Does anyone ever know what they are doing when they sin?

[guanophore]

This is a direct reference to the shadow self. There is part of himself within that he has naturally come to condemn, because he cannot control the existence of his innate drives.

I don’t think this can be supported by scripture and catholic teaching. Rather, Paul is talking about his “old man” or that controlled by “desires of the flesh”. The “sinful nature” can also be called concupiscense, but the passage makes it clear that there is nothing in the shadow or unknown here. On the contrary, this battle takes place in full view of his observation constantly!

What makes you think that Paul finds “innate drives” sinful? I don’t think that human instincts need to be confused with evil.

as long as he is condemning those drives, then his conscience is functioning in his focus on them in a negative way, and in this way assists in his control of the behavior.

I would have to agree, when it comes to improper acting on such drives, but I think it is a mistake to equate natural human drives with something that should be condemned. God created us with these drives, they are part of our humanity.

So while the negative attention is helpful, there is yet a deeper transcending to take place when he is ready to do so.

What kind of transcendence do you think St. Paul can achieve?

Reference to the parts of himself, the desires, that he resents.

You discussed them, OS, but I do not agree with your construct. Human desires are not, in and of themselves, sinful. Human beings have an inclination to turn against God, and to engage in actions that are sinful, but the inclination, in itself, is not a sin.

While the conscience creates a divided self, (we see a “good” and a “bad” within, and there is a battling) which in effect compromises inner peace, creates an inner discord,

This seems like quite a black and white approach, especially since moral decisions contain a lot f gray area. This makes it sound like the conscience creates inner discord, as if a person with a fully formed conscience will not experience inner peace.

Instead of “waging war” we can come to reconcile with all that is within.

I guess the best way to do this is to call good evil, and evil good. that way, real evil will not exist, the sin nature will not exist (or it will become “good”). This way, we can forgive ourselves and others always because no one really knows what they are doing when they sin?

 

[Benadam]

A&E to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (conscience). While the conscience is very good, it also brings with it the capacity to condemn oneself and others.

Hi OneSheep.

I was reading the thread and wanted to make this contribution. I hope it does
Conscience is human in nature. It’s knowledge is both inherent and externally informed from accepted moral authority.

The tree of knowledge of good and evil caused a ontological shift that included a shift in the mode of knowing evil. For us to know a frog we examine it cut it open and come to understand in as much as are able about a frog. But to know a frog fully we have to be a frog. That is the ontological shift that Adam and Eve experienced in knowing Evil. That is what God meant when He said now they are like us. God knows a frog fully without being a frog…

Adam and Eve’s conscience was endowed with inherent knowledge ie; the law that God writes on our hearts. Adam and Eve had no ego. Ego is not inherent in our nature. The ego formed when T
the object of Adam and Eve’s will was no longer the good of God but the false good that the serpent tempted her with.The good that pleases the senses. The sensitive powers of our soul usurps the powers of the intellect causing the ontological shift. That also caused their bodies to move involuntarily. They had never experienced the body move without permission from the will. The emergence of shame from the conscience informed by the body caused the need to hide. Their bodies informed their intellects of their fallen state.

The knowledge of the forbidden tree came by revelation from God. This knowledge came from an acceptable moral authority, it was singular in every respect.

My point in all this is to oppose the idea that conscience causes internal division or was a positive consequence of original sin… That it isn’t the cause of the internal struggle that Paul was describing. Paul was describing the ontological shift that was a consequence of the original sin…

 

[OneSheep]

Hi OneSheep.

I was reading the thread and wanted to make this contribution. I hope it does

Welcome, and thank you!

Conscience is human in nature. It’s knowledge is both inherent and externally informed from accepted moral authority.

Yes.

The tree of knowledge of good and evil caused a ontological shift that included a shift in the mode of knowing evil. For us to know a frog we examine it cut it open and come to understand in as much as are able about a frog. But to know a frog fully we have to be a frog. That is the ontological shift that Adam and Eve experienced in knowing Evil. That is what God meant when He said now they are like us. God knows a frog fully without being a frog…

So the shift is that humans can “be” evil, as God cannot “be”?

Ego is not inherent in our nature.

We may be operating from different definitions of ego. In the definition I use, the ego is good.

The sensitive powers of our soul usurps the powers of the intellect causing the ontological shift.

