men and women goes far, far beyond the realm of reproduction - and includes all the highest and most important aspects of thinking.

It isn't just that men and women think differently, have different abilities and dispositions; it is that only when there is a dyadic fusion of both a man and a woman, then the fullness and truth of perception, insight, knowledge and creativity can be.

(This applies to individual persons - a man and a woman; and it also applies if or when there is a true, organic, familial society - the men as a real group, and the women as a real group, will have analogous complementarity. The 'social organism' is intended, destined, to be complementary also.)  

What is the ultimate role of 'the feminine' in divine creation?

Many writers on theology (in many religions, including Christianity) believe that the masculine principle is primary in divine creation; the feminine being secondary, or perhaps inessential.  

Or else, they believe that such sexual differentiation is superficial, and that primarily/ originally there is no sex, no masculine or feminine - but a single creative principle that includes both. 

Others believe that sex is merely an earthly and mortal accident or expedient; and that the highest form of after-life entails loss of sexual differentiation (either as spirit, or as resurrected Man). 

But I regard God as a loving dyad of man and woman, masculine and feminine; and that original divine creation comes from this creative love. 

This dyadic quality is not a matter of 'equality' - it is simply that both man and woman are the actual basis of this divine creation that we all inhabit. 

A man and woman, who are coherent on the basis of love, were and are the true spiritual 'unit' of both divine and human creativity: thus God (the prime creator) is a Heavenly Father and Mother - both. 

The destiny of individual mortal men and women is a different question. Each person's mortal and resurrected destiny is unique - and we are not supposed to conform to a template, not be poured-into a standard human (or male, or female) mould. Love of God first, and fellow Man second, is mandatory for salvation - because only such persons want Heaven. 

Thus woman/ the feminine is Not subordinate to man/ masculine - both are absolutely spiritually necessary; just as (by analogy) both have been necessary for reproduction in this mortal life. 

We were not originally, nor will we ultimately become, de-sexed or a single sex. The dyad goes 'all the way down' to before creation; because dyadic love was what made creation possible. 

Ultimately; in absence of both - there cannot be love, therefore no real creation nor creativity. 

How do I 'know' this? Simply by having formulated the question; after which it 'answered itself' as these things do. I other words by 'intuition', by direct knowing. 

By contrast, when I asked other questions, when I formulated my understanding in other ways; I came up with answers that did not suffice - as became clear after a while.

This is not the kind of thing that anyone should accept from external sources - not from me, nor anybody else, nor institutions. 

We are supposed-to discern such matter for ourselves - and there is no substitute for this conscious choice. 

(Probably, it was not always thus - at times and among some peoples, it was right that Men be ruled spiritually by their environment or society or church - but here-and-now we must choose consciously.)

To know-for-ourselves, from experience, the nature and motivation of God is perhaps the primary task of Man here and now; given that almost-all external sources of such 'information' are deeply corrupted. 

At the very least, we need to exercise experiential direct personal discernment in relation to the external sources that we choose to accept as authoritative; for instance, choosing a denomination and church; and then choosing-between the conflicting views emanating from denominations and churches. The requirement for each individual person to discern is unavoidable. 

Having gone through this process of discernment - rooted in formulating a question such that the answer is coherently self-validating in ones actual and examined life - I don't really care what 'other people' say about the problem - and certainly will not abandon my direct knowledge of such matters on the basis of people pointing at 'authorities' whose authority to determine my spiritual life I do not acknowledge!

Others should do likewise. 

And what if/ when they come up with 'a different answer? What then?

What then depends upon each individual for himself or herself. Group-orientated policies and behavioural/ belief compulsions can have nothing to do with such matters. 

But whatever happens in each mortal life, we certainly should not attempt to avoid personal responsibility for deciding upon such matters. Salvation is between each Man and God (God would not have it otherwise!); and 'my' salvation depends on 'me' discerning the nature and motivation of God. 

Positive and Negative theology

I first came across the idea of a Positive (as well as a Negative) Christian theology in the writings of Charles Williams - he also called it Romantic Theology and the Via Affirmativa or the path of affirmation of images. The general idea was that Christian theology had typically been a path of negation, denial, asceticism, celibacy - but that there was also a (neglected) path focused on romantic love, art and poetry, richness of imagery etc. Williams regarded these as equal alternatives.

But it is hard to see how they could be equal, since they are so different - alternatives, yes, but in real life one or other of such vastly different paths is surely to be preferred; one or another must become the focus of societal aspiration and organization - one cannot aim both at being a celibate, solitary ascetic hermit or monk; and also at being a husband and father engaged with 'the world'.

