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| Gustave Doré, The Death of Abel (1866) |
I struggled with some demons, they were middle-class and tameI didn't know I had permission to murder and to maim
-- Leonard Cohen, "You Want It Darker"
And Cain said: Truly I am Mahan, the master of this great secret, that I may murder and get gain. . . . And Cain gloried in that which he had done, saying: I am free.
-- Selections from the Book of Moses 5:31, 33
In Joseph Smith's retelling of the Genesis story, Cain feels that as a murderer he has become privy to a "great secret," that he had discovered a hidden truth which others could never guess. What was it? I don't think it was the fact that it is physically possible to commit murder; Abel slaughtered animals, and it hardly requires much extrapolation to realize that one might also slaughter men. No, Cain was using the word may in the sense approved by grammatically strict mothers; his great secret was that he was allowed to murder, that God had given him permission.
"But Cain was punished!" you say. Yes, he was punished -- but not prevented. Imagine watching one of your own sons conceive, plan, and carry out the murder of his brother -- "for these things are not hid from the Lord" (Moses 5:39) -- and doing absolutely nothing to intervene or prevent the crime. Sure, you could later punish your murderous child by kicking him out of the house, but wouldn't you still be guilty of allowing the murder to happen in the first place? Isn't this precisely the accusation that the Problem of Evil crowd level against God himself -- and aren't they right?
Sartre's famous paraphrase of Dostoevsky has it that "if there is no God, all is permitted." Actually, we can dispense with the conditional clause. All is permitted. That is an observed fact. This is a Wild West universe. There is no imaginable atrocity that humans are consistently prevented from committing. If there is no God, that makes sense, since there is no one with the power to do so -- just us humans with our various forms of imperfectly executed vigilante justice. If there is a God, though, the observed fact that all is permitted requires some explaining.
The philosophical Problem of Evil is divided into the questions of natural evil (earthquakes, disease, and such) and moral evil. If we reject the Supergod doctrine, the problem of natural evil is tractable; we live on earth in order to learn, and painful experiences can be a teaching tool. Just as schools are not designed to be maximally pleasant for students, this world is not so designed for us; but it is still "the best of all possible worlds" in terms of what it is designed for.
The problem of moral evil is more complicated because it is by definition not God's will, not really "the best" for God's purposes. Moral evil is that which is destructive of the Good; otherwise it would not be moral evil. It would have been better if Cain had not murdered Abel. Any normal human being who saw Cain trying to murder Abel would try to intervene and stop him if he had the power -- but God didn't, and doesn't.
"Free will" is generally the explanation given for this. Goodness is only meaningful if it is freely chosen over evil, which means evil must be a possible choice. Is it really necessary to allow us to do such extremely evil things, though? Couldn't we all, like Leonard Cohen in the song, just struggle with some demons that are middle-class and tame? It's perfectly possible to go choose to go to hell by, say, being lazy, spreading malicious gossip, looking on a woman to lust after her, or saying unto thy brother "Thou fool!"; is it really so important that people also be able to choose to go to hell by raping children or committing serial murders? So long as we're free to choose heaven or hell, isn't that freedom enough? Is there really any compelling reason for us to have "permission to murder and to maim"?
Even if we consider freedom to be so important that it trumps all other considerations, it is a truism of basic political philosophy that freedom is not maximized when do what thou wilt is the whole of the law. If respect for Cain's free will requires that he be allowed to murder Abel, what about Abel's own free will? He presumably intended to go on living and doing this and that, but his freedom to do so was taken away by Cain. If people are allowed to do whatever they choose, one of the things some of them will choose to do is to force their will on others. We humans protect our liberty by making and enforcing laws; why doesn't God do the same?
Yes, I know that in theory God does make and enforce laws, but the laws have a strangely optional quality. "And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord," said Joshua, "choose you this day whom ye will serve" (Josh. 24:15). Jesus said, "If ye love me, keep my commandments" (John 14:15). What kind of commandment is it that you only have to obey if it seems like a good idea to you, or if you love the person who is commanding you? Human laws don't work that way, and if they did, they would not be effective in protecting our liberty. "Cain," Joseph Smith tells us, "loved Satan more than God" (Moses 5:18), which I suppose is why he was allowed to kill Abel.
God's "enforcement" of his commandments -- posthumous damnation -- also has little in common with law enforcement as we understand it. In human law enforcement, the primary purpose of punishment is prevention. Executing or incarcerating a criminal is intended to prevent that particular criminal from offending again, and punishment of any kind also serves to deter would-be criminals in general by making crime less appealing. We punish theft because if we didn't, there would be a lot more theft. Yes, there's also an element of abstract "justice" or "giving them what they deserve," but if that were the whole story, societies with a widespread belief in hell or karma would feel no need to punish criminals themselves, knowing they would inevitably get their comeuppance anyway.
God's punishment, in stark contrast, seems deliberately calculated to have as little deterrent effect as possible. As I expressed it elsewhere, back when I was an atheist:
It's like giving a very young child rules to follow -- but the only punishment for violating them is that the child will be written out of his parents' will if he breaks any of the rules -- unless, of course, he sincerely apologizes at any point before his parents' death. Nothing is done at the time of the violation, not even an angry reprimand and a reminder of the standing threat of disinheritance. This is obviously not an effective way of enforcing one's demands, not the method that would be chosen by anyone with any understanding of human nature.
