Corporeality, the hindrance to Last Ends?

[Qoeleth]

Frankly that is a binch of bs. It is gnosticism. I am sure that Aquinas would explicitly reject gnosticism, but in this passage he affirms it indirectly and in all practical purposes. You contradict yourself if you say matter and the body are good, and then turn around and say that the body is a hinderance to a persons natural ends.

The body is part of who a man is and without it he is not a man. You know what you know through your body and without it you would know nothing.

The centuries-old tradition, affirmed by countless saints, is that the soul has three enemies- the flesh, the world and the Devil.

It has become ‘untrendy’ among modern theologians, who often flee from the Church’s traditions- to come up with some kind of hippy-eco-Creationism-paganism, which affirms the flesh and the World. If you did this in the Middle Ages, you would be arrested as a heretic. Now, if you suggest that the flesh and the world are the enemies of the soul, you get arrested for being a Gnostic.

Maybe we need to be more post-modern, and accept multiple narratives. In one narrative, the body is the prison of the Heaven-longing soul. In another, alternative, narrative, the body is the gift from God and a part of our identity. The first narrative can be used at funerals, the second narrative can be used at infant baptisms.

 

[GEddie]

The centuries-old tradition, affirmed by countless saints, is that the soul has three enemies- the flesh, the world and the Devil.

It has become ‘untrendy’ among modern theologians, who often flee from the Church’s traditions- to come up with some kind of hippy-eco-Creationism-paganism, which affirms the flesh and the World. If you did this in the Middle Ages, you would be arrested as a heretic. Now, if you suggest that the flesh and the world are the enemies of the soul, you get arrested for being a Gnostic.

Maybe we need to be more post-modern, and accept multiple narratives. In one narrative, the body is the prison of the Heaven-longing soul. In another, alternative, narrative, the body is the gift from God and a part of our identity. The first narrative can be used at funerals, the second narrative can be used at infant baptisms.

Or we can just be Biblical, and recognize that sarx is not the same as soma; that we do not have bodies, we are bodies; and that while we all face the punishment of death, our final objective is to be not spirits but bodily human beings, via the bodily resurrection.

ICXC NIKA

 

[jimmy]

The centuries-old tradition, affirmed by countless saints, is that the soul has three enemies- the flesh, the world and the Devil.

It has become ‘untrendy’ among modern theologians, who often flee from the Church’s traditions- to come up with some kind of hippy-eco-Creationism-paganism, which affirms the flesh and the World. If you did this in the Middle Ages, you would be arrested as a heretic. Now, if you suggest that the flesh and the world are the enemies of the soul, you get arrested for being a Gnostic.

Maybe we need to be more post-modern, and accept multiple narratives. In one narrative, the body is the prison of the Heaven-longing soul. In another, alternative, narrative, the body is the gift from God and a part of our identity. The first narrative can be used at funerals, the second narrative can be used at infant baptisms.

Read the fathers on gnosticism. Read Irenaeus, Tertullian, and the other second and third century fathers. Then read the fifth and sixth century fathers on the incarnation. The fact is that the dogma of the incarnation is an affirmation of the goodness of the body and of the world. The analogies the fathers used for the incarnation affirm the fact that the body and soul are one substance and any division between them is a travesty. Your soul is no more you than your body is. You are a composite of body and soul, and to seperate them is to annihaliate the human person (which is an essential conception to Christian dogma). If the middle ages considered gnosticism a good thing then that is a problem with the middle ages, not with anyone else.

 

[GEddie]

Read the fathers on gnosticism. Read Irenaeus, Tertullian, and the other second and third century fathers. Then read the fifth and sixth century fathers on the incarnation. The fact is that the dogma of the incarnation is an affirmation of the goodness of the body and of the world. The analogies the fathers used for the incarnation affirm the fact that the body and soul are one substance and any division between them is a travesty. Your soul is no more you than your body is. You are a composite of body and soul, and to seperate them is to annihaliate the human person (which is an essential conception to Christian dogma). If the middle ages considered gnosticism a good thing then that is a problem with the middle ages, not with anyone else.