Charles Williams knew (so far as I can find) nothing about Mormonism - and he would likely have found it to be boring or unpleasant if he had known anything - but Mormonism has for a long time been advocating and practicing something pretty close to Positive Theology: a Christian 'way' focused on marriage, family and engagement; and with no tradition of monasticism or the eremitic (reclusive) life.


Fundamentally I believe there are very different aspects of human psychology at work behind the positive and negative paths. The negative path aims at the relief of suffering, and the positive path at making life more fulfilling.

To feel the desire for the Christian negative path seems to me a desire to escape the sufferings of this world and live, instead, in a state of static bliss - absorbed in a permanent communion with God (who is, in essence, an abstract entity about which nothing positive may be asserted): doing nothing, simply being.

In the negative path, Love is seen as a sameness, a fusion of wills, the loss of barriers and all strangeness.

And there is no sex - indeed there are no sexes: maleness and femaleness are lost.


To desire the positive path is to wish that the best things in life be amplified and sustained - it also stems from the concern that static bliss would (sooner or later) become boring; and the conviction that the only thing which is not, ultimately, boring is actual, real, other-persons.

The dyadic goal of Mormon salvation can be seen in this light - the ultimate bliss is not the state of an individual soul in permanent communion with God, it is a man and woman in a permanent and divine Loving relationship at the centre of a network of loving relationships including God the Father and Jesus Christ (who are solid persons).

The difference between this version of the positive ideal and the negative ideal is profound - because in a permanent and eternal dyadic and sexual relationship between husband and wife, there would not be a desire for fusion and sameness but rather a delight in fundamental and complementary difference.


Sexual difference, and sexuality, both entail difference - a you and a me: not communion nor fusion nor loss of self nor consciousness. Instead a perpetual delight that 'we' are not the same, but 'fit together'. There needs to be the perpetual possibility of being delight-fully surprised; which means that there can never be full communion. Indeed if communion is full, it renders void the separateness and necessity of the dyad.

If a husband and wife become one, they stop being husband and wife.

There is indeed a desire for surprise, for open-ended possibilities. Once static bliss is put aside as a goal; it becomes essential that eternal life be interesting, rewarding, creative and (in some sense) progressive or evolutionary - changing, growing, developing without end-point or end. Otherwise - if life were static, or merely cyclical - it would become predictable and boring, and we would prefer a state of blissful loss of self.


It seems to me that Heaven must either be mostly like either the Negative or Positive ideal and that God would have a preference between these goals for Man - but I do not see why Heaven would have to be exclusively the one or the other.

So I see the Positive Way as primary, and God's first wish for us, and the basis upon which eternal life and Heaven are organized. But I see the Negative Way as an option available (on Earth and in Heaven) to those who - more than anything - wish to escape from suffering and hope to lose-them-selves in blissful communion with the divine.


Note added: Charles Williams descriptions of Positive Theology are at least difficult to understand, and probably fundamentally incoherent - this is because Positive Theology is metaphysically Pluralist - or at least implies this; while Charles Williams was very much a Monist who sought always to reduce apparent dichotomies (e.g. Good and evil) to unity.

If relationship is an ultimate goal and possibility, then there must be at least two irreducible entities to have the relationship - because if Man and Woman can be reduced to one, and Man with God can be reduced to one, then reality is One; and Positive Theology merely an indirect and off-route means to the same end as that which Negative Theology aims-at directly: viz oneness.

So Mormons - as pluralists - are the true Romantic theologians; and Charles Williams is fundamentally and ineradicably confused!

The mind-to-mind contact of primary thinking is always mutual, shared; involving two (or more) beings

For some years I have been trying to understand the distinction between what might be termed primary thinking and mundane thinking...

In which primary thinking is assumed to come from our real/ eternal/ divine selves and is objectively real (primary thinking affects reality, and does so in a direct way - i.e. without needing physical modes of communication)...

While mundane thinking is the ordinary subjective stuff that grinds-away (sometimes unconsciously, sometimes as the stream of consciousness) in response to memories, outer perceptions, external manipulations etc; and in accordance with psychological mechanisms. 

Mundane thinking is "merely" subjective in the sense that it is inner, personal, cut-off; and (of itself) does not directly influence any other beings or the world in general. 

For me; this is a matter of absolutely core interest and concern - fundamental to my life and its purpose. It's a subject I cannot leave alone, nor do I want to neglect it 

Following-on; I have often explored why primary thinking is so difficult, so rare, so hard to initiate and continue. 

Yesterday it struck me that the answer may be implied by the fact (or assumption) that primary thinking is not private and subjective; but that primary thinking, on the contrary is linked-with, actively participates-in, ongoing divine creation.

This implies that we are not doing primary thinking unless we are in direct contact with another Being. 

Put negatively; we cannot do primary thinking unless our thinking is being-shared with another being. 

Or, positively expressed, we are thinking primarily when we are in a situation that I've sometimes called direct knowing. 