Let me say that again: God's goal appears to be to punish sins specifically in such a way that it does not unduly deter people from sinning. This is extremely counter-intuitive from the standpoint of human justice, but I think it is undeniable. It is in fact a commonplace of apologetics that the reason God does not make his existence obvious is because doing so would diminish our free will, giving us no real choice but to obey him, just as you have no real choice but to obey the law when an armed policeman is standing right there looking at you.
The closest thing to this in human law enforcement would be something like a speed trap or sting operation, where the presence of the police is deliberately concealed in order to make people feel safe breaking the law. When this is not done merely to generate revenue from fines, its purpose is to catch and punish people who are already breaking the law but might not otherwise be caught. The larger purpose is still deterrence -- to make people afraid to break the law even when no police appear to be present. None of these purposes would make sense if ascribed to God.
The conclusion to draw from all this is that what we refer to as divine "law," "commandment," and "punishment" are fundamentally different from their human counterparts, and their goals are not the goals of human systems of justice. What God does is not the same as what human law attempts to do; if it were, human laws that duplicate divine laws (e.g. those against murder, theft, etc.) would be redundant and unnecessary. Why create imperfect human systems to enforce laws that are already being enforced with perfect justice by God? The answer is that God and humans "forbid" and "punish" in different ways, for different purposes. Specifically, God -- who could easily have saved Abel's life -- does not generally protect people from becoming victims of the evil actions of others.
What is God's goal, then? To restate the paradox in the form of a dialogue:
A: Why does God give us "commandments" but fail to enforce them, instead allowing us to do whatever we want, no matter how terrible?B: Because human free will must be preserved. We must be allowed to choose good or evil without coercion.A: But one of the things God allows us to do is to enslave and coerce others. Why would he allow that if preserving free will is so important?B: True free will -- which is metaphysical, not practical -- lies in the realm of thought, not action, and cannot be taken away by coercion. Physical actions may be restricted or coerced, but the mind remains free. Paul taught that even a slave is free in the sense that matters to God -- spiritually free, free to align himself with Christ or with Satan.A: But that means God could after all enforce his commandments, and prevent us from doing terrible things, without infringing on our free will -- which brings us right back to our original question.
I think B's second point, that free will is primarily metaphysical freedom of thought and does not require freedom of action, must be true; otherwise, God would not allow some people's freedom of action to be so severely curtailed. Therefore, preserving free will must not be the reason God allows moral evil.
So why is moral evil allowed? There are obviously no blanket answers that will apply in every situation, but I think one of the most important principles to keep in mind is that we are here to learn from experience. Joseph Smith said that Adam was cast out of the garden "to learn from his own experience to distinguish good from evil." That would not be possible if the true nature of evil were systematically disguised by God's constantly intervening to prevent its natural effects from playing out. If serving Satan were artificially made to seem safe -- if God always intervened to make sure that nothing seriously bad was ever done -- then no one would be able to learn (from direct experience, or from observing others) the true difference between good and evil.
Why is it so important for us to learn that sort of thing, even at the cost of allowing all sorts of horrendous evil in this world? As Owen Cyclops puts it in this thread, it makes sense only if Heaven is not an "eternal rest" but an active state in which we do things.
[Mormon theology] also makes the things the individual goes through in this life [meaningful] because there's a post-mortal state. Basically, you "keep going" and doing other stuff in a way that isn't just entering a static afterlife. It obviously totally changes the story. I found this interesting because it would mean there really are ways that suffering in this life could be necessary, for you to learn something or something like that. In general, in our classical situation, it's much harder to appeal to this explanation cohesively. . . . [If] we're all going to Heaven, it's more difficult to imagine how extra suffering here will help you there because you're in Heaven. . . . Heaven not being static but being a full-on post-mortal existence where you do things makes lessons learned here applicable.
If we children of God are to grow up -- and surely that is one of the main purposes of incarnation -- innocence must eventually give way to experience. And it must be honest experience, experience of things as they really are, not an artificially sanitized experience maintained by an overprotective God. There must be permission to murder and to maim. God can and doubtless does intervene in particular cases to avert particular calamities as he deems necessary, but what he cannot do is have a general policy of averting all sufficiently horrific calamities. "Truth is knowledge of things as they are, and as they were, and as they are to come; and whatsoever is more or less than this is the spirit of that wicked one who was a liar from the beginning" (D&C 93:24-25).
Another possible reason all is permitted -- deeper, if harder to accept -- is that our ultimate destiny is creative and therefore not predetermined. "It doth not yet appear what we shall be" (1 Jn. 3:2). Nothing can be categorically ruled in advance to be a dead end, and so all paths must remain open.
34 comments:
@Wm - In general terms (because I don't think responding to a list of specific questions is any use); I think your implicit conclusion is correct that your premises/ assumptions are indeed incoherent!
This, I believe, is because your assumptions are at a kind of halfway house between classical Christian theology and its concepts, which operate at a level of groups, laws and the like -- and a genuinely pluralistic, individualist, developmental Christian theology; towards which Mormonism points, but which has not yet been fulfilled by the CJCLDS (and presumably never will, the opposite way the church is going).
In an oversimplified way, the answer has to do with resurrected eternal life in Heaven - Heaven being God's place, where everything is Good and based on love. Earth and mortal life are - ultimately - means to the end of Heaven.
For individuals who cannot love or who reject love, or who don't want Heaven; then mortal earthly life does not necessarily make sense. Mortal life is not For such people. And, for those capable of Heaven and who want Heaven - the situation wrt the balance (and extremity) of pleasure and suffering is unique to each individual.