Ahhh… But remember, the High Middle Ages were the zenith of philosophy, and philosophers have a tendency to devalue the body, because to do philosophy requires no “conscious” use of the body (although you need a functioning head).

Although I am not a fan of Nietzsche, he did have a point concerning those who “despised their bodies.”

ICXC NIKA

 

[JDaniel]

I do not dispute the Angelic Doctor concerning intelligible things; he makes it very clear and coherent, as usual. My dispute is, I do not care about intelligible things at all, I only desire to know God, the “Divine Light” or as Plato stated “the Form of Good” (which he stated is the master form). “And this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” John 17:3. The crux of the argument is that we are tied to this reality which only serves itself and not our last end, which is existing in the Godhead through Christ as one. Do you not agree that time and space serves no function to what we are trying know, which exists outside of time and space?

TS:

I think Eckhart was a bit eccentric - of course, with the best of intentions. (And this is where some of our other poster’s ideas might come to our aid.) There must be a reason why God did not simply continue to make angels. Angels are capable of that oneness (as you’ve defined it) with God. Yet having experienced a sample of it, a great many were too intimidated by His vision that they left the final ends decreed by God to follow their own lesser ends. There must be some correlation to this where humans are concerned. I am wondering what that correlation might be? I am not sure; and want to think about it more then get back to this.

(You’ve introduced a great thread, which takes us someplace far away from incessant atheist drivel. No deleterious aspersion intended. This is just Catholic to Catholic talking.)

God bless,
jd

 

[Qoeleth]

Read the fathers on gnosticism. Read Irenaeus, Tertullian, and the other second and third century fathers. Then read the fifth and sixth century fathers on the incarnation. The fact is that the dogma of the incarnation is an affirmation of the goodness of the body and of the world. The analogies the fathers used for the incarnation affirm the fact that the body and soul are one substance and any division between them is a travesty. Your soul is no more you than your body is. You are a composite of body and soul, and to seperate them is to annihaliate the human person (which is an essential conception to Christian dogma). If the middle ages considered gnosticism a good thing then that is a problem with the middle ages, not with anyone else.

St Francis of Assisi and many other saints frequently prayed to be “delivered from the miserable prison of the flesh.”

Jesus said, let me repeat, “The Spirit gives the life. The flesh has nothing to offer.”
The Book of Wisdom say “The perishable body burdens the soul, and this tent of clay weighs down the mind.”

In fact, the incarnation has traditionally ben though of as a sacrifice of God. That is why we bow during the creed at the mention of the incarnation, but not the crucifixion. Eckhart tells a story of the Incarnation: A man (God) has a wife (man). The wife (man) sustains an injury, and loses an eye (takes flesh). She then thinks her husband (God) won’t love her anymore. To show that he does, the man (God) takes a knife and cuts out his own eye (takes flesh), thus sharing the disfigurement of his wife.

Doesn’t St. John of the Cross say that of the three enemies of the soul (the World, the Flesh and the Devil), the flesh is the most insiduous?

I think you are making too much of Ireneaus and Tertullian, and probably have fallen victim to the trendy theology I mentioned before. They intended merely to affirm the sacrifice and mystery of the incarnation. The idea that the purpose of the incarnation was to sanctify the flesh is an entirely modern invention.

 

[TS_Aquinas]

TS:

I think Eckhart was a bit eccentric - of course, with the best of intentions. (And this is where some of our other poster’s ideas might come to our aid.) There must be a reason why God did not simply continue to make angels. Angels are capable of that oneness (as you’ve defined it) with God. Yet having experienced a sample of it, a great many were too intimidated by His vision that they left the final ends decreed by God to follow their own lesser ends. There must be some correlation to this where humans are concerned. I am wondering what that correlation might be? I am not sure; and want to think about it more then get back to this.

