Bruce Charlton's Notions

...Has been neatly described by Amo Boden at his Brief Outlines blog:


All of ethics and morality can now be reduced to a quantifiable number.

The final judgement is no longer God or a set of ideal moral principals that must be interpreted by each individual.

Whether you are a good person or a bad person, whether your contribution to the world is of value or not - all this is ultimately judged in terms of a single, quantifiable number.

Any institution or culture, no matter what its inherent goodness is, will from now on be judged in terms of this number. If this number is high, you, the institution or culture are deemed "bad". If this number is low, you, the institution or culture are deemed "good".

This number is the parts-per-million of carbon dioxide that is released into the atmosphere as a result of you, your institution, or your culture. There is no longer any gauge of morality that is higher than this.

This number is the final judgement. 

The definitive answer can be found at my Notion Club Papers blog...

We live at an advanced state in the destruction of Christian marriage by the secular (Left) state (aided by the mass media and all the other major institutions).

At first we had 'no-fault' divorce, which meant that marriage lacked even the status of a legal contract (so that just one party could dissolve the marriage, unilaterally, and without any sanctions). This continued with unlimited serial marriage, same sex marriage, marriage of 'trans'-sex persons, multiple marriage (half-implemented - accepted legally in the UK but not yet legally initiated)...

On the horizon we have non-human marriage (e.g. Men with animals) and marriage including children - these are mainstream-mooted, and 'logically' implied by consistent application of the current minimalist concept of marriage in terms of 'principles' and trends.

What we have (from a Christian perspective) is a social system where 'legal marriage' - the 'institution' of marriage - is (already, here-and-now) both corrupt and corrupting; and becoming ever more so.

'Legal-marriage' is already a manyfold-fake - we just have not adjusted to the fact. 

Or, to put it bluntly, official-marriage is now evil: a creation of an evil-corrupt state; and 'arbitrarily' created, expanded, sustained or ended by that evil-corrupt state.


Add to this the 'convergence' of all the major, mainstream churches with the secular-Leftist state; which means that church-marriage is already just as bad as legal-marriage in most instances; and the real Christian churches that are current exceptions all display signs of being on the same path towards ever-fuller convergence as the mainstream churches.

In sum: a fake church cannot (and will not) sanctify Christian marriages.

So, the option of real-Christians having a separate system of 'church marriage' - to substitute for the legal marriage seems to be, at most, a temporary expedient.


And even if this expedient were attempted, it is clear that - while the Western state will tacitly (de facto) sustain the marriages of some religions (including allowing, and not interfering with, the operations of religious courts which may impose severe negative sanctions for marriage transgressions - including physical violence and even death); this will not apply to Christianity.

Quite the opposite. It is ever clearer (albeit only to those with eyes to see) that the unifying purpose behind the half-century of wide and expanding range of changes of law and practice in relation to marriage and the family, is precisely the destruction of Christian marriage. 


The consequence for real Christian marriage, as I foresee it, is pretty extraordinary.  

Christian marriage will need to become a personal commitment between a Christian man and woman. Full Stop.

Whether made in public or private, this marriage commitment will (ultimately) neither be validated nor sustained by any formal institution; neither state nor church.

Marriage will rely exclusively on the two parties - who cannot depend on help, or even encouragement, from anyone else... Who should, to the contrary, expect that institutions will continually be working towards the break-up of that marriage.

Meanwhile, 'official' marriage will go in quite the opposite direction; and more and more 'relationships' are recognised legally and socially; with the increasingly 'unorthodox' participants seeking the status, protections and sanction of an official marriage.


In the end, real marriage is the only (official) 'fake'; and only fake marriages are 'real'.

It may be that real Christians may be among the few people who do Not marry (legally).

We may soon be in an inverted-world where zero Christian men-and-women but instead nearly-everybody-else (in various combinations and numbers of men, women, other self-identified genders, animals, children, AI robots... who knows what?) will become the majority of 'married' (um...) entities.

Theosis is the 'process' by which Men may become more divine. (Similar terms include divinisation and sanctification.)

For me, theosis is the primary purpose of mortal life - i.e of life extended beyond mere incarnation - whether that be to the stage of foetus, embryo, baby, child, adolescent, adult of into old age. In other words, I believe that God sustains our life (beyond mere incarnation) in order that we may have experiences and learn from them such tha we become more divine in this mortal life.

Albeit this 'being more divine' is (at most) a temporary experience; something we cannot 'hold-on-to during the changes of mortal life. Nonetheless, if we assume that learning has a spiritual and eternal dimension, and is not merely a matter of brain-sustained-memory, then even brief experiences of more-divine states may have a permanent effect on our-selves.


(If you ask why we cannot, in practice, hold-fast to anything in mortal life - or cannot be sure of doing so - then I would answer that this is because it is about experiences. We are not supposed-to make eternally-binding decisions in mortal life; because the proper time to do so is after death when it comes to a choice between resurrection in Heaven or other alternatives. Our experiences in mortal life are intended to aid that final, post-mortal decision which may be eternal; and eternally-binding.)


I would say that - with the qualified exception of the monastic type of Eastern Orthodoxy - theosis has never been a central goal in mainstream Christian life.

And the reason is obvious. It is that the 'gap' between Man and God is asserted to be infinite and qualitative - therefore there can be no-such-thing as movement-towards becoming 'more' divine. This because (according to mainstream, classical theology) we are creatures but God is uncreated; we are finite but God is infinite (omni-potent/-scient-/present etc.) The gulf is un-bridge-able.

This would seem to make it impossible for man to progress spiritually and become 'more divine' - whether that progression be gradual or incremental.


The description of Jesus Christ as having a dual-nature of both God and Man is of no practical help in explaining theosis; because in the first place it does not make literal sense but is a mystical formulation, while in the second place it merely kicks the can further down the road.

The dual concept of Christ has his divine nature as being the-same-as the divine nature of the Father and Holy Ghost, thus with all the infinite and omni attributes (infinitely-remote-from Man); and furthermore Men are Not part of that uncreated divine trinity, therefore Men cannot (presumably) have any share in real divinity. 


Therefore, for theosis to be comprehensible and explicable in ordinary language (without recourse to non-coherent mystical word-formulations), entails that classical and mainstream theology be rejected and Man and God (and Jesus Christ) be seen as of the same basic kind (and presumably having the same ultimate origin), such that the difference between Man and God is quantitative rather than qualitative.