This sort of sounds like what happens when we have strong desire. Desire has a way of compromising (“perverting”) our conscience. Consider this though: just as it can contribute to the survival of the empathy trait that sometimes empathy is shut off (i.e. when protecting one’s family against an aggressor), it can also contribute to survival that our conscience is somewhat compromised when we experience strong desire. So both “empathy blocking” and “reason blocking” contribute to the survival of both the individual as well as the survival of both empathy and conscience-forming traits in themselves. Of course, the default will always be both empathy and conscience, because these are what contribute the most to our social (intra-tribal) cooperation.

The emergence of shame from the conscience informed by the body caused the need to hide. Their bodies informed their intellects of their fallen state.

So, while God said that what He created was good, it is the conscience that says that parts of ourselves are evil (and parts good). This is the internal division I am talking about. This division has a positive effect in “managing” the ego. Certainly nudity is not “shameful” in all cultures, so the shame of A&E represents the fact that we come to resent parts of our nature because they motivate us to sin, not for the sake of sinning itself, but to gain something “good”.

I may be misreading your own ontology, though. Do you see the human as evil, or only partly evil? For example, is your view that we are simply bad? That would be a view coming from a different set of parameters, I think.

Thanks! I look forward to any response.

 

[OneSheep]

I don’t think this can be supported by scripture and catholic teaching. Rather, Paul is talking about his “old man” or that controlled by “desires of the flesh”. The “sinful nature” can also be called concupiscense, but the passage makes it clear that there is nothing in the shadow or unknown here. On the contrary, this battle takes place in full view of his observation constantly!

We fight our shadows without knowing their content. Paul knows, we know, that something is there to battle, but the “something” is an unknown. We perceive that “it” is a big negative. That illusion in itself is helpful in a “net” way. I hope that clarifies the “paradigm” I’m observing.

What makes you think that Paul finds “innate drives” sinful? I don’t think that human instincts need to be confused with evil.

But people do view that many human instincts are evil, and this helps us modulate our behaviors. For example, all people have a strong desire for status. Since this desire drives people to do all kinds of hurtful (and ridiculous) things, the normal conscience comes to resent the desire itself. Same goes for desire to dominate. Resentment brings with it the illusion of a negative, and people naturally try to avoid doing the negative or being motivated by the negative - all workings of the conscience.

I would have to agree, when it comes to improper acting on such drives, but I think it is a mistake to equate natural human drives with something that should be condemned. God created us with these drives, they are part of our humanity.

It is not a “mistake”, guanophore. It is an illusion, but it serves a purpose, as I described above. However, yes, the drives are part of our humanity, and they are good. OTOH, once we are at the point of realizing that they are good, (one at a time, in my experience) then we are experiencing a reconciliation with the shadow.

You discussed them, OS, but I do not agree with your construct. Human desires are not, in and of themselves, sinful. Human beings have an inclination to turn against God, and to engage in actions that are sinful, but the inclination, in itself, is not a sin.

But if a person resents, for example, his own drive to dominate, this serves a purpose. Later on, when his empathy and wisdom grow to the point that they, not the internal resentment, guide his behaviors, then the resentment itself becomes rather obsolete, even though his conscience is still providing gut-level reaction to sin.

Yes, the inclination to dominate is not sin, but seeing this inclination as a big negative is helpful in guiding our behaviors. Human desires are not sinful, but would you second-guess the teenager who thinks that desire for sex is “negative” in some way? This thinking is something helpful, it is helping the teen pay attention to consequences.

 

[OneSheep]

This makes it sound like the conscience creates inner discord, as if a person with a fully formed conscience will not experience inner peace.

The peace happens when a person reconciles within. The conscience does not go away, it simply no longer usurps knowing that there is only goodness within.

I guess the best way to do this is to call good evil, and evil good. that way, real evil will not exist, the sin nature will not exist (or it will become “good”).

You are so great at sarcasm!

Simple label-switching is of no use, of course. The starting point is, “what within me is evil?” or “what about the human is evil?”, and go from there. Everyone can pretty much agree on what behaviors are evil, but that is not what I am referring to.

 

[guanophore]

We fight our shadows without knowing their content. Paul knows, we know, that something is there to battle, but the “something” is an unknown.

I agree with this statement, but it is not supported by the passage in Rom. 7, where Paul is fully knowing, and able to describe in DETAIL the struggle he has daily with the flesh.

