To me, the two most profound statements in all holy writings (aside from Jesus' immortal doctrine) are these: "God is love," and "God is light." Taken separately, we may say that if it is true that God is love (the word 'is' being an equal sign), then it is also true that LOVE is GOD. An equally true statement would be that LIGHT is also GOD. And by this I infer that since light is merely frequency-patterns transmitted over space and time, the act of COMMUNICATING (that is to say, using frequency transmissions) must also be synonymous with the words 'love,' 'light,' and 'God.' Taken together, all of the above statements amount to a new (and much more profound) definition of the term 'God.' But how many can accept such a radical departure? And yet, the evidence has been before our very eyes for nearly two thousand years! Has it really taken mankind so very long to thus expand his mindset or world-view?
27 May--7 July, 1997.
How may we define man as being separate from the other forms of life on this planet?
By the degree of his self-awareness, by the degree of his awareness of his environs (and this includes other forms of life), by the degree of his ability to communicate (and the level of complexity of his communications), and by the degree of his ability to manipulate his environment to suit his own needs or wishes.
What defines a 'civilised' society? Or--better yet--how can we determine when and if one particular society is more (or less) 'civilised' than another? This is a question that has plagued many for years, and yet I can't see how such a simple answer could have escaped notice for so long:
A society is more (or less) 'civilised' based upon the level of complexity of its technical know-how, the level of complexity of its social organisation, the level of its manipulation or domination of the environment to suit man's needs or wishes, and by the degree of its dependence (both individually and collectively) upon primitive animal emotion or instinct. In other words, a society becomes more 'civilised' than another when its constituent members (or a safe majority thereof) become more fully HUMAN (and less animal-like) than the members of another society--which may, indeed, be 'civilised' in its own right, only less so than another which finds itself in the evolutionary vanguard of the species. Or what else could Nietzsche have possibly meant?
30 June--7 July, 1997.
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
Pantheism== The belief that "God" or "deity" exists everywhere in the universe surrounding us-as, for instance, in the air, the water, the flowers, the animals, human beings, and even the stars themselves.
Mysticism==The belief that it is possible, in this mortal life, to obtain a personal, inward spiritual awareness of, and communion with, the Divine. Example: As in an inward spiritual awakening or experience. Many shallow-minded people would call this "being born again." I say it is much deeper than that--much more profound and far-reaching in its results or consequences.
My theology, while definitely admitting and including the above two statements, really begins and ends with one simple formula, found in the first epistle of St.John (the "Beloved"):
GOD IS LOVE.
Simple logic will then tell us that if "God" (the Divine) is the same thing as "Love", then therefore everything that is "Love" is also "Divine" (or God). All expressions of love, therefore, are expressions of the Divine and of the Divine Will--even those expressions which some narrow-minded and prejudiced persons are pleased to negatively judge and condemn. To love another human being, in a selfless and "Christlike" manner, that is to say, is to give expression to the Divine, to let the Divine flow through one, as it were, thus transforming oneself into a vehicle whereby the Divine becomes expressed in the physical world: a means whereby 'the Word may become made Flesh'.
This, in my opinion, is all that "religion" should ever need to be. "Anything more or less than this cometh of evil."
What are the two greatest commandments? According to Jesus, they are to love God (which is LOVE, right?) with all one's heart, might, mind and strength, and to love one's neighbour as oneself. They are both about love, correct? Basically restated, they are: Love LOVE with your entire being, and love your fellow-man as much as you love yourself. Basically, the idea is (as constantly as is humanly possible) to have a heart filled with Divine Love--toward "deity" and toward one's fellow-beings.
St.Paul said in Romans that a person truly filled with Divine Love will not murder, lie, cheat, steal, or do any other thing to harm his neighbour; or at least, if he should by mistake and due to his frail human nature do something of the sort anyway, he will be sorry therefor, and will honestly try to make amends and avoid repeating the mistake.
Shakespeare's ideal of love was unconditional love:
...love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
Ah, no! It is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on Tempests and is never shaken:
It is the Star to ev'ry wandering Bark. ...
(Sonnet No.116)
Which was merely a rephrasing of St.Paul's standard, the famous passage found in First Corinthians, Chapter 13 (Shakespeare obviously knew his Bible):
...Love is patient and kind, love does not envy... love never seeks repayment, nor is provoked to anger; love does not rejoice in harm to others, but rejoices in the truth. LOVE NEVER GIVES UP!
(Emphasis added)
Now I here freely admit that I am a human being, too. It is just as hard for me sometimes to actually live what I am saying here. But I know that I know better. And I do try at all times to conscientiously live this ideal, as should we all. I never said that it was easy, only that it is what we should all be doing (myself included).
"This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."
(St.John 15:12-13)
Notice here that Jesus said "friends." He did not say, "wife," or "husband," "father," or "mother," or even "children." No, he said "friends." And I find this very significant. Some would perhaps say that it would be even more significant to voluntarily give up one's life for a total stranger, but that is not really based on conscious, full-knowing LOVE, is it? That would rather be a form of Altruism--somewhat more remote than intimate, personal LOVE, which has full knowledge and awareness of all a friend's faults and failings, and yet is still willing to sacrifice for him.
Mysticism==The belief that it is possible, in this mortal life, to obtain a personal, inward spiritual awareness of, and communion with, the Divine. Example: As in an inward spiritual awakening or experience. Many shallow-minded people would call this "being born again." I say it is much deeper than that--much more profound and far-reaching in its results or consequences.