We can't reason general principles from individual instances; because in trying to do so we strip-away the complexity that makes each individual instance unique.
I don't think it is correct to regard God as if perfection of earthly moral life was even an option, and then seek to explain departures from this. This world and our lives are what they are: we work with them, and God works with them - but plenty of demons and humans (and other beings) are working against these ideas.
Either we assume and accept that God (the creator) IS our loving Father who wishes us to choose Heaven and learn from mortality; and seek to explain things on That basis. Or else we assume something else, and get a different understanding.
But specific observations on this mortal life will not decide the issue.
William,
You wrote; we live on earth in order to learn, and painful experiences can be a teaching tool. Just as schools are not designed to be maximally pleasant for students, this world is not so designed for us; but it is still "the best of all possible worlds" in terms of what it is designed for.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
my response; If we live on earth in order to learn, what and how exactly do we apply that lesson learned in one lifetime, especially if we learn the lesson later in life?
And what about the people who , through no fault of their own, live a brief life, perhaps
a tragic one? Are those people on earth to learn a lesson or is their presence on earth
and/or perhaps their tragedy ,a lesson for someone else to learn from?
I do agree however with the perspective that this duality gravity manifestation dimension is a SCHOOL of learning, and a dimension where our Soul incarnates in physical body to ' manifest lessons both for our Soul's growth, and the Soul of those significant persons whose paths we cross, but not for our physical body's growth.
The physical body is in matter therefore it is weak. It can be crushed.
The physical body is needy ( needing physical matter, and someone to provide that matter, be it shelter, clothing, water, food, sex ect ).
For example: If we are in a school setting and we have not been fed or have access to food and water or a bit of shelter from the elements, than the only lesson we learn is survival
first and foremost, and then perhaps Hope and/or Fear.
The physical body stinks, it ages dies and rots, and more importantly through our EGO, and in this duality dimension, the physical body can be and often is MANIPULATED AND CONTROLLED courtesy of our Opponents.
Fascinating topic, thanks.
I believe one form of evil that God has and will continue to actively prevent is nuclear holocaust. I've even heard some Christian mystics (I can't recall who specifically at the moment) tell of visions where they witnessed angels of God short circuit nuclear launches during the Cold War. This is one reason I don't believe Dr. Charlton's posited giga-death scenario is likely, even if God has to intervene supernaturally through His people to keep things going. When the time comes it will be God Himself who brings things to an end, not man, as with the Flood in Noah's time and the prophesied cleansing of the Earth by fire at Christ's return.
But I don't think this changes your analysis significantly.
-Andrew E.
To expand a little: an assumption creeps in with talk of God 'allowing'. My belief is that evil is already in existence from eternity; and God's task and plan has been to create a situation (Heaven) in which creation can continue without evil. This entails a multitude of Beings (Men, and others) with widely varying dispositions to evil - choosing salvation.
Beyond that, it is all a linear process and built around individual Beings; which means that the amount and type of evil is not a constant - neither by time nor place. Nor are the choices of beings pre-determined.
God is always and everywhere working with evil, and trying to turn it to Good; but always with an eye to the Answer to evil: which is found in Heaven and not in mortal life.
Can we understand the details of this scheme? Yes, to the extent it concerns our-selves specifically; and (maybe) to some extent for those we love.
But we can't possibly understand it for everybody in the world, or for big segments of many people, or for places or eras. It is just not the kind of thing susceptible to the kind of summary 'model like' (quasi scientific) explanation that too-many people are seeking.
@Bruce
"I think your implicit conclusion is correct that your premises/ assumptions are indeed incoherent!"
I don't follow this. Which assumptions have I implicitly concluded are incoherent?
"I don't think it is correct to regard God as if perfection of earthly moral life was even an option, and then seek to explain departures from this."
I'm not talking about perfection. I'm talking about the kind of commonsense limits which earthly parents and societies put on the free will of their children and citizens. We do our best not to let people murder each other, for example, and we think that letting murder go unpunished -- or with a punishment specifically calculated NOT to deter or prevent future murders -- would be wrong. God very obviously thinks differently, and it seems important to understand why.
"Either we assume and accept that God (the creator) IS our loving Father who wishes us to choose Heaven and learn from mortality; and seek to explain things on That basis. Or else we assume something else, and get a different understanding."
Yes, I do make that assumption. If I didn't -- if I assumed that there was no God or that he didn't love us -- then the questions I attempt to address here wouldn't even arise.
@Debbie
The lessons we learn are primarily to be applied in our post-mortal, resurrected existence ("Heaven"), not here.
About those who live very brief lives, I can only speculate. Perhaps they had less need or capacity for this sort of learning, or perhaps they do reincarnate.
Regarding the physical body, as a Christian who takes the resurrection seriously, I view a perfected physical body as superior to existence as a spirit, though the mortal bodies we have now obviously come with lots of problems.
William,
You wrote : "About those who live very brief lives, I can only speculate. Perhaps they had less need or capacity for this sort of learning, or perhaps they do reincarnate."
My response: Yes, all of us can only speculate/believe why our existence here, I agree with you about that.
However, I've had a gazillion " learning experiences (in this particular incarnation) especially my esoteric experiences' that has led me to believe the existence of the power of the Soul (which I ''believe' our Soul is connected to God).
And in regard to your answer: "Perhaps they had less need or capacity for this sort of learning, or perhaps they do reincarnate."