Aquinas might have agreed there was a correlation, (ST, 1, 61, 3) “For the angels are part of the universe: they do not constitute a universe of themselves; but both they and corporeal natures unite in constituting one universe. This stands in evidence from the relationship of creature to creature; because the mutual relationship of creatures makes up the good of the universe. But no part is perfect if separate from the whole.” The book of Enoch, though not proclaimed inspired, explained that the pre-flood period, angels and men were in direct communication and they had command over men. Maybe the book is false but makes a possible explanation. Aquinas made this statement in the following article from above (ST, 1, 61, 4) “As was observed (3), the universe is made up of corporeal and spiritual creatures. Consequently spiritual creatures were so created as to bear some relationship to the corporeal creature, and to rule over every corporeal creature. Hence it was fitting for the angels to be created in the highest corporeal place, as presiding over all corporeal nature; whether it be styled the empyrean heaven, or whatever else it be called.”

(You’ve introduced a great thread, which takes us someplace far away from incessant atheist drivel. No deleterious aspersion intended. This is just Catholic to Catholic talking.)

I have another topic in the brew (you’ll definitely like the topic), will post this week after sorting through this one.

 

[TS_Aquinas]

Frankly that is a binch of bs. It is gnosticism. I am sure that Aquinas would explicitly reject gnosticism, but in this passage he affirms it indirectly and in all practical purposes.

You need to demonstrate how my statement reflects Gnostic teachings because frankly, I am insulted by this drivel. I spend a lot of time devoted to reading refutations and philosophical works to combat Gnostic garbage, not that it’s a challenge but because they always pose the greatest threat to the Church ever since the first century. Can’t wait to see this, so let’s have it.

You contradict yourself if you say matter and the body are good, and then turn around and say that the body is a hinderance to a persons natural ends.

I didn’t, move along.

The body is part of who a man is and without it he is not a man. You know what you know through your body and without it you would know nothing.

Yet angels, beings who have no bodies, know things in the fullest detail because all they know is form, from which matter can vary in degrees of privation of that particular form. Yet in the corporeal world, matter can never reflect the perfection of form but only vary in degrees.

 

[GEddie]

You need to demonstrate how my statement reflects Gnostic teachings because frankly, I am insulted by this drivel. I spend a lot of time devoted to reading refutations and philosophical works to combat Gnostic garbage, not that it’s a challenge but because they always pose the greatest threat to the Church ever since the first century. Can’t wait to see this, so let’s have it.

I didn’t, move along.

Yet angels, beings who have no bodies, know things in the fullest detail because all they know is form, from which matter can vary in degrees of privation of that particular form. Yet in the corporeal world, matter can never reflect the perfection of form but only vary in degrees.

What pure spirits can or can’t do is totally unrelated to you as a human being. You are designed to BE (not have) and know as a BODY. Death is not a liberation, it is a disablement. Reduced to a spirit, every human faculty would be lost or disabled.

That a handful of saints in the High Middle Ages believed the then prevailing philosophy, which devalued the body, does not make their beliefs truth. Saints are not infallible.

ICXC NIKA

 

[jimmy]

You need to demonstrate how my statement reflects Gnostic teachings because frankly, I am insulted by this drivel. I spend a lot of time devoted to reading refutations and philosophical works to combat Gnostic garbage, not that it’s a challenge but because they always pose the greatest threat to the Church ever since the first century. Can’t wait to see this, so let’s have it.

Then get used to being insulted, because you are espousing gnostic doctrine. No one has a right to not be insulted or offended. You basically said the body is evil by asserting that it is a hinderance toward your true end. Gnosticism is about the liberation of the soul from the body because the soul knows God (or the One) through an infused knowledge.

In reality the only way you will ever know God is through your body. Through the use of your senses and your brain you come to know God.

