Bruce Charlton's Notions

The only good magic is Christian magic - i.e. rooted in Christianity and arising from it; but I have often said that traditional 'ritual' or 'ceremonial' magic is inappropriate and ineffective for these times; because it depended on a passive, immersive Original Participation type of consciousness, that has (all-but) disappeared (at least in The West, among adults). 

We are now in an era when Final Participation is the proper way for us to engage creatively with the world - and Final Participation is a consciously chosen, individual activity - done in the realm of 'primary thinking' (a.k.a. heart-thinking).

Yet thinking may be aided by particular activities, and this is where the 'magic' (broadly conceived) comes-in. 

Ritual magic was done using formal ceremonies, words and artifacts; usually by groups; after training; and according to pre-arranged timetables. 

But now, magic ought to have a different form (I would say is destined to have a different form): a very different form, that I propose to call Intuitive Magic.

Intuitive magic depends on intuition, which is individual (not groupish); and cannot be ordered nor elicited on-demand; therefore it must occur spontaneously, in response to the arrangements of divine providence. 

It is a matter of the individual being aware of possible situations emerging (such as synchronicities and unexpectedly striking stimuli), alert to such clues and implications; and being correctly orientated, from a basis in Christianity.  

To amplify; I personally am not able to attain intuitions of the form "What should I do?", but will only receive answers to questions of a dichotomous form, such as: "Is this right (or wrong)?" or "Should I do this (or not)?" or "Should I proceed with my plan (or not?)".

Therefore, when an intuition arises, it must be cast into a Yes/No form; and the second test or check, is to seek guidance on the validity of this specific formulation. 

When a clear and self-validating answer comes, the process is complete; although it may be repeated as often as seems necessary to generate sureness.  

When an answer to this intuitive check is not clear despite genuine commitment to seeking it - or is not forthcoming at all - this is because the question has been incorrectly formulated; being insufficiently precise or rooted in false assumptions. More 'work' is needed. 

Thus, if intuitive Christian magic is regarded as things we might do - material things such as words, actions, meditation, or anything else - to attain goals compatible with the divine will; then a major pre-requisite is patience.  

Ritual magic is done to a timetable; but intuitive magic takes as long as it takes for the individual to be in the right frame of values and mind, awaiting correct intuition, and for providence to arrange circumstances to make it possible. 

Patience, in turn, requires trust; trust in God's personal loving concern for us our-selves, eternally; and trust in God's creative power - that in a world of beings with free agency and whatever the operations of evil: sooner or later the situation will be made to arise in which intuitive magic can be done. 

What then, is this 'intuitive magic'? 

Subjectively and temporarily, it is experienced as a positive change in consciousness. 

But objectively and eternally; it is the operation of our personal creativity in this mortal life, adding to God's creativity: it adds our own creative contribution to the ongoing divine: is an instance of co-creation. 

I have written a fair but about Primary Thinking in an attempt to clarify what Owen Barfield meant by Final Participation.

The difficulty with the 'thinking' aspect of the term, is that most of thinking is not primary - and I have felt a misleading temptation to strive to attain a new and different 'method' of thinking - perhaps a meditation technique. I know this is an error, and method/ technique is not a path to wisdom - but the call to change the mode of thinking seems to lead in that direction...

I am currently finding it more helpful to think of what I am aiming at in terms of Intuitive Knowing, with a metal emphasis on the 'ing' aspect of knowing - that intuitively know-ing something is not a thing static and categorical, but an active process; the attribute of a conscious Being.

And, for me, Intuitive Knowing is a proper goal however is may be achieved, by whatever method or technique or by none at all. I need to know intuitively - that is the goal; and how this best happens may vary widely or open-endedly according to the unique situation. 

My understanding is that - in life - there is a lot which we 'know' in a shallow, contingent, secondhand fashion; but that the aim is to base all knowledge, thought, action on only that which we know directly and intuitively - know for our-selves, from that of us which is divine.

In this mortal life, intuitive knowing only happens sometimes and temporarily - it cannot be attained as a permanent state. That is sad but not tragic; because this mortal life (for those of us who have it, the minority of Men who survive the womb and early childhood) is a time of experiencing and learning - a vital yet transitional phase.

This mortal life is a time of change - the one thing impossible is any fixed state of Being. Fixity is not an option. This situation intrinsically maximises our experience; we must keep learning, because we always keep experiencing change.

Since I am still alive, I have more that I ought-to learn; more situations in which I need to discern and rely-upon direct and intuitive knowing. Beyond death - if I actively wish it - I could live eternally in a state where intuitive knowing is the norm.

But clearly, for me, there is value in continuing to live here, now, in my situation; because there are things that I can learn best in mortality.

My conclusion is that I should seek intuitive knowing; but should not despair that it is an exceptional state that cannot be held-onto. Not holding-onto is one of the things I must learn.

Intuition is spontaneous - in the sense that it emerges from our true self. And - if you word search this blog for such terms as Intuition, Primary Thinking or Final Participation - you will see that I regard nothing as more important (here and now) than the development (and thus takeover from childhood instinct and adolescent intellect) of spiritually grown-up, intuitive thinking.

Why doesn't intuition just happen - when we want it; why is it so difficult?

One difficulty is that intuitive thinking must be consciously chosen - it doesn't just happen. But given it is possible, why is it is so very difficult - when my assumption is that this evolutionary development of consciousness is our divine destiny?

Leftism is a big reason; because Leftism blocks our spiritual development (as well as blocking real Christian faith). And Leftism blocks our spiritual development by crushing intuitive thinking.


Consider what Leftism does? It takes a spontaneous, unconscious, and correct intuition - then labels it as evil. Differences in ability and personality between social classes; differences between men and women and the identity of man or woman; recognition and classification of racial distinctions; the ethic of favouring family over non-relatives - or favouring natives and neighbours over foreigners and strangers... all these are examples of intuitions which Leftism simultaneously denies and demonises.

Leftism is indeed a systematic denial of our intuitions, in one area of life after another: first by subversion (inducing uncertainty), then denial (i.e. destruction), ultimately by inversion (so that we are induced to believe and act-upon the opposite of whatever intuition tells us).


(Once Leftism has stabbed us with deep lies, it delights in twisting the knife by mandatory stark contradictions - asserting that there are no differences between the sexes or races; yet simultaneously different... for instance women and non-whites are are superior in desirable attributes. Yet when such superiorities are accepted, then denial of any differences -and the evilness or noticing them - is recommenced. And so on...)


This crushing of individual intuition is how Leftism enforces the Ahrimanic evil of bureaucracy - and (by intent) transhumanism.

How may it be overcome, and intuition validated? The answer is: by bringing all the processes to awareness.

Intuitions begin as spontaneous and unconscious. These are then 'unmasked' by Leftism, mocked and vilified.

The proper response is to thank Leftism for having helped make conscious, and therefore free, that which was previously unconscious and therefore unfree.


Once we are aware of the reality and nature of our intuitions - something assisted by Leftism's organised, sustained and focused attempts to crush them - then we are able to choose to adopt intuitive thinking from the full agency of our true selves.

Probably, this is the divinely-intended role of Leftist thinking - as a temporary clarification and conscious-making our previously unexamined (because unconscious) assumptions. Our culture has become stuck in what was intended to be a brief temporary phase.

For us to mature spiritually towards divinity, and to move towards Final Participation characteristic of Heavenly life, this development of intuitive consciousness is necessary. Yet so long as a person (or group) makes Leftism the primary ideology; such a vital development will be blocked.

The West is a case of arrested spiritual development - bereft of the deepest source of wisdom and courage; with potentially lethal consequences including nihilism, demotivation and suicidal despair.

Hence - in a world already and increasingly dominated by Leftism in all aspects of public/ institutional discourse and life - we have become individually and collectively crazy and evil. For us the realistic choice is intuition or hell.  

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As I wrote yesterday, I feel that human thinking is essentially undivided, but that styles which could be called intuitive and rational have different absolute and relative strengths in different individuals.