If so; then Men can become God bit-by-bit; by a spiritual progression - happening through time.

And theosis can then be seen as a divinely-intended goal of our mortal (as well as pre- and post-mortal) life.

 

A big factor over the past fifty-plus years has been the decline in history as a solid basis for life. This has happened in two ways - first, a loss of faith in the accuracy of history and the objectivity of interpretation; so that people are much less confident about the meaning of any piece of history.

Secondly - and related - the facility with which the modern fundamentally-Leftist media apparatus (which now includes the educational and academic systems) is able to generate and propagate 'history' on demand; in order to manipulate the masses (for example the dominant and fake histories of feminism, sexuality and slavery).

Between these; history has become merely an arm of the totalitarian bureaucracy; imposed and changed at convenience, by means of incentives and sanctions. And, on such a basis, any history supportive of Christianity is excluded, because opposed to mainstream, official, Establishment-sustained history.


An effect of this general trend has been a decline (or complete loss) in the ability of historical documents such as the Gospels, to provide a solid basis for Christianity. This applies most strongly to Protestant Christianity, but has affected all types.

Historical documents nowadays seem an insecure basis for faith - with all their problems of translation, incomplete survival, insertion and deletion, unsure and contested interpretation etc...

Secular ideas and interpretations, by contrast, are uncritically sponged-up; being mostly unconsciously and implicitly imbibed due to the (unarticulated and unacknowledged) assumptions of the entirety of Western public discourse - which assumes (works on the basis of) a wholly materialist world of 'things'.


The entirety of public discourse therefore acts as 'proof' for secular materialism, and a utilitarian, hedonic morality - no argument is needed; but if asked-for, all elements of public life (politics, law, mainstream religion, economics, media, education, the military, science etc) support all other elements in their exclusion of divine and spiritual matters.

Christianity has come to seem not so much impossible or untrue, as simply meaningless - because modern reality has no place or role for God, or any kind of deity or spiritual being; it has no place or role for meaning or purpose but regards every-thing as subject to either deterministic causes or else 'random' chance.

As I said, all this is mostly assumed, unarticulated and unacknowledged - it is not 'proved'. Not proved because such metaphysical (primary) assumptions as materialism are not amenable to proof; but on the contrary they define what counts as proof.

Thus a materialistic metaphysics excludes all possible evidence in favour of the reality of the spiritual and divine; only materialistic factors are acceptable explanations. For instance; every alleged miracle (as possible 'evidence') must/ can/ will be (necessarily) explained-away in terns of error, insanity, stupidity or dishonesty.


So this is the situation in which we find ourselves. Nearly everybody who is active and competent in public discourse has (in order to attain this position) absorbed and uses exclusively the mainstream materialistic metaphysics. At the same time, this person will deny any such assumptions, but will assert that all their views are derived from 'evidence', or are merely 'pragmatic' - and directed at common-sense improvements in the well-being of people-in-general.

And in making this false statement, he will be supported by the entirety of powerful/ wealthy/ high-status organisations, and corporations; by all the acceptable nations and all the supra-national and global institutions.

Thus the modern world is trapped, and indeed traps-itself; by having false and socially-lethal assumptions that cannot be named, explained or challenged because they are understood as having derived-from objective 'evidence'.

By becoming imperceptible and implicit; modern metaphysics has become an impenetrable barrier to truth. 


Yet, the only way of correcting error, of knowing truth, of providing meaning, purpose and relatedness in life - must come via the challenge to modern metaphysics: must come via making this barrier perceptible in order that its reality and nature can be known.

The only way I can imagine doing this is by presenting an alternative and true metaphysics, in a hypothetical spirit; and inviting other people to consider it seriously. Inviting others to 'try it out' in their own lives, and observe what is the effect.

The trouble is that any genuinely and fully-alternative, non-materialistic, metaphysics will sound ridiculous, absurd and obviously wrong. It will seem to be contradicted by Everything in modern public discourse - which is, in a sense, absolutely true; because anything non-contradictory is excluded from public discourse, and all public discourse derives from the covert assumptions of materialism.


Regular readers will know that my own metaphysical assumptions (that this is a world consisting of Beings in Relationships - that everything is alive, conscious, purposive - or a part of something that is) sound absolutely foolish, like mere childishness or wilful perversity.

Such a set of assumptions will not be understood, let alone entertained; despite (or because) we all of us once held exactly such beliefs as young children, and it is believed (history again!) that all human societies originated in such beliefs - such assumptions, which apparently still survive in some parts of the world.

Thus the mass of Men ideologically imprisoned with 100% security, and zero chance of escape.

Nothing external prevents re-examination of metaphysical assumptions; nothing actively compels any individual to exclude the belief in a world of living, conscious, purposive Beings - yet, in actuality, in daily living; such assumptions are made to seem absolutely impossible - like holidaying on a distant star.  

An important post in which William suggests an almost 'god's eye view' of the modern era; what it was intended to achieve and how - and what we should do about it now:

...There was a great purpose behind what we loosely call the modern world but it was a risk that could either advance the human race and take it to new heights or else take it back to a primitive level from where it would have to effectively start again. Or even destroy it completely.

The experiment was in consciousness. Human consciousness became more focused on itself, more individual, so that it could be more creative and, once realigned to a spiritual sensibility, more godlike. From being largely passive children of God we could become gods ourselves, able to wield divine powers for the creative enlargement of the universe. 

This was always intended as the evolutionary path that humanity should follow but I believe that in the West a few hundred years ago the process was stimulated and accelerated. A gradual evolution was boosted. 

This was done by the incarnation of certain highly evolved souls who could act like leaven in flour, obvious examples Leonardo da Vinci, Shakespeare and Beethoven* but there were many others at various levels and in various fields, and also, I would conjecture, by angelic forces acting on human consciousness from within. This double process has brought about the world today.

However, sound as the principles involved were, everything depended on the reception of human beings to their new powers, as powers is what they were. Would they use them to become more aware of God or would it be to pursue their own individual ends in their immediate environment? 

We know the answer to that. Does this mean the experiment has failed? Not necessarily...

Just for your Saturday enjoyment...