What is meant by "direct" is that there is no intermediary. Normal mundane knowing works by communication - by a message being sent, received, interpreted etc - but there is (indeed there must be, for there to be any knowing at all) potential for a direct, mind-to-mind way of sharing thinking, of simultaneous thinking. 

But it wasn't until yesterday that I realized this implies, or rather it entails, that primary thinking can only be done "in collaboration". 

We cannot do primary thinking on our own ("in our own heads"), which is perhaps why primary thinking so often seems impossible  no matter hard we strive for it... 

Indeed the striving for it often seems to block primary thinking; presumably because it merely intensifies the cut-off and subjective nature of mundane thinking. 

What I'm saying is that primary thinking happens, and only happens, when we are in "mind to mind" and direct contact with another being - which might be a living human being, or some other kind of being.

This "other kind of being" could be almost any kind of being; e.g. a deceased and resurrected human, animal, an angelic spirit, the Holy Ghost...

But (as I've said elsewhere) primary thinking is intrinsically good in the sense that it is a participation in divine creation. 

So, the "other kind of being" could not be an evil-affiliated being; at least not while such a being, is currently-actively rejecting-of or hostile-to God and divine creation. 

In sum, primary thinking is a dyadic activity at minimum - or could involve more than two beings that are actively, currently, in real time - actually sharing thinking directly and without mediation. 

To do primary thinking we must first be aligned with God's creative will, and secondarily must mutually be participating in thinking with another God-aligned being. 

(I'm not sure; but it might even be that primary thinking is only possible when there is some degree of a love relationship between beings.)

This could explain why primary thinking is rare and tends to be brief; but also suggests how it might become more frequent and sustained - in that our striving should be aimed toward discovering the right kind of "contact" with the right kind of other beings - and this contact essentially needs to happen at a spiritual (not material) level. 

I'm not suggesting "a recipe for primary thinking", and I don't possess one...

Indeed, since I am saying that primary thinking is rooted in fundamental mutuality, harmony with divine creation, and indeed perhaps love; it cannot be attained by any standard method or procedure! It is another kind of thing altogether. 

But maybe this "dyadic" perspective will stop me from pursuing futile and counter-productive efforts; and perhaps point me in the right direction. 

The evilness of evil (in a pluralist universe)

*

The reason that mainstream theologians have persisted for 2000 years with monism (and an Omni- concept of God) despite the insoluble and fundamental problems these cause for Christianity is that they want to be able to say that God is necessarily good - i.e. that the goodness of God is built-into reality, part of the existence of the universe; and therefore that to oppose God is to be irrational (i.e. they want to be able to state that evil is simply irrational).

(Note: this doesn't actually work, because it makes evil into a kind of insanity rather than a deliberate choice of evil. For instance, Satan could not rationally choose to rebel against God and reject salvation, and because he is a high angel who would know for certain the terrible consequences of rebellion; this framework makes Satan into a kind of lunatic or demented creature, rather than truly-evil).

Pluralism would regard this as a mistaken purpose in theology since it makes a universe where choice is meaningless and Man is a puppet. Such a universe is incompatible with Christianity.

(i.e. Incompatible in a common sense way. But obviously if theology is allowed to get-away-with recourse to paradox and mysticism then anything is possible - and paradox and mysticism have duly been built-into mainstream intellectual Christianity since not long after the death of the Apostles - e.g. in describing the nature of Christ, the Holy Trinity and the operations of free will.)

*

As I understand it, pluralism starts with assumptions and a situation that 'just is' and cannot be (or does not need to be) explained further - and the main assumption is the God is God - He is just there.

(And, for Mormons, so is Mother in Heaven 'just there' - because reality is dyadic, male and female are two complementary and irreducible parts that together make unity. ^See note below)

God is inside the already existing universe of reality (matter or 'stuff') which is also 'just there' and has certain properties which are understood by us as the laws of nature including the principles of beauty and morality.

We Men (and other intelligences) were also 'just there' but as some kind of essence that lacked self-awareness.

*

God (and, for Mormons, Mother in Heaven) then made us into self-aware 'children of God' so that now we are all related to God and to each other - relationships (or one enormously large family with multiple sub-families) is the reality of the situation in which we find ourselves.

Therefore, 'good' is to choose to live in accordance with these relationships, as established by God; evil is to reject these relationships and aim to live as solitary and self-sufficient gods. (This is pride.)

*

So evil is a choice. It is not necessarily irrational, it is not necessarily dishonest - except that it seems always to involve a denial of the true situation and of our debt to God - but evil can be a hatred and rejection of the divine families in which we find ourselves - perhaps a hatred of God for forcing us to become self-conscious (and therefore liable to suffer) and to having saddled us with unasked-for responsibilities to our divine parents and siblings.