I didn’t, move along.

Your right, you didn’t say the body is good. But I assumed you would since the Catholic Church and Aquinas did. You did assert that it is a hinderance though.

Yet angels, beings who have no bodies, know things in the fullest detail because all they know is form, from which matter can vary in degrees of privation of that particular form. Yet in the corporeal world, matter can never reflect the perfection of form but only vary in degrees.

Who cares about the way angels know things, humans aren’t angels and Catholic doctrine denies that they will ever be angels. The fact is the a man is a body/soul composite. He is not a soul which inhabits a body. Seperation of the soul from the body isn’t a liberation of the soul as you and the gnostics think. Rather it is the destruction of a man.

 

[jimmy]

St Francis of Assisi and many other saints frequently prayed to be “delivered from the miserable prison of the flesh.”

Jesus said, let me repeat, “The Spirit gives the life. The flesh has nothing to offer.”
The Book of Wisdom say “The perishable body burdens the soul, and this tent of clay weighs down the mind.”

St. Paul also says the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and excoriates those who defile it. If it truely is an enemy and is evil as you want to say then who cares whether you defile it, it isn’t an essential part of you?

In fact, the incarnation has traditionally ben though of as a sacrifice of God. That is why we bow during the creed at the mention of the incarnation, but not the crucifixion. Eckhart tells a story of the Incarnation: A man (God) has a wife (man). The wife (man) sustains an injury, and loses an eye (takes flesh). She then thinks her husband (God) won’t love her anymore. To show that he does, the man (God) takes a knife and cuts out his own eye (takes flesh), thus sharing the disfigurement of his wife.

The only way in which it can be considered a sacrifice is in as much as it is a condesension of God to be a man. The part of the creed you speek of states ‘and he was made man’. Guess what that means; it means he assumed a body, soul, and spirit. Everything that it is to be a man. If you want to assert that it was a sacrifice, then you have to include the assumption of a human soul as part of the sacrifice. Remember, Apollinarius was condemned for denying that Jesus had a human soul.

Doesn’t St. John of the Cross say that of the three enemies of the soul (the World, the Flesh and the Devil), the flesh is the most insiduous?

Who cares what he said, he was wrong if he asserted that the body is evil or needs to be liberated from.

I think you are making too much of Ireneaus and Tertullian, and probably have fallen victim to the trendy theology I mentioned before. They intended merely to affirm the sacrifice and mystery of the incarnation. The idea that the purpose of the incarnation was to sanctify the flesh is an entirely modern invention.

Of course you think I make too much of them, because they don’t support your views. It is no more modern than Cyril of Alexandria and maximus the confessor. As Maximus said, ‘if the body and soul are parts of man, as we have seen, it must be granted that as parts each necessarily bears a relation to something other than itself. It is only as they are related to each other that they have the whole predicated of them. Something that is always spoken of in relation to something else must have come into existence with the other. For the parts by coming together constitute the whole, and what each is in essence can be distinguished only in thought. Therefore since they are parts of man it is impossible for either the soul or the body to exist before the other or indeed to exist after the other in time. If that were not the case the necessary relation each has to the other would be destroyed…Therefore the human being is composed of soul and body, for soul and body are indissolubly understoody to be parts of the whole human species. Soul and body came into being at the same moment and their essential difference from each other in no way whatsoever impairs the logoi that inhere naturally and essentially in them. For that reason it is inconceivable to speak of the soul and body except in relation to each other. It is only as they come together to form a particular person that they exist. If either existed before the other, it would have to be understood as the soul or the body of the one to which the other belongs. The relation between them is immutable [Ambiguum 7, On The Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ, p.72-74].’

Maximus’ theology isn’t new to him. It was held by Severus of Antioch, Leontius of Byzantium, and Cyril of Alexandria. But maybe they submitted to the modern, trendy idea.

The idea of saying the body is evil sounds cool to a lot of people. It sounds really spiritual. In the end, though, it is nonsense.