We perceive that “it” is a big negative.

The shadow, or the unknown part of human psyche, can contain as much positive as it does negative.

I hope that clarifies the “paradigm” I’m observing.

I will endeavor to hold this at the center. Your paradigm is not consistent with what the Scriptures and the Church teach, but I do respect that it is what you observe.

But people do view that many human instincts are evil, and this helps us modulate our behaviors.

Which instincts might those be?

Since this desire drives people to do all kinds of hurtful (and ridiculous) things, the normal conscience comes to resent the desire itself.

Desire is also what “drives” us to do good things. I know you think that motivational theory does not apply to your paradigm, but suffice to say that it is “normal” for human beings to have mixed motives about pretty much everything.

It is not a “mistake”, guanophore. It is an illusion, but it serves a purpose, as I described above. However, yes, the drives are part of our humanity, and they are good. OTOH, once we are at the point of realizing that they are good, (one at a time, in my experience) then we are experiencing a reconciliation with the shadow.

I think I see. Humans see the desires as evil and self condemn. If humans become enlightened, they will no longer see their desires as evil and will be able to accept them as good. If Paul the Apostle had been further enlightened, he would have realized that all his striving with the “body of death” (being at war with his members) was just an illusion. He would realize that he really does not even need a saviour, because he was already created the way God intended him to be. What he perceived as sinful is only an illusion. In fact, his desires of the flesh are “good”.

there is only goodness within

I can see now how St. Paul was so lacking in maturity and enlightenment. Romans 7, along with a number of other passages he wrote, make it clear that he did not believe there was only goodness within man.

 

[Benadam]

hello again OneSheep!

I am terrible at formatting my posts. I hope it isn’t too discumbobulating.

Pre-fall man and woman… Before the fall, the sensitive powers and the intellect were perfectly ordered and harmonious.

There was a profoundly peaceful sense of wellness we don’t have now. Imagine the perception of reality that doesn’t include death,time,or a need to survive. An entirely different mode of being. No childhood, better said, a childhood that never ends. That relationship of the powers of nature and the spiritual powers of will and reason was destroyed by Original sin. What we experience now is way different.

The powers within us and the powers of nature external to us, the vegetative powers of plants the sensitive powers of animals were all effected by this sin. The disorder in human nature projected outward. The relationship with the earth animals the powers of nature outside of man was brocken

I must have misunderstood your meaning of conscience. You don’t see it as added on to human nature after sin? I’ve run into that idea a few times. Conscience as a needed consequence of the fall.
I see parallels with the idea of the shadow and the unconscious self that emerged after the fall… .

So the shift is that humans can “be” evil, as God cannot “be”?

Yes, the human’ mode of knowing evil became fuller because they existed in a state of being evil. God knows evil that way without having to be evil. You’re right God can’t be evil in the way Adam is.

We may be operating from different definitions of ego. In the definition I use, the ego is good.

Yeah, I don’t think we see ego as the same thing. I don’t understand the benefits of ego. I’m kinda selfish and self absorbed.

It makes my shadow grow. The shadow grows longer as the sun sets::rof:

Ego to me is destroyed as the soul is sanctified . Adam and Eve had no ego. I see the ego in the tree. God told them they could eat from any tree but the one in the middle. When Eve entered into dialogue with the serpent He began " Did God say you couldn’t eat from any of the trees?" God said eat from any tree but the middle one. It’s like the serpent heard they couldn’t eat from any tree.if they couldn’t eat from his tree To the serpent if you can’t eat from the middle tree you can’t eat from any tree.He’s all the trees as one tree. I see in that the ego emerging from the internal disorder of the first sin. It’s evident in the sanctification process of St John of the cross’.dark night of the soul. purging the ego There is a dark night of the senses that is a process of purging the disordered appetite. A dark night that purges the intellect too.

continued

 

[Benadam]

continued

This sort of sounds like what happens when we have strong desire. Desire has a way of compromising (“perverting”) our conscience. Consider this though: just as it can contribute to the survival of the empathy trait that sometimes empathy is shut off (i.e. when protecting one’s family against an aggressor), it can also contribute to survival that our conscience is somewhat compromised when we experience strong desire. So both “empathy blocking” and “reason blocking” contribute to the survival of both the individual as well as the survival of both empathy and conscience-forming traits in themselves. Of course, the default will always be both empathy and conscience, because these are what contribute the most to our social (intra-tribal) cooperation.

