Thursday, July 09, 2020

No Exodus for You!

We left off with the idea that history is the flow of presence characterized by the intersection of time and eternity, or vertical and horizontal.

If there were only horizontality, there could be no awareness of time, no history, no now, and no humanness. We inhabit an ambiguous space indeed, where time passes and we are aware of its passing, but which can only be recognized from above, beyond, or outside time.

No wonder humanness cannot be described without ambiguity or ambi-valence, without a "nevertheless" or "having said that": mortal and immortal, animal and divine, earthy and celestial, body and soul, intellect and passion, etc. Why, it reminds us of God himself, about whom nothing can be said without immediate qualification, since he is beyond any univocal or mono-logical attribute.

As we've iterated and reiterated any number of times, man is composed of irreducible complementarities, male and female being only the most obvious. Qualify that: not totally irreducible, since one of the complements is usually prior, even in the Godhead.

For example, the Father is mysteriously "prior" to the Son, but certainly not temporally, since there was never the Father without the Son. Moreover, they are coequal branches of the Godhead, sharing the identical substance.

We also left off with an observation about the historical omnipresence of the Logos. We could say that the Logos is precisely that which illuminates the space -- the presence -- where eternity bisects time. John says as much, about the true Light which gives light to every man who comes into the world.

Seriously, where do you think the Light comes from? Physics? Chemistry? Natural selection? If that's what you think, then you haven't yet begun to think, and certainly not about thinking.

Christ is both the "historical Christ," with a "pre-" and "post-" in time, and the divine timelessness, omnipresent in the flow of history, with neither a "pre-" nor a "post-" (Voegelin).

This seems perfectly clear to me in all its ambivalence. You can try to eliminate the ambivalence, but only at the cost of clarity. Call it Bob's Certainty Principle of Uncertainty, and vice versa. (Voegelin says something to the effect that our quest for truth in the luminous in-between is ultimately penultimate; the moment we default to ultimate ultimacy -- i.e., collapse the vertical tension -- we descend into ideology.)

So many of the early church councils accomplished precisely this: the specification of ambiguity with great precision, e.g., one God in three persons, two natures in one person, one scripture and multiple authors, etc. -- all simultaneously clear and ambiguous, AKA clearobscuro. With this in mind, we see

God reaching into man and revealing himself as the Presence that is the flow of presence from the beginning of the world to its end. History is Christ written large.

The inter-mediate nature of consciousness itself allows us to think about the inter-mediate nature of everything else, in that everything is mediated by vertical and horizontal. Man is both temporal and transtemporal, every time. And timeless.

Alienation. What is it? And why are leftists by definition so alienated?

Well, alienation is our lot, isn't it? Genesis 3, once upon a time and every time. Because of the ambivalent structure outlined above, man is never going to feel fully at home in this world. We can try, but there just aren't enough drugs. We're always shadowed by sobriety, and always vulnerable to persecution by reality and conscience. These two nuisances can never be vanquished except in Democrat politicians.

The symbol "alienation" is meant to express a feeling of estrangement from existence in time because it estranges us from the timeless: we are alienated from the world in which we live when we sense it to be the cause of our alienation from the world to which we truly belong; we become strangers in the world when it compels conformity to a deficient mode of existence that would estrange us from existence in truth.

This alienation can be wrongly expressed in a multitude of good and bad ways, as foreign country (good), desert (fine), class struggle (stupid), identity politics (evil), patriarchy (hysterical), white privilege (pathetic), Trump derangement (sick), etc. All share one thing in common: enslavement in Egypt. But unlike the Jews, they reject any and all possibilities of exodus, because their very lives are structured by the master-slave intra-temporal dialectic.

The only real way out is by the ceiling, not the door. Indeed, the doors aren't even guarded anymore. People of all races and creeds are free to walk right through but will still feel alienated, from Don Lemon to LeBron James to Barack Obama to countless other Millionaires of Color.

This is why the most important thing to know about any leftist is who's your daddy? For feminists it is Daddy; for professional Blacks, white privilege; for homosexual activists, heteronormativity; for Islamists, Judaism and Christendom; for our trolls, Cousin Dupree.

The essence of ideology -- and we'll have to resume this discussion tomorrow -- is the pathological effort to eliminate the alienation by forcing this world to be a place without alienation, AKA utopia. Being that utopia is noplace and nohow, this strategy assures there will be no solution and increased alienation despite so much improvement in, say, race relations. You will have noticed that the better they are, the more alienated and angry is the race activist. No exodus for you!

Aphorisms:

He who jumps, growls, and barks has an invisible collar and an invisible chain.

Today the individual rebels against inalterable human nature in order to refrain from amending his own correctable nature.

Man matures when he stops believing that politics solves his problems.

The only possible progress is the internal progress of each individual. A process that concludes with the end of each life. --Dávila

30 comments:

julie said...

Because of the ambivalent structure outlined above, man is never going to feel fully at home in this world. We can try, but there just aren't enough drugs.

Indeed; if you've ever caught even the slightest hint of the real Presence, you realize there is no substitute.