What's good about this is somebody airing his private eccentricities - these are (if honest) always interesting to me: self-justifying.

It may help (in explaining some references) to know that this chap was a Gaelic Football journalist and commentator by profession.

A great deal of political commentary over the past couple of hundred years (and continuing) is directed at the question of what kind of political system we ought to have; what we could (in principle) have, and what we should be striving for. I have certainly spent a good deal of my life pondering and researching such matters.

My current understanding is not welcome to me, but it is something I can't shake. The conclusion is that I can see no future; or, at least, none that is significantly better than what we have now.

The present System is actively destroying itself, and is anyway unsustainable for multiple reasons. None of the past systems are viable from here forward; and anyway none will happen because they are not wanted/ opposed.

And knowing what we now know, I think we can see that no conceivable political system is going to be better. But more than this, I don't see any kind of System at all surviving - at least nothing on the scale of any current nations.


The ultimate reason behind this is the change in 'human consciousness'. This is not something that can be proved with evidence (indeed, nothing can ever be proved by evidence); but there is plenty of evidence compatible with my belief (coming via Rudolf Steiner and Owen Barfield, mostly) that human beings have changed through history; so that past possibilities are left behind.

We can see this in so many ways. The death of real leaders, and the absence of real and good leaders. On the other side, the lack of desire among the masses for real or good leaders. The short-termism, the petty selfishness - making survival in the long term impossible. The (really astonishing) lack of courage means that no plans get followed-through; indeed so cowardly are people that they seldom even get as far as formulating an idea of resistance.

And, most decisive of all, the lack of motivation - which underpins most of the above; and which stems from the denial of God, the denial that we live in a creation, the denial of ultimate meaning and purpose and relatedness in the world.


All of this might not be sufficient to destroy the hope of something better if it was not for the utter inability of people (both the leadership, but also en masse) to be able to acknowledge the real problems; the habitual and denied dishonesty, the inability to stick to a line of thinking for more than a single step, the absence of even the most basic discernment.

All of these stem from the denial of God; yet the denial is itself denied; and the basic consequences of the denial of God are denied... so that this situation itself seems extremely unlikely to be remedied. 

But even if all-of-the-above was remedied; and we had brave and honest Christians looking ahead; I see no conceivable way in which any kind of politics, any social organisation, can be imagined that would allow the kind of Christian world that we know we ought to have.

The Christian societies of the past are all (in their different ways) so obviously and so deeply flawed to the modern mind, so not-truly-Christian; that we cannot honestly regard them as anything other than a merely quantitative and partial improvement on what exists now.

And we know that all were riven with contradiction, and unstoppable change and decay; so even if they could be recreated (which they can't) they would begin to collapse as soon as (or before) they were remade.


So this is my best guess, my foretelling, my prophecy. That the experiment of human civilisation will come to an end.

There will be no future politics in the same sense that (as far as we know) there is no such thing as politics in small scale, nomadic, tribal societies. That whole level of things will cease to exist.

If my understanding is accurate, then this is something we cannot prevent, cannot stop, should not stop; but it is something we will each need to acknowledge and learn from. We will be severely challenged by it, each in multiple and different ways; and these challenges are an opportunity to discover things we personally need to know - for eternal life in Heaven.


Perhaps it is worth clarifying that I am not in any kind of despair about this, above and beyond the usual worrying to which we are prone. It is not a projection of some kind of inner nihilism.

I see this a just a matter of fact; which it is my duty to confront. The future of the world really is in God's hands; and I trust God.

That is to say I trust God not to make this world 'more perfect' (more comfortable, prosperous, peaceful, cheerful or whatever); but I trust God (as my loving parents) to arrange things such that my personal experience in this world will be for my ultimate eternal benefit - if I make the choice For love; For God, Goodness and Creation. If I join the side of right.


But for those who decline Jesus's offer of Life Everlasting in Heaven and adhere to the mainstream materialistic this-worldly atheism; there will be zero meaning or value in this collapse.

Presumably they will carry on living in terms directed by their aspirations - such as grabbing for more immediate pleasure, and eluding current suffering; or perpetuating their biological life for just a bit longer.

It's a choice - and we each make our own choice. 


Note added: The inevitability of collapse raises the question of whether it could have been averted. My view, expressed throughout this blog over the past few years is: yes, probably. The original (Christian) Romantic era - beginning in the late 1700s with the likes of Coleridge, Wordsworth, Blake and (in Germany) Novalis - and extending from then, with several revivals - showed clearly (and explained) the way it should have been; although, since Men's minds were Not so-transformed, we cannot Now, retrospectively, reconstruct how this would have worked-out. Instead, Christianity did not change and the residual mainstream of Romanticism became anti-Christian. Instead of Christianity being transformed and retained, retained and subjected to the best efforts of the best minds; Christianity was either un-transformed and shrank, or (more often) rejected. If the West had followed what I regard as its divine destiny; all kinds of things might have been possible. Yet as things stand, we are something between one and two centuries too-late; and have accumulated a truly colossal level of spiritual damage; such that value inversion is now mainstream, mandatory and - broadly - accepted as 'common sense'. For a few generations it might have been possible to re-grow The West from a minority of  Romantic Christians, but now the minority is minuscule and there is near zero in the way of shared assumptions. The units at issue have shrunk - over the decades - from civilisation, to nation, to denomination to the individual and his family. Well, so it goes. That is the situation. We know what we each need to do.

Although genius is almost extinct in The West, this is not yet wholly the case; and in some fields there are still first rate works emerging. One is novels (by contrast with poetry and drama). I don't read many modern novels, but have discovered three that seem to me first rate of their kind.

1. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, 2005.

I've gone-on about this wonderful book considerably on this blog already; but it is both original in concept and superb in its execution.  It is my favourite among these three, by far; and one of the very best books I have ever read.

2. Look Who's Back by Timur Vermes (translated by Jamie Bulloch), 2012.

This is a novel concerning Hitler coming back to life in modern Germany. The novel, and a film version, had immense success/ caused immense scandal in Germany. Again, the basic idea is very original, the execution masterly; and the book achieves an un-classifiable, un-pigeon-hole-able blend of humour, and several kinds of seriousness - that I have never seen adequately summarised. An unique flavour.

