The mistake here, and this of course began in our lengthy PM conversations, is that you have been able---you feel justified---in assigning a negative label of Gnostic to describe what I think or the ideas I am developing. It is not possible to control or to modify how another chooses to define another so I accepted it. But an issue is developing where, by accepting your definition and your structure, I am locked into a debate that I sort of don't want to have.
What I mean too really is simple: you cannot win a debate with a 'typical believing Christian' because, by definition, their view and understanding is 'right' and also by definition yours is 'wrong'. However, I would not ask you to modify your ideas and that is not really my point here.
But I do not see things---not at all---in binary terms. So, I have no problem at all exploring all the various forms of Christianity and just seeing how they functioned, and what people were able to construct out of those idea-systems. Because we can see, now, into an ancient idea-system and understand how it mis-functioned, and even miscarried, I think this (should) give us a unique perspective to be able to analyse those idea-systems surrounding us that are accepted as 'The Way Things Are'---and of course also the metaphysical assumptions underlying our present age---and then too our own positions. My understanding is that we are in a huge process of redefinition as we come to new understandings and new ways to see things, express truths.
I note here, now, that you wish to argue against what I take to be, what you apparently take to be, your supreme enemy: Gnostics and Gnosis. It appears obvious to me, though you might clarify it differently, that everything that is not non-denominational Christianity (your branch of it and however you understand and define it) is 'Gnosticism'. I won't bother to name the various non-Christian and then non-non-denominationalist varieties that exist. The entire structure of religious thought is all contaminated therefor and the only one that has validity and can approach 'truth' is non-denominationalism which aligns itself around the mendicant Jewish Carpenter. I am not trying to be deliberately difficult, nor snide. I think that this is your position and if that is so I can respect it.
I agree this far: it is true that Christianity has otherworldly concerns as its primary focus; what would one expect? But it's totally wrong to think this is dismissive of the body or the physical word. Now,Gnosis is, for sure; but Christianity can never be, since "the Word became flesh," as John says. Or as the author of Hebrews writes, "since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same..." If God was manifest in the flesh, how can flesh itself be evil? And how could anyone genuinely Christian believe such a thing?
Again, you have the 'luxury' as I am calling it to dismiss the European Christian tradition generally, which very certainly and truthfully has had many problems with carnality and the earth-plane. Doing this, you can then redefine a special Christianity which, according to you, exults in physicalness and has no issue with incarnation and mortality. But we have covered this ground, haven't we? The Christianity you define, excepting the rigour of a necessity of holding strictly to halachah, seems in this sense more a form of Judaism. You certainly can and have every right to define whatever you wish to define, but it does not seem fair to call it 'Christianity' since Christianity is what happened when the Greco-Christian world met Europe.
The Bible simply doesn't support the Catholic or Gnostic readings on that, whether I can convince you or not. So perhaps I'll simply register my dissent, and let that stand as it may. I really cannot agree: I know too much about what the Bible actually says on the subject.
The Bible, both Jewish and also Christian, is an astounding and a rich source. It is foundational to almost everything that we think and do. One could devote a life just to tracing all of that. But the Bible does not, in the conversation I am interested in having, define the issues. And certainly not the New Testament nor the Epistles. Nor the Early Church Fathers. In my view one does better to step back from a specific source and look at the entire ancient world. If one became interested in doing that, one could turn to resources like
Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture by Werner Jaeger as a good starting point. In 3 volumes he covers the whole sweep of that corner of the ancient world. And having done that one would realise that what is said to be 'new' in Christianity is not new, and what is good in Christianity (worthy, valuable) is not necessarily Christian. Christianity is in my view significantly revisionist. It is a compendium. It is many things and of course many excellent things, things really remarkable and important. Yet I venture to say that the angle you take in limiting it so much is an aspect of its undesirable side.
I wrote: 'if we are to define a total way to undertake our living, and our dying, here in this plane.'
You wrote: Why? And if we wanted to, how would we know for certain it was right to do so? If there actually were another plane, why would confining ourselves to thinking only about this one make any sense?
I think that what you are trying to say is that you consider the Bible, and the New Testament, or in any case the Gospels, as revealed scripture and therefor we know what is right and what isn't. The work has been done for us.
I am afraid that I'd have to---if I have understood you aright---reject this assumption. That predicate. Especially now on a farther shore of history. And basically this is what I have been trying to communicate in all that I have written on the topic of religion. I am interested in exploring the common traditions of the Indo-Europeans and I think that there we can discover all sorts of different ideas which we can use. Perhaps I can say this: By grasping where we have come from we might be in a better position to define what really is valuable, and what really needs to be protected.
But we have only skirted that conversation because it is not one you have any interest in, it seems to me.
Now, you say Christianity is simple: and it is, in one sense -- so simple a child can be saved. And it's a good thing it is that simple. For were it not, how many would there be who simply could not be saved?
'Salvation' is
your category. I see it as a terribly problematic term. It is similar to 'enlightenment'. Possibly one of the reasons---one among many!---that we can't meet so well here is that 'salvation' is not a meaningful category, for me. I am really only interested in ideas and traditions that can be used to create worthy things while we are alive.
...think for ten seconds of the people in history who have been passionately dedicated Christians, and you'll know it's no philosophy for fools. At the doorway, it may be simple: but the inner chambers have complexities sufficient to stretch the greatest minds in history.
All the writing I have done, nearly all of the writing on this forum, has circled this topic. It is a little surprising that you would write what you have written here. But it seems pretty clear I have a different
orientation in relation to it.
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I was trying to think of something funny to say, to lighten the mood, toward a Gnostic explanation for Eichmann. The best I can come up with is that he never heard Captain Beefheart sing
Ice cream for Crow. Might have saved him...