The intuitive style of thinking is the non-rational basis of creativity, and works by a different kind of 'logic' (or anti-logic).

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I conceptualize intuition as (very roughly speaking) working by association of emotions and by 'subjective' semantic categories (i.e. by categories of meaning that - according to mainstream culture, are partly inborn, and partly the result of individual experience).

This can be seen in remembered dreams, with their strange changes of direction in narrative. Usually, these changes of direction can be 'explained' by some individual association based on the emotions generated.

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It is a bit like the way we categorize personal names in our mind; we have certain categories of names Rebecca and Emily might go together (because of an 18th century feel); or Charles, William and Robert ('King's names); or Nicola and Tracy (tow girls who were best friends) - and this association leads to slips of tongue. The same applies to cities, and (I believe) all the way through are structures of knowledge - even abstract knowledge such as science: there are spontaneous and not-rational (or not necessarily rational) association between chemicals, numbers, colours and so on.

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So we have a grammar of intuitive thinking which will - to a greater or lesser extent, vary between individuals - and will cut across the categories of rational thought.

And the reinforcement of intuition comes from emotions: our associations are validated by emotions.

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The sense of 'depth' which we crave and which we may experience in life, in social relations, in art, even in science; this sense of depth comes (I believe) from these personal and spontaneous associations.

So a 'deep' experience is one which triggers many associations that hang together, and these associations seem to go on and on, rooting the experience deep in our minds.

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By contrast, non-intuitive reason, for example formal logic, lacks this emotional back-up; so that even when we regard it as correct our decision is not validated by emotions.

So we acknowledge that one place is better than another; a particular car is better than another; a composer is better than another - 'on paper' or rationally and yet we may not feel this emotionally, and our assent is shallow and weak - and indeed alienating.

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So if a person believes rationally that Mozart is better than Rossini yet Rossini feels deeper to them at an intuitive level and Mozart just comes across as tinkling noise - then it is alienating to spend all ones time listening to Mozart and trying to manufacture an appreciation.

Likewise, if modern life is superior to ancient life in all rational respects, yet feels shallow, meaningless, purposeless - it is alienating to try and live by the belief that modern life is superior.

Likewise, if one's perspective on life (one's philosophy of life, or religion) feels shallow, meaningless and purposeless - yet apparently is supported by reason - this is alienating, profoundly alienating.

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What we seek is 'the good' such that our perspective on life is rationally true, beautiful and virtuous, and that all valued things are TBV, and each unit of experience has 'depth' such that all which is TBV is linked to all other entities that are TBV - no matter how far back we push.

Anything less than this feels incomplete is experienced as incomplete, is uninvolving, isolating - we can almost feel our minds crumbling at the prospect of such a life! Hence the need for inducing numbing indifference and distraction in modernity.

And if we are told that we are being unreasonable to want more than shallowness, then we are even more alienated!

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Yet if intuition and subjectivity are 'merely' the result of evolved predispositions and individual experience, then alienation becomes a personal problem; which may elicit sympathy, but which cannot be acknowledged as having any general validity.

The mismatch between intuition and reason is a profound criticism, a refutation of life as it is experienced - and this is probably the basis of nihilism - the disbelief in the reality of life - and because nothing is real, then nothing matters except therapy.

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Nothing matters except therapy...

Yes indeed, for secular modernity, the bottom line of all action is therapy.

For each individual, life is a matter of therapy - self-therapy and therapy from others (especially the therapeutic state - the politically correct state): a matter of making ourselves feel good, or at least less-bad, or blocking-out bad feelings with pleasure, or just obliterating all feelings with intoxications of one sort of another (drugs, or falling in love/ lust - it matters not which...).

For modern spirituality (New Age) - all is directed to therapy.

And therapy is this-worldly and temporary, a matter of aspirins and band-aids, because there is no possibility of anything else.

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For modern secualr culture, art is - at root - merely aspirins and band aids, so is any absorbing job or hobby, so is love - (nothing more than) a chance to live imaginatively and temporarily in a world of apparent meaning and purpose (or, a world where absorption obliterates all thoughts of meaning and purpose), even though we 'know' that this is not real, just a temporary 'escape' from the reality of nihilism.

In secular modernity we seek - as our ultimate goal - strong medicine.

And since we become tolerant to strong medicines, we need a perpetual procession of new strong medicines; of inventions, novelties, of change. 

Even philosophy, even religion is conceptualized as nothing more than a strong medicine (which works for some people, not everyone).

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So intuition points elsewhere than reason, but intuition and reason cannot be brought together under a materialist, this-worldly perspective - since at this level of analysis intuition merely points to therapy.

What we crave is a world where intuition and reason are merely different sides of the same coin; where all reaosn is intuitive and vice versa.

Untill we find such a perspective, we are right to be dissatisfied.

The profoundest therapy is successful Zen - a living death, a state of utter detachment and indifference and acceptance of meaninglessness and purposelessness.

Yet if the Zen perspective is really true, one might as well die now and have done with it! Why struggle and meditate for years to achieve indifference?

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Therapy cannot be an ultimate goal in life, because therapy points to death as the only answer to life.

The therapeutic culture is the consequence of a culture which regards intuition as important, but ultimately intuition as something we are 'stuck with' - due to heredity and individual experience.

For New Age spirituality, intuition is at root merely an unfortunate obstacle in the path of humans accepting (as they rationally ought to) the meaninglessness and purposelessness of real-reality.

For secular modernity - even New Age Spirituality - intuition is important only because it makes us unhappy. Modernity aims to provide an ersatz satisfaction of intuition - but the satisfaction will be, must be, fake - because there is no real form of satisfaction.

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What we yearn for is meaning and purpose of life; and that requires a framework of reality not therapy, and reality requires rooting outside of this world, and beyond of reason and intuition.

We seek, therefore, a perspective which contains both reason and intuition and in which both are really-real.

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Because secular modernity acts asif reason/ logic was objectively true, while intuition/ creativity is subjectively-validated. 

In fact neither reason not intuition are objectively true in terms of a secular and materialist analysis - because for this to be the case it would be necessary that both reason and intuition were self-validating.

People act asif reason were self-validating. Secular modernity makes this assumption.

But on the slightest reflection it is apparent that reason cannot prove the validity of reason any more than intuition can prove the validity of intuition.

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So, both reason and intuition are either not objectively valid (on a materialist and secular perspective) - in which case we have no real knowledge of anything; or else either/ or both reason or intuition are validated by something hierarchically higher and beyond themselves - which is divine revelation.

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(This is why the most fully rational person who ever lived was religious - viz. Thomas Aquinas. He was fully rational because he believed that reason - indeed the selective sub-set of reason that was scholastic logic - was validated by God. I think Aquinas was incorrect and misguided in the emphasis he placed on logic, even when conclusions were unsupported by intuition - but it could not validly be said that Aquinas was irrational (or, if Aquinas was irrational, then everyone who ever existed before and since has been even-more-irrational); and Aquinas was of course deeply religious - being a Roman Catholic Saint.)

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So, those who sense that reason (or logic) is necessary but insufficient as a guide for life, but who find that secular modernity regards intuition as contingent and idiosyncratic, should consider that intuition may be validated from the same source as reason - and in the same kind of inevitably partial and distorted way as reason is validated.

The conclusion would be that, like reason, intuition is necessary. And, like reason, intuition is valid - but in a partial and biased fashion.

Both reason and intuition are both necessary yet partial and biased because underlying reality (i.e. transcendental reality) is a whole, in which reason and intuition are merely aspects of a single mode of thought.

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The advice to live by intuitive knowing (primary thinking) is difficult - even for short spells. Difficult to remember, in the first place; but also difficult because - at times when it is most important - to follow intuitive knowing will mean contradicting natural instincts and intellectual observation.

We personally need to go-against not just the intellectually expressed social assumptions and expectations that we have imbibed insensibly from culture and consciously from education; but also our 'gut feelings' which will be tending instantaneously to 'react' to the given-situation (e.g. with fear, lust, resentment).

