< Back The Old Testament David Cowles Apr 5, 2023 “Even the most ardent atheist will find a treasure trove of information and wisdom in this anthology.” Once upon a time, nearly everyone in Europe and the Americas was either a Christian or a Jew. The smattering of atheists, agnostics, and members of other faiths did not move the needle. In those days, it was customary to read the Bible’s Old Testament, searching for spiritual guidance, ethical norms, historical details, and cosmological insights. Today…not so much! Theological Judeo-Christianity, distinguished from its Cultural and Ideological variants, is in free fall. For better or worse, most of us no longer look to the Old Testament for spirituality, ethics, history, or cosmology, and so we don’t bother with it at all. This is a mistake! Even the most ardent atheist will find a treasure trove of information and wisdom in this anthology. Recently, a contemporary British philosopher and atheist, Julian Baggini, published The Godless Gospel . In part, this book is a synthesis of the works of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John - with all references to ‘matters divine’ (e.g., God) scrubbed out. I wish this author would do the same for the Old Testament. Now that you’re here, can I give you a quick tour? I promise to have you home in less than five minutes: We’ll begin with Genesis – NOT! Even though I think a persuasive argument can be made that Genesis is at least compatible with contemporary astronomy and evolutionary biology, it’s way too much of a hot potato…and I promised to get you home. Instead, we’ll begin with the first successful and fully documented slave rebellion in Western history ( Exodus ). Job One : Escape from Pharaoh! Follow Moses and Aaron as they first ignite, then curate national and class consciousness in the Hebrew community. Then we’ll follow these newly liberated people during their 40 years of wandering in the wilderness of Sinai. This is as close as we’re ever likely to get to an historically documented version of Rousseau’s State of Nature . Our physical scientists have their precious laboratories; but what do social scientists have? They have the Sinai. With no tradition of self-government to fall back on (they were slaves), the Hebrews spent 40 years in the desert, learning to live with one another and with nature. Job Two : Devise a Social Contract ( aka a Covenant): it’s called Torah . Rousseau & Co. speculated about the choices that folks would make in the State of Nature . Why speculate? The Hebrews painstakingly recorded their entire ‘state of nature’ experience in the Pentateuch (the five books of Moses); they presented their conclusions in 613 mitzvah (rules of the road) that cover everything from the periodic redistribution of wealth to the washing of pots. It’s a masterpiece of social engineering. (Lenin & Mao, eat your hearts out!) Any study of Western political philosophy must begin here. Now the Hebrews are camped at the edge of Canaan, the promised land…but there’s a problem: How do we take possession of this land from its more numerous, more prosperous, and better armed inhabitants? A polite, ‘we’re here now, please step aside’ probably would not have worked; neither would a full-frontal assault. So Joshua devised a plan to exploit the social injustice embedded in Middle Eastern societies during the second millennium (BCE). He identified Jericho’s potentially revolutionary class and mobilized it with the promise of a new society, founded on the principles of Torah : i.e., robust human rights (including the right to property), a resilient social safety net, and periodic redistributions of wealth. It wasn’t a hard sell! Job Three : Capture the megalopolis known as Jericho, the Gotham of its day. Joshua used spies and ‘outside agitators’ to gather intelligence and sow dissent. Then over the course of seven days, he ‘acted out’ the key provisions of the Torah in history’s first recorded performance of Guerilla Theater. Ultimately, the city fell (‘its walls came tumbling down’) without a single ‘shot’ being fired. According to the Imperialist Playbook, once you conquer a country, you immediately co-opt its existing institutions. Your goal : “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.” There was every reason for Israel to follow this path…but it didn’t! It stayed true to Torah and delivered on its revolutionary socio-economic agenda…unlike political parties today. Instead of seizing the reins of authority, Joshua cut them. Instead of controlling the levers of power, he smashed them. But now what? Job Four : Govern! Govern without a king, without an oligarchy, without an aristocracy, without a ruling class (lie quiet, Marx), without a legislative body. How then? With a succession of charismatic leaders, designated ad hoc as Judges; in other words, Anarchism . You’re laughing, “How long could that experiment possibly have lasted? Let’s see, the