I think it is at least conceivable that a person might simply choose to reject self consciousness, and/or family ties  and aspire to live utterly alone. By the mercy of God this state could be made into an unselfconscious bliss; but this state too might be rejected and the person would then live in 'hell' of utter and self-imposed eternal and self-aware solitude.

The evil of this 'hell' comes from rejecting divine relationships but clinging to selfhood; rejecting gratitude and responsibility towards God but clinging to God-given powers.

*

The primary moral decision in the history of reality was therefore that God (and Mother in Heaven) unilaterally decided to 'make' us into self-conscious personages, to make us into His children. His motive for this was love and our own benefit, just as the motive of earthly parents for 'making' children should be love and the children's own benefit - nonetheless it was unilateral, and is irreversible.

Consequently, because God is loving; I think it must have been the case that God made provision for us to opt-out of this situation in which we find ourselves, and to return to primordial unawareness and unpersonhood.

This is why I believe God has made provision for 'Nirvana' i.e. what feels-like loss of self/ personhood, and reabsorption into the blissful state of His goodness.

This is not an actual stripping away of our status as Sons and Daughters of God - that is irreversible - but it does allow a non-evil choice to reject the basic situation in which we find ourselves - to reject self-awareness, incarnation, intelligence, power and everything else. 

To 'return' to original un-consciousness.

*

But these are all choices: suboptimal, sad - but self-chosen and self-inflicted. They are simply a consequence of the reality of agency/ free will.

The evilness of evil is really about the gratuitous spitefulness of trying to wreck the self-consciousness and divine family relationships which other people want and have chosen; of trying to persuade other people to inhabit 'hell' as some kind of eternal consolation for the misery of one's own choice of hell. 

*

^The other explanation for God in a pluralist universe is an infinite regress - i.e. that God the Father and Heavenly Mother are children of previous Gods, are children of previous Gods, and so on forever. But this amounts to the same thing as saying 'just there' - it is merely substituting a process which is 'just there' for entities which are 'just there'.

What is the single most important and positive thing that differentiates Mormonism from mainstream Christianity in the modern West?

The 'dyadic exaltation' aspect of Mormon theology increasingly seems like the key issue: the doctrine that while salvation is available to all (if they choose it), the highest theosis (state of divinity) is for a husband and wife (and their family) united in eternal marriage.

Therefore, marriage and family are at the very heart of God's plan for the salvation and exaltation of Man. 

There is essentially nothing Biblical to support this doctrine, and it was never known to be a feature of the historical and traditional Christian churches; nonetheless you can see that Christians seem independently to have 'discovered' something of the sort at various times and places.

The fact that Joseph Smith made it explicit, and received revelations on this topic - is (for me) a compelling proof of, or reason for, the necessity for the Mormon Restoration of the Gospel - because without explicit revelation on this topic, the core necessity for marriage and family is simply not strong enough in other Christian churches to survive (even in principle) the long term destructive pressures being put onto marriage and family in modern secular societies.

Why not strong enough? Because Catholics are tempted to retreat into celibacy as being (anyway) their highest form of spiritual life; while Protestants/ Evangelicals are tempted to retreat into the individuality of Grace (without any need for any particular earthly arrangements).

And all non-Mormon Christians regard marriage as 'merely' a temporary expedient of earthly and mortal life while will disappear in Heaven - thus, insofar as they develop an other-worldly and post-mortal perspective (as Christians should) - so mainstream Christians will tend to downgrade the importance of marriage and family.

Thus mainstream Christians are not doctrinally compelled to defend marriage and family. And M&F are incrementally and rapidly collapsing in mainstream Christianity. And this collapse of marriage and family will (and is intended to) take down those Christian churches. Not just in theory - but here and now, as things actually are, in the modern secular West.


Anti-Christian Secular Leftism has evolved and probed at mainstream Christianity over the generations, attacking here and attacking there, and it has at last found this weakness - this Achilles heel  - of marriage; and have broken through, and the churches have given-way, and the enemy is pouring into the breach. 

Only Mormonism explains why marriage and family are of eternal significance - plenty of Christians feel that this is so, and that marriage and family are (somehow, potentially) of primary and eternal importance - but only Mormons can actually back this up with revelation incorporated into theology.

My interpretation is their either: 

1. It was intended (by God) that the early stage of Christianity was to be dominated by celibate ascetics (because he foresaw the effects of the collapse of Empire) - but this has changed in the Latter Days. Or else:

2. That the necessary revelations about marriage and family were either lost or eliminated from the scriptural record - and were not, in the end, restored by the Reformation (as perhaps God hoped) due to an excessive and exclusive focus on the Bible, and the contingent but rooted Protestant misunderstanding that there was no other legitimate source of revelation (the falsehood that the Bible is sufficient, and uniquely sufficient; as well as necessary). 