Benadam:

Yeah, the burdens placed on us because we have to be surviving

You have a great way of articulating the disordered lower appetites effect on the higher faculties .Empathy is diminished when we experience life threatening situations. and how the conscience is distorted by powerful sinful desires.The diminished ability to reason. all that is the sensitive powers of the soul overtaking the intellectual powers of the soul. None of that was experienced by Adam and Eve before sin. As St Paul described There is a law in his members fighting the law he wills but can’t do.

 

[Benadam]

I may be misreading your own ontology, though. Do you see the human as evil, or only partly evil? For example, is your view that we are simply bad? That would be a view coming from a different set of parameters, I think.

Thanks! I look forward to any response.

I look foreward to writing it!

What is the good I’m missing about the ego?

I do see a disordered soul. An inner conflict. But it can be managed. and I think it’s all good just wounded making me have to go to confession, and things need rearranged , Put back in place so to speak. Make friends with my shadow.

The Church has been reconciling the shadow for two thousand years:relieved:

 

[Benadam]

Certainly nudity is not “shameful” in all cultures, so the shame of A&E represents the fact that we come to resent parts of our nature because they motivate us to sin, not for the sake of sinning itself, but to gain something “good”.

The shame though wasn’t about nudity. It was the body making movements without permission from the will. forgive me with my next words.Death created an need to survive and a body with urges to reproduce. The sexual appetite emerged because the sensitive powers of the soul were dominating the will.

Adam was seeing Eve as an object for pleasure. that shamed them. Her body and perception of Adam changed too. So they made loin cloths from fig leaves. Modesty was born. The need to not create an environment that causes scandal

 

[OneSheep]

I agree with this statement, but it is not supported by the passage in Rom. 7, where Paul is fully knowing, and able to describe in DETAIL the struggle he has daily with the flesh.

Good Evening. Thanks for your gentle tone in discussion, guanophore. I don’t sense that you are judging at all, but simply evaluating.

From Romans 7:

8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness.

He is calling the part of himself that produces covetousness “sin”. It’s a negative, and this seeing our covetousness as a negative is what I am saying is part of the normal-functioning conscience.

The shadow, or the unknown part of human psyche, can contain as much positive as it does negative.

Yes, I believe that is true, but we don’t battle the positive stuff.

I will endeavor to hold this at the center. Your paradigm is not consistent with what the Scriptures and the Church teach, but I do respect that it is what you observe.

And I respect yours. Keep in mind that I am not, in my mind, negating what the church teaches, it’s all good. This is a deeper look, I think.

Which instincts might those be?

To follow Paul’s lead, another example would be to want what other people have.

Desire is also what “drives” us to do good things. I know you think that motivational theory does not apply to your paradigm, but suffice to say that it is “normal” for human beings to have mixed motives about pretty much everything.

Yes, we have mixed motives, and yes, desire also drives us to do good things. However, since the drives are essentially imposed by our nature, there is a natural resistance (deep down, or not so deep). Paul lamented his “covetousness” and called it sin. That is his healthy conscience speaking.

I think I see. Humans see the desires as evil and self condemn. If humans become enlightened, they will no longer see their desires as evil and will be able to accept them as good.

Yes, this is the enlightenment that you are also expressing, that the desires are good. I think St Thomas A. pretty much said the same. So did Jesus:

Matt 6:23"But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

I think that there may be something lost in the translation about the eye being “bad”. I think it simply has to do with a developing awareness, rather than a condemnation of the eye that sees darkness. The enlightened eye sees the light of God within, that is what I am gleaning from this.

 

[OneSheep]

He would realize that he really does not even need a saviour, because he was already created the way God intended him to be.

But that is exactly why he needs a savior and why I need a savior, to show me that I am created just as God intended, beautiful as everyone else. We are enslaved by self-condemnation, and He frees us. We are enslaved by many aspects of our nature, and He frees us.

In fact, his desires of the flesh are “good”.

Yes, and this is what you are also observing, as well as St. Thomas and others. The desires are good, but we do evil, we hurt people when we are blind to our empathy and conscience. Sin is a perversion in the mind, it is the irrational warping of what is true.

I can see now how St. Paul was so lacking in maturity and enlightenment.