So, what you're saying is that a person who dies tragically, say at 5 years old, do not have the capacity or right to learn? Why were they here?
For example : What makes you and I special/different to have learned all that we have?
Are we cursed for our longevity or blessed?
That 5-year-old didn't have time to learn the lessons of good or evil, so where does
that 5-year old's 'spirit/soul go?
Nowhere?
I personally don't believe that a Divine God 'loves or favors or choses' one skin/race/bloodline over another.
In my opinion that attribute of 'picking favorites' if from the perspective of the EGO and lies more in line with a human flaw (much like a parent choosing favorites) which I absolutely do not believe that God possesses human flaws.
I personally believe that much like a school, lessons are learned here in this duality dimension existence where the physical body (being in matter) has the ability to 'manifest lessons the Soul needs to learn/earn to eventually be one with God, which I believe takes many many many lifetimes/incarcerations/incarnations to do, as everything of worth requires much effort to achieve, and as it should be IMHO.
I believe Heaven is when our Soul has learned all of its lessons (good, bad and the ugly) in this dimension and no longer has to 'Fall Down' and incarcerate to this Hell' under the sun in an imperfect blood mortal body and after the Soul has EARNED the right to be one with the Divine and no longer required to incarnate, which to the Soul that reward ( to be one with the Divine ) is Heaven.
A mortal skin blood body is weak. Why would God place any importance on a weak needy skin body?
Our Power is in our Soul, not in our physical body (all of this in my perspective of course)
Maybe that 5-year old's Soul, I previously made reference to, sacrificed its mortal body in that particular lifetime to 'teach someone else' the meaning of Love, or responsibility, or the fragileness and briefness of life.
I believe that we are our brother's keepers and in order to do so, we must walk for a while and miles in their shoes.
Reincarnation, IMO, is just changing shoes. Nothing more, nothing less...
@Wm - "Which assumptions have I implicitly concluded are incoherent?"
Well, the assumption in your title, for instance. You assume that God permits.
My assumption is almost the opposite. God (by creation) is the source of good in an originally chaotic reality.
The scope of creation grows, but (as it were) in a boundless ocean of chaos.
Heaven is the solution, and growing - but Heaven is finite.
@Bruce
God permits us to do things. He has the power to stop us, but he generally chooses not to do so. I don't see how anyone could dispute that.
I agree with all the assumptions you have characterized as "almost the opposite," but I fail to see how they contradict anything I have said.
@Wm- "He has the power to stop us" - no, not as a generalization; absolutely not. Not if God began from scratch, as it were, and is building creation and goodness. So this is a work-in-progress.
One reason is that what 'needs to be stopped' is not a detached chunk of causal reality, but part of a web that ultimately includes all of creation; so that every thing stopped has multiple other consequences - and some of these may be very bad (from the POV of salvation-theosis).
e.g. to stop what we regard as a specific bad thing might actually entail something massive like deleting a family, a city, or some other great destruction. So, God might instead work by alleviating the pain of the bad thing, in a variety of ways (including mortal death of a saved-soul).
My point here is that the lines we draw around segments of reality are seldom genuine limits.
In general; I see you as not completely following through from your core assumptions, but continuing with other assumptions from a different metaphysical scheme - leading to those clashes/ incoherences that form the bulk of the post.
@Bruce
It is obvious that God, even if not strictly "omnipotent," has the power to stop a great many crimes which he does not in fact stop. I don't think "God let Cain kill Abel because he didn't have the power to stop him" is a credible position.
But I don't think you're really saying that. What you're saying is that, while God does have the power to stop us from committing particular crimes, doing so might often have indirect ("butterfly") effects which would be worse than the crime itself. God allowed Cain to kill Abel because, all things considered -- taking into account indirect effects of which we mortals can have no knowledge -- it was better for the murder to go ahead than for it to be prevented.
But, as I said in the post, I think this has the effect of making moral evil not-really-evil. How could we say that Cain did anything seriously wrong if God himself apparently (as evidenced by his not preventing the murder) agreed that it was for the best? If it was God's will that Abel die, then Cain was only doing God's will. We're veering into Candide territory here.
would it not break immersion?
@ben
Too telegraphic. Stop. Please expand. Stop.
If God kept intervening in human affairs; if there were some kind of ever-triggering mechanism or mechanisms by which something like murder were always prevented, would it not make it too obvious that this world is part of a broader system? Maybe most people need to be strongly mentally immersed in this world to learn from it.
@Wm - No, you misunderstand what I am trying to say.
" I don't think "God let Cain kill Abel because he didn't have the power to stop him" is a credible position."
Life is not about God 'letting' things happen. It is this metaphysical framework that is wrong.
Reality is an interaction of Beings (i.e. living conscious entities, each with agency).
Things happen, ultimately not because God 'lets' them happen, but because this is a universe of Beings, all with motivations, all with agency - all pursuing their purposes.
Then, secondarily, God shapes (is shaping) this life for his purposes; by his work of ongoing creation.
But this-world cannot be Good because it has unGood Beings in it - loads of them - pursuing unGood purposes.
At the same time; God continually *uses* this unGood world to recruit and educate people for Heaven.
(I suppose 'creation' could be regarded as the ways by which God uses this unGood world.)
I think our specific explanations need to be made on such assumptions.