 

[Qoeleth]

St. Paul also says the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and excoriates those who defile it. If it truely is an enemy and is evil as you want to say then who cares whether you defile it, it isn’t an essential part of you?

The only way in which it can be considered a sacrifice is in as much as it is a condesension of God to be a man. The part of the creed you speek of states ‘and he was made man’. Guess what that means; it means he assumed a body, soul, and spirit. Everything that it is to be a man. If you want to assert that it was a sacrifice, then you have to include the assumption of a human soul as part of the sacrifice. Remember, Apollinarius was condemned for denying that Jesus had a human soul.

Who cares what he said, he was wrong if he asserted that the body is evil or needs to be liberated from.

Of course you think I make too much of them, because they don’t support your views. It is no more modern than Cyril of Alexandria and maximus the confessor. As Maximus said, ‘if the body and soul are parts of man, as we have seen, it must be granted that as parts each necessarily bears a relation to something other than itself. It is only as they are related to each other that they have the whole predicated of them. Something that is always spoken of in relation to something else must have come into existence with the other. For the parts by coming together constitute the whole, and what each is in essence can be distinguished only in thought. Therefore since they are parts of man it is impossible for either the soul or the body to exist before the other or indeed to exist after the other in time. If that were not the case the necessary relation each has to the other would be destroyed…Therefore the human being is composed of soul and body, for soul and body are indissolubly understoody to be parts of the whole human species. Soul and body came into being at the same moment and their essential difference from each other in no way whatsoever impairs the logoi that inhere naturally and essentially in them. For that reason it is inconceivable to speak of the soul and body except in relation to each other. It is only as they come together to form a particular person that they exist. If either existed before the other, it would have to be understood as the soul or the body of the one to which the other belongs. The relation between them is immutable [Ambiguum 7, On The Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ, p.72-74].’

Maximus’ theology isn’t new to him. It was held by Severus of Antioch, Leontius of Byzantium, and Cyril of Alexandria. But maybe they submitted to the modern, trendy idea.

The idea of saying the body is evil sounds cool to a lot of people. It sounds really spiritual. In the end, though, it is nonsense.

I did not say the body is evil. It is, however, a hinderance, a prison, to the soul. This view is expressed by Solomon, Jesus, the Buddha, the Bhagavadgita, Origen, St. Boethius, St. Francis, St. John of the Cross, Schopenhauer, John Calvin, E.M. Cioran.

St. Paul, in whom you put so much weight says:
For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my flesh, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my flesh.

O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

I have suffered from chronic physical illness for more the 20 years, which will at some point in the future end my physical life. Not one days goes by when I do not experience the body as a prison. But it is a prison created by my own sin- that is, Original Sin, the sin of all humanity. And eventually the suffering of the flesh will serve the sentence (in union with the sufferings of Christ), and the soul will be released to its true Heavenly home.

“That which is born of spirit is spirit. That which is born of flesh is flesh.” That is why we “must live in this world as strangers in a strange land”.

 

[GEddie]

You are aware that quoting Hindu, Buddhist, or atheist sources does notHing to advance your point in a Catholic context?

My condolences for your bodily sufferings (although that’s not worth much to you). But your experiences in an ill body do not generalize to human bodyhood generally.

The body is not a prison, it is the holder, expressor and enabler of human
life. And despite the hideous loss of body occasioned by death, we will ultimately spend eternity as human bodies. Just ask our LORD!

ICXC NIKA

 

[Qoeleth]

You are aware that quoting Hindu, Buddhist, or atheist sources does notHing to advance your point in a Catholic context?

My condolences for your bodily sufferings (although that’s not worth much to you). But your experiences in an ill body do not generalize to human bodyhood generally.

The body is not a prison, it is the holder, expressor and enabler of human
life. And despite the hideous loss of body occasioned by death, we will ultimately spend eternity as human bodies. Just ask our LORD!