Against these very powerful influences, we ought-to-be listening to the quiet sureness of intuitive knowing; but that is something that only we our-selves can know.

Even when we see our way clear to do what is right, and have courage to do it; how can we justify ourselves to others in face of what seems like logic, probability and impulse?

In the end, we may not be able to. 'Other people' tend Not to respond constructively when one explains 'because I Just Know; even when that is the simple truth of the matter.

I personally tend to state this fact 'I Just Know' somewhere in my explanation - at the beginning or the end; but in explanations I try to set-aside instinct and impulse as being temporary hence unreliable; and make some space for what I instinctively know is right by emphasising the uncertainties of intellect, thinking and prediction - how these almost-never can predict with sufficient certainty and accuracy to be used as a justification for what we do.

So, intellectual observation based on social knowledge may suggest that X is 'the best' course of action (which contradicts intuitive knowing); but this can only ever be based upon probabilities - since there are other factors we don't know about, and long, unpredictable chains of causality between now and then.

And conversely, doing what one intuitively knows is the proper thing May - by whatever improbable, unlikely chain of events - end up 'for the best'.

And that has to be enough. Others may well still say that you are wrong, but from their perspective it is 'merely' the wrongness of making a 'long shot' bet on the future at high odds, instead of (as they would advise) backing the favourite. Perhaps foolish, but not utterly insane.

While in reality, in its true frame; you are not aiming at publicly-defined-success in this mortal life; but at 'success' conceptualised in ultimate, divine terms and beyond the portal of so-called death.

 

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In academic psychology, there are two concepts of creativity:

1. an older one which sees creativity in terms of dreamlike cognition, psychoticism, 'primary process' thinking, and thoughts linked-by emotional-associations; and

2. a newer one which sees creativity in terms of 'openness to experience' - that is neophilia, novelty-generation, random permutations and combination of memorized information.

I believe that the earlier concept is much closer to the truth, or to validity - and that indeed the idea of creativity as Openness is a modern, bureaucratic and politically-correct corruption and hijacking of creativity: creativity redefined such that the shallow childishness of modernist art and the committee-defined-consensus of Big Science counts asif creative in the same way as the great art and natural philosophy of the past.

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But there is, I suspect, something intrinsically corrupt in the concept of creativity; which emerged into public discourse at about the time of the Romantic movement in the late 17th and early 18th centuries; as a contrast with scholastic logic, and an explanation for the difference between philosophy/ science and the arts.

Properly speaking, rather than the twin poles of creativity and logic as the basis of human knowledge, I think the proper (or closer) conceptualization is intuition and reason.

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Intuition is inborn, spontaneous, it comes first, and everything is based upon it and it varies between people.

Intuition is related to 'common sense' and also to understanding other people and to instant apprehension of situations. It is related to the emotions; and seems to proceed by emotional association.

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Reason is also mostly innate, although partial forms can be learned (e.g. mathematics, geometry, formal logic), and it also varies between individuals.

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However there is not a close correlation between intuitive ability and reason; and people can be unusually high in one and unusually low in the other.

Indeed, there is probably an inverse correlation between intuitive ability and reason among healthy people; although the correlation is not very close and there are exceptions (which get rarer as they get more extreme).

These exceptions are the very rare 'creative geniuses' who are both intelligent and intuitive...

...and the more numerous and more obviously dysfunctional people who lack both intuition and intelligence - the number of these vary between societies, because intelligence and intuition can both simultaneously be damaged by brain pathology (due to degenerative disease, trauma, infection, malnutrition etc.) and the causes of brain pathology vary widely in frequency between societies.

Intelligent people who are lacking in intuition are much commoner. These are the 'clever sillies', more-or-less - the i.e. bulk of the modern ruling elite.

And also common are highly intuitive people of moderate or lower-than-average intelligence. This group includes, but is not confined-to, people with irrational ideas and illogical thought processes who may be psychotic - or regarded as mentally ill by the high intelligence-low intuition types.

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My point is that while these processes of knowing I have called intuition and reason can be statistically separated and contrasted, ultimately they are meant to work together.

It is only reliable for knowledge to proceed such that both intuition and intelligence are satisfied by each step and conclusion.

Otherwise we get the strange distortions which are usually conceptualized as of logic unsupported by emotion; or emotionality unchecked by logic - more correctly this is reasoning in contradiction to intuition and intuition apart from the context of reason.

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I am sure that humans cannot function unless intuition and reason go together; otherwise we mistrust ourselves and become detached (alienated), proud, despondent, exploitative - oscillating between domination by logic and then by emotions in unrelated sequence.

In other words we get the normal mainstream fragmentary, sound-bite-sized, conduct of modern public discourse.

We get the counter-cultural advocates of impulse and instinct alternating with the absurdly restricted and legalistic procedures of bureaucracy.

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At root, I think we need to recognize that neither creativity nor intelligence are good in themselves: which recognition is easy to say, but hard to do. 

We must recognize that creativity can be, has been, highly destructive, proud and evil. Many of the worst tyrants and sinners of history have been highly intuitive creative individuals: Napoleon, Hitler, Mao.

And that reason/ intelligence is also, more often than not, highly destructive - as evidenced by communism and its descendant political correctness.

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When it comes to Christianity we cannot allow either reason or intuition to go ahead alone; the one must always be able to catch up with the other, in each of us.

This sets a limit to how far we can go in understanding.

Rational understanding (following a line of logic) cannot go further than intuition allows; and intuition cannot go further than is check-able by reason.

So we should not follow systematic theology further than our intuition can follow; and we should not follow what seem to be personal insights and revelations further than we can personally support with reason.

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In this refusal we must each of us be stubborn - especially in a secular and corrupt world where valid spiritual advice may be impossible to find.

Better not to know than to know wrongly.

To do otherwise - and to allow logic or emotion to run-away independently - is to pull-apart human understanding and to split our souls when they should be unified.

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The main difference between Romantic and Traditionalist Christians (when they are real-Christians) is that Romantics will acknowledge explicitly (to themselves, as well as others) that their bottom-line convictions are a matter of intuition... 

Two twentieth century Christian ritual magicians I like as people and whose work is valuable are Dion Fortune and Gareth Knight. Having said this; I regard them both as of-their-time, and their methods as no longer effective or valid.  

Both worked (partly) via what they termed 'contacts' - that is, spiritual beings with whom they made contact and who provided instruction, advice and conversation - using language. Such contacts were achieved by persons of suitable ability and motives, and also as the culmination of a long period of mental training that encompassed concentration and visualization. 

(I regard such magical contacts as a more active and conscious form of the varieties channeling and automatic  writing that have been a part of New Age spirituality, generally.) 

While I acknowledge that such contacts had some valuable effects and consequences up to the later parts of the twentieth century; I believe they are intrinsically prone to error - and these errors are amplified when the results are transmitted to a wider audience. 

Even assuming that the magician is well-motivated, that the spiritual contact is genuine, and that the spirit contacted is of a good and competent nature; then there are nonetheless two layers of problems about the use of language in these communications. 

Contacts work by a double-translation. In the first place; the spirit must translate from his thinking into words - in the second place the magician must understand the words, and translate into his own understanding. Thus thinking into words, then words back to thinking - before the recipient can know what is being communicated.

And the training of magicians is double-edged; because the capacity to concentrate and visualize entail a mental discipline that tends to perpetuate any distortions or errors in the magician. In particular; when the magician has not fully formulated his questions, or asks an unanswerable question (because the question contains false assumptions) - then there will nonetheless an answer will be generated - because that is how the training has made things. 

So the recurrent problem with magical contacts seems to be that of generating too-precise answers to too many and poorly formulated questions.   

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By contrast, what I mean by intuitions operate in a wordless sense, without language. As I have written before; almost everything hinges on the 'question' which needs to be fully, clearly and validly understood. 