Paris Commune of 1871 lasted 71 days, but I’ll be generous, I’ll give this ‘new’ model government six months…tops.” But you would be wrong, as usual. (Is it ‘best practices’ to insult your readers? Probably not…but I promised to get you home…now in two minutes.) So let it go. Six months was not a very good guess. The correct answer: 250 years! Then what? Well, here’s where I say, “Pick up the book and see for yourself;” but I do have time left for a preview of coming attractions: Sit in on a decades-long debate between anarchists and monarchists, at the close of the period of Judges. Follow the triumphs and tragedies of Israel’s kings, ultimately leading to secession, conquest, and exile. Hear nearly two dozen ‘populist prophets’ speak truth to power. Meditate on the wisdom of Ecclesiastes , made famous by the Byrds, and of the eponymous Book of Wisdom . Revel in the gorgeous poetry of Psalms and Songs . How’d I do? Did I keep to my timeline? You’ve got some reading ahead of you. Enjoy! Image: Francis Danby, "The Delivery of Israel out of Egypt," 1825. Oil on canvas. Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston, U.K. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

“…The spacetime world of matter and energy, 14 billion years old and almost 100 billion light years across, is not the final word.” < Back Eucharist David Cowles Jul 15, 2023 “…The spacetime world of matter and energy, 14 billion years old and almost 100 billion light years across, is not the final word.” The sacrament known as Eucharist is the cornerstone of Roman Catholic (RC) spirituality. The accompanying theology maintains that in Eucharist Jesus Christ is substantially present, body and spirit, human and divine, under the accidental appearance of bread and wine. RC Eucharistic Theology holds that the consecration of bread and wine (the specie ) during a proper liturgy actually changes the substance of that specie into the Body and Blood of Christ. Appropriately, Catholics refer to this process as transubstantiation . Much of RC Theology can be (and has been?) dumbed down and/or sugar coated to be more appealing to our modern intellectual tastes…but not Eucharist! Here, there is no wiggle room. Believe me, we’ve tried everything over the past 2,000 years – but to no avail. Eucharist does not symbolize or signify Jesus’ body and blood; it is Jesus’ body and blood. Nor are we saying that Jesus’ body and blood co-exists with the bread and wine; it doesn’t! Substantially speaking, after consecration, there is no more bread or wine. There is the appearance of bread and wine but not the substance. Nor are we saying that Jesus is only ‘provisionally present’ in Eucharist. His presence is not dependent on the moral virtue of the celebrant nor on the faith of the congregation or of the individual communicant…nor on the grape or vintage of the wine. Hints of leather and tobacco are strictly optional! See what I mean? No wiggle room! I’m holding a baseball in my hands. It’s a baseball! It doesn’t matter who made it or what that person’s state of mind was at the time; it doesn’t matter whether I enjoy baseball or even understand its rules. Being a baseball does not depend on context; it’s a matter of substance. Of course, there is one difference: the baseball not only is a baseball, it appears to be a baseball as well. Not so Eucharist! It is the body and blood of Christ, but it appears to be bread and wine. Needless to say, few non-Christians share this belief. In fact, most non-Catholic Christians hold a different view of the Sacrament. It is only slightly more surprising (Pew, 2019) that a majority of self-identified ‘Roman Catholics’, and even some practicing Roman Catholics, do not accept the Church’s teaching on this matter. Frankly, the wonder is that anyone accepts so bizarre a doctrine as this. Today, we share an understanding of physics, chemistry and biology that would seem to rule out anything even remotely resembling transubstantiation. It sounds more like Alchemy than Sacrament. But that is precisely the point! Transubstantiation is incompatible, superficially at least, with ‘the hard sciences’. Modern science has given us a compelling model of the physical world, and we have no quarrel with that. However, what science has modeled is, obviously, the world of appearances, attributes, qualities, accidents – Kant’s phenomena - not the world of substance, his noumena . In the Beatles’ iconic movie (1967), Yellow Submarine , Jeremey Hillary Boob famously instructs the Fab Four, “Be empirical, look!” Exactly! And when we do, we see the accidents, bread and wine; we don’t see anything that we would recognize as body or blood, thank God! In this respect, Eucharist is a symbol, not of Jesus, but of Universe. To be clear, Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ, but it is also symbolic of Universe. How so? Eucharistic Theology suggests that the spacetime world of matter and