Therefore the Restoration of the Gospel by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints became necessary - to complete the unfinished work of the Reformation, and to correct the deformities which had arisen in consequence.

Of course there is a lot more to Mormonism than that - but as things stand in the West this is probably the single most important and most relevant thing. 

Whether the CJCLDS can continue to withstand the sustained and increasingly aggressive attack on its core doctrines by modern secular Leftism is another matter - but at least they are core doctrines for the LDS, so things are set up as well as they could be. 

As always, it is up to people to be courageous and discerning.  

Note: http://en.fairmormon.org/Mormon_ordinances/Marriage/Eternal_marriage

This Romantic era and the end of all groups...

Rudolf Steiner prophecied that there would be a second coming of Christ 'in the etheric' from about 1933 - and somehow Anthroposophists still believe that this has actually happened; despite that the 'evidence' for this event includes the coming to power of National Socialism in Germany!

And since the hippies of the middle 1960s, there has been a constant undercurrent with waves of belief in a happening and incipient New Age of the spirit, of enhanced consciousness. The term New Age itself became popular in the 1980s with much activity related to neo-shamanism, neo-paganism etc.; and in the late 90s the coming millenium led to another crest of expectation. Then there was another surge of excitement related to the Mayan Calendar ending on the winter solstice of December 2012.

There is currently, I think, another post 2016 resurgence of belief that there is an awakening of Western Man, a mass seeing-through of the lies and propaganda of the Illuminati - this supposedly signalled by a increased populism and higher profile (including banning) of people like David Icke, Julian Assange and Alex Jones specifically, alternative/ 'conspiracy' theories of politics and society more generally. Many apparently expect major positive spiritual and consciousness change - and soon.

What fascinates me is not so much the expectation, but how - time after time - people can become convinced that the New Age is actually happening.

People who claim that there are more people haveing more spiritual experiences (more visions, more miracles, more paranormal events...); that there is a massive change enhancement of spiritual interests - a shift away from materialism, consumerism, the mainstream. That people are becoming more idealistic, more elevated in consciousness and so on. Not just the hope of change, but a conviction that chnage is already ongoing and afoot.


I have heard such things claimed by hundreds of people, spread over many decades; and flying in the face of very obvious, massive and relentless (albeit stepwise and incremental) increases in materialism, consumerism, politicisation, bureaucracy, progressive narrowing of minds and public discourse; increases in surveillance, propaganda advertising, micro-social control. 

How does this happen? How can people believe the opposite of what is obvious in the face of what one would suppose to be contrary evidence?  If the burning of the Reichstag really counts as evidence for the second coming of Christ (as I have heard several eminent Anthroposophists claim), then surely anything can prove anything!

My feeling is that it is to do with the way that groups work on the individual - and the way that  individuals have usually known truth. The New Age types of spirituality are strongly associated with 'group work' of various kinds, and I think it is the 'psychodynamics' of groups that explain the sense of objective spiritual progress that comes to grip so many minds so strongly.


A small intense group can, it seems, come to believe and validate almost anything. The groups have experiences together - whether that be visions, mediumship, channeling. or experiences in relation to UFOs, megaliths or crop circles; and the process by which knowledge and emotions reflect back-and-forth within the group, combined with relations of authority and discipleship and emotional dependence and support, can create an experience of amplification and increase - that is felt as a generalised awakening in The World.

On top of this the expansion of mass media and bureaucracy has affected all forms of organisation - so that there are more books, materials and media generally on almost every topic - including all kinds of spirituality. Organisations that survive have (almost always) either become very intensely inter-personal (as described above) - or else have grown, combined, become professionalised, subsidised... become gripped by the perspective of management, public relations and propaganda (as can be seen from web pages and brochures).

So that it becomes normal within nearly-all groups to perceive that things are moving in the desired direction. After all, that is what people in groups tell each other, and to be a group-member that must be believed.  


This is another reason why I think that this Romantic era implies the end of all groups except for the family, marriage and close friendships (usually dyadic). In sum; I have come to believe that all other forms of human groups have become agents for creating and sustaining delusions.

The New Age delusion, in its various forms, is just one of many such. And the way-out is for each individual to take full responsibility for his own assumptions, love, faith, beliefs and hopes; and adhere strongly only to those personally affirmed by direct intuition.

In this sense, we are On Our Own - but of course, we are never truly on our own, and that is the other side of this Romantic era; we are in society with the divine, the dead and all those whom we love. And it is the reality of that relational experience which makes possible the radical autonomy that is being compelled upon us.

