Dr. Charlton recently posted a comment he had left on one my post concerning subjects and spiritual truth:
There are no 'objects' (in the usually understood sense) but only Beings (and parts of Beings) on the one hand -- and primordial, unknowable, chaos on the other hand.
(In other words, that which is not a Being, or of-a-Being - is unknowable.)
What we think of as 'objects' are actually 'abstractions' - abstractions which exist in the thinking of Beings.
So we can oppose God-as-a-Being, versus God-as-an-Abstraction that has either been derived from our-selves (who are Beings) - or else an abstraction deriving from other Beings.
God as an Abstraction is wrong, because such a conceptualization does not seek a relationship between Beings; which is what Christians (ought to ) believe. It is confused; because we are first making an abstraction, then trying to relate to that abstraction as if it was a Being...
But an abstraction is not a viable and relatable Being, but only a model of a Being (simplified, distorted, incomplete).
Doing this with God is analogous to trying to have a good/ alive/ ongoing personal relationship with your wife while regarding her primarily as 'a woman'; or with your son while he is being considered as essentially 'a son'.
If we try to relate to (the-Being-of-) God as if he actually, truly was a collection of abstract attributes; then we will Not be able to relate to God as the person, the Being, that God truly is.
Dr. Charlton's response to my post about subjects provides an answer to the question of God, an answer that very few Christians appear capable of considering, let alone accepting.
A large part of the problem seems to reside in the formulation of the question itself. When I encounter traditional/conventional answers to the question of God, I am struck by the general impurity and un-originality of the manner through which the question is framed.
More often than not, the traditional/conventional framing of the question of God is too fastened to scholasticism, abstract philosophy, concept play, and verbal acrobatics.
The Christians who promulgate such answers to the questions of God have -- unintentionally one would hope -- degraded the very idea of God, mostly by saddling God with all sorts of abstract qualities that do not derive from the reality of Spirit but from the "realities" of civilization, culture, society, and doctrine -- that is, the object world.
The basic thrust of this sort of answer to the question of God congeals around the notion that God's existence can be verified and guaranteed by the "reality" of civilization, culture, society, and doctrine. However, on closer inspection, this conception of God as a provable collection of abstract attributes that can be verified via other sets of abstract attributes bears little, if any, spiritual fruit.
The "reality" of such conceptualizations about the reality of God is that they offer no guarantee of God's existence at all. Despite the supposedly overwhelming evidence pointing to the reality of God -- evidence that should convince any rational person to believe -- man remains at liberty to doubt, and he is also at liberty to deny and discard. And at no point in the history of the world have so many doubted, denied, and discarded the existence of God.
Instead of reconsidering their metaphysical assumptions, traditionalists are quick to ascribe this denial of God to man's rebelliousness, sin, and stupidity. The answer to the question of God is there for anyone to understand, but people are just too mutinous, wicked, and dull-witted to accept it.
If anything, man's ability to deny God is evidence of the manner in which God appeals to us. God does not coerce; nor does he impose. On the contrary, he calls to our freedom. He desires to meet us in freedom -- not abstraction. He yearns to meet us in Spirit -- not in necessity.
Traditionalists rarely, if ever stop to consider that their traditional abstract proofs of God's existence -- be they cosmological, theological, ontological, or epistemological -- have become spiritually bankrupt. More than that, they are dispensable -- perhaps even harmful.
Traditionalists fail to realize that their answer to the question of God amounts to little more than to the objectivization of being. By extension, that man's rejection of God may not be a pure rejection of God as a Being, but rather a rejection of the objectification of God's Being.
Man seeks a relationship with God. Tradition provides man with an abstraction with which relationship is impossible.
Traditionalists point to the evidence of God's existence everywhere, but they usually diminish the obvious proof that stares back at them whenever they look in the mirror. God is a being. Man is a being. God exists because man exists. Man exists because God exists. This existence makes relationship possible.
The recognition of God as Being rather than an object is vital; however, a meeting of Beings -- man and God -- is insufficient for the simple reason that being can quickly be objectivized -- that is, rendered into abstract concepts or social necessity or natural necessity or whatever. For the meeting of Beings to "work", it must occur in Spirit, which is based in the subject and in freedom.
The answer to the question of God lies in the internal meeting of Beings in the freedom of spiritual experience. Put another way, man cannot meet God in thoughts about God, in abstract concepts; he can only meet God when he recognizes God as a Being and recognizes himself as a Being.
Once the reality of this "Beingness" has been established, meeting can occur, but it can only occur in Spirit, between Beings as subjects, free from the objectifying influence of the thought-object world.
