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Replying to post 30 by Anomaly]
This is also a pervasive idea throughout other religions as well. It's nothing new, but effectively points out that none of this is real. It's just an illusion, or a deception.
First, I’m surprised that you find this idea pervasive. Have never heard of this before. Could you provide some sources? Not that I don’t believe you, just that virtually everyone else I’ve run into the last 20 years has treated the idea of the symbolic representation of salvation as a "parts and whole" metaphysic as some new heresy.
Sure, I would start off with the Upanishads, the Vedas, and the Bhagavad Gita. The writings of the Buddha, Taoism, Sufism, St. John of the Cross, Ramana Maharshi, Meister Eckart, Eckart Tolle, and perhaps even someone like G.K. Chesterton who saw the common man as a mystic.
Second, can you elaborate what you mean by the allegorical system “ effectively points out that none of this is real. It's just an illusion, or a deception�? Seems to me you either don’t understand the implications of the theology or entertain some metaphysical notions unusual to Christian thinking, or maybe some of each.
Perhaps you're right. If you'd care to elaborate on the core tenets of what you're presenting, I may be able to see where I've left the tracks.
There is only Christ, and these separate identities we all hold onto are nothing but silly ideas.
Again, I’m unsure of your meaning. What sort of “separate identities� do you mean that are silly ideas?
All separate identities are silly ideas. Do you have an identity apart from Christ? Do you identify with the identity you were given as an infant? That is a silly idea. It is nothing more than an idea. It is nothing more than an abstract construction. Therefore it is idiotic to identify with it. We are not ideas.
As to one Christ, I also don’t understand how or why this fits with the rest of the sentence. Do you suppose I somehow divide Christ into parts, or see more than one Christ?
No, but Christ is the ikon of God and as image bearers ourselves, we can see Christ in everyONE.
on the surface the idea of a true-false value mechanism operating in a whole-parts structure in the soul is, left to its own devices, decidedly static and deterministic.
Most notably because it is nothing more than a superficial idea.
The problem is I think reasonably addressed by an ontology wherein the deterministic feature is interrupted in some measure by volition as a natural non-empirical causative force by which one is able to make what might be called “degrees of infringement� on the resolute nature of value forces.
I doubt this addresses the problem at all, and this is clearly seen in one's efforts to fly to the moon. This in no way alters one's free will, it only spotlights that one's free will is insufficient against the will of God. More to the point, when it comes to hearing the gospel message, only those who it has been granted to hear it are going to be drawn to Christ. Anyone can come to Christ and ask how to gain eternal life, but only those to whom Christ says, "Follow me" can enter into eternal life, and even then, it is only those to whom it has been revealed can see it to begin with.
In short, I hold to the traditional view that the intellect with its limited power of volition impedes the deterministic process that inorganic matter is subject to.
Again, I would have to say I seriously doubt it because so-called 'impediments' to the deterministic process are not actually impediments, but part of the process itself. And what is limiting the intellect's power of volition other than the deterministic process or inorganic matter?
This is a compatibilist view, the mutable operating under the supervision and within the constraints of the immutable. I.e., man has limited freedom to make moral choices in time, but is ultimately and inexorably being drawn to the spiritual cleansing of salvation.
Sure, but when the man is composed of his immoral choices, there is nothing left when God is done cleansing him. This is necessarily the case of those who never receive the gift of repentance. At the core is nothing but filth and gore. Limited freedom, isn't freedom unless we're going to limit access to evil, but if that's the case, then we're right back to my position which is that; "Ay gar eu piptusin oi dios kuboi" The dice of God are always loaded. We can "choose" to play dice with God, but he's given us this choice to begin with, and he knows what we're going to throw every time, not to mention when we finally "decide" to quit. It's simply an illusion.
But the process of a value-fragmented soul being cleansed plays a crucial role in salvation that you may have missed. It replaces the common definition of free will as “The power of making free choices unconstrained by external agencies“ with the concept that having falsity fragmentally removed from the soul changes the will to being freed of hindrance to move in the only logical, reasonable direction one would ever want to go: toward the perfection of restoration to a wholly true state.
In a nutshell, revelation from God. One doesn't choose to jab a spike into their eye when they haven't lost their mind, right?
As the soul is being restored to an increasingly true state, existence in this superior state of ‘truth-bearingness’ produces dispositions, motives, reasons, etc. and the actions peculiar to them that are ever more truth-oriented. The fractional removal of falsity eradicates tension that prevents adherence to truth.
The bible refers to this simply as "sanctification", or "being conformed to the image of Christ".
When Jesus told His apostles, "…I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth…for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee…� (Jn 17:19-21) We are sanctified literally in and by the power of truth, so that all may, in being made wholly true in essence ourselves, be brought to unity with Truth [God] Himself. As we’re being cleansed, our resistance to God is being melted away and replaced with the power of adherence to His will. (To the extent this happens in time, we refer to it as “sanctification�.)
I jumped the gun. Seems like we're on the same page, with the possible exception that I see no need to elaborate these ideas into something more complex than as stated in the texts. Again, none of this is covering new ground.
In the end, we find that the dictionary definition of free will is really just an explication of our desire for anonymity as per Isa 14:1-20,
I missed the part where we desire anonymity in Isa 14:1-20
whose metaphoric truth most Christians are unable to face:
I don't know what you're referring to here with "metaphoric truth".
we are individually the morning star, satan,
Sure, this is no different than Jeremiah's revelation where he points out:
The heart of man is deceitful above ALL things, and desperately wicked
The heart of man is clearly not more deceitful than Satan, therefore Jeremiah is pointing out these are equivalent. The field of psychology recognizes the super ego in the figure of Satan; most notably in the temptations of Christ in the wilderness. Satan is simply the ego personified.
wallowing in sin created by falsity in our essence. As falsity rises from static pathology to active evil capacity in the animation of the intellect, it produces the "bad" part of us.
I'm not so sure that the evil capacity is confined to just the animation of the intellect. The intellect may be participating, but the heart is as well.
The entire 14th chapter of Isa (and many others in the OT prophets) is metaphor dedicated, methinks to the explication of this principle. It identifies the two natures of man, the true (good) and false (bad).
I see what you're saying, but here again, it would be more accurate to point out that there is no true nature to begin with. One could just as easily substitute the personality or the self itself, the ego etc. They are all false. The only place where we may find truth is in truth (itself), and there is no literal nature to truth.
Most can’t look the “horrible thing� in the eye and have to remain chained in the literal, where Satan takes on the more comforting feature of “otherness� as a fallen angel we can blame our evil on.
We are no less likely to pull this same stunt with our "false nature". When one is able to get beyond these ideas and instead mediate reality through Christ, there is no self, ego, true or false natures, etc. These are all just delusions, illusions and deceptions.
True freedom of the will isn’t in being able to choose as we wish from among alternatives, it’s having the hindrance to choosing the only way one would reasonably and rationally choose removed.
I'm not sure that works either. Reasons and rationales can be used for either choice. I think it is more accurate to simply point out that the choice to sin is removed. It's a "no-brainer". There is nothing wrong with the intellect in and of itself. It is only when the intellect is misused that problems occur.
One only stands against absolute Truth because our falsified souls cause us to rebel. Who in their right mind rejects perfection?—and perfection is just the wholeness of truth.
Sounds about right. I'll go along with that. Although even though I agree with this conclusion, I still don't necessarily see how you arrived at it from what preceded it.