@Bruce
Of course life is not "about" God letting things happen. I have used words like "let" and "allow" precisely because of their negative meaning, because they denote a passive lack of interference. Things don't happen because God lets them happen -- they are, as you say, the work of various Beings with various motivations -- but it remains true that God does let them happen. Meaning, once again, that he could intervene but generally chooses not to do so.
As an analogy, a government that did nothing to enforce its laws against murder would be allowing its citizens to commit murder. You could say that any given murder ultimately occurs because of a citizen's action and not the government's inaction, and that would be true. You could also say that in a country with "loads of unGood Beings," some murders are bound to occur no matter what the government does, and that would also be true. But neither of those points would negate the fact that the government is allowing its citizens to commit murder and that, if we are to maintain that it is a Good government, that requires some explanation.
I really don't think any of your objections is a matter of a different metaphysical framework; I think we are mostly on the same page metaphysically. I think it is more a difference of emphasis.
@ben
I don't know. I suppose if the intervention were really consistent, people would just take it for granted as a sort of law of nature.
@Debbie
"So, what you're saying is that a person who dies tragically, say at 5 years old, do not have the capacity or right to learn? Why were they here?"
At bare minimum, they were here to get a body so that they can be resurrected. Beyond that, God knows. Each individual is different and has different needs, and some may need much more incarnate experience than others. Some may need (or be able to benefit from) many successive incarnations; for others, only a single lifetime is called for; still others, perhaps, can bounce off mortal life like sparks and go on to the next phase.
(I should make it clear that I am operating on broadly "Mormon" theological assumptions: We did not begin in the womb but existed as distinct individuals long before we were born, and ultimately God did not create us.)
Bruce Charlton has written some interesting posts on how to understand the fact that most human beings in history have died in the womb or in infancy.
https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2017/10/theological-implications-of-fact-that.html
"That 5-year-old didn't have time to learn the lessons of good or evil, so where does
that 5-year old's 'spirit/soul go? Nowhere?"
Again, I assume that mortality is just one stage in the soul's existence, and a prolonged mortality may not be necessary or helpful for some souls.
"I personally don't believe that a Divine God 'loves or favors or choses' one skin/race/bloodline over another."
God loves us all. But he does choose particular individuals and nations for particular missions and purposes, because we are all different. The Israelite race obviously had a special mission, for example, and I think this is true of others as well. Nowadays, due to evolutionary changes in human consciousness, races and nations have less spiritual reality than they once did, and God deals more and more with individuals.
"A mortal skin blood body is weak. Why would God place any importance on a weak needy skin body? Our Power is in our Soul, not in our physical body (all of this in my perspective of course)"
I come to this question from Christian assumptions which you may or may not share, but for me the Resurrection is proof that the body is important. After living and dying in human form, Christ did not return to a purely spiritual existence but instead incarnated permanently in a glorified body. The resurrection body is not mortal, weak, and needy like the bodies we have now, but it is physical, and its physicality is important. The reasons for this are a matter of speculation, but it seems likely that incarnated spirits have a greater capacity for individuality and agency than discarnate ones.
@Wm I think what you are actually asking is: Why does God Sometimes not intervene miraculously to prevent a murder.
That might be answerable for those who know enough of the specific circumstances.
Because mostly the worst things Don't happen.
In countless ways the world works for God's purposes.
Thank you so much for writing this, William. One of the joys in my life is reading something that makes me wander off into a room or a meadow and think thoughts and ask questions that I never put down on a page or speak into the air. This post did that for me.
William,
You wrote: At bare minimum, they were here to get a body so that they can be resurrected. Beyond that, God knows. Each individual is different and has different needs, and some may need much more incarnate experience than others. Some may need (or be able to benefit from) many successive incarnations; for others, only a single lifetime is called for; still others, perhaps, can bounce off mortal life like sparks and go on to the next phase.
My response: ???? .. Some may need more incarnate experience than others? So, you're saying that reincarnation exists?...... or not?
I believe each lifetime/incarnation is different, so yes I agree with you, we are individuals with different experiences which means we've acquired knowledge from many lifetimes( cultures, skins, genders ) which is why and how we Learn From AND TEACH to our fellow man/woman. IMHO
In my previous comment, I made the metaphor of the Soul' changing shoes ", the physical mortal body being 'the shoes'.
I absolutely do not think that our high vibrational Soul wants to fall down (away from Source) to this duality dimension, 'incarcerated in a CELL physical body.
I personally do not think that Earth is Eden, at least NOT from the perspective of
the Soul, perhaps from the perspective of the EGO (which pleasures and protects the physical body ONLY) but not the Soul.
It's interesting how EGO and EVIL, sounds phonically very similar.
As does incarnation and incarceration.
I personally believe that this duality (GOOD AND EVIL) dimension of manifestation
is a School.
When my grandmother passed over in 1965, my sister and I saw her spirit, so I absolutely
believe in the Soul/Spirit, which I believe is one and the same.
It's our Soul that is judged, not our imperfect physical body.
all from my perspective of course...
@Debbie
"???? .. Some may need more incarnate experience than others? So, you're saying that reincarnation exists?...... or not?"
It may. I don't know. I don't rule it out.
@Bruce
"I think what you are actually asking is: Why does God Sometimes not intervene miraculously to prevent a murder."
Close. The question is: Why does he almost never intervene to prevent us from doing any number of horrible things?
"Because mostly the worst things Don't happen."
Because people mostly don't choose to do the worst things. But when they do, God lets them. It's that general pattern of laissez-faire that I'm trying to account for.
