Thinking About Thinking -Will Brady
So many ideas to be unpacked, so little time... Confessions is absolutely loaded, and the struggle is real.
Can I start by commenting on how Augustine views sin from such a different angle as everyone else? We talked about the pears on Thursday, and now we have his struggle to keep from thinking of God in physical terms. Half of the story of his life as a Manichee seems to revolve around this; in Book V, chapter nineteen, he says, "I thought it shameful to believe you to have the shape of a human figure, and to be limited by the bodily lines of our limbs. When I wanted to think of my God, I knew of no way of doing so except as a physical mass. Nor did I think anything existed which is not material. That was the principal and almost sole cause of my inevitable error." He knows how to be honest about the roots of the matter, at least. Is it heretical to think of God as a literal giant person in space somewhere? I mean, yes. Absolutely. But I can't say I would trace the core of my sin to that belief. I would trace it to a corrupt desire to be like God, as Augustine said in Book I (or II?), and also as Satan said when tempting Eve. Is this incorrect perception of God the true cause of sin, or the desire to be God? Or do the two go hand-in-hand?
While you're thinking about that, I have to say that I can't blame Augustine for his confusion. We know that "God is a spirit, and those who worship Him must do so in spirit" (it's in the Bible somewhere but I'm too lazy at the moment to find the reference) and not a physical being, but our limited minds are still tempted to view "a spirit" as a ghost or wisp or anything that can be traced to a physical location (Heaven for some people, "everywhere" for others). We want to be able to label Him as something comprehensible, because EVERYTHING ELSE is, right? ...But what about thoughts? Can anyone describe what they are? "Neurons firing," scientists will say, but aren't neurons firing just the physical gears in the physical machine of our brain that produces thoughts? When the physical brain does its thing, what are the thoughts that are produced? They can't be seen or defined by any physical shape. We view them as voices or pictures in our heads but still can't actually give them form of any kind or project them into physical reality without use of our physical body. I'm not trying to twist this into some analogy where thought equates to God (also heresy), but I will say that we have no problems whatsoever accepting the existence of abstract thought. We can't understand what our own thoughts are, but depending on who you ask our ability to think doubts about our own minds is the only evidence we have that our minds do exist. We have evidence of our ability to think, though we might not be able to understand it. We have evidence of God through creation and conscience, though we cannot comprehend Him at all.
In any case, I stand with the crowd who says that any god I can understand is a god I can potentially outsmart, and a god I can outsmart is not worth worshipping.
P.S. The fury of my commentary hath descended swiftly upon Abbigayle and Owen.
Can I start by commenting on how Augustine views sin from such a different angle as everyone else? We talked about the pears on Thursday, and now we have his struggle to keep from thinking of God in physical terms. Half of the story of his life as a Manichee seems to revolve around this; in Book V, chapter nineteen, he says, "I thought it shameful to believe you to have the shape of a human figure, and to be limited by the bodily lines of our limbs. When I wanted to think of my God, I knew of no way of doing so except as a physical mass. Nor did I think anything existed which is not material. That was the principal and almost sole cause of my inevitable error." He knows how to be honest about the roots of the matter, at least. Is it heretical to think of God as a literal giant person in space somewhere? I mean, yes. Absolutely. But I can't say I would trace the core of my sin to that belief. I would trace it to a corrupt desire to be like God, as Augustine said in Book I (or II?), and also as Satan said when tempting Eve. Is this incorrect perception of God the true cause of sin, or the desire to be God? Or do the two go hand-in-hand?
While you're thinking about that, I have to say that I can't blame Augustine for his confusion. We know that "God is a spirit, and those who worship Him must do so in spirit" (it's in the Bible somewhere but I'm too lazy at the moment to find the reference) and not a physical being, but our limited minds are still tempted to view "a spirit" as a ghost or wisp or anything that can be traced to a physical location (Heaven for some people, "everywhere" for others). We want to be able to label Him as something comprehensible, because EVERYTHING ELSE is, right? ...But what about thoughts? Can anyone describe what they are? "Neurons firing," scientists will say, but aren't neurons firing just the physical gears in the physical machine of our brain that produces thoughts? When the physical brain does its thing, what are the thoughts that are produced? They can't be seen or defined by any physical shape. We view them as voices or pictures in our heads but still can't actually give them form of any kind or project them into physical reality without use of our physical body. I'm not trying to twist this into some analogy where thought equates to God (also heresy), but I will say that we have no problems whatsoever accepting the existence of abstract thought. We can't understand what our own thoughts are, but depending on who you ask our ability to think doubts about our own minds is the only evidence we have that our minds do exist. We have evidence of our ability to think, though we might not be able to understand it. We have evidence of God through creation and conscience, though we cannot comprehend Him at all.
In any case, I stand with the crowd who says that any god I can understand is a god I can potentially outsmart, and a god I can outsmart is not worth worshipping.
P.S. The fury of my commentary hath descended swiftly upon Abbigayle and Owen.
I had never heard that last part before, "any god I can understand is a god I can potentially outsmart." That's actually a really powerful thought, though... I had never seen it in that aspect before, although now my brain is starting to make connections with the Greek and Roman gods where that could've brought some of their tales to a halt without any further explanation... Also, being less brutal, that could be used as an Evangelical statement as a basis to introduce God... I mean, there have been brutal missionaries before but I do not recommend it as a solid form of practice. ((don't want someone getting executed or stoned or something like that. that's a no-no.))
ReplyDeleteI definitely think that interpreting God as a human figure held a part in the Fall and I see where Augustine is coming from with his confusion on the matter, but in my opinion, I don't believe it to be a substantial sin by any means. God literally made Himself into human form and sent Him down to Earth so that we could not only have a spiritual relationship with him, but a tangible, physical one. It is so much easier to believe in the things we can see and feel and I believe God uses Jesus as an example of himself to represent that He is, in fact, 100% real. Now I could be completely wrong because as you stated, I do not fully understand God, but that is just something that I think about when I think about the physical form of God.
ReplyDeleteThis post has totally debunked a theory I was working on which I now realize as heresy so thank you. I do agree with you. I previously have imagined the spirit of God to be similar to thought. Upon speaking to God I rarely get any voice in my head but instead ideas which can be hard to translate into words. I believe another analogy for God could be emotion as they are not physical either yet still real. The idea that God is a physical being probably comes from parts in the Bible where he appears to people and converses with them (one being Genesis 18:16-33 Where "three men" appear to Abraham).
ReplyDeleteWell thought out, Shark. We (mankind) always try to elevated ourselves above and beyond our state. We model Satan's fall in that fact. Humanity's fatal error is assuming we can understand a God that cannot be contained but fills everything on the planet. We err because we believe our finite mortal logic can explain a holy and all-powerful God. We could learn knowledge spanning millions of years, but we will only understand the whole on the other side of eternity.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I currently consider protocol sentences (which I extend to experiences of thought and consciousness in general) to provide the ultimate foundation, so I, contrary to "common sense," think it's circular to talk about projecting thought into the physical world, as base experience logically precedes talk of a physical world. In other words, I agree that we don't require some special justification for the existence of thought apart from a physical explanation.
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