Anonymous said...

Alienation. What is it? And why are leftists by definition so alienated?

Half the leftists I know go to church on Sundays. So maybe they’re the confused half? I’d put the pope into that category but it just gets too confusing.

Instead of “alienation”, I’d say that “feeling bullied” would be closer. Their job went overseas, their boss is a sadist, their husband beats them, the cops beat their kids, medical and educational costs are too high, whatever… And they feel there’s not a damned thing they can do about it. Not in this world. So instead of embracing “YOYO TINA, fool!” they fall back on social instincts which evolved back when the had to deal with the bully bear in the clan cave.

Since the bear’s a lot bigger now, and far craftier, they appeal to some authority to help relieve them of this feeling. Conservatives say this feeling is irrelevant because people only really ever allow themselves to be bullied, or they’re just bullying themselves, or YOYO TINA, fool!

But whenever I ask a conservative about how they themselves overcame their own feelings of being bullied, to tell me their own personal inspirational story, they usually mumble something incoherent and tell me to go to hell, wuss. This leads me to believe they’ve never experienced such in any kind of lastingly impactful way.

Anonymous said...

Instead of “alienation”, I’d say that “feeling bullied” would be closer.

Demonstrating that you haven't understood the post at all...

Cousin Dupree said...

A conservative in California is bullied all day long, but I don't let it spoil my fun.

julie said...

Apropos musical interlude: Home

Anonymous said...

Demonstrating that you haven't understood the post at all...

This is exactly why Christianity in America is in such steep decline. Smug attitudes which specifically explain nothing, rationalize everything, while caring nothing for the interlocuter, will gain zero followers.

The athiests I know love to describe all the times religious people tell them that they actually just hate God, they just read the Bible wrong, they were just influenced by those damned liberals from the Great MSM Satan… Then the atheists always love to smugly proclaim that it was none of those things. They simply see no evidence of any gods.

This is how I see scientism working. If human senses cannot detect it, then they’re just not going to believe it. No hate or reading or MSM involved at all. It’s a tough one for sure. As things are set up, one has to feel God in their heart, or imagine that that wild coincidence was really a miracle, or collect pictures of Jesus on tortillas.

Yet spirituality seems such a basic human need. Spirituality seems to help so many. What to do?

Personally, I’d recommend not doing the wrong thing, let alone the exact wrong thing, stuff that turns prospective spiritual travelers off.

Personally, I was never able to get a fish onto my hook by shaming them or trying to impress them with the size of my boat. Maybe one needs to fish for men with bait, and not hate. Maybe craft a conservatism that’s like one big net (which isn’t statist).

Assuming there's no forthcoming explanation, I'll try to read the post again.

Anonymous said...

Dupree, you really think the people at BLM are gonna buy that?

"Revel in your wasted college tuition debt. Enjoy your three jobs. Be sure to always look like Steve Urkel when walking past any cops."

I once considered writing a handbook about how to thrive as a black man in America. But I worry that as a suburban white male I may not be taken seriously, even if I blackface my author bio portrait.

Anonymous said...

Anon @ 12:23,

1) On the off chance you might grasp what kind of alienation is under discussion here, I suggest you listen to the song.

2) You spend a lot of time focused on what other people are doing. How much does that help you in your search for a closer relationship with God? For that matter, are you searching for a closer relationship with God? Because if you are it really doesn't come across. Mostly, you seem to be searching for a place to air your grievances, which nobody here cares about, and which is why you get such a cold response most of the time.

Cousin Dupree said...

BLM? Not my circus, not my clowns. I am racially colorblind, but photosensitive to IQ and values.

Anonymous said...

Anon @7/09/2020 12:42:00 PM

This is a place for Bob's grievances, not mine. Fair enough. We need to address Bob's grievances here.

But what if we disagree?

Dougman said...

"Yet spirituality seems such a basic human need. Spirituality seems to help so many. What to do?"

Think of it this way, Truth is God and G_D is Truth.
Have a relationship with the absolute truth and watch how your life changes.
For better or worse, you will grow spiritually.
I'll take a truth loving atheist over the Pope.

Petey said...

The comment section is a place to express disagreements with Bob. Even better is not commenting at all, and just ignoring the pompous crank.

neal said...

Perhaps it would help to see left and right as a political axis and relative.
Bob is not a crank. Just making movies and drawing soulful vectors.
Didya see that new cathedral in Russia?
Enough to make a grown up cry like a newborn.

Anonymous said...

Wouldn't it be easier to just detach the political from the spiritual? I seem to remember growing up that way, way back when the godless Soviet Union was the Democratic party of the day.

Some say no. The "separation of church and state" was something the Founders came up with when they were stoned. It seems that even with verses as simple as Matthew 22:21 around, some would prefer to have lawyers, many well paid lawyers, to help them swing their ideas their way.

Anonymous said...

The Declaration of Independence is unconstitutional because it grounds our rights in the Creator!

Anonymous said...

The Declaration of Independence is unconstitutional because it grounds our rights in the Creator!