Here's something I just read today:
(https://digital.nls.uk/scotlandspages/timeline/17762.html). An account by Boswell, visiting David Hume shortly before Hume's death. Interestingly enough, Hume observed that many people die in infancy. I would guess other people around that time noticed it, but I don't know of any other old writings talking about this. They are probably out there, though.
Here's the passage:
"I had a strong curiosity to be satisfied if he persisted in disbelieving a future state even when he had death before his eyes. I was persuaded from what he now said, and from his manner of saying it, that he did persist.
I asked him if it was not possible that there might be a future state. He answered it was possible that a piece of coal put upon the fire would not burn; and he added that it was a most unreasonable fancy that we should exist for ever.
That immorality, if it were at all, must be general; that a great proportion of the human race has hardly any intellectual qualities; that a great proportion dies in infancy before being possessed of reason; yet all these must be immortal; that a porter who gets drunk by ten o'clock with gin must be immortal; that the trash of every age must be preserved, and that new universes must be created to contain such infinite numbers. This appeared to me an unphilosophical objection, and I said, 'Mr. Hume, you know spirit does not take up space'. "
I don't want to distract anyone off into the weeds, but Ra1119bee made a statement that got me to thinking about something I haven't pondered in a while.
"... so I absolutely believe in the Soul/Spirit, which I believe is one and the same...."
I wonder what your thoughts are on this, William? For me, I am uncomfortable with the idea of the soul and the spirit being the same, remembering that Scripture talks about how the word of God divides soul and spirit.
@SK
I think the Greek words psyche ("soul") and pneuma ("spirit") cover roughly the same ground -- and both can also mean "breath, wind" -- though philosophers have used them in technical senses and made various distinctions between the two. The same goes for Latin anima ("soul") and spiritus. (The spirit has traditionally been considered the seat of the will, probably because spiritus is masculine but anima is feminine.)
In Hebrew, ruach ("spirit") and its near-synonym neshamah are like the Greek and Latin, and can also mean "breath, wind." Nephesh ("soul") has no reference to wind or breathing but means something more like "being, person, self" -- a bit like Sanskrit purusha.
Genesis says that when God put the breath (neshamah) of life into Adam, he became a living soul (nephesh). Mormon usage follows this: "The spirit and the body are the soul of man" (D&C 88:15). In practice, though, discarnate spirits are also sometimes referred to as souls.
In common English usage, I think spirit always means the non-physical part of a person, while soul is more flexible and can sometimes even mean the body (as in "ten souls were lost in the accident"). I think soul only refers to spirits that are, have been, or will be embodied. You would not refer to a non-human spirit, which had never had a body, as a soul. It's also interesting that it is always the soul, never the spirit, that is sold to the devil.
But this is linguistics, not philosophy. Are there two distinct non-physical parts of a human being? I don't see any reason to assume that and am not really clear on what the distinction would be.
William,
Again I'm at my word limit so I'll post this in 2 separate comments.
Part 1
Thank you for sharing this information and your perspective about the Soul.
My intention here on your blog comments, was never to attempt to convince anyone of what is Truth, or what is Not.
I personally do not think we (Humanity) will ever agree on one absolute truth especially regarding Spirituality.
My perspective of life, especially regarding Spirituality, which has become my truth, is because of my personal lifetime esoteric experiences and dreams (many premonition) and the gazillions of hours researching the symbolism of those experiences and dreams.
Nothing more, nothing less.
While it's true, I've researched extensively trying to find the meaning of my experiences (and I've learned from a vast spectrum of ideologies in my research) but truth be told
much of those ideologies are from other people's theories/perspective/opinion/stories
and beliefs, albeit a Strong Belief, but a belief nevertheless, which may or may not be 'true'.
Your response to S.K.Orr, about the different perspectives of what is Soul and what is Spirit, somewhat proves my point.
That's not to say that we (collectively) have not been giving a compass to 'navigate' through this dimension, as I absolutely believe that we have been given a compass/roadmap through our Soul (which I personally believe our Soul is connected to God).
Our Soul still retains the Sacred Science Knowledge Compass, spoken to us every night through our REM sleep.
I don't believe God abandons us to 'figure stuff out'.
In one of your previous comments to me, you wrote: God loves us all. But he does choose particular individuals and nations for particular missions and purposes, because we are all different. The Israelite race obviously had a special mission, for example, and I think this is true of others as well. Nowadays, due to evolutionary changes in human consciousness, races and nations have less spiritual reality than they once did, and God deals more and more with individuals.
My response :I agree with your comment that God loves us all, however your perspective
about God 'choosing' particular individuals and nations for particular missions and purposes is somewhat vague.
Was chattel slavery' chosen' as a punishment for a certain 'skin' of people, whom he (God) Loves?
And yes, I am familiar with Ham and his descendant's curse, which that ideology was taught
to the Slaves in Sunday sermons by Black Baptist Preachers, many of them (the Black Preachers who didn't know how to read (especially read the symbolic writings of the Bible )
makes one wonder as to Exactly the Whos and Whys of the mission and purpose of the perpetrators.
Although.....I think I can guess the reason why..
If by believing that Black Skin is punished because of Ham's curse, means ( at least to me ) that Black People do not possess a Soul, as the Soul doesn't incarnate into the same skin body incarnation after incarnation which in order for Ham's descendants to feel the wrath of the curse would mean their Soul (let's saying that Black people have a Soul) would always incarnate in Black Skin.