3. The Martian by Andy Weir, 2015.

You will all know about this one. It is the hardest of hard SciFi - so 'hard' that the science is barely fiction; and also a very enjoyable and exciting story - an instant classic of its genre.


Looking at the three books, all were first novels by unknowns, coming somewhat 'out of the blue' - and confirming that our official Western culture is moribund while life remains around the edges.

But it is very encouraging to see confirmed that the scope for creativity remains wide-open; and real originality (that is not merely novelty, subversion or inversion) remains achievable in practice... so long as there are people who have ability, motivation and character to do honest and genuine work.

In an expanding divine creation; there will always be more things to say and do; things worth saying and doing.

 

Here in the remote wilderness of central Newcastle (less than a mile from the city centre), this can be a disturbing time of year; since the night is often shattered, and I am started from sleep, by blood-curdling howls that sound exactly as if somebody (or some-thing) was being painfully murdered - except that it goes on and on...

It is, of course, the urban fox; and this is the mating season.

To get some idea of the sound, try these videos... But I have to say, our foxes sound a lot scarier than any of these examples.

It truly is 'the call of the wild' - and to hear this in the early hours of the morning through the open window, sounding near and loud, is suddenly to be projected mentally into a primal situation; as if I was alone in the middle of nowhere.

It is a general insight (and one that I have accepted) of Rudolf Steiner, Owen Barfield and William Arkle; that evil in the world can be understood as having an educative purpose. In essence this mortal life is 'for' theosis (becoming more divine); meaning for experiencing and learning aiming at an eternal resurrected life in Heaven.

Evil is tolerated because it may be necessary for this purpose. But such a general explanatory 'model' is Not understanding; understanding can only come from learning the role of evil in our own life (or, perhaps, the life of someone loved by us).

Thus it is a foolish and arrogant error to try and explain what specific role some named evil has-played or is-playing in another-person's life, or in the lives of groups of people who are strangers or known only at secondhand (from hearsay, the mass media or history books; or even from fictions and lies) - families, tribes, races, nations, or mankind as a whole.


What I will do here is simply to explain ways in which the creeping totalitarianism of the modern West has had a positive and educational role in my own life. This can be summarised briefly: the fact that totalitarianism has been increasing throughout my life has prevented me from living-out a worldly life; has prevented me from living a life dedicated to mortal life.

In different words; the ratchet of totalitarianism disrupted every accommodation and adjustment I made with The World, continually preventing me 'settling' into contentment; and thereby it pointed me in the direction of realising that my life was ultimately not 'about' my happiness in this world.


I am, by nature, someone who finds totalitarian bureaucracy extremely unpleasant. I am a natural romantic and individualist. I have no desire to be a leader, but I hate to be a cog in a machine. I am not a 'joiner' and tended to fall-out, or become disaffected, with almost any group; sooner or later (apart from my family).

Yet I began life with an idealism directed at certain institutions such as the profession of medicine (being 'a doctor') and the universities. I loved the arts of literature and music. I was a proud member of my schools, and medical school; and did well at both.

I was also dedicated to the ideals of these institutions: education, science, medicine etc. My dreams were substantially of fulfilment through success in these institutions - envisaged as as these institutions had been during the period of my youth, and earlier as I knew them through reading and the older generation. I craved the special status that comes from recognition by the peer group of those I admired.

But as I moved forward and upward through these institutions, they were always changing - getting worse overall, always in the direction of more bureaucracy, greater surveillance, tighter and more detailed control. They became more hostile to the individual, to the eccentric, to the ideals - and more merely instances of the generic bureaucracy (the Iron Cage of Weber, the Black Iron Prison of Philip K Dick).

As soon as I achieved a position to which I had aspired (and this did happen, several times); that situation would begin to collapse, would begin to be corrupted by the (universal) forces of totalitarian bureaucracy.

No sooner did I plant my feet on some ledge of firm and pleasant ground, than that ground would begin to crumble under my weight. I would very soon feel a need to seek some other niche.  


My early and immediate response to recognising the creeping evil was political. To try and 'change the world'.

My implicit assumption was that there was no other existence than this mortal world, and that the solution to The System of bureaucracy was (must be) a better system. Therefore I thought (as most people do) in terms of a political solution. I would fight the changes - on the confident assumption that something significantly better was possible.

I went through one after another 'possible' political solution, and pursued my political goals as most intellectuals do: through joining a 'party' or pressure group, conversation, writing, lecturing, and a bit of 'organising'.

My covert assumption was that institutions - society itself - could (in principle at least) be improved to the point that the major problems would be eradicated sufficiently for a worthwhile life; and that the positive rewards would be sufficiently great that life (my mortal life in particular) would be justified.

In sum: that a meaningful and purposive life would be attainable.


I can now perceive that this was a foolish, vain aspiration - that the reality, the bottom-line, the existential nature of mortal life (with its intrinsic change, decay, disease, and death understood as annihilation) does not, cannot - therefore will not - suffice.

But so long as there was some (albeit dwindling, as the years went by) worldly, political-social avenue left unexplored; so long as it looked theoretically-possible that the totalitarian bureaucracy might be halted and compelled into reverse - for so long did I fail to understand the nature of life and the perspective of real-reality.

It actually, in practice, I needed the ever-worsening, ever-greater unreality and evil of The System, The Matrix, The Establishment - to exhaust one after another and all of my false and feeble daydreams, wishful thinkings, simplified models and half-insights - before I eventually learned the necessary lessons concerning the true nature of reality and hope.


Therefore, this is an actual example of how the long-term personal effect of something evil - indeed the long-term triumph of purposive evil across the world - actually led to learning something vital; and a thing that a more gratifying, easier, more-successful life in a better world would Not have taught me.

If things had gone 'according to plan' - if I had had the kind and degree of worldly success and gratification that I envisaged for myself as a youth, and if I had found my tastes of such things to be as subjectively and sustainedly-gratifying as I expected - then I would almost certainly have lived my life in a delusory dream, and died without ever noticing that I was engaged in a demonic project of self-centred, hedonistic, short-termist, manipulative and (ultimately) nihilistic evil.


Thus if I had achieved something-like my dreams -and if these dreams had really worked; then I would have wasted my mortal life.