The pseudo-dilemma of being forced/ encouraged to take a side between evils; when we are being-manipulated by false-delineation of the sides

As I have often said; it seems to me that the Ahrimanic Sorathic struggle is very evident in the Arrakis war - with the Sorathic-demon servers current triggering extraordinary acts of nihilistic (and indeed suicidal) provocation; while Ahrimanic affiliates are trying to maintain control of the envelope, and daily re-applying veneers of geopolitical pseudo-logic. 

This is exactly the kind of characteristically "End Times" danger that I was brooding about a few years ago; when there are only two allowed options in public discourse - chaotic destructiveness or globalist-bureaucratic totalitarianism. 

It superficially seems obvious positively​ to take the side of Systemic evil - e.g. of favouring more "peace" instead of uncontrollable war - and then one too easily finds oneself, for example, pinning hopes on that deeply evil-motivated organization the UN!

I'm sure this kind of pseudo-dilemma (ie. trying to induce us to take one of two sides, both of which are ultimately evil in motivation and methods) is something deliberately planned and sustained.

One of "Their" tricks is to mis-describe the sides: to falsely delineate who is actually fighting whom. 

For example the Fire Nation is fighting the globalist West - and the West is merely using the nation that is the venue of conflict: using them to the point of annihilation and (currently) beyond. 

This is obscured by the suicidal complicity of those being-used; yet this is not a surprise because self-destructiveness is a standard feature of modern, Not Religious, Man. Self-destruction is the inevitable ultimate consequence of unrepented sin; and resentment is maybe the most powerful and common of unrepented sins of this era. 

False delineation of sides is also evident in the Arrakis war (where there are no good sides, and the Western Establishment is unequally split - and supports both of them). 

As in the Fire Nation war; the actual venue of conflict is not one of the two real "sides"; but is merely the location of a war between much larger powers - and thereby is currently, rapidly, being-annihilated. 

And, as with the FN war; the Western side is motivated by powerful, long-term, unrepented - indeed celebrated - resentments - fuelled by fear, which is itself deliberately fuelled. 

Something somewhat analogous applies to the other side - so that the desired outcome on both sides is annihilation of the other - but the most probable outcome is de facto annihilation of both sides: which is why I regard this as ultimately a Sorathic war. 

My point about the need for accurate delineation of sides is that the mainstream, official and media sources persistently misrepresent these conflicts as being "about" the smaller, venue-nations; whereas in reality the venue nations are actually victims (albeit, to a variable but significant extent, complicit victims) of external manipulation . 

"In a rational world" we would not personally be concerned by the doings of remote places; yet because of Western complicity, funding, intervention, geopolitical strategizing - we Just Are involved. 

Not having an opinion is hardly possible with mainstream mas and social media and official saturation coverage; as it was hardly possible with the birdemic-peck, or the antiracism of "MLB". No opinion, "neutrality" or a balanced-view is always - in practice - treated as taking a side.  

Therefore in practice; we must take a view. 

But we ought not to take a side in situations where both sides are evil (albeit evil of different types and motivations); when the choice of sides amounts to a choice between inwardly supporting either demonic chaos or demonic control - because that is precisely what They are attempting to manipulate us into doing. 

The dilemma is not, in reality, "di" - and there are other options and alternatives. By making it a choice of evils; the attempt is strategically-distraction from what we, as Christians and as dyadic direct-knowers, ought to be committing our-selves to. 

Evangelism in an officially-evil world: the Fourth Gospel perspective continues to unfold...

I find that I cannot stop the incremental process of restructuring that was initiated by my reading the Fourth Gospel as the primary and most authoritative source of revelation on Jesus Christ. In particular, the implications that Jesus brought resurrection to eternal life - specifically resurrection. I feel that resurrection is much more important, and much simpler (child-like) than I have been aware.

That, for another day perhaps.

In a strange way, the function of the Fourth Gospel has been to clarify that the work of Christ did not depend upon any gospel; his work was primarily to make possible our resurrection to life eternal. The work was done, it was done well - and in a vital sense nothing more needed to be done.

From that point, it was up to each individual person to make the choice of whether to follow Jesus. That is, to love, trust, have faith in - and also literally follow Jesus through death to resurrection into life eternal, in Heaven, as members of the divine family.

For this decision, revelation is not necessary since we all know Jesus from our pre-mortal spirit lives - so that when we have died (biologically) we will know (recall) what it means to follow him, and will then choose.

This was and is a necessary part of the plan, since salvation could not be made to depend upon contingencies such as date or place of birth or parents. God will ensure that each gets what is needed for this decision, but cannot (because of the absolute nature of freedom) assure that the revelation and scriptures, teachings and authorities, are correct and correctly-motivated.

Which is just as well! Because - from a Fourth Gospel perspective - major errors and distortions were built into the Christian denominations, theology and churches from as far back as is known. If men were reliant upon the validity of teaching, ritual and scriptures, and the validity of their own ability and motivation to interpret these, salvation would resemble a lottery with very poor odds.