I absolutely do not believe that our Soul incarnates in the same skin body as I've
shared my perspective as to why in my previous comments.
William
Part 2
As stated, many times, I believe that our Soul transcends linear time because I experienced this myself many many times over my lifetime.
I've shared my beliefs to family and friends and several times in my comments on your blog. I believe our Soul is the domain of intuition and creativity and can 'see' Past (including Past Lives)... Present.... and Future.
We ALL have had intuitive experiences, however many times people dismiss those experiences
as 'silly' or just a one off, or a coincidence, or simply as odd.
I believe that to see the Future is a powerful and priceless gift, because it means we can change direction, which is why our Opponents Final Frontier as always been our Soul via Transhumanism via Artificial Intelligence.
As I've shared my perspective many times on your blog, I believe we (humanity) are on the precipice of a Great Upheaval. What's happening on the World Stage was planned centuries ago.
I believe that what is happening on the World Stage is a Spiritual War.
You wrote : I think the Greek words psyche ("soul") and pneuma ("spirit") cover roughly the same ground -- and both can also mean "breath, wind" -- though philosophers have used them in technical senses and made various distinctions between the two.
Genesis says that when God put the breath (neshamah) of life into Adam, he became a living soul (nephesh). Mormon usage follows this: "The spirit and the body are the soul of man" (D&C 88:15). In practice, though, discarnate spirits are also sometimes referred to as souls.
My response : I agree with this about the Soul and Breath, as I believe that the Soul
enters our physical body at the time of our first breath at birth.
I personally believe the Soul enters through the baby's soft spot called the Fontanelle.
I also believe that our Soul exits the mortal body at time of our last breath, which may explain, at least to me, why my sister and I saw our grandmother's Spirit.
My grandmother died of cancer, and she passed over in the hospital. My sister and I were at home in our beds when we saw her Spirit/Soul. We were NOT asleep, however.
Maybe this ideology about the meaning of the Soul and breath explains your earlier comment about those human beings who die in the womb.
William,
I forgot to add my perspective about the exiting of our Soul during our last breath.
As stated, I personally believe that our Soul
enters our physical body at the time of our first breath at birth
through the baby's soft spot called the Fontanelle.
I personally believe that our Soul exits the physical body through the Soles of our feet.
I understand an argument can be made or a question asked that some people who have had amputations of their foot (feet ) may not agree with my perspective about the Soul exiting
through the foot( feet )however taking in consideration of a condition called phantom limb sensation may explain my perspective, especially regarding my perspective about our Soul's power to transcend linear time (and space).
We are so much more than our individual selves and physical bodies.
all IMHO, of course...
CS Lewis had some interesting things to say about the medieval view of the spirit, as distinct from the soul and body in The Discarded Image:
"No Model yet devised has made a satisfactory unity between our actual experience of sensation or thought or emotion and any available account of the corporeal processes which they are held to involve.
...
Spirits, then are the 'subtle gumphus' required by Plato and Alanus to keep body and soul together, or as Donne says, 'the subtile know which makes us man'.
...
As Timothy Bright says in his Treatise of Melancholy (1586), they are 'a true love knot to couple heaven and earth together; yea, a more divine nature than the heavens with a base clod of earth', so the soul is not 'fettered with the bodie, as certaine Philosophers have taken it, but handfasted therewith by that golden claspe of the spirit'.
The spirits also enable us to given an account of insanity without having to say - which would have been felt as a contradiction in terms - that Rational Soul herself can lose her rationality. As Bartholomaeus says in the same place, when the Spirits are impaired, the 'accord' of body and soul is resolved, so that the Rational Soul 'is let' (hindered) of all its 'works in the body, as it is seen in them that be amazed, and mad men and frantic'. The appropriate Spirit being out of order, Rational Soul has no purchase on the material body. "
Lewis expresses doubt about this idea and when I first read the book I agreed. But over time I have come to believe that there is something to this notion of the spirit. There are various phenomena, such as ESP that seem to lie in the realm between the spiritual and the material and it would make sense that there is a bridge between the two linking soul and body together.
By the way, I don't own the book, but I quoted that from a copy on archive.org. If anyone reading this doesn't know, you can make a free account (all you need is an email address) and then there are books which you can borrow for one hour, which you can't read otherwise.
If someone else wants to read the same book at the same time, that's a problem, but so far it hasn't been an issue. I have found this quite helpful in reading obscure or difficult to find publications or looking things up in books I do not own.
@Debbie
"I agree with your comment that God loves us all, however your perspective about God 'choosing' particular individuals and nations for particular missions and purposes is somewhat vague."
It's vague because it's a sweeping generalization. Each person (and sometimes, especially in the past, each race/nation) has a specific mission, but that's mostly between each person and God. It's hard to speculate about the mission of another person you don't know well.
"Was chattel slavery 'chosen' as a punishment for a certain 'skin' of people, whom he (God) Loves?"
If you're asking if I think God approves of the institution of slavery in general, or of the race-based slavery of the antebellum US in particular, no, I don't think so. If you're asking is specific souls were "chosen" to incarnate as slaves, yes. I don't think the conditions into which we incarnate are random but are carefully chosen with a view to providing for the spiritual needs and maximizing the learning opportunities of each individual. Ultimately, the choice is up to the individual himself; we all consented to incarnate when and where we did.
"And yes, I am familiar with Ham and his descendant's curse, which that ideology was taught
to the Slaves in Sunday sermons by Black Baptist Preachers, many of them (the Black Preachers who didn't know how to read (especially read the symbolic writings of the Bible) makes one wonder as to Exactly the Whos and Whys of the mission and purpose of the perpetrators."