I would have been 'taken' by sudden death directly from a euphoric state of pleasurable self-congratulation and confronted with a Jesus to whom I regarded myself as greatly superior; and whose offer of Heavenly life everlasting would have had little attraction (involving as it does, a loving embrace of the divine project of creation).

I might well have rejected Heaven on the basis that I was existentially satisfied by living conceived as here-and-now self-gratification as the highest ideal; all I would have wanted was that this be continued until... nothingness. 


In sum, without the sustained and adverse environment of creeping totalitarianism to sabotage my tin-pot schemes of immediately pleasurable indulgence; I would very likely have stayed on the broad and pleasant road to Hell - which I had sketched-out in my youth.

And this - it seems to me, is a specific and exact instance of why (and how) we need evil in order to reach good.

Of course this instance does not in any way justify the evil in your life; let alone some other person's life (known or unknown) - nor any great masses of people who might be envisaged. That is for you to discover for yourself - each and individually.

But you can be sure that your actual life is trying to tell you what you most need to know; year-by-year, day-by-day, hour-by-hour trying to break-down your resistance to such knowledge. Even so obtuse a person as myself eventually crumbled under this pressure - but it took a great deal of such pressure, and for a long time, before I did.

For me - this is one reason why my world was adverse; and why there needed to be so much adversity and of that particular type.

First of all listen to the piece sung by a favourite group - The City Waites (I've posted this before)


This is a kind of 'round' (like Three Blind Mice, a version of which was also published by Ravenscroft ). This one is much longer and more sophisticated than our usual children's ones - having four separate 32 bar melodies that can be sung separately or together.

What I like very much about this piece is the harmony of the second half of the verses - bars 17-32 - perhaps especially 22-24, which is gorgeous and very 17th century; the kind of harmony that you don't get before or after this time, which which is just delightful.

(BTW I don't understand why this is three, rather than four, country dances in one...) 

If anyone can explain - musically - how this kind of effect is obtained, I'd be pleased to hear; because I can't work it out. (There is loads of it here by Thomas Tomkins; one of the greatest pieces ever written IMO.)

I've always assumed it was an harmonic 'movement', produced by contrapuntal voices, that was later ruled-out as insufficiently smooth and homogeneous (it jumps-out of the texture) - rather like the ban on parallel-moving, open-fifths, despite that these were the first foundation of Western harmony. 

If you want to see what is going on, here is a version that shows a musical score of the separate vocal lines.


Note: The synchronicity fairies have been at work, since Frank Berger has also today published some 17th century music - although his example is pretty Scheidt.

The Scottish writer and painter Alasdair Gray - who was the subject of my 1988 MA thesis at Durham University, and my friend for a decade around that time - died about a week ago. He lived to the age of 85, which was considerably more than would have been expected when he was an unhealthy child (hospitalised and nearly dying from asthma several times) - or indeed a wheezy, overweight adult who too-often drank too-much.

Alasdair is regarded as one of the major Scottish writers of the past century - mainly for his first novel Lanark (1981); which is in the modernist/ post-modernist genre - a hybrid work: realistic semi-autobiography sandwiched by the two parts of a SciFi dystopian fiction, both sharing an indirectly related main character. And an embedded 'Epilogue' where the author comes on-stage to exchange banter with his protagonist (and confess to the multiple stolen ideas or 'plagiarisms' deployed through the novel). The whole embellished by the author's very impressive illustrations (which often look like parody/ pastiche ancient engravings).


I bought a copy of Lanark in 1982, during perhaps the most 'miserable' year of my life, and went to Glasgow to buy a print of some of the artwork; and met Alasdair for the first time. Alasdair turned out to be the most eccentric person I had ever met, very genuine and kind, very funny, extremely interesting, and enjoyable to talk with.

His books' subject matter, his general artistic stance, his (socialistic Scottish nationalist) politics, all suited me at that point in my life.

And five years later, when I decided to do a one year research thesis - he allowed me to work from the collection of his diaries and journals in the National Library of Scotland; which meant that much of my work was published in The Arts of Alasdair Gray (1991) for which I also provided a short biography. So, for a while I was The expert on this author.

When I went to live in Glasgow in 1989 I saw a lot more of Alasdair and helped out with a couple of his later books - Poor Things and the Book of Prefaces - for which I was duly credited in the detailed acknowledgements (and 'plagiarisms') which had become something of a trademark.


After moving away from Glasgow, I only saw Alasdair once - when the above portrait was done. But we kept in touch - Alasdair especially being a very loyal correspondent. Rather sadly I "went-off" the books that had once meant so much to me;  and found - after that intense immersion of the late 1980s - I did not wish to re-read Lanark, or the books that followed. Perhaps because my infatuation coincided with that dark and depressing decade of my early adult-working life (aged 23-33) which I did not especially want to have revived in memory.

Also, Alasdair's best work is pretty gruelling to read - if there is a happy or hopeful resolution, this only comes after a very dark, dark night of the soul; and en route there is typically more pervy-ness and sordidness than I will willingly submit to nowadays.

For most would be readers it might therefore be best to go for the hardback, lavishly embellished edition of his first collection of short pieces - Unlikely Stories, Mostly (1983); which is a sheer delight of wit and erudition throughout; and also packs a powerful punch - here and there.

Two of the prominent phenomena of 2019 – the teenage ‘climate change’ campaigner Greta Thunberg and the “climate change” campaigning movement Extinction Rebellion – share the striking characteristic that, unlike virtually all great radical causes of past decades and centuries, their cause is almost entirely supported by the Establishment and by many, though not all, of its usual propaganda instruments in the media. 

From the global business elite at their annual jamboree in Davos, Switzerland in February this year – where Ms Thunberg told them she wanted them “to panic” because “our house is on fire”, but did not tell them to change the fundamental nature of western capitalism – to the Pope in Rome, to the leaders of the EU and of the British political class, Ms Thunberg has been welcomed and feted by the rich and powerful everywhere she has been, by the leadership class in religious, political and business circles. 

This salient fact seems to escape Ms Thunberg’s younger supporters and also many of her older ones.



Note: Terry Boardman is the deepest and most convincing analyst of socio-political trends that I know of; I have learned a lot from him.

The fact that he is an anthroposophist applying the insights of Rudolf Steiner is more evidence that we ignore RS at our peril - despite all the necessary reservations.

