Abiding in the Place from Which

Picking up right where we left off, a big question is whether our distinction between the Absolute Absolute (AA) and Relative Absolute (RA) is ontological or merely epistemological -- i.e., really real or really just our opinion, man. 

In other words, there is one sense in which the RA cannot be the AA, otherwise we'd be God: our knowledge of God is not and cannot be the same as God’s knowledge of himself. Or just say that finitude is not infinitude. Forever.

Having screed that, if I’m not totally out of my element here, then nor is finitude not infinitude, full stop, end of story. By way of analogy, we don’t live inside the sun, but then again, who can draw an ontological distinction between the sun and the rays streaming in through my window? Somewhat like the Trinity, there is distinction but no substantial difference, because light is light and heat is heat.

So, we’re simultaneously inside the sun but not inside the sun. So much for Aristotelian logic. Big rabbit hole here, but suffice it to say that Aristotelian logic is still valid -- duh -- but either situated within, or complementary to, another logic. 

Come to think of it, there is ultimately a kind of “tri-logic” that involves a complementarity between symmetrical and asymmetrical logics on the horizontal plane, situated vertically within the logos as such. 

Not only is this an even bigger hole, off in the distance I see a hookah-smoking caterpillar more than willing to sell us some pot and other edibles. No thanks. Caffeine is enough for now.

Think of other distinctions we routinely make, say, between heart and brain, or mind and body, or intellect and truth, or human and animal, etc. Who can draw a literal line between these? No, I’m serious: name me one. NAME ME ONE!

If you follow this line of thought -- or have another toke -- you not only begin to wonder where the line is, but whether we’ve crossed it. Isn’t this what heresy is? (One toke) over the line, Smokey! Excuse me! MARK IT ZERO! Next paragraph.

But this is something I think about a great deal, that is, cosmic heresy vs. mere religious heresy, which are again real but by no means identical. Of all the religious thinkers of whom I am aware, only Schuon is astute or deluded enough to make this distinction, referring to them as intrinsic and extrinsic heresy (or what we just now called cosmic and religious, respectively).

It just now occurred to me that the deeper I get into retirement, the more I am surrounded by these rabbit holes. For “retirement” isn't merely an absence of toil, it is -- for me at any rate -- a nonstop vertical plunge into the source or ground or something. 

This may sound off-the-Walter, but I’ve always envied the seemingly Dude-like life of Bob Dylan. No, not the money or fame or any worldly perks, rather precisely the opposite: that he seems to float along in the otherworldly world from which creativity arises. 

Perhaps someday I’ll write a post on this subject, but at any rate, if I have a bucket list, the only thing in the bucket is a desire to penetrate this annoying worldly world and dwell inside the real one. Back when I owed my allegiance to what 99% of human call the “real world,” I had to render myself unreal in order to live there. 

Granted, most people aren't built this way, and thank God, because if they were, we’d be in big trouble. But a few of us are, and I like to think that we pneumatics provide the vertical innertainment. Yes, we are here to amuse you, accent on the muse -- even if no one else seems to find it amusing except for me, Dupree, Julie, Ted, and occasionally the late Vanderleun, Slack be upon him, there where poetic champions compose!

Matter of fact, yesterday at the library sale I picked up a biography of one of my literary heroes, P.G. Wodehouse, who most definitely lived in the Dylanworld mentioned above. 

Like anyone else, he was at times forced "to take account of the rest of the world. But he never cared for it.” He was “remarkably unresponsive to many aspects of the world around him,” but here again, this was not fundamentally an avoidance but a total plunge into that place from which creativity arises.

Example. I was thinking about taking weekends off in order to give readers a break. But guess what? My mother-in-law is visiting, which will require much more attention to that other world than Bob is comfortable with. Therefore, I need to come back to this world for a little oxygen, or what the voice in Brandon’s head calls a little breathing room.  

And here’s a coincidence: the Wodehouse bio is my nighttome read, while in broad daylight I’m reading a book on the implicit theology of Tolkien, who is very much in the same boat as Dylan and Wodehouse. He hardly ever left his "legendarium," just as I am ill at ease outside my jestarium (https://www.amazon.com/Tolkien-Dogmatics-Theology-Mythology-Middle-earth/dp/1683596676/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3P1QM5VK5MEFQ&keywords=austin+freeman&qid=1676221198&s=books&sprefix=austin+freeman%2Cstripbooks%2C163&sr=1-1.)

I guess the bottom line is: STFU, I’m not avoiding anything, least of all reality. Rather, I'm nondoing whatever I feel like I want to, gosh!

There's a dream where the contents are visible / Where the poetic champions compose