And a lottery with poor odds is Not the kind of world that would be made for us, by a loving God who is our Father, and is also the creator of this world.

For Christians this world must (surely?) be fit-for-purpose - yes?


This world is God's creation, and it is well designed for its core purpose. From each person's individual perspective, that purpose is to give us experiences from which we can learn in ways that will benefit us in the coming life eternal (if we choose it). What happens during this mortal life is (from God's perspective) therefore about theosis - the process of becoming more divine, living more divinely - this world is Not primarily about salvation.

That is (ultimately) why we do not remember our pre-mortal lives - for theosis we must live this life with full realism; not as a temporary prelude to eternity. We need to be separated from immersion in the divine in order to choose, freely, our own future - do we choose loving creation, or do we reject it? 

It is the demonic powers who try to make this mortal life about salvation, by trying to induce people to reject Jesus.

Some will do this naturally, spontaneously (some demons have always been evil, since eternity); but some individuals have a choice. Up to that last decision whether or not to accept or reject Jesus's gift to dwell in Heaven in a life of creativity and love; anyone can decide for Jesus (this is what repentance is about, and its absolute power).

To induce such people to reject Jesus is difficult, because it entails them embracing an inversion of values - such that good and evil, virtue and sin, beauty and ugliness, truth and lies become inverted. However, we can see that this is possible, because mainstream modern Western society is already 'officially' and extremely value-inverted society.

All that modern people have to do is go along with the mainstream moral, aesthetic and bureaucratic practises; and they will quite 'naturally' choose hell in preference to Heaven, having decided that Hell is the 'real' Heaven, and Heaven is 'really' a place of evil (full of judgemental, hypocritical 'haters').

However, getting the mass of people to reach this inverted state has been a long, multi-generational, delicate process of subversion. The main (not the only, but the major) weapon has been the sexual revolution - such that the demands of sex and (now) sexuality have gradually weakened, demolished and replaced the entirety of the innate, natural and spontaneous value system of humankind.

So, that is the current situation - made possible by the decisions of millions of individuals to reject the gift of Jesus Christ, for all kinds of reasons - and the effect that such has had upon modern Western society.


But - Nothing Has Gone Wrong with what Jesus did 2000 years ago. The Plan has not been sabotaged or anything of that sort - although the mix of personnel has changed, although the nature of social pressures has changed; the ultimate situation is the same now as it was from the time of Jesus's ministry and death, resurrection and ascension.

Each of us still has exactly the same chance of accepting the gift of Jesus; about which we already know from pre-mortal life, and which we will recall after death. I am not saying that each person has exactly the same odds of making such an acceptance, because in the first place these are incalculable, and secondly that is the wrong way to regard our situation.

We need to get used to regarding our situation in a very personal and responsible fashion. This is a great advantage of this modern, Western era. The pervasive evil of our society means that any honest and virtuous person will distrust external authority, and will realise that external authority is arbitrary and labile at best - and over the long term is evil in motivation.

This means that we are each being all-but compelled to take explicitly direct and personal responsibility for our life choices, for our understanding of our situation, for our salvation. This has, in fact, always been the true situation - but in the past a passive, externally-regulated person could go through life without being confronted by the stark fact of it - and this was itself an extremely spiritually hazardous situation, since the ultimate choice was unavoidably personal.


What does this imply for Christian teaching and evangelism. Does it mean that it is unnecessary or futile?

No, it does not. We should learn from the current vast and pervasive environment of evil propaganda that personal choice can be influenced. We are each a part of the environment for 'other people'. Recalling that all this operates at a strictly individual level - what we personally say and do, how we personally think and behave, is a part of the environment that God can use to help other people in their theosis. We are part of the experience of others.

Some people are solidly evil, have made their choices; some would find Heaven intolerable, some are dedicated to the destruction of creation. It would indeed be futile to evangelise such people - even if, as is possible, they are a large majority of the population in the West.

But other individuals are evil because they have been induced into inversion and have chosen that which will make them miserable (even though many people will double-down on that which makes them miserable). These are the people who are open to a change of heart.

A person who is well-motivated - that is motivated (at that particular moment) by truth, beauty and virtue - may make a positive difference... of course! We know this from our own experience, don't we?

The best and most powerful motivation is love - and I believe it is operative post-mortem and at the actual moment of choice for or against Heaven. But effective love is essentially dyadic, and can't be compelled or made; and saving love has a narrow range. The 'benign altruism' kind of love espoused by preachers and edifying writers (such as myself!) is a very different and much weaker thing than real interpersonal love. 