Did you remember that sincerity was a very important virtue?

Spiritual growth is multi-directional, not limited to a single line or plane. All of us are inspired by Jesus. All of us have room to grow.

 

[OneSheep]

Good Morning Benadam!

I must have misunderstood your meaning of conscience. You don’t see it as added on to human nature after sin?

I see the creation story as allegorical. I think the point of the matter is that the tree can represent the conscience, because it is about the knowledge of good and evil. The sequence of events, to me, is immaterial. The conscience is not a punishment, it helps us get along in light of the fact that we have all of our natural desires and drives.

Yes, the human’ mode of knowing evil became fuller because they existed in a state of being evil.

So here is where the conscience is already playing a part in what you are saying. When we say humans are in a “state” of evil, what do we mean? Are you saying that part of the human is evil, or are you saying that the human in general is bad in state (completely) when he does evil?

Yeah, I don’t think we see ego as the same thing. I don’t understand the benefits of ego. I’m kinda selfish and self absorbed.

Would you say that it is part of our nature to be selfish and self-absorbed? If yes, how do you feel about these aspects of our nature?

You have a great way of articulating the disordered lower appetites effect on the higher faculties

Thank you, but I think the CCC does a great job at this also!

Empathy is diminished when we experience life threatening situations. and how the conscience is distorted by powerful sinful desires.The diminished ability to reason. all that is the sensitive powers of the soul overtaking the intellectual powers of the soul. None of that was experienced by Adam and Eve before sin.

Well, Eve saw that the fruit was good to eat. Was good to eat it?

What is the good I’m missing about the ego?

The ego is all the “self” that is caught up in the natural motivations, emotions, capacities etc. It is essentially a human robot, so in that sense it is “dead”. When one takes it apart and looks at the different aspects, one can see that the parts serve in our survival.

Let me give one example: the desire to accumulate lots of stuff (wealth). The corollary of this desire in other mammals is the desire for territory (i.e. bears) or hoarding (i.e. squirrels). Just as these innate drives serve those species, they serve us in the same way. Please note, though, I am not advocating runaway wealth accumulation. I am just saying that this is a natural drive, and when we see the hurtful consequences of it, we come to resent it, it becomes part of our shadow. All of this happens subconsciously.

 

[OneSheep]

The Church has been reconciling the shadow for two thousand years:relieved:

I think we are using the terms a bit differently. With the Sacrament, the Church is involved in showing people that God forgives them (He always does!). Reconciliation with the shadow involves embracing and seeing the beauty in all that He created, especially aspects of our nature.

The sexual appetite emerged because the sensitive powers of the soul were dominating the will.

When I start with the premise that nature itself is a source of revelation, I think it is pretty clear that other species have such appetite so that they will be motivated to procreate. I really don’t have any reason to believe that humans are any different in that respect.

Again, I see the story of A&E as allegorical, not as a sequence of events. That said, I respect the approach that takes the story more literally, especially since a literal approach serves the working of the conscience. The literal approach is “You are in a bad way, and it is your fault”. The conscience functions in modifying our own behaviors, and if we begin with a self-blaming attitude, we are already in the mode of watching and “packing” parts of the ego with a wrap of negative emotion. This, again is the shadow.

In my observation, forgiving one’s shadow, reconciling, involves taking a look at the whole picture, and especially all of its parts, with a non-judgmental eye. It is a “via”, it is a self-reflection that involves paying specific attention when one runs across an internal resentment, because resentment immediately colors the value of what we are looking at. Resentment triggers the cognition that what we are resenting is something bad. Again, this is all part of the functional beauty of the conscience, but in prayer we can transcend the conscience itself.

Adam was seeing Eve as an object for pleasure. that shamed them.

I think that is a very practical possibility. Desire for sexual pleasure was imposed on A&E, and they resisted it internally, they saw some harm in it. Indeed, sexual desire compromises the rational mind, it has us believing untruths. In addition, it drives us to do things that are quite harmful, and King David was a good example. So the conscience subconsciously compartmentalizes sexual desire, “This is a Bad thing”, and it focuses our attention in a way that guides our behaviors. The well-formed conscience says “lust for her is bad” and says “his lust for other women is bad”, and we self-condemn and condemn others, and this condemnation serves in group cooperation and modulates our own behaviors (for the most part, until it fails!).