My theology, while definitely admitting and including the above two statements, really begins and ends with one simple formula, found in the first epistle of St.John (the "Beloved"):
GOD IS LOVE.
Simple logic will then tell us that if "God" (the Divine) is the same thing as "Love", then therefore everything that is "Love" is also "Divine" (or God). All expressions of love, therefore, are expressions of the Divine and of the Divine Will--even those expressions which some narrow-minded and prejudiced persons are pleased to negatively judge and condemn. To love another human being, in a selfless and "Christlike" manner, that is to say, is to give expression to the Divine, to let the Divine flow through one, as it were, thus transforming oneself into a vehicle whereby the Divine becomes expressed in the physical world: a means whereby 'the Word may become made Flesh'.
This, in my opinion, is all that "religion" should ever need to be. "Anything more or less than this cometh of evil."
What are the two greatest commandments? According to Jesus, they are to love God (which is LOVE, right?) with all one's heart, might, mind and strength, and to love one's neighbour as oneself. They are both about love, correct? Basically restated, they are: Love LOVE with your entire being, and love your fellow-man as much as you love yourself. Basically, the idea is (as constantly as is humanly possible) to have a heart filled with Divine Love--toward "deity" and toward one's fellow-beings.
St.Paul said in Romans that a person truly filled with Divine Love will not murder, lie, cheat, steal, or do any other thing to harm his neighbour; or at least, if he should by mistake and due to his frail human nature do something of the sort anyway, he will be sorry therefor, and will honestly try to make amends and avoid repeating the mistake.
Shakespeare's ideal of love was unconditional love:
...love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
Ah, no! It is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on Tempests and is never shaken:
It is the Star to ev'ry wandering Bark. ...
(Sonnet No.116)
Which was merely a rephrasing of St.Paul's standard, the famous passage found in First Corinthians, Chapter 13 (Shakespeare obviously knew his Bible):
...Love is patient and kind, love does not envy... love never seeks repayment, nor is provoked to anger; love does not rejoice in harm to others, but rejoices in the truth. LOVE NEVER GIVES UP!
(Emphasis added)
Now I here freely admit that I am a human being, too. It is just as hard for me sometimes to actually live what I am saying here. But I know that I know better. And I do try at all times to conscientiously live this ideal, as should we all. I never said that it was easy, only that it is what we should all be doing (myself included).
"This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."
(St.John 15:12-13)
Notice here that Jesus said "friends." He did not say, "wife," or "husband," "father," or "mother," or even "children." No, he said "friends." And I find this very significant. Some would perhaps say that it would be even more significant to voluntarily give up one's life for a total stranger, but that is not really based on conscious, full-knowing LOVE, is it? That would rather be a form of Altruism--somewhat more remote than intimate, personal LOVE, which has full knowledge and awareness of all a friend's faults and failings, and yet is still willing to sacrifice for him.
I have the greatest admiration and respect for those few, rare souls who are somehow able to free themselves intellectually, but more especially emotionally, from their surrounding, invasive, and demanding culture. I may even say that it actually excites me almost beyond words to meet and converse with such people. Alas, though, this experience has been mine only too seldom in my lifetime. Many of those few I have actually met who would aspire to this high title of 'genius' or 'non-conformist' have, upon, closer inspection, proven only to have been fraudulent deceits, thus earning only my distasteful scorn.
For those people who are still the mental slaves of their cultures, but who (as in many of the young) still show some youthful strength, idealism, and hope of liberation, I find myself frequently feeling a mixture of pity and an urgent yearning hope that they might succeed in breaking and destroying their mental shackles.
For those who have patently given up the struggle, and hasten to conform themselves in every way possible to their peer culture--that culture with which they unquestioningly and exclusively identify themselves--for those, I say, who are now and likely ever will remain only mindless, safe, obedient, unquestioning drones, I can only feel the lowest form of contempt and disgust, and only the fact that they, too--even they--are still human beings also capable of SUFFERING prevents me from treating them exactly as their behaviour merits: as expendable, interchangeable drones in the human hive. Only the hope that--difficult as it may be for me to imagine at present--they may in some future age exercise that flabby muscle called a 'brain' beyond the automatic and instinctive reactions, and thus expand and redeem themselves, prevents me from this reaction.
26 August, 1994.
For those people who are still the mental slaves of their cultures, but who (as in many of the young) still show some youthful strength, idealism, and hope of liberation, I find myself frequently feeling a mixture of pity and an urgent yearning hope that they might succeed in breaking and destroying their mental shackles.
For those who have patently given up the struggle, and hasten to conform themselves in every way possible to their peer culture--that culture with which they unquestioningly and exclusively identify themselves--for those, I say, who are now and likely ever will remain only mindless, safe, obedient, unquestioning drones, I can only feel the lowest form of contempt and disgust, and only the fact that they, too--even they--are still human beings also capable of SUFFERING prevents me from treating them exactly as their behaviour merits: as expendable, interchangeable drones in the human hive. Only the hope that--difficult as it may be for me to imagine at present--they may in some future age exercise that flabby muscle called a 'brain' beyond the automatic and instinctive reactions, and thus expand and redeem themselves, prevents me from this reaction.
26 August, 1994.
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