ICXC NIKA

The thought of spending eternity in a human body would really worry me. I sincerely hope this is not the case- I hope that “the resurrection of the body” is only a very distant metaphor for something quite different.

 

[TS_Aquinas]

Then get used to being insulted, because you are espousing gnostic doctrine. No one has a right to not be insulted or offended. You basically said the body is evil by asserting that it is a hinderance toward your true end. Gnosticism is about the liberation of the soul from the body because the soul knows God (or the One) through an infused knowledge.

In reality the only way you will ever know God is through your body. Through the use of your senses and your brain you come to know God.

You really need to reread the summa then. Read all of question 88 and get back to me.

Your right, you didn’t say the body is good. But I assumed you would since the Catholic Church and Aquinas did. You did assert that it is a hinderance though.

Really? Because I keep reading we’re in the fallen state and were supernaturally upheld in a higher mode of existence prior to the Fall. Sounds like the present state of corporeality hinders us as it presently is in a fallen state. Which really puts into question, how does the human person exist in the state of original justice and even more-so in the Mystical Body of Christ, one in being with Him…

Who cares about the way angels know things, humans aren’t angels and Catholic doctrine denies that they will ever be angels. The fact is the a man is a body/soul composite. He is not a soul which inhabits a body. Seperation of the soul from the body isn’t a liberation of the soul as you and the gnostics think. Rather it is the destruction of a man.

I already know the metaphysics of hylemorphic dualism, so no need to explain it to me as I made it clear in the very first sentence of my first post. I made it clear we exist naturally as this unity of form and matter but the point was to demonstrate that last ends is to know God fully or see Him as He is, face to face. He exists outside of time and space, as Eckhart demonstrated if the soul desires to know God, it must go beyond time and space. Aquinas saw the immense difficulty that it “For since nature is always ordered to what is best, and since it is better to understand by turning to simply intelligible objects than by turning to the phantasms; God should have ordered the soul’s nature so that the nobler way of understanding would have been natural to it, and it would not have needed the body for that purpose.” He resolves the difficulty by stating “Now it is clear that in the natural order human souls hold the lowest place among intellectual substances. But the perfection of the universe required various grades of being. If, therefore, God had willed souls to understand in the same way as separate substances, it would follow that human knowledge, so far from being perfect, would be confused and general. Therefore to make it possible for human souls to possess perfect and proper knowledge, they were so made that their nature required them to be joined to bodies, and thus to receive the proper and adequate knowledge of sensible things from the sensible things themselves.” So, we are lowly inferior creatures, naturally created that way because the Divine Intellect was bound to make the universe according to grades of being, beings closer to actuality and beings less actual, He was also bound by necessity to create corporeality for us because we would be confused in a mode of existence like of angels. Am I the only one who sees the problem with this answer or are people really that comfortable with the fact the only answer is that God was bound to create it like this and we are lowly stupid creatures needing a sandbox to play in because our nature can’t comprehend anything beyond the sandbox? The answer does not suffice and I’m getting tired of being the only one here doing the metaphysical demonstrations.

 

[GEddie]

The thought of spending eternity in a human body would really worry me. I sincerely hope this is not the case- I hope that “the resurrection of the body” is only a very distant metaphor for something quite different.

Sorry, you will be just as much a BODY as our LORD was on Easter Sunday. That is NT and Church teaching!!!

I don’t understand some people’s longing to become pure spirits; the very idea is hideous to me. Would you enjoy being bound, blindfolded and nose-plugged indefinitely?

Heaven wouldn’t be worth it without the human ability to move, breathe, see, smell, hear, taste, touch and be touched. Oh, and to form and enjoy memories. All those functions require the human body. Your head is also part of your body.

For that matter, the main attraction of Heaven would be to hug and be hugged by our LORD. For that, I’d need limbs and skin, just as HE has!