The need for cover, then, is part of what our conscience dictates in controlling our desire. The conscience functions, like I said, in self-condemnation. Shame is a triggered self-condemnation, i.e. we don’t ordinarily think “Oh, I should be condemning myself about that”. Instead, the self-condemnation is triggered from the subconscious shadow. It’s a “gut reaction”.

 

[OneSheep]

The shame though wasn’t about nudity.

I really believe that it is no accident at all that it was lust that became the focus and symbollic of the “fallen state”. All the rest of the drives and capacities we have that our consciences come to resent we are pretty much born with, and they develop as we age. Lust, however, springs upon the human after already having achieved a level of rational thinking. We remember our pre-hormonal state, as comparatively “pure”.

Indeed, it is to be taken under consideration that part of the reason why the idea that we were first-pure-and-then-fallen has so much appeal is because of this “purity” we see we had before the hormones kicked in. It appeals to reason that all other innate desires follow the same trend, that we were more “pure” beforehand, and not “pure” now that we have them.

 

[Benadam]

Good Morning Benadam!

Thank you! Top of the day to ya OneSheep!

The sequence of events, to me, is immaterial.

I think so too but not with the event of disobedience… That to me, marks a pivotal point in understanding what we are being as humans. I agree with you other than that particular sequence.
And I believe the conscience is good too. St John Paul II said" " Our conscience, the inner voice from God in every human heart,"

When we say humans are in a “state” of evil, what do we mean? Are you saying that part of the human is evil, or are you saying that the human in general is bad in state (completely) when he does evil?

Benadam:

I believe we are in a state of becoming more or less one or the other at every moment. For instance, when I’m bored, when I give in to that urge to eat because it gives me a false sense of well being, I’m tempted to do something that lacks good. Whether or not I do it determines whether or not I will more or less lack good.If I do it, I’ve lost a little bit of my good habit of resisting the urge…

 

[OneSheep]

I believe we are in a state of becoming more or less one or the other at every moment. For instance, when I’m bored, when I give in to that urge to eat because it gives me a false sense of well being, I’m tempted to do something that lacks good. Whether or not I do it determines whether or not I will more or less lack good.If I do it, I’ve lost a little bit of my good habit of resisting the urge…

Good Morning Benadam:

It is my own observation that we use the language very loosely, but the usage is actually very important. For example, it is pretty clear that we do not create ourselves, but instead we have already been created good by our loving Father.

So, while I think it is accurate to say that our behaviors can either be good or evil (or neutral, shades of grey, etc.), our being is 100% part of the goodness that God saw in His creation, especially being created “in His image”.

What then, do we mean about “becoming bad” or “being bad”? This is where we go right back to the conscience. The conscience in part serves to condemn ourselves and one another when we misbehave, and with condemnation (resentment) comes the illusion of a lower value in that we condemn.

For example, the people of Daesh/IS condemned those who persecuted them; they wanted justice. They resented those that benefited from the corrupt government that followed the US invasion of Iraq. They projected (from their shadows) that their enemies were evil, as the enemy always appears to have the worst aspects of our own shadows. And then, when there is such projection of lower value or evil, along with the automatic blocked empathy the individual person (Daesh member, in this case) is able to punish, even destroy the other without feeling any hesitation that they are destroying or harming something of value.

What I am saying is that dehumanization is a real phenomenon that happens in the human mind. It is an action of the conscience itself, and it is natural, it serves the survival of the tribe, but it is also an aspect of our nature that can enslave us and has essentially lost much of its purpose in modern post-tribal society. And what is the terminology expressing such dehumanization? There is no other term more poignant in this respect than the use of “bad” or “evil” when referring to the characterization of a person or people’s existence.

I am not saying that the conscience itself is not self-modulating, because it is. We have come to recognize as individuals and societies that “racism is bad”, and this particular rule helps us recognize and be wary of the way that we think and behave toward one another. However, because the conscience is involved, the machinations of such discipline involve thinking of racists themselves as evil! And then, of course, thinking of a person as evil because of their evil behaviors is still just fine according to the “collective conscience”, but such cognition, again, still remains as an illusion that dehumanizes, so the problem remains.

(continued)

 

[OneSheep]

We have a particular point in history that we Christians all know as very pivotal, and it is important to see that the problem itself comes to a climax. What we had at the crucifixion was a crowd who condemned, they saw a person as an evil blasphemer worthy of destruction. Jesus was dehumanized in their minds.