It may take someone a long time to become clear about what exactly it is that he needs to know. The question needs to be clarified to the point of being wordlessly grasped as a whole and held in mind. And motivations need to be clarified - because only genuinely Christian motivations will lead to Christianly-valid intuitions. 

In practice such questions seek equally simple - binary-type - answers such as Yes-No, True-False, Good-Evil.  

And in practice - as soon as the question has been clearly and simply known - the 'intuitive' answer is immediately forthcoming. 

No media, language, technologies or symbols are involved; therefore no training in concentration, visualization, meditation etc is needed - indeed such training will do more harm than good insofar as it has become an unconscious habit. 

And any attempt to explain the reasons for the intuitive understanding will therefore necessarily misrepresent the situation - and tend to reduce the solid assurance of the intuition. Because as soon as the intuition has been reduced to words, it will be distorted and incompletely represented; and these wrong reasons may then become a target for rationalistic-public critique such that the knowledge is no longer intuitive. 

Therefore true intuitions are private, clear and simple; and cannot be captured in language, nor can their intuitive nature be communicated. In a sense, each is a personal miracle that sustains faith, and potentially guides thought and conduct.  

There isn't an agreed word to describe the kind of Christian I am - so I will label it Intuitive Christianity for present purposes - and compare it with what might broadly be called Catholic and Protestant versions. Understand that this is a short post - and what is described are 'ideal types' meant to capture a particular essence of each version. I am talking of ultimates - not of practical living - which will surely be multi-factorial...

The transition between childhood and adulthood takes place at adolescence - and adolescence is the only path from the one to the other. The essence of this transition - from an ultimate and divine perspective - is the transition from Obedience to Freedom.

(Noting that Freedom means something like Agency - i.e. becoming a conscious, actively-autonomous, personally-strategic adult: a source of innate motivation, decision, creativity.)

Obedience roots The Good externally - in some person, institution or social group. The Christian assumption is that these external sources are conduits of God's will.

(As in childhood - the child's role is to know and follow the guidance of parents, family, church, school, social group etc. - and such obedience is 'passive' - it does not require consciousness, and indeed young children are only somewhat conscious.) 

Freedom roots The Good in The Self, internally. The Christian assumption here is that God is within-us - as a deep, true Real Self.

Note that Freedom (that is Agency) is truly Good only if the Real Self is Good. And in practice this is a matter of contention among Christians - because clearly the overall-self is not wholly Good - so some kind of discrimination, definition and distinction concerning the Self is required.

1. The Catholic belief is that the Church (the mystical Church, contrasted with the organisation) is Good, is the conduit of God's will - but the individual is fallen and (in essence) depraved such that for the individual to be Good entails Obedience to the (mystical) Church.

God intervenes to ensure that The Church is and remains the conduit for God's will, and worthy of Obedience. Freedom is mostly about choosing this Obedience.

In practice, therefore, all Men are more-or-less permanently children; so permanent Obedience a necessity. Freedom/ Agency of The Self would be a cruelty; because as individual agents all Men are damned... self-damned by their sin and incapacities.

Freedom is therefore, and necessarily, tightly circumscribed by the overall duty of Obedience.  

2. The Protestant also believes that Men are depraved; but with the capacity to know Good by Obedience to divine revelation, especially as encapsulated in Scripture.

That is, all Men - as autonomous selves - are incapable of Freedom in the ultimate sense of agency rooted in the Self; but all Men have the innate capacity to understand Scripture and choose Obedience to it.

God intervenes to make this understanding of scripture possible; and that the Freedom of choosing to obey Scripture will be under God's will. Freedom is tightly circumscribed by the overall duty of Obedience.

3. My understanding (Intuitive Christianity) is that Freedom/ Agency is our proper, divinely-destined and ultimate goal - here-and-now, in The West; superseding the primacy of Obedience (whether to Church, Scripture or any other external source).

Christianity therefore ought to be rooted in the Real Self and pervasively based upon the Real Self; and Freedom ought not to be constrained to the primal chose of Obedience to Church or Scripture; but this discerning Freedom ought to be incrementally extended to all other matters of primary importance.

This is based upon a conviction that the Real Self is in fact God-within-us; and also distinctive to ourselves alone. In other words, as children of God we inherit God's divinity - but also each child is unique and has an unique destiny within creation.

(There must be a distinction between the true-real-divine Self which is intrinsically Good - and the multiptude of false selves which arise from error, sin, by inculcation, for expedience etc. - which may be good or evil; but are not divine, are often arbitrary and typically transient.) 

We all (potentially) know The Good innately and directly - and the ultimate authority is therefore with, not external; the ultimate value is Freedom to live from the Real Self, not by Obedience to any external source excepting our direct knowing of God.

Therefore, in an ultimate sense, my conviction is that Man - any man, any woman - may attain to salvation and live a life of theosis from-within; without membership of The Church or access to Scripture of other external sources; and, indeed, in an ultimate sense it is proper and best for a Christian's Life to be rooted in n the Freedom of the Real Self, and not in any external source.

In sum: Freedom is a higher (more mature, more adult) value than Obedience. 

External sources may of course be helpful, perhaps very helpful - but here-and-now in The West external sources may also be extremely harmful - the Church may be (usually is) subverted, corrupted and anti-Christian; Scripture, its translation and its interpretation is likewise usually corrupted, distorted, selective, misrepresented - inverted.

Indeed, it is precisely this situation that creates the urgent necessity of an Intuitive Christianity based on the individual and Freedom.

My understanding, therefore, is that Freedom has always been an essential element of Christianity; but in the past Freedom was used to make a single choice of Obedience; of whom or what to serve. In the past Obedience was more important than Freedom.

My contention is that this primal and vital Christian Freedom ought now to be extended to all major and significant aspects of Faith. From now, Freedom is more important than Obedience. That is our divine destiny; if Man is to move from his current spiritual adolescence into adult maturity.

It is one thing to understand that this is a living, purposive and conscious ("animated") world we inhabit; but another and more difficult matter to experience it as such.

At least that has been my experience, and apparently the experience of many others: we find ourselves stuck, thinking in the materialistic fashion that innately imposes the usual alienated life in which everything is experienced as a 'thing' - and we find ourselves unable to relate the our environment.

Of course I have tried to experience the world as alive and conscious - but it seldom works. Indeed, the very act of trying is what seems to block the process. It is as if my willing forms a skin around my-self.

As so often - it seems I had things the wrong way around; I was trying to do the opposite of what was actually required. The clue came from reflecting upon a passage about Heart Thinking in a talk by Stanley Messenger that I have posted before.


I regard it as a primary insight that we need to make a conscious choice in order to move forward to the next and destined development of consciousness.  It won't just happen-to us: we must actively choose to make it happen: meet our destiny half-way...

I also regard it as necessary that we recognise the primacy of intuitive thinking - thinking which is based-upon direct contact between beings (not merely indirect communications, such as language)...

So that, in effect, we think each others thoughts, without perception or mediation; without need for language or any other symbolism.


At one point in that above-linked lecture entitled "Crop Circles: gateways to new worlds"; Stanley M comments that Beings (such as angels, or the so-called dead - or, implicitly, the manyfold Beings that surround us in our environment (sun, moon, stars, wind, mountains, trees, animals...) - cannot talk to us unless we first our-selves produce a language, more exactly a channel of contact, in which we can talk to them.

Now; SM actually meant 'talk', as the mode of contact - and he deployed 'channeled' conversations as his medium. However, I would regard such perceptual and 'hallucinatory' experiences as being pretty-much inaccessible-to, as well as mostly inappropriate-for, modern Men. But if I modified 'talking' to the kind of direct and intuitive knowing that I regard as primary and necessary; I found that my question was partly answered...

It became clear that what was needed was for me - consciously and by choice - to initiate direct intuitive contact with Beings, thereby to dicover from experience that they were alive.

And this was different from what I had been trying to do - which was to be receptive to the 'communications' from things around me. I had been trying to experience the world as I did when a young child - but this time consciously. I had been looking, listening and feeling; when what was actually required was for me to make an active approach...