Yet, when Terry Boardman's article moves from analyses to policy - and he puts forward Steiner's century old idea of a 'threefold society' - I am compelled to remember my recent post stating that,when it comes to large scale plans and general schemes, Everybody Is Always Wrong.

Not that I have anything much better to suggest; but I know for sure that Threefolding is not going to happen, and would not make enough of a positive difference even if it did (somehow) happen.


The best I can suggest that is we each 'quarry-out' our own personal policy, plans and schemes as a part of what William Arkle termed 'quarrying-out our own uniqueness in our own way' - this being what God intends us to do in mortal life; so that we may ultimately each express to the fullest (within the context, meaning and purpose of loving creation in Heaven) our eternally-individual nature.

The real Christian churches have been pretty solid concerning the reality (and identity) of sexual sins; but have neglected dishonesty - which is surely the most pervasive sin of modernity among the middle, professional and leadership classes.

Consequently, churches have become strategically dishonest - without awareness, hence without repentance - and this is a factor in their continuing corruption: their absorption-into The System. 


This has happened because The West has become dominated by bureaucracy; management has  become the most frequent job and activity of the upper classes - and management is intrinsically dishonest in its nature and operations.

I have seen this happen through my adult life in science, academia, education and medicine - but most strikingly in science. From 1985-2000 British science went from being almost wholly honest to being almost wholly dishonest. The corruption was earlier in other systems.

And when the leadership have become habitually, pervasively, calculatedly dishonest - then everything will fall apart; because in a system permeated by lies and distortions, nobody knows anything about anything.


Dishonesty in langaue is analogous to inflation of a currency. When dishonesty reaches a certain level then communications lose their meaning; indeed become counter-productive; because we only know that language does not mean what it claims or seems to mean - but we do not know what language does mean.

We cannot even be sure that language is untrue, since sometimes (in specific places) it will be true - but truth in one place does not any more imply truth in another place.

And the pervasiveness of untruth degrades real truth from honest people - since liars can easily 'disprove' truth by lying about it (which we see all the time and everyday in the mass media).


Thus the problem: Not only is dishonesty a sin; but it is (like cowardice) a sin that undermines all virtues and enables all other sins - both in public discourse and (even more lethally) in our own minds.

It is a sin which is engaged in by almost all middle class people, on a daily - hourly - basis for their jobs, upon which their livelihoods depend. So, all the churches are jam-packed with professionally dishonest people; people who are paid to be dishonest and who would be punished for truthfulness. And since managers are the most dishonest group - the sin is worst among those who administer the system.

In effect, truth has been replaced by status; as happened in science where a peer review cartel nowadays (and for several decades) controls appointments, promotions, publications, funding and prizes - hence the consensus of science-managers defines what counts-as 'truth'.

Yet there is near zero awareness of this fact. Consequently, evil is pursued under cover of lies, with impunity.


All this will - I believe - become obvious very soon; when the totalitarian power grab begins - probably under the excuse of the 'climate emergency'.

When the demonic global Establishment (try to) take-over the nations; and impose a centralised system of omni-surveillance and micro-control - I do Not expect many Christian churches to refuse to cooperate. indeed, I don't expect them to notice what is happening.

Indeed, I expect Christian church leadership to regard World Government (in a 'good cause', naturally) as 'a good thing', overall and potentially*.

When that happens, the only spiritual alternative for Christians will be in their own consciousness; their own personal commitment to follow Jesus rather than corrupt institutions. Either individuals will opt-out of the System of Evil, or everybody will be opting-in, passively, by default - while lying about the fact.  


Note: As commenter 'Epimetheus' said yesterday: "Everybody's solutions revolve around somehow getting the world's most powerful and wicked people to bring about Utopia. But the joke's on us - this is their Utopia."

And I mean that literally - so far as I know.

I'm talking about the world and what ought to happen. It is a strange situation - to know for sure that everybody is wrong and yet not to know what is right.

I spend a fair bit of time (far too much time) reading analyses of the current spiritual (and materialist) malaise; how we got where we are, and the main features and problems. There are plenty such analyses - many I find broadly convincing, and some seem very astute.

But when it comes to the matter of what we should do, everybody is always wrong. This seems very obvious to me. It is not a subtle matter. When it comes to making suggestions about how to make a better future, when it comes to policies and plans - everybody is always wrong. 

Of course, some/ most people are not just wrong - but are the opposite of right: they advocate stuff that will make things much more, much more quickly. Some are incompetent and uninformed; but many of these, indeed, want to make things worse - they are evil people, with inverted values - and they want to make this mortal life as much like hell as possible.

But even the well motivated people, even Christians, even Christians who really understand things - are always wrong about what we should do.


It suddenly struck me that this is an exact description of our situation. It isn't going to change. We know what is wrong, but we don't know how to fix it - we don't even know approximately. We haven't a clue.

And this is rather strange.How is it that I know for sure that everybody is always wrong when I myself do not know what is right, when I myself am always wrong?

It doesn't seem to make much sense - how can wrong plans and policies be known without right to compare it with? Yet wrong obviously can be and is knowable, even without knowing right.

Where does this leave us; where does it leave me, specifically? The situation is that I know for sure that all these plans and policies are wrong, and will make things worse; yet I cannot suggest what ought to be done instead. Even if I could, nobody would take any notice - but in fact I can't and never will be able to say what ought to be done.


I don't think things always have been like this; I think this is something new. I think it is a characteristic of the End Times.

What it tells me is that the whole System and set-up of world civilisation has come to the point when it is unavoidably finished - when it makes no sense of any kind, and cannot be made to make sense.

We live in an insane and incoherent world of purposive lies, deliberate ugliness and the inversion of virtue. We know enough to recognise the fact, and not to go along with it - but there is nothing we can do about it.

There is no way out - in this mortal world. Of course there is a way out through the portal of death and (by following Jesus) to Heaven, if we choose it.


In a sense this is a great relief! I can - and should - stop worrying, have faith, and get on with my actual life. Time spent on plans and policy aiming at a better future would merely be making matters worse (because inevitably wrong).

So, everybody is always wrong... This is good news! What a liberation!

(These web pages were created by Michael Perry in consultation with Arkle, about twenty years ago shortly before Arkle died; and for many years this was the only significant web presence of William Arkle - and it was the source of my own informed engagement with Arkle from 2008. Sadly the site is now gone.)