What Jesus did from the cross was directly address the problem in a way that transcends human machinations. While our innate conscience requires repentance in order for us to forgive, Jesus took forgiveness to the level of supernatural; He forgave the unrepentant. He understood (ety. “stood among”) those murdering Him and saw that they did not know what they were doing, and by this path, this via, He became one with them and forgave.

Do you see, then, why I think this thread is so important?

 

[Benadam]

Let me give one example: the desire to accumulate lots of stuff (wealth). The corollary of this desire in other mammals is the desire for territory (i.e. bears) or hoarding (i.e. squirrels). Just as these innate drives serve those species, they serve us in the same way. Please note, though, I am not advocating runaway wealth accumulation. I am just saying that this is a natural drive, and when we see the hurtful consequences of it, we come to resent it, it becomes part of our shadow. All of this happens subconsciously.

That’s the thing, a quality of life in the Garden was that it is an environment that provided for human life. The good of the environment that preserved the good of human nature.The desires that satisfy the need to survive were foreign to human nature in the environment of paradise. Toss out just those desires and human nature becomes something mysterious. There are other things considered fundamental to the human psyche too that don’t exist for us at our dawn. If we try to understand what it would be like to experience immortal life. Not knowing any other existence,.how that would change our experience of time. The experience of human life without death would be fundamental to our nature.

Tied to the nakedness, paradoxically, is the nakedness before shame. St John Paul II taught about ‘the internal gaze’ . Not a gaze that comes from having nothing to hide, but a real unobstructed gaze of pure intuition .I think it might be scary to see. That is the nakedness that shame has no reason for… The mystery of human nature without ego.So much of what is considered fundamental to our nature are add ons imo. The conditions that the environment of paradise offered constitute a change in the human being. What is natural to us now isn’t what is natural at the core of being huiman. We make a mistake when we consider the condition of life now as all that it ever was. or that what human nature is now is all it ever was.Sorry I got long winded. Peace.

 

[OneSheep]

Good Morning Benadam,

That’s the thing, a quality of life in the Garden was that it is an environment that provided for human life.

Yes, according to the story there was no competition for resource, and that narrative serves the themes of the story, such as God saying it is all good. It is very natural for a human to lament competition from bugs or predators, and it serves the point of the story that the garden had been more idyllic. We had to have lost something, and it had to be our fault, those points mirror what we see in the “loss of innocence” in our own lives and the fault part is a manifestation of eating of the tree, that blaming is part of seeing good and evil.

The fossil record shows that there were not such idyllic times in on Earth. There has always been competition for resources. This observation, while it seems to conflict with the Biblical creation story, only does so if the story of A&E is taken literally instead of allegorically.

Not a gaze that comes from having nothing to hide, but a real unobstructed gaze of pure intuition .I think it might be scary to see. That is the nakedness that shame has no reason for… The mystery of human nature without ego.

Not sure what you mean by this. Are you saying that there is something scary in us?

human nature without ego

What about tiger nature without ego? Do you see what I am saying? If one looks at the nature of other creatures, and sees the beauty of their desires, what drives them, the way that they react to things, one can see that we share so much of their nature, their “egos”. It’s all very automatic stuff. Human nature includes the ego, its a total package, and it’s all beautiful when reflected upon. The conscience, too, is beautiful, but it serves to condemn the parts of ourselves that drive us to hurt ourselves and others in order to help us keep our behaviors in control, cooperative with others, etc.

If the conscience is what continues to inform what you see, that there are indeed good and bad parts of ourselves, then it is working! There is an internal conflict, but the benefits of the conscience far outweigh its cost.

So much of what is considered fundamental to our nature are add ons imo.

Yes, I agree! Are they added by God our Creator?

What is natural to us now isn’t what is natural at the core of being huiman. We make a mistake when we consider the condition of life now as all that it ever was. or that what human nature is now is all it ever was.

At our core is the “true self”, the self that is beneath our (good) nature. It is Love, a part of the Whole that is Love.

Is the “mistake” the thinking that we are not to blame ourselves for condition of life we live in?

You are calling yourself long-winded? Hey, when it comes to explaining, please do not hesitate to be thorough! I am obviously not hindered by thoughts of long-windedness.

Have a great day!