That is what I tried to do. The problem was that It Never Worked. What never? Well, hardly-ever. 


My conclusion was that this is not sufficient, it was not specific enough, thus it didn't work.

The questions arose: what (from all the infinite environment) should I approach, and how should I make this approach for it to be effective?

One clue is that this must involve 'heart thinking'; a term which means the same as intuition - and thinking with the heart is distinguished from head-thinking/ reason/ logic on the one hand; and gut-thinking/ instinct/ spontaneous impulse on the other hand. In practice, heart thinking is happening when knowledge 'appears' in conscious thinking, knowledge that we know to be from another Being (not our-selves) inserts-itself into our stream-of-thought.

So, that tells me how to know when it has-happened (and it is characteristic of heart thinking that it is retrospective. We know that an intuition has-happened - but do Not know when it is-happening.

A further characteristic of heart-thinking is that it is self-validating; while it is happening, I am sure of it, I don't doubt it. It brings with it that faith which is the natural consequence of trust. And trust is the consequence of love.

So, we begin to see how all the necessary elements are fitting together... Still, the problem remains - how exactly to initiate this process of heart thinking, how to make contact, and with-what to make contact?


(Because there are plenty of ineffective recommendations knocking-around; notably the 'exercises' prescribed by Rudolf Steiner - despite that most of these ideas come (whether directly or indirectly) from Rudolf Steiner. Steiner suggested an essentially arbitrary method, by which some-arbitrary-thing is picked-out (e.g. a plant) and then a mental-concentration form of meditation is practiced; whereby (through practise) thoughts are compelled to remain focused on the object, and to follow certain prescribed themes. I mention this only as an example of something well-meaning that has proven itself solidly-ineffective over the course of a century, during which Anthroposphy has become ever-more Ahrimanic, passive and politicised - and nearly all Anthroposophists (who practice these exercises) have become psychologically-indistinguishable from the mass of mainstream, bureaucratized, totalitarian-minded leftists.)


I got the clue for this next and final step from another comment Stanley Messenger made in the 'crop  circles' talk, from about 1h 22mins before the end; which was (in my slightly edited transcription):

The huge evolutionary step that has been taken over thousands of years in Man's history is that a conscious being now exists in the universe which can arrogate to its own consciousness the freedom to decide what is true - to create universes. 

And this is a perilous and devilish capacity; and is at the same time a capacity that can raise mankind to the level of the gods.

What is the difference between those two possibilities? The difference is whether, in this growth of self-awareness, mankind will come to the realisation that the perceptions of the heart are more fundamental than the perceptions of the brain. The realisation that our capacity to know through the heart reaches a more profound and truth-filled level than can be reached by perception, hypothesis and analysis.

The difference between this new freedom on the one hand to deny and destroy the reality of the cosmos; and the opposite capacity that it can create new universes of its own; depends, in the end, entirely on whether there is love in the heart - or not.

If there is no love in the heart, then this advance to a freedom of knowledge is the most Satanic thing that could possibly have happened to Mankind.


In the first place, this distinction is a stunning clarification of the catastrophes of 2020. We are ruled by those who have-not love in the heart, and the masses have allowed/ chosen that love should leach from their hearts in all world-relations excepting some of the human. Hence we have embarked upon the perilous, demonic, Satanic pathway - which is the terrible consequence of Man's choice to misuse his new freedom to create new universes.

The 'reality' that that is being created - before our eyes - is literally a Satanic hell; in which people's capacity to choose what they believe, is being used to believe the inversion of those true values that derive from God and creation.

We have created, and are developing, a 'universe' where lies are truth, the ugly and disgusting is celebrated as beautiful, evil plans are celebrated as idealistic visions; and where all representations of God, the Good and Creation are being subverted, mocked, destroyed, vilified and punished. Then all this is being locked-in by a global totalitarianism based on fear, resentment and despair. 


But most vitally this 'love in the heart' requirement is the final clue to how to experience our living in an animated world; a world of Beings.  How do we come to know these Beings, how do we begin to have a relationship with these Beings?

Firstly, we focus on those Beings we love.

Only by love can there be heart thinking. So anything and every-thing we love - but nothing else - is suitable for us to address. As well as people alive and around us we may love someone we have never met, perhaps one who has died; or an author, composer or artist from the past. We may love a pet, or other animal. And we may love any environmental 'thing' - a particular plant or tree in our garden, a landscape or hill, the crescent moon or the constellation of Orion.

We may love something 'made' like a house, a church building, a picture, an old car, a much-used tool...


But love is not arbitrary. The point is that we must truly, spontaneously, already love the Being we address.

Love is not an aspiration, but a necessity: an absolute requirement.

Start with what we actually love: that is vital.


Secondly, we ourselves actively, by conscious choice, express our love: and so we open the channel of communication.

A mistake is to try and manipulate, or get-something-from, that which we address. Animistic thinking is magical - but it is not magic. (Magic is an attempt at manipulating reality.)

What is needed is analogous to the difference between telephoning your mother, and making a sales call; the difference between patting a dog, and using a carrier pigeon to send a message; between a real fan-letter expressing gratitude and delight, and asking for an autograph.

Love is - in the proper sense - disinterested.

Being based in Love; we might rightly express such emotions as gratitude, appreciation, respect, admiration, even adoration.


Putting all this together:

If we want to experience the whole of reality as living and conscious - experience the animated universe - be in relation-with the world; then we begin by knowing this is true, selecting that which we actually love; and then opening the channel for direct contact by expressing that love in positive, generous, affirmative and appreciating ways.

After which we may expect to become aware of our heart thinking - so that the responses to our consciously-chosen initiation of contact becomes consciously known by us, as having appeared in our own consciousness.

We will know that we have-been in direct communication; and will intrinsically (at the time it happens) know the validity of this process.

Anyone who goes back through this blog to its early days of 2010 will know that it was many years before I wrote about the Bible in any detail; and only more recently that I wrote about my experiences of close reading.

This is because when I converted, under the influence of CS Lewis, I regarded having opinions about the Bible as a snare, and the path to leaving the faith. However, I have never been able to freeze my beliefs at any particular point - or, at least, not without a rising tide of feeling-dishonest about it - and a consequent erosion of active faith.

So I began with the idea that being a Christian was about joining a church, then trying to find the correct church, then discovering there was none. The Bible I simply accepted as true in an overall sense; then I became unable to say sufficiently precisely what that truth actually was; only then did I realise that everything depends upon at least one act - more often several acts - of intuitive evaluation.

If which religion and which church can only be decided by intuition; the problem does not end there. Because the churches are all riven by dissent - and each position depends on different assumptions that can only be decided by intuition...

So eventually I became clear to me that I need to reach an intuitive decision on everything that was sufficiently important to trouble me - or else rely on this current decision to be guided by a previous intuition (eg about the truth of a particular church, or person).

This led, by a process of gradual homing-in, to posting accounts of my thought processes reading the Fourth Gospel.

Some of these have apparently been helpful to some people; and unhelpful or subversive to others - I have no idea where the balance of help and harm lies, nor would such knowledge be decisive. Although I defend my own understanding; I have no interest in leading others, nor in imposing a particular interpretation on others.

My intention is to show people that such things may be done. And also that they need not be destructive - because (at least at present) I have what feels like a very coherent, strong, positive and inspiring Christian witness - albeit it is very probably unique to myself, and probably not final even to myself.

How this 'work out' is not possible to know - not least because part of my understanding is that past solutions are not open to us, the present is unsustainable and undesirable - therefore any valid solution will be unprecedented.

But that is what is going-on here.

Because thinking is primary (from Rudolf Steiner) we immediately need to distinguish thinking - because thinking knows itself to be self-contradicting. We need (at least) a thinking that can withstand the scrutiny of thinking.

We need, that is, a coherent Primary thinking - i.e. which satisfies all other kinds of thinking - which explains all other kinds of thinking - which explains itself.

...Although the conviction that this explanation is true must be intuitive.