But if your aversion is related to the difficulties of your present embodiment, take courage: you will not resume your original body, rather take on what S. Paul called the “pneumatikon soma.”

Read 1 Corinthians 15.

ICXC NIKA!

 

[TS_Aquinas]

Sorry, you will be just as much a BODY as our LORD was on Easter Sunday. That is NT and Church teaching!!!

I don’t understand some people’s longing to become pure spirits; the very idea is hideous to me. Would you enjoy being bound, blindfolded and nose-plugged indefinitely?

Heaven wouldn’t be worth it without the human ability to move, breathe, see, smell, hear, taste, touch and be touched. Oh, and to form and enjoy memories. All those functions require the human body. Your head is also part of your body.

For that matter, the main attraction of Heaven would be to hug and be hugged by our LORD. For that, I’d need limbs and skin, just as HE has!

But if your aversion is related to the difficulties of your present embodiment, take courage: you will not resume your original body, rather take on what S. Paul called the “pneumatikon soma.”

Read 1 Corinthians 15.

ICXC NIKA!

So, where is Our Lord? Our Queen? Enoch, Elijah and Moses? They have their bodies, only a body can exist in this mode of existence, so where are they?

 

[JDaniel]

Aquinas might have agreed there was a correlation, (ST, 1, 61, 3) “For the angels are part of the universe: they do not constitute a universe of themselves; but both they and corporeal natures unite in constituting one universe. This stands in evidence from the relationship of creature to creature; because the mutual relationship of creatures makes up the good of the universe. But no part is perfect if separate from the whole.”

TS:

I was thinking more along the lines of what it is about the angelic nature that makes it susceptible to the sin of Lucifer. Why would an angel, fully aware that it is a creature of God, determine to look to itself, knowing full well that once a determination is made (by an angel) it cannot be rescinded. As committed as you appear to be, you can change your mind at any time, whereas an angel cannot (per Catholic doctrine). What is it about such a “perfect” creature that would make it that susceptible? Perhaps the fact that it never had any communion with corporeality?

The book of Enoch, though not proclaimed inspired, explained that the pre-flood period, angels and men were in direct communication and they had command over men. Maybe the book is false but makes a possible explanation.

I am trying to envision that. There is no mention of angels in the period before the flood. To my knowledge there is no mention of them ministering to Noah either, when he was in need. I think that the angelic ministry, as a ministry, began later with the beginning of the history of the Jewish people. This would exclude the book of Enoch from a proclamation of “inspired.”

Aquinas made this statement in the following article from above (ST, 1, 61, 4) “As was observed (3), the universe is made up of corporeal and spiritual creatures. Consequently spiritual creatures were so created as to bear some relationship to the corporeal creature, and to rule over every corporeal creature. Hence it was fitting for the angels to be created in the highest corporeal place, as presiding over all corporeal nature; whether it be styled the empyrean heaven, or whatever else it be called.”

In another thread, I have been conversing with a poster who has outlined an extensive model of God, the universe, and His creatures. The thread is entitled, “Space?” (It’s worth a read.) In this theory, God creates at one level, the implicate level, and creation becomes physical at another level, the explicate level. God, as well, is seen as Infinite Continuous Space. Matter is seen as finite discrete space. The universe, which is an exigency within continuous space, consists of point particles. Point particles are seen, at the explicate level, as electrons and the fermions and bosons that make up protons and neutrons. All of these so-called “point particles” are dimensionless. When the Big Bang took place, these point particles began expanding until what exists now (at the explicate level) is a lattice of points (s-points), called s-gaps, that form what is called an s-frame, in this case, the cosmic s-frame. In between these points of the “s-frame,” within the s-gaps, is continuous space, e.i., God. And, that is how He remains contiguous with matter and space.

Matter is nothing more than configured s-points within the s-frame. Specific configurations of s-points are the determinants of specific species of matter. Angels and souls are “sparks,” again, so to speak, produced from God Himself, that either are free from s-point configurations, or embedded in them, one in each configured group of s-points.