**

I very nearly called this web site 'The Play of William Arkle', and then I felt that it would sound rather too casual for most people and even an insult to the endeavour that is brought to the resolving of the mysteries of life.

The reason that the word 'play' suggested itself is that the journey of understanding seems to lead from the level of human survival as a personality in this world, through to a spiritual view that takes survival of our spiritual self for granted; and then on again into the appreciation of the all-encompassing smile of our Divine Creator.

This Divine Smile says a very simple thing, which is that the everlasting nature of its Spirit can have only two options: either it remains in its Absolute condition of Blissful non-action; or it can engage in action through the creation of play-grounds. This means creating theatres of time, space and lots of things - from a condition of no action or time or space or things.

Our Creator felt that the first choice of 'no action' could becoming boring because there was no adventure, surprise or growth involved. The livingness of The Spirit felt itself to be in need of such adventure as an expression of joyful love and fun. So the second choice came about purely for the exercise of joy and love and fun.

The only word I could find to cover the activity of joy and love and fun was the word play, but unless it is approached in the right way the word does not carry the correct significance. And thus the whole of this web site is a journey into the understanding of The Creator's view of the word play.

You will find that my own earlier understandings moved gradually into this way of talking about our reality. It seemed to become more and more light-hearted while being able to sympathise with all the conditions of growth which can feel to be the conditions of fear and anxiety. Thus the big game of life at play has conditions within it which can descend to the very opposites of its initial intention.

These opposite conditions are the result of our Creator deciding to give us the Gift of being able to become real players in our own right at this adventure which is being undertaken. This is why the picture book was called The Great Gift and why the writings in it referred to God as being our friend in this one life endeavour. Later on this was changed to the expression God, The Player Friend.

As for me, I have kept the name William Arkle. I like the name because it implies that my Will is doing its best to be a small expression of the Ark of Life, The Heart of the Creator Friend.

However my close associates now find me calling myself Billy The Kid.

**

Here Arkle is saying that the first and deepest question about divine creation is why did God do it? Why is there something rather than nothing? Why is there action rather than stasis?

And Arkle is saying that this is to do with the nature of God, the kind of person that God is. Like a young child; God has an enjoyment of play.

(With 'play' Arkle, very typically, chooses a simple and 'childish' word for the most profound of his metaphysical beliefs - 'friend' would be another example.) 

As a child's favourite activity is to-play - rather than do-nothing; so with God.


So God made things happen. For a while, perhaps, God 'entertained himself'; and thus will presumably soon have discovered that solo make-believe does not satisfy for long (too predictable) - and soon one craves 'playmates', people like oneself to play with.

Play needs other-people. In this instance, other gods. Thus the whole purpose of creation.  


Of course a child does not want to play always; and wants to eat, rest and sleep from time to time - but these are mainly in order to prepare for more play.

The same with our reality, this creation. There are some persons (and some religions or ideologies) that focus upon 'eating' (sensual gratification - e.g. sexual gratification, euphoria), and others that focus on the hope for rest/ peace/ sleep (Nirvana).

But for most people, most of the time; play is the primary thing - if, by play, we ultimately mean the only endlessly rewarding 'play' which is the divine work of loving-creation in heaven: the Great Gift of Jesus.

(Which we sample and approximate in mortality in the life of loving families; and in the life of human creativity (experiencing, learning, doing, making) in its multitude of individual types - games, sports, pastimes, hobbies, arts and crafts...)


Arkle - shortly before he died, tells us here that called himself Billy the Kid. Why?

My guess: because a free, conscious, chosen return to the basic situation of the child is the purpose of life. Life is a cycle, but not a recapitulation.

To become again As a child (which Jesus is said to have commanded us); 'as' a child means not to be a child, but to live as grown-ups, as a child live (and as we ourselves once did).

For instance: a child cannot plan - adolescents plan with obsessive self-consciousness - the spiritually mature human adult chooses Not to plan; but again to live spontaneously and as improvisation.

And in perfect love (which casteth out fear).


(And, thereby, at the last moment - unpredictably, unstoppably - to thwart all plans and schemes of evil! Evil is beaten by Not plotting-against evil, but by doing Good; as a child.)

We may agree that materialism is false, evil and self-destroying. But it is hard to say - positively - what is meant by 'spiritual'. Indeed, I once participated in a research project where the literature was reviewed and people were interviewed about what they understood 'spiritual to mean' - and no conclusion emerged about any shared meaning.

The usual definitions (such as they are) tend towards excessive abstraction (in terms of the properties or classes of spiritual entities), or gestures towards a world beyond the material (reality is 'more than' just that which is perceived or measured) - which are true, in their way, but hardly adequate.

Clearly, too, spirituality does not equate with religion. Some religions, including some practices of Christianity, are barely spiritual - for instance religious life that is almost wholly ethical, rule-following, or focused on ritual participation. Indeed, many people claim to be 'spiritual but not religious' - however, strictly there is no such thing. To be coherent, to make sense; spirituality depends on metaphysical assumptions of a religious kind.


When someone tries to be spiritual but not religious - for example by merely believing-in and communicating-with spirits, or the dead - then this simply reduces to a type of materialism - spirits are, in effect, being brought into the definition of material and treated as mundane.

People who say they are Not spiritual seem to be those who regard life as being wholly on the 'level' of the everyday - so that the entirety of life (including personal and leisure time) is of the same quality as the normal, shared, public world of work, officialdom, the media. 

By contrast, when a spiritual dimension of life is desired - this is a wish for a larger life, beyond the mundane - with a different and 'higher' quality. In practice, nowadays, with the current pressures; this seems to entail according 'the spiritual' the highest priority; above (in particular) the political - and this is where so many would-be spiritual people and organisations fall-down.    


It is probably best to think of materialism as the assumption that the world is made of Things, and spiritual as the contrary assumption it is 'made of' Beings. 'Beings' meaning living-entities, conscious and motivated. Thus, to be spiritual means to assume that this universe and reality consists of Beings. 

We could further say that the materialistic perspective says that the universe arose by means of 'physics' processes - it just-happened for deterministic reasons and/ or perhaps randomly. In other words, in materialism there are Things interacting by physical processes.