In short, we need a thinking that rests solidly upon intuition, and which is never contradicted by itself.  

A thinking that is both coherent and validly experienced.

To move to metaphysics; why should intuitive validity be true? (Rather than a delusion.) Only if it is built into Men by a personal creator god... This requires, minimally, a god that has equipped Man with the ability to know reality (including god itself).

However, this ability to know reality is Not the same as Man's original essence of being; Not the same as Man's agency.

Thinking is primary, agency is primary...

Therefore, there is an intrinsic potential conflict between agency and intuitive thinking.

In other words, Man can know - by Primary thinking; but Man's agency must choose to know.

If we start from the actuality of a potential Christian confronted by "Christianity 2022"; he cannot take a single step towards conversion without making a personal discernment; and this can only be intuitive because there is nothing else it can be. 

(And, as of 2022; all real Christians are essentially converts; and need to remain perpetual converts if they are not to leave the faith.) 

Where does he look, who are the authorities, who should he take seriously? By what criteria should he judge? 

Nothing at all can happen towards conversion until some assumptions are made, and these assumptions are either made by the potential Christian or by... somebody-else - and for it to be somebody-else the potential Christian must have made assumptions about who has the authority to make those assumptions. 

Someone who ends-up as a traditionalist Christian, and who believes that his church is divinely ordained and the prime locus of spiritual truth; and this church has authority to define Christianity; and authority to define theology and doctrine, and to define ritual, and to define and interpret scripture and so on and forth... can only have-arrived at that position by many, many personal discernments that can have no foundation beyond personal intuition.

Once the convert is in the position of subscribing to a traditionalist church - he can point to that church's interlocking authority on all manner of matters to make a coherent case as to why that church is God's ordained church - but the convert cannot get to that position without a hidden history of personal intuitions.    

The traditionalist church member can then decry intuition, can then assert the primacy of His Church over all crucial matters of definition and interpretation - he can then decry 'mysticism' as dangerous, can denounce individualism as evidence of pride, can assert that nothing is more important that to worship and obey in accordance with his church's rules...

But All of this is only reached via multiple-intuitions - which may be forgotten, denied, decried and denounced - but they happened; and continue to happen...

The intuitions continue to happen because the traditionalist Christian can - as of 2020 - only become and remain a traditionalist by discerning as wrong some of what his church leaders tell him; and typically by adopting a minority view within his church. 

Such selections and rejections of the obvious majority and higher authority represent a continuing history of personal discernments, based on intuitions - because the criteria for judgment that is the basis for all such discernments is also an intuitive decision. 

In sum - as of her-and-now; the traditionalist position (whether it is really true, or not) has the structure of a logical tautology. It is a system of circular reasoning - and to enter that circle cannot, in principle, be done by means of already-knowing the validity of criteria and judgment from within the circle - because these criteria are rare and alien to modern society. 

In 2022 in the West; Nobody is be raised to adulthood regarding the within-circle criteria as unconsciously valid and knowing no other. 

This was possible in ancient, medieval and perhaps later societies - it is not possible now. Thus the circularity of traditionalism has been, can only be, entered via multiple intuitions. 

Conclusion. All modern Christian faith - including the mort traditional, orthodox and church-primary - is based-on, rooted-in intuitions - therefore Not in any kind of traditionalist Christianity itself.

This is a universal and necessary fact.

The only difference between Christians is that some are aware of the fundamental role of intuition (i.e. 'Romantic Christians); while others are unaware, have forgotten, are insane and incapable of reasoning; or dishonestly deny the fact. 

To recapitulate, in brief, why I have settled on the Fourth Gospel as the primary source of communicated-knowledge (i.e. not direct knowledge) about Jesus and his mission:

1. When I read the Fourth Gospel (at the times of my best reading) I get a strong intuitive endorsement of its coherent overall truth (excepting a few verses).

I do not get this coherent witness from any other section of the Bible; but instead variable amounts of partial endorsement balanced by variable amounts of intuitive rejection.

(This feeling about the special quality of the Fourth Gospel goes back about forty years, to long before I was a Christian but tried reading the Bible to discover what it said.)

2. This means that I take the Fourth Gospel as true; and read it as such; and this makes clear that the original Gospel was written to be read by people who knew the author, and knew the author's identity and history.

The first readers were pretty much 'handed' a copy of the Gospel by its author (or a scribe who took it from dictation - or whatever).

The Fourth Gospel (Chapters 1-20) makes it clear that it was written soon after Jesus's ascension - when such events were fresh in the author's mind. Except where otherwise indicated, the Fourth Gospel is either an eye-witness account or came directly from Jesus.

(Chapter 21 was added considerably later, after the death of Peter; and after the church had moved in a different direction from that envisaged by Jesus in the Fourth Gospel, under Peter's direction.)

3. From the internal evidence of the Gospel, the author of the Fourth was Lazarus; and he had, by the end, a very special relationship to Jesus:

• Best friend to Jesus - whom Jesus loved from before he commenced his ministry; Lazarus initially a disciple of John (the Baptist)
• Disciple of Jesus, in the inner group; his most-loved disciple
• Brother in Law to Jesus (who married his sister Mary 'Magdalene' of Bethany)
• Adopted brother of Jesus (via the instruction given Lazarus from Jesus on the cross, to take Jesus's mother as his own)
• The first Man to be resurrected*; then an immortal prophet in his own right
• The first and only eye-witness chronicler of Jesus's ministry, death, resurrection, ascension

These, in summary, are some of the strong reasons why I believe that authority ought to be accorded to the Fourth Gospel above all other sources;including  above any of the other parts of the Bible.

(Each of the above 'evidences' also needs to be tested by intuitive prayer and meditation; to ensure they have been understood and until stable clarity is attained.) 

The Fourth Gospel is our only Primary Source about Jesus; no other Bible sources even claims to be primary.

I further believe that, because of this primacy, the Fourth Gospel has (by divine intervention) been preserved adequately and almost completely down to our time (in the English Authorised/ King James version) - and this miraculous translation and preservation can be seen by its almost absolute coherence (such that the added or changed parts stand out from the whole); and also by its unique beauty and profundity.

If this primacy of the Fourth Gospel is accepted; it should make a significant difference to our core understanding of Christianity as compared with the usual ways of understanding that have arisen since the Fourth Gospel; and which have come down to us via the various churches that arose after the Gospel was first written.


 *Note added: The author of the Fourth Gospel goes out of his way to state that Jesus loved Lazarus - just after Lazarus is first name (11:1) saying (11:5) Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister [Mary], and Lazarus. In 11:35-6 we get "Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him!" It strikes me now that this love for Lazarus is linked to him being the first resurrected Man; since in this Gospel, love is mutual; and it is those who love Jesus who are resurrected to life eternal. Perhaps, then, Lazarus was the first and only person who loved Jesus to die, after Jesus became divine and commenced his ministry and before Jesus himself died. Lazarus was, therefore, the only person 'eligible' for resurrection during the period when Jesus was divine and dwelling upon earth. This would explain why Lazarus was resurrected, and why no other people were resurrected, during those three years of Jesus's mortal life.
  

Since the sexual revolution is now the true socio-political divide (The Left being in favour, and those in favour being The Left) it seems clear that an understanding of sexual identity and sexuality is a core part of any viable religious understanding.

The only way of opposing the sexual revolution that most people acknowledge or understanding is as a part of church-teaching; and as obedience to church teachings. Yet, such knowledge is indirect.

What is needed, I believe, is direct, personal, experiential knowledge of sexual identity and sexuality. in other words, people need to know about sex in what might be termed a 'mystical', esoteric, or (I would prefer to say) intuitive way.


The problem is that most traditional mystical 'systems' regard celibacy as the ideal - this applies to the Eastern and Western Catholic Christian traditions, and to Hindu and Buddhist traditions - the mystical path is for 'monks'.

I can't go into the arguments about this here - but this is not the correct answer. Intuition does Not tell us that not-sex is higher than sex...