Not to mention the content still being debated by constitutional scholars.

Witness the preamble, which states:

"that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

...which begs the question: Within what scope and limits is this "destructive of these ends" or "Safety and Happiness" of which they speak?

So we go to the Creator and ask, but the Creator may or may not answer. At least not us mere mortals beneath the pay grade of Pat Robertson. So we go to the Bible.

Any Biblical scholars in the house?

Don LeMon said...

Well, I know that Jesus Christ was not perfect, so admittedly, that makes me a Biblical scholar.

julie said...

Neal - I did see that. It's an amazing combination of traditional and modern. Beautiful, and also very Russian. It is clear that they do not follow "Buddy Christ."

Anonymous said...

Alienation is over-rated; kids are involved in alienation as a rite of passage. Adults not so much. They get jobs, put down roots, start going to school board meetings, soccer games, bake sales, etc. They get involved. They get caught up in the warp and weft of society.


Now, the commenter who mentioned bullying is on to something there.

Was "Gagdad Bob" tragically subjected to prolonged and intense bullying? The trauma of being bullied informs his book and blog. He clearly writes like a survivor of abuse.

One tell is the temporal hang=ups. In GDB's universe, the Red Scare is forever in full swing. Sen. Joe McCarthy is cleaning house. Good people drive cars with fins. Moms stay home, Dads are real men. Homos are bed, a risk for national security. Probably this played on TV in the Godwin home young Bob soaked it up.

Against this backdrop young Bob had painful conflicts with authority figures within and outside the family, and from peers.

GDB developed a survivor mentality; a constant crisis is always going on, must always go on, until the pain is over.

GDB's enemy is the Leftist. His Leftists are cartoonish, Stalinist figures. The call each other "Comrade." They read Marx and are card-carrying members of the Communist Party.

He cannot conceive of a Democrat who goes to Church, who is personally saved, who has a relationship with Jesus. And then turns around and advocates for gay marriage and uni-ses bathrooms.

This will not compute for GDB; it violates his 1960's sensibilities. He would reason, there must be some error. They are just faking it. Don't you know, there's a Civil War on? Take your sides! There can be no meeting in the middle.

All that being said, progress is being made. GDB has found Jesus, he feels presence, he is saved. But he will have to learn to love each black man with his pants down low; that's not going to come easy.

And he will have to forgive his persecutors and let it go. That will be the crowning achievement of a life well-lived.

-Psychonomicon Probosci

Cousin Dupree said...

Interesting theory. One question: how is it that was Bob a liberal Democrat until his mid 40s?

Anonymous said...

Cousin Dupree:

I did not know Bob was a liberal Democrat until his mid 40's.

I had believed Bob had barely made it out of his teens when gradual changes and a shift in ideology occurred, culminating in a decisive turn to conservatism around the age of 30-32 years old. I see that time-line was erroneous.

Bob apparently spent the majority of his adult life as a liberal Democrat. Interesting.

The question is, what occurred in Bob's mid 40's that caused this sea-change in attitude? What events transpired?

Dupree, may I prevail upon you to fill in the back-story? You know Bob intimately. You were there for everything.

Petey, you are nominally at the helm, are you not? You must have been involved. Tell us more?

-Frumious Bandersnatch, nee Pscyhonomicon Probosci

Petey said...

Red pilled, like anyone else.

Petey said...

Well, not exactly like anyone else. His was an admittedly refractory case, and required an IV drip of purified liquid crimson solution over a matter of years to knock out stubborn remnants of gnostic escape and egophanic revolt.

Anonymous said...

I'm mostly seeing suburban/country evangelical whites being red pilled these days.

I've tried to describe my own experience with red pills, but something has obviously gone terribly wrong. Instead of wanting "small government" and obsessing over cultural enemies everywhere, I want smart government and whine a lot about general stupidity.

The USA is the worldwide epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic and Trump will likely not be reelected.

You see!?! There I go again. And these are not red pill concepts. Word must get out that not all red pills are created the same. Maybe mine came from China?

Petey said...

If the pill causes political hope, it's counterfeit.

Anonymous said...

Political nihilism would work for me, except my information sources regarding history and world events tells me that results have and do vary wildly.

For example all the excitement over Trump's election from all the official red pillers.

Anonymous said...

Communist publications like the Wall Street Journal beg to differ from true red-pillers.

Google this to see:

“As Coronavirus Surges in U.S., Some Countries Have Just About Halted It”

Petey said...

Re the reaction to Trump's election, "excitement" and "profound relief" can resemble one another. As the man said, there's nothing quite so exhilarating as being shot at without result.

Anonymous said...

I am not sure what is meant by the "red pill."

OTC pseudoephedrine pills used to be fire-engine red.

What I am getting from this is the red pill is probably a metaphor for something else. I just don't know what.

Is it a sexual thing? Red is the color of engorgement of the labia and vulva, the flushing of the neck and chest, the taut head of the penis swelling to resemble a small red apple.

Yes, no? Not even close?

Dougman said...

Well, alot of politicians on the right are dicks.

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