By contrast, a spiritual perspective assumes that we live in A Creation - that is, a universe made by a Being. Furthermore, the Beings interact by 'relationships'. For the spiritual person; the ultimate reality of interaction is not the forces, particles, processes of physics, but the attributes of relationships - such as motivations, emotions, beliefs...


What prevents a spiritual world view (among those who want it) is many things. Habit, of course, plus that The World requires us to operate on materialist assumptions - to treat everything (including people) as Things.

It can be seen that this is a source of confusion. in that plenty of people assert a living universe, a purposive creation - but then explain it in abstract, geometric, mathematical, and physics terms. This is, indeed, difficult to avoid - for it is seen in Rudolf Steiner, Rupert Sheldrake and a staple of 'New Age' spirituality. I am saying that this is an error, and leads to an unstable hybrid that default-reverts from failed-spirituality back to materialism-in-practice.

This drive to abstraction based on the idea that abstractions are the primary reality - for example the view that ultimate reality is mathematical, or that physics provides the deepest explanation of the origin of the universe.


All this is a version of the ancient Greek metaphysical practice of explain reality in terms of abstractions; which was taken up by Christian theologians who (to varying degrees, but always to some extent) made Christianity fit-into this pre-existing materialistic framework (whereas most of scripture is describes a world of beings and relationships).

In a strange paradox; much Christian theology over the past many centuries represents a continued attempt at maintaining materialist assumptions as foundational for Christianity. Any whiff of anthropomorphism, animism, a world of beings - all such are regarded as childish errors.

In terms of the evolutionary-development of human consciousness, this was an early and necessary step in the direction of increasing human agency, freedom, choice; until the point (reached within the past 200 years in the West) that belief in God became active and voluntary rather than unconscious and passive.


Men began living in a world of Beings - but passively and unconsciously. This was Man's childhood.  The abstraction was part of detaching us from that immersive world and allowing us to think independently - Man's adolescence. The future is to return consciously and by active choice to the deepest truth of the spiritual world view - and again acknowledge reality as created by a Being, and consisting of Beings.

(From which perspective the abstractions - mathematics, sciences, Classical metaphysics, traditional Christian theology - are seen as ultimately tools: pragmatic approximations for particular purposes.)

But it is this vast inherited inertial legacy of abstract materialistic theology - mistakenly regarded as definitive of being-a-Christian - that has made mainstream institutional Christianity fall-into materialism (including bureaucracy); and which makes it so surprisingly difficult to be a Christian and to be spiritual.


Spirituality entails creation having a purpose, and materialism - with its physics universe - has none.

So, I would say that the spiritual world-view - which I want, and which is sought by many - is one in which we inhabit a universe of Beings that was itself created by a Being.

'Spirituality' is therefore thinking and living in such a way that we interact with 'the world' on the assumption that it is a purposeful creation and consists of Beings.

I wonder if future historians will look back at the last decade and conclude that this was the time when the Western world finally went insane? 

I can only hope so as it will mean that some form of sanity has been recovered. 

Will they note that the condition had been building up for more than a century but in this period the evil seeds planted in, for the sake of argument (because actually the real seeds go much further back), the 18th century when faith began to be lost, finally flowered? 

It is the loss of faith that is the root cause of the insanity...

Back in the day, twentysomething years ago, during a cold winter; I developed arthritis in both my big toe joints; such that I could not bear the pressure of shoes.

The only solution I could think of, was to wear sandals; and because it was winter - to keep my feet warmer - I wore them with my bright coloured loop-stitched walking socks - red, bright blue, purple and other high visibility shades. It looked stupid, I felt stupid - but it was either that, or stop walking, stay at home all day.

I was a university lecturer at the time; and so I was going into work, teaching classes, and spending long coffee breaks with colleagues, wearing this unignorably grotesque outfit. I sheepishly padded into college. And yet...

And yet, Nobody Ever Mentioned It. Nobody asked why I was wearing sandals in the middle of winter, with such garish socks; none of the students, my co-workers nor even friends poked fun at my footwear.

At first I was relieved to escape the merciless ribbing and ridicule, to which I expected to be subjected. Then the horrible truth dawned on me.

The horrible truth was that everybody assumed that this - wearing sandals and bright-thick socks in the middle of the winter - was just the kind of thing that they expected me to do. Nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing worth commenting on...

It was a chilling insight, and I am chilled now just thinking about it. But by then it was too late to explain; my toes got better; and I returned to the usual shoes or boots.

But chastened.

It is important to seek Final Participation - living in conscious and chosen awareness of the world as consisting of Beings - who are alive, conscious, motivated...

And yet to keep in mind that this mortal life is one of change; so what is sought is not a permanence (that being mortally impossible) but is primarily for learning. Life is primarily for learning not achieving. Learning from experience.

But while any experience may be learned-from; some experiences reduce further capacity for learning, while other choices increase them - so some choices are better than others.


What choices? My actual life is what I should learn from.

Further - learning is a spiritual and permanent transformation of my eternal spirit...

When we have learned, we move on to new and different experiences: the lessons and lectures that creation (God's loving creation) teaches us.


The Apocalypse is here, we are in it already and have been for a while. First step is to recognise the fact. We live in a materialist world where spirit is denied, mocked, suppressed. An inverted world where the material is declared to be the spirit.

Yet without the spirit we will not just die, but will turn upon ourselves, kill ourselves - and that is happening. Value-inversion is rife.

Why else the abolition of sexuality, marriage and family?  Medicine as a cult of disease, impairment and death? Over all: the ratcheting global totalitarian bureaucracy: The System - calling itself freedom and hope.

Materialism is death, self-willed self-death; we must have the spirit - the spirit of Jesus, the Holy Ghost - and recognition of universal aliveness, and Being-ness.


We need to live 2020 in the light of our knowledge and love of the Good Shepherd; and that he (and only he, albeit vitally helped by others who love us and whom we love) will lead us (if we choose to follow) through biological death to resurrected life eternal in Heaven.

There to live in love, and participate in divine creation.

(That is what I want - how about you?)

That is the true perspective of our specific lives, here and now, today, this moment; as moving towards Heaven.

Far from being a materialistic world, this is a world in which such a spiritual knowledge - and the objectivity of love - is the prime reality into-which all material and mundane matters require to be fitted.

The Apocalypse is spiritual.