Celibacy is Not the highest ideal. Intuition tells us that celibacy is only partially human.


The error is seen in that the celibacy ideal seems to encourage loss of sexual identity, loss of spontaneity and creativity, loss of a coherent relationship between men and women and children - destruction of the family. It leads to a maiming rather than a completion. The ideal of celibacy thus, by another path, actually abets the sexual revolution.


What is instead needed is for people to address the nature of sexual identity and sexuality in a direct and intuitive way - to understand that sex goes very deep in our natures. Sex is not something to be transcended, but something to become transcendent.

It is possible to reach an intuitive understanding of sex that tells us, personally, why and how the sexual revolution is wrong, why it is anti-human, why it is a social and personal disaster. And this kind of understanding is necessary - nothing else will truly suffice.


We need to know for ourselves, and we can know for ourselves - that sexual identity and sexuality are objective metaphysical qualities. They are not something dogmatic which we merely obey, they are not something that is 'for the good of society'. They are not merely expedient towards something else.

The result is close-to (but not identical-with) many of the traditional dogmas, and against most of (but not all of) the sexual revolutionary doctrines.

But we cannot just be told these things, and should not believed them just because we are told them; there is no short-cut: to be adult and spiritually developed persons we need to know-for-ourselves and freely choose to live-by this understanding.


'The truth about sex' is an absolutely solid-and-mystical reality, that can be known by anyone who makes the effort with the right attitude.


Reference: Direct Christianity

One way of thinking about Direct Christianity is that - in this modern era, and due to the limited scope and corruptions of the Christian Churches - we may experience Jesus directly, that is without the traditional sources of revelation such as church, scripture and practice.

I explored this possibility in a post last summer (before I had developed the idea of Direct Christianity) on Albion Awakening, which I excerpt and edit below:

Rudolf Steiner realised that it was God's hope, and the time was ripe, for modern Western Man to move to a new kind of intuitive spirituality of thinking. It was therefore Man's destiny to move forward from the dominant materialism, and spiritual blindness, of the modern era; and if this happened then there would be new and expanded possibilities of direct, intuitive knowing.

One vital and crucial aspect of this was that If Man developed this new spirituality, Then he would come to experience Christ as a living and active personal presence in the world - not by seeing, hearing or touching Christ in his body (this would have to be an imagined Christ, an hallucinated Christ); but instead by a direct, intuitive knowing of Christ in thinking.

What this means, in practice, is that for modern Man it is more important to become spiritual than to become 'a Christian' because to become a non-spiritual Christian is not enough; while to become truly spiritual will also, inevitably, sooner-or-later, lead to becoming a Christian by direct personal experience.

Could it really be that - here and now, in this modern world - well-motivated sincere spirituality of the true self will lead to true Christianity for any serious, seeking individual, without any other input being necessary?

Yes, I think so.

This sounds outrageous at first; but it is clear that merely 'being a Christian' in the usual sense is not enough now (if it ever was).

Modern Christians are often terribly lacking in discernment, and wide-open to demonic deceptions, corruptions and inversions.

The traditions of the churches are wrecked, Biblical interpretation deeply distorted, philosophy riddled with false assumptions; the general culture is one of lies, ugliness and sin-enforced as virtue; many or most church leaders, priests and pastors are primarily secular Left materialists working strategically to harness Christianity to politics; Good to evil...

There are so few safe and reliable sources of Christianity that it seems we must have direct knowledge of the truth - or else what we learn may be worse than nothing.

Specifically: we need direct and personal knowledge of Christ, or we are lost. 

If that is what we absolutely need, then that is what God will surely have provided.

Because we need direct knowledge of spiritual truths, that is now made available to us; and the method by which this is possible should therefore be our first priority.

Romantic Christianity made a brilliant start with Novalis, William Blake and ST Coleridge - and then nothing-much for many decades until Rudolf Steiner became (strange sort of) Christian in about 1898; to be followed by Owen Barfield and William Arkle in later generations - and there is William Wildblood and myself among current writers. But there have never been many Romantic Christians...

Why so rare, and what went wrong with the intermediate generations? Of course there were plenty of Romantics - but among them hardly any Christians; indeed most of them were either atheists or spiritual anything-but Christians.

A pre-eminent example was Ralph Waldo Emerson; who was an arch-Romantic and who began as a Unitarian minister - Unitarians being, at that time, like Emerson, Christians on-the-way-out. He ended-up as a kind of deist, flavoured with what he had gathered of Hinduism and Sufism.

Emerson was known for his elevation of the intuitive, epiphanic, 'moment' of insight to the highest possible valuation; like most Romantics, he required that all knowledge be derived from direct personal experience. SO why did Emerson not do the same for Christianity as he did for everything else? Why did he not develop a Romantic Christianity built from the kind of direct intuitive insights that fuelled the rest of his wide-ranging creativity? This will be answered below.

My guess is that Emerson accepted the evaluation of most Churches that Christianity must be derived from external authority - or else it is not Christianity. Catholics demand that the individual conform to the teaching of the Church authorities, or the traditions of the lineally descended ancient Church. Protestants demand conformity to the canonical scriptures of the Bible.

But what unites all churches is the assumption that whatever Christianity is, it is located outside the individual. The insistence is that Christianity does not come from within - not from individual experience, not from personal intuition.

Ultimately the task for the individual is to conform to external authority. The church judges the individual. 

If this is true; then Romanticism and Christianity are incompatible. So, how did Novalis, Blake and Coleridge come to believe that they had developed a Christianity based on their inner knowledge? It is mostly a matter of their basic and ultimate assumptions, of metaphysical assumptions. These authors believed that the individual could have direct knowledge of Christianity without it being derived from any intermediary at all; not rooted in church authority, without canonical scripture, traditional, philosophical theology or anything else.

Or, at least, and in conformity to Romanticism; that this direct form of personal knowing should serve to evaluate all other knowledge claims. So the individual judges the church; and may (like Blake, Steiner and Arkle) dispense with all churches - although Coleridge and Barfield were both, in later life,' communicating' (communion-taking) members of the Church of England.

We can see, then, why Emerson did not remain a Christian - because he apparently accepted the assertion that a real Christian must be under the authority of a church. (The only dispute was about which church/es it was correct to regard as really Christian.) It seems that, for Emerson, anyone who claimed to be a Christian outside of a church, was not really a Christian.

But there may be more to it than this - because Emerson did not believe in the divinity of Jesus; therefore real Christians were in error. Emerson's idea of deity was abstract - 'The Over Soul' - and therefore infinitely different-from a Man. The only union of Man with deity, therefore, was for Man to surrender his self and 'melt-into' the infinitude of deity.

So Emerson was a hopeless case! Ultimately, he did not want what Jesus offered; and preferred what Eastern religions offered. And what applies to Emerson, also applies to many other Romantics since. Some Romantics are materialist; but among those who are spiritual - it has mostly been an Eastern spirituality; which ultimately regards the individual self and our mortal world as temporary illusions.

This is the source of the paradox by which Emerson valued the moment of insight above all; yet ultimately he regarded each epiphany as evanescent, soon to be lost in time - and therefore worthless.

Other Christians have had strong Romantic impulses, but retained the conviction that the individual judgement must be subordinated to church authority - GK Chesterton is an example. Chesterton regarded the 'catholic' church (at first the Anglo Catholic wing of the Church of England; then in his late middle age, the Roman Catholic church) as the source of knowledge, of truth. For Chesterton Romanticism was the proper attitude each individual ought to adopt towards this truth.

For Chesterton, therefore, the individual did not have direct and personal intuitive access to knowledge; except for the knowledge that the church was true. The only primary knowledge was that the church was the only source of knowledge. 

Something similar could be said for CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien. They were Romantics and also Christians - but their Romanticism was secondary to their Christianity - and was at most understood to be a good and proper (perhaps even necessary) attitude towards their Christianity. The Romantic intuition was not, for them, a primary source of knowledge: that was revelation as communicated by  their churches.