So, evangelism is (as everyone already knows) something that all Christians should do at some level - that hasn't changed, ever; and that level ought to be personal - not systematic (not necessarily systematic). If done once, for one person - and it hits home, and if it helps towards a change of heart...

Well... given what is at stake, that of itself would be a cosmically vast achievement.

Perhaps a womanly and procreative aspect of God is necessary for a solid belief in eternal life?

I am re-reading Geoffrey Ashe's fascinating study The Virgin (1976), which is focused on Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ (Ashe was a Roman Catholic) - but takes in the broader perspective of goddesses throughout history, in a non-hostile - indeed sympathetic - fashion. 

He makes the stimulating suggestion that a Goddess was primal in ancient spirituality, because she was the assumed basis of the procreative hence creative; and that some form of female deity is needed for Men really to believe in a life beyond life. 

The idea is that a supreme male deity cannot sustain belief in a full life beyond life. So that when the ruling Goddess goes; the afterlife becomes very partial, ghostly, and all-but irrelevant. 

Male deities could never bestow life of their own nature as the Mother had done. Zeus and his colleagues were immortal, but they did not transmit that quality to their human subjects... 

Through most civilized and semi-civilized lands... death ceased to be a passage to a future life... the dead were no longer pictured as significantly existing. They were reduced to feeble, bloodless shades in a gloomy underworld. For the Greeks this was Hades...

With the fading of the Eternal-Womanly, with her cutting-down or anathematisation, [for the vast majority, with extremely few exceptions] death had become the end with no prospect of rebirth. 

Israel's shift was similar... The Old Testament has no doctrine of survival or return... the dead become shades. They do down to an underworld called Sheol, The Grave.

The sole Israelite immortality is collective... God's chosen community...  

I think it likely that Ashe is "on to something" here. 

In the book; Ashe is preparing the ground for an attempted explanation of the rise of Mary the mother of Jesus as a more and more important focus of Christian faith - recognizing that this phenomenon cannot be accounted for by Scripture, or by the practices of the earlier generations of Christians. 

With Mariolatry (Ashe says) we seem to be dealing with some kind of deep and direct apprehension of spiritual reality, probably coming from grassroots, bottom-up, the "masses". Christian leaders and theologians seem merely to have been trying to explain and validate theoretically something that already was beginning to become important in practice. 

From my own experience; I find it striking that Mormonism included a very strong element of the "Eternal-Womanly" with its dyadic deity composed of Father and Mother in Heaven. 

And - perhaps in consequence? - the "Mormon culture of salvation" was (at least until fairly recently) probably the most vividly lived and believed-in form of Christian afterlife among the major Christian churches. 

The spiritually unsatisfactory and unconvincing nature of one-sidedly masculine, Christianity is something I find very striking. I mean the monochrome hardness, negativity, heartlessness, legalism and this-worldliness of Mary-rejecting forms of Protestantism is something I feel is very evident. It is one reason why England ceased to be "Merrie" with the reformation.

But there is something of this in all of Christianity. 

(And this defect has not-at-all been ameliorated, let alone cured, by the dominant trend towards secular materialism in all the Christian churches, which comes-in on the back of leftist ideology. Spiritual problems can only be made worse by "liberalization" - which is actually and always covert apostasy.) 

Insisting upon the non-sexual nature of God does not work either - this is just an attempt to escape contradictions absences and by raising abstractions; which has the effect of confusing people - and thereby impairing motivations.

Furthermore, the idea and ideals of ultimate transcendence of sexuality point away from Christianity (rooted in Jesus, the divine incarnate mortal Man) and towards Oneness spirituality, where (eventually) every-thing merges with everything else - in a timeless stasis.   

The problem is that it does not really make deep theoretical and theological sense to insert Mary alongside the (masculine) Trinity; and she is therefore always accorded an ultimately secondary and intercessionary" role in creation - no matter how central is her position in everyday worship (eg. devotion to the Rosary, or Marian icons). 

But even worthwhile degrees of habitual lifestyle and provision of psychological comfort are insufficient motivations in a world so dominated by evil-affiliated institutions. 

In our unavoidably self-conscious era; these inner contradictions about Mary have become nigh-lethal to strong Christian faith - as is evident all around us.

 

This is why I regard Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Mariolatry as "on the right lines" but ultimately insufficient and unsatisfactory. 

And, as Ashe described , this requisite kind of development can only come from directly apprehended knowledge - it is not already existent. 

To emphasize: what is required is not something that can honestly be derived from existing Scripture, theology or history.

Furthermore it needs to arise bottom-up; which means from individuals, not institutions.  

If modern Men are to grasp and retain the needful structuring-focus on resurrected eternal life; if we are to live-by knowledge of Heaven; then we will need explicitly to discover and embrace what will be new truths of eternal verities concerning women in relation to creation and salvation.