Now, I am relating all of this to you, not to throw us off your desired intent, but to offer a possible mechanism whereby angels (non-composites) and human souls (composites) may have existence together, within the level of God’s Reality.

To get back to Lucifer’s fall from grace, is it possible, do you think, that Lucifer, seeing God’s Creation, s-points, s-gaps, cosmic s-frame, configuration algorithms, how God causes motion (at the explicate level, which is simply God advancing s-gaps within the s-frame in small jumps), that he was so amazed that He withdrew himself from analyzing it? We know that smart people exist and that dumb people exist. Is it possible that Lucifer was a dumb angel? By this I mean, not “dumb” by our standards, but in terms of angelic standards. Otherwise, the impetus for his stupid decision is hard to fathom.

I have another topic in the brew (you’ll definitely like the topic), will post this week after sorting through this one.

Terrific! I’ll look forward to it.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

I did not say the body is evil. It is, however, a hindrance, a prison, to the soul. This view is expressed by Solomon, Jesus, the Buddha, the Bhagavadgita, Origen, St. Boethius, St. Francis, St. John of the Cross, Schopenhauer, John Calvin, E.M. Cioran.

St. Paul, in whom you put so much weight says:
For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my flesh, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my flesh.

O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

I have suffered from chronic physical illness for more the 20 years, which will at some point in the future end my physical life. Not one days goes by when I do not experience the body as a prison. But it is a prison created by my own sin- that is, Original Sin, the sin of all humanity. And eventually the suffering of the flesh will serve the sentence (in union with the sufferings of Christ), and the soul will be released to its true Heavenly home.

“That which is born of spirit is spirit. That which is born of flesh is flesh.” That is why we “must live in this world as strangers in a strange land”.

Qoeleth:

In those early days, I think people had essentially two distinct impressions of our relation to God. Relation one was that of other. IOW, we are creatures that are separate and separable from the Divine Creator such that it was as though we were “bubbles” within His infiniteness. The second relation was that we were much more than other, we were one with and within God. This dichotomy is, IMHO, responsible for making men see the relationship incorrectly. I think that God does permeate us, that He exists in the gaps between an atom’s nucleus and its electron(s), and within the atomic particles themselves - as well between the molecules of material substances. I think God causes everything (with the exception of Sin).

But, I also think that whatever was the impetus that caused Lucifer to abandon God’s Decree for communion with Him, is somehow resolved by our immersion in matter. I cannot explain a mechanism for this, only that God has His reasons.

Men grow impatient. Men grow impatient to see God face to face. Yet, upon seeing God face-to-face, spirit forms are, perhaps, only about 50% able to commune with Him. The other 50% follow Satan down to that lower level, which is more on the order of an explicate level - precisely where we are as mortals.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

The thought of spending eternity in a human body would really worry me. I sincerely hope this is not the case- I hope that “the resurrection of the body” is only a very distant metaphor for something quite different.

Qoeleth:

“I believe in . . . the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting.” - The Apostles Creed.

“The doctrine of the resurrection of the body is an integral part of Catholic belief concerning the Last Things – that is, concerning death and the life after death. It is so intimate a part of this belief that to reject it is to reject a doctrine which was taught from the very beginning of Christianity, and which has been unalterably affirmed by the Church throughout the centuries.” - The Teaching of the Catholic Church, Vol 2, Ch. XXXIV, The Resurrection of the Body, p 1211, 1948.

Quoleth, it is not a ‘distant metaphor for something quite different’! Perhaps you need to wrap your mind around the ‘how’ of it, but try not to “reject” it. Consider the body as an amalgamation of dimensionless points, configured (Formed) into “gaps,” which are separated with God - as continuous space (at our level). How, then, can the body be “evil?” It is 99.9% God, for Heaven’s sake!

God bless,
jd