This is why Romantic Christians - by a strict definition - have been so rare. Most Romantics were not Christians, but among those that were; Romanticism is regarded as an attitude but not as a source of knowledge.

It was the great contribution of Owen Barfield - posthumous disciple of Steiner, best friend of CS Lewis, and fellow Inkling with Tolkien - to clarify and emphasise this vital distinction.

(Note: These are not really 'constraints', because they are not externally imposed. Nor is 'limitations' the right word. I am simply talking of the nature of intuitive knowing)

I am trying to think with the heart; that is, trying to think primarily - such that my thoughts will be realities (not merely 'about' realities...). I am trying to know intuitively, by an act of direct apprehension (and not indirectly, by making and testing hypothetical models).

And I find that this is not possible for much of the stuff in my thinking. As expected; because primary thinking is self-validating, and much of what I think is not valid.

Even more: much of what I think cannot be validated because it is Abstract - hence systematically-distorted in un-knowable ways.


Much/ Most (perhaps all) of what I am fed (to 'think about') by the mass media, government officialdom, propaganda at educational institutions and workplaces... the general world of public discourse... is Abstract. It is disconnected from the reality I experience and know. It is made up of definitions, models, hypotheses, 'concepts', 'ideals' (aims and objectives, mission statements, slogans) and the like - many of these are incoherent or nonsensical.

There is no connection between my living and this content from the very beginning.


So much modern 'thinking' takes place in this realm of Abstraction! Discussions of economics, ethics, fashion... everything, pretty much. The assumption behind it all is that My Life is a subset of these Abstractions - and the Abstractions are real, and if I cannot related my life to the Abstractions, then it is my fault.

The Abstractions (Democracy, Social Justice, The Environment, The Economy, Peace, Climate...) are the real reality - it's my job to conform to this reality...

The Abstractions are real because that is what Everybody is talking about, all the time - especially powerful people. They are real because they are on the agenda, they are voted-about, they lead-to public policy, to law - to all manner of decisions...

It is the Abstractions that tell us about the future, what to love and what to fear; tell us what to think and believe and approve about the future; and then we organise our entire world because of these Abstractions.


The world is organised to encourage or discourage 'trade', nations aim at 'growth'... then Trade and Growth are destroyed to control the Climate... The the destruction of Trade and Growth are inverted by reference to Sustainability. There are phenomena like Immigration, Diversity, Human Rights... and we are told why-they-are-Good; or we try (by thinking-about 'evidence', and by reasoning) to understand whether they really are good...

But these are Abstractions. Such knowledge is based upon simplified models, and 'tested' using perceptions which we know are not true (seeing is not believing, neither is hearing - especially not when it comes to generalities) - so we can never know about such things. The questions are ill-formed, the evaluations are of unknown meaning...


In sum, intuition does not work on Abstractions - how could it? We can know intuitively (only) about that which can be grasped intuitively.

We might know the validity of some Abstraction like an aspect of mathematics, or about the coherence of a theory - but that tells us nothing about actual, real world 'applications' of such generalities...

Thus, we can intuit about Abstractions, but we cannot intuit the extent to which Abstractions apply to specifics - which is what we are very often trying to do.


In fact, I think that the low reputation of intuition partly derives from the fact that it can-not (therefore should-not) be used to evaluate the kinds of things that feature as Most Important in modern public discourse.

We cannot intuitively answer such questions as whether women are equal with men in modern society - or whether they should be - or what it would mean if they were. We cannot intuitively know what people mean by racial prejudice, what race 'is' (or is not), whether racial prejudice is responsible for racial differences - and what any such differences mean.

Almost the entirety of the content and theme of major discourse is beyond intuition, because unreal. And this has a profound effect on us. We live inside a System that is not just evil or trivial, but which is untrue, hence incoherent, hence permanently and incurably disorientating. 


We can (and should) be 'using' intuitive knowing to understand well-formed questions about 'concrete' (especially personal) realities such as the goodness or evil of individuals in public life, or the effect of new changes, the quality of actual buildings or landscapes, the beauty of some piece of music - and of course in dealing with the human beings (and animals, and plants) of our lives; the Creator, Jesus, spiritual beings etc...

Such questions cannot be answered by hypothesis and evidence; can only be known by direct intuition - and we need to learn to rely upon that which (potentially) works, not that which which we know for sure cannot work.

The ability to use intuition forms a kind of litmus test of reality. The great mass of modern phenomena are beyond the scope of intuition because they are not really-real - and this is why there is unbounded and intractable capacity for error in modern life.  

The conclusion is that our public world is based upon unwarranted - indeed unwarran-table - assumptions; and is unverifiable by direct intuition. We are prevented from primary thinking so long as we are engaged in this bureaucratic-media system...

But then, we knew that in our hearts already, surely?

Spiritual knowledge comes from spiritual perception. It is not acquired through reason or deduction or calculation or even thought as ordinarily understood. It is intuitive. 

One of the reasons that it is so important here-and-now (it was not always thus) for Modern Man to recognize that all possible knowledge relies on fundamental (metaphysical assumptions) that ought-to-be intuitively endorsed -- is that otherwise we can be so dishonest with ourselves, that our entire belief-system becomes distorted and incoherent. 

A specific instance is my own - pre-Christian - decades-long belief that death brought a total annihilation of body, mind... everything about a person. Any suggesting of anything personal (or a soul or spirit) that survived death - was blocked as obviously as wishful thinking. 

The dishonesty was that I actually had some such assumption myself. If I was honest with myself, I assumed that at least some people in some way continued after death.

But, because I regarded this as wishful thinking; I dishonestly denied this conviction of mine. 

Another example was about morality. As is very common, I would come across people doing some thing or another to themselves; which my official utilitarian secular ethics said 'did nobody any harm' - and therefore was not-wrong... 

And yet - if I was honest - I could not shake-off the intuitive conviction that it was wrong. I assumed (wishfully?) that my own moral sense in this instance was merely socially-inculcated, and therefore meant nothing. 

Therefore, I dishonestly denied my own unshakeable moral conviction that this particular self-act was wrong; at the price of obliterating the validity of all my moral convictions. 

Because, after all, why had I assumed that acts done-to-oneself were necessarily morally neutral; whereas acts done to others were the sole proper domain of morality? What was that principle based-upon? 

Was it not just-as arbitrary, just -s socially-inculcated, to say that morality was only about acts affecting others, as the unshakeable feeling that private acts were morally significant? 

You see how dishonesty-to-oneself is used to deal with moral incoherence, with value=-incoherence in general?  

And perhaps you also see that all values eventually reach a terminus at which we each, as individuals, must make an 'intuitive' evaluation, about what we personally regard as Good and True? 

That our values are always, at root, our own responsibility - and that attempts to deny this are dishonest? 

And perhaps, too, you may see how corrosive to Good and True values it may be, when one tries to deny this; that people can only deny it by lying to themselves about themselves - and how doing this will always have destructive consequences that will tend to ramify under-cover of this dishonesty? 

 

Note added: Dishonesty with oneself is commonest among the mainstream materialist ideology of the West; but is also found among those who are "lifestyle religious" - those who regard the Main Thing about religion as being particular behaviours. 

Further note: Honesty must be distinguished from 'doubt'. There is a state of modern 'doubt' that paralyses and causes despair. It often seeks relief in dishonest certainty; attained by surrender to arbitrary external authority - that is: from expediency masquerading as conviction. 

But doubt may also lead to simple despair, and a desire for self-annihilation. It is therefore vital to realize that honest conviction rooted in fundamental intuition is distinct from 'certainty' - especially when certainty is assumed to entail something-like 100% correctness with zero possibility of error. 

The search for such certainty as pre-condition for 'belief' - the insistence upon a situation clearly impossible in this mortal world - is a chimera; a trap set by evil. 

Yet while certainty is indeed a snare; solid conviction sufficient to live - or die - by; is attainable by anyone who is honest with himself, and who pursues his surface beliefs to their intuitively-endorsed roots.