Institutional religion will always be used to support the agenda of the powers that be. We can see the same thing today, though the agenda has changed.
"If by believing that Black Skin is punished because of Ham's curse, means (at least to me) that Black People do not possess a Soul, as the Soul doesn't incarnate into the same skin body incarnation after incarnation which in order for Ham's descendants to feel the wrath of the curse would mean their Soul (let's saying that Black people have a Soul) would always incarnate in Black Skin."
I'm agnostic about reincarnation, so I obviously don't have an opinion as to whether successive incarnations tend to be of the same or different race. I also don't see how being "cursed" or punished implies not having a soul.
Ham is described in the Bible as the ancestor of various North African (not sub-Saharan) groups, as well as the Canaanites, Phoenicians, and Mesopotamians -- so I think the idea that Ham was the ancestor of the blacks was likely just an ad hoc justification for slavery. In the big picture of course, most blacks have not been slaves, and most slaves have not been black.
William,
Thank you very much for your insight.
You wrote : Institutional religion will always be used to support the agenda of the powers that be. We can see the same thing today, though the agenda has changed.
My response; I agree with you absolutely, about why and to a lesser extent ' who'controls
this illusion on this duality planet.
Sex, Power and Money are the three elements and Power Sources that are integral to the workings of this duality dimension, and I believe all three are manipulated by an extremely powerful entity that I personally believe do not have a Soul.
You wrote : It's vague because it's a sweeping generalization. Each person (and sometimes, especially in the past, each race/nation) has a specific mission, but that's mostly between each person and God. It's hard to speculate about the mission of another person you don't know well
My response : Again, I agree. I believe that the Soul 'chooses' each incarnation
and the skin/ culture/time in history/and experiences and opportunities that that particular body will have and will be given.
However when we incarnate in mortal body we are subjected to the EGO, which I believe it is the EGO that becomes our Demon/Evil as the EGO protects and pleasures the physical body only. The EGO and Soul although intertwined
do NOT have the same 'mission' and are, more often than not, adversaries.
That's why, I believe, our Opponents strengthen our EGO each incarnation so as to minimize or Soul and Collective Consciousness (our harmony with our fellow Man/Woman).
However, more often than not, we succumb to our EGO which means we have to continue incarnating in mortal body as we transverse around the wheel until we learn the lesson of each grade ( Zodiac Aires through Pisces )
That's why I made the example of a tragic death of a 5 year old child. I absolutely believe the Soul sacrifices the mortal body as we not only learn lessons, we teach lessons as well.
Same can be said about the incarnation of slaves in antebellum US or any person subjected
to cruelty and evil.
For whom do you think the lesson of:' I am my brothers keeper' is for??
It certainly isn't for the Powers that Be, especially the One Eye, which again, I believe
the One Eye do not have a Soul. The Gatekeepers, who work for the One Eye, I believe
do have a Soul, however they succumb to their EGO.
I believe the reason why a particular Soul sacrifices its physical body, is to teach a lesson.
That lesson is for those who turn a blind eye and do nothing about atrocities that they know is morally wrong, which was especially true in antebellum America.
The Gatekeepers even justifying chattel slavery through the Bible, even 'selling' the justification to the enslaved themselves.
Of course there have been numerous atrocities throughout history, not just America,
as you commented on as well, and perhaps the lesson needed to be learned
has always been one and the same. Are we our Brother's Keepers?
All Power Sources in this duality dimension are manipulated and controlled.
Always has been, always will be, which is why our Soul endures this incarceration time after time into a mortal body in order to EARN the worth to be one with the Divine.
All IMHO.
William,
I want to add just one more thought if I may and expound on my comment about : Are we our Brother's Keepers.
Maybe, that simple idea of being our Brother's Keepers
is the core of every lesson the Soul must learn because that simple idea incorporates
Love, Compassion and Harmony.
That trinity balance integral to help Humanity Evolve.
However,since time immortal, War has always been a part of the
human experience on this planet, including in Biblical Times and throughout Religious
Doctrines.
And there's always a contrived reason as to why War must be waged.
One day it's: 'this group of people are declared the enemy, the next" day"
it's another group who are declared the enemy, and on and on and on ad nauseum.
Humans destroying each other in fierce battle, always in conquest for something.
That "something" almost always having to do with the EGO.
Even conquest itself is drenched in EGO.
Males vs Females (and vice versa).... Blacks vs Whites (and vice versa).... Religion vs Religion, One Political Party vs the Other Political Party... Generation vs Generation.... One Country vs another Country (and always subject to change).... Haves vs Have Nots and on and on and on.
Divide and Conquer.
We (Humanity ) have always been drenched in Wars, in some way shape or form.
And we think this is Eden??
Truth be told, we ourselves are part and parcel to these atrocities when we turn a blind eye,and we turn a blind eye because of our EGO which pleasures and protects the mortal body.
Much like those Black Baptist Preachers I spoke of in my previous comments.
Their pulpit manipulated and controlled by the Gatekeepers as the Gatekeepers were quite aware (then and now) that Knowledge is a Power Source.
The Preachers who complied were tossed a bone of a bit of a better, perhaps easier, life and many of those type Preachers still exist to this very day.
They're called Prosperity Pimps, and they sell hopeium, much like they did during chattel slavery.
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” – Edmund Burke
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