There are no 'objects' (in the usually understood sense) but only Beings (and parts of Beings) on the one hand -- and primordial, unknowable, chaos on the other hand.
(In other words, that which is not a Being, or of-a-Being - is unknowable.)
What we think of as 'objects' are actually 'abstractions' - abstractions which exist in the thinking of Beings.
So we can oppose God-as-a-Being, versus God-as-an-Abstraction that has either been derived from our-selves (who are Beings) - or else an abstraction deriving from other Beings.
God as an Abstraction is wrong, because such a conceptualization does not seek a relationship between Beings; which is what Christians (ought to ) believe. It is confused; because we are first making an abstraction, then trying to relate to that abstraction as if it was a Being...
But an abstraction is not a viable and relatable Being, but only a model of a Being (simplified, distorted, incomplete).
Doing this with God is analogous to trying to have a good/ alive/ ongoing personal relationship with your wife while regarding her primarily as 'a woman'; or with your son while he is being considered as essentially 'a son'.
If we try to relate to (the-Being-of-) God as if he actually, truly was a collection of abstract attributes; then we will Not be able to relate to God as the person, the Being, that God truly is.
Dr. Charlton's response to my post about subjects provides an answer to the question of God, an answer that very few Christians appear capable of considering, let alone accepting.
A large part of the problem seems to reside in the formulation of the question itself. When I encounter traditional/conventional answers to the question of God, I am struck by the general impurity and un-originality of the manner through which the question is framed.
More often than not, the traditional/conventional framing of the question of God is too fastened to scholasticism, abstract philosophy, concept play, and verbal acrobatics.
The Christians who promulgate such answers to the questions of God have -- unintentionally one would hope -- degraded the very idea of God, mostly by saddling God with all sorts of abstract qualities that do not derive from the reality of Spirit but from the "realities" of civilization, culture, society, and doctrine -- that is, the object world.
The basic thrust of this sort of answer to the question of God congeals around the notion that God's existence can be verified and guaranteed by the "reality" of civilization, culture, society, and doctrine. However, on closer inspection, this conception of God as a provable collection of abstract attributes that can be verified via other sets of abstract attributes bears little, if any, spiritual fruit.
The "reality" of such conceptualizations about the reality of God is that they offer no guarantee of God's existence at all. Despite the supposedly overwhelming evidence pointing to the reality of God -- evidence that should convince any rational person to believe -- man remains at liberty to doubt, and he is also at liberty to deny and discard. And at no point in the history of the world have so many doubted, denied, and discarded the existence of God.
Instead of reconsidering their metaphysical assumptions, traditionalists are quick to ascribe this denial of God to man's rebelliousness, sin, and stupidity. The answer to the question of God is there for anyone to understand, but people are just too mutinous, wicked, and dull-witted to accept it.
If anything, man's ability to deny God is evidence of the manner in which God appeals to us. God does not coerce; nor does he impose. On the contrary, he calls to our freedom. He desires to meet us in freedom -- not abstraction. He yearns to meet us in Spirit -- not in necessity.
Traditionalists rarely, if ever stop to consider that their traditional abstract proofs of God's existence -- be they cosmological, theological, ontological, or epistemological -- have become spiritually bankrupt. More than that, they are dispensable -- perhaps even harmful.
Traditionalists fail to realize that their answer to the question of God amounts to little more than to the objectivization of being. By extension, that man's rejection of God may not be a pure rejection of God as a Being, but rather a rejection of the objectification of God's Being.
Man seeks a relationship with God. Tradition provides man with an abstraction with which relationship is impossible.
Traditionalists point to the evidence of God's existence everywhere, but they usually diminish the obvious proof that stares back at them whenever they look in the mirror. God is a being. Man is a being. God exists because man exists. Man exists because God exists. This existence makes relationship possible.
The recognition of God as Being rather than an object is vital; however, a meeting of Beings -- man and God -- is insufficient for the simple reason that being can quickly be objectivized -- that is, rendered into abstract concepts or social necessity or natural necessity or whatever. For the meeting of Beings to "work", it must occur in Spirit, which is based in the subject and in freedom.
The answer to the question of God lies in the internal meeting of Beings in the freedom of spiritual experience. Put another way, man cannot meet God in thoughts about God, in abstract concepts; he can only meet God when he recognizes God as a Being and recognizes himself as a Being.
Once the reality of this "Beingness" has been established, meeting can occur, but it can only occur in Spirit, between Beings as subjects, free from the objectifying influence of the thought-object world.
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