energy, 14 billion years old and almost 100 billion light years across, is not the final word. There is something more fundamental. Christians believe that that ‘something more fundamental’ is God. The world we live in appears to be continuous, flat and inert. We do not need complicated mathematics to plot a trip from Boston to Cleveland; a simple road map, unfolded on the passenger seat, will do just fine. We can ignore contributions to our trajectory from relativity, quantum mechanics and the earth’s curvature. Likewise, modern science has given us a map of Universe that allows us to accomplish just about anything we want…except to understand that universe. Hasidic Rebbe Schneerson spoke of “…t he concept of oneness within the microcosm of the human being—which serves as an analogy and example of the true oneness of the macrocosmos.” He concluded, “All that exists is spiritual. Yet further, everything is divine.” According to modern cosmology, the foundation of the material world is a ‘void’; according to Rebbe Schneerson, it is a ‘person’, aka God. We see the personhood of Universe reflected in the ‘souls’ of things that exist in that universe. According to the Rebbe Yitzchak Luria, even a rock has a soul as evidenced by its self-identification, by its cohesion, and by its discontinuity with the environment. Rabbi Schneur Zalman, founder of the Chabad school, wrote that a rock must have a soul ( persona ) because it exists. Being is an activity. “I seem to be a verb” (R. Buckminster Fuller). Using Eucharistic terminology, Universe is accidentally space and time, matter and energy; but it exists, so substantially (obviously not accidentally), it is the will of God. David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Return to our Beach Read 2023 Table of Contents Share Previous Next Click here. Do you like what you just read? Subscribe today and receive sneak previews of Aletheia Today Magazine articles before they're published. Plus, you'll receive our quick-read, biweekly blog, Thoughts While Shaving. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing! Return to Table of Contents, Winter 2023 Issue Return to Table of Contents, Holiday Issue Return to Table of Contents, Halloween Issue Return to Table of Contents, Fall Issue Return to Table of Contents, Beach Issue Return to Table of Contents, June Issue

< Back Choices that Lead to Deception Magesh I often ponder over what drives individuals to opt for a deceitful path rather than a righteous one. Lately, I've been contemplating the divergent decisions people make in identical situations. I often ponder over what drives individuals to opt for a deceitful path rather than a righteous one. This article delves into the opportunities presented to me and those around me, focusing on how my faith guided me towards the right choices. As a musician, I've had the privilege of performing worldwide alongside multiple Grammy Award-winning artists. Throughout my years in the music industry, I've witnessed and encountered occurrences that some may only encounter through reading. While this industry teems with opportunities, it also harbors behaviors steeped in scandal. My steadfast relationship with God shielded me from the allure of drugs, alcohol, and other negative influences. In my earlier years as an up-and-coming musician, I received a call from a prominent nightclub owner, who owned the most sought-after spot in town. This establishment drew eager crowds every night to witness local and international bands. A sudden opportunity arose when the singer of a renowned band scheduled for a Sunday performance fell ill. They asked if my band could fill in for a 9 pm show the following night, offering us a generous fee of $700—an excellent start for a budding band. Upon arriving for the soundcheck, I was astonished to find a queue forming outside the club, hours before the show commenced. The club owner, as I set up my drums, remarked, 'I hope you're ready, kid!' The audience greeted us with cheers from the first note. They had come expecting the previously scheduled band but embraced our music, talent, and positive vibe. Perhaps our backstage group prayer played a role! At the night's end, when I approached the club owner for payment, I was met by his brother, as the owner had left due to illness. Reassuring me, he handed over a brown paper bag. Only upon reaching home did I realize it contained $5,000 instead of the agreed $700. A miscommunication had occurred—his assumption being that we were the established band. I immediately contacted my older bandmate, suggesting we return the excess. Recalling Corinthians 4:2, emphasizing faithfulness in entrusted matters, I recognized this as a test from God and resolved to pass. The following day, I returned to the club, acknowledging the mistake in payment. Astonished by my honesty, the owner not only corrected the error but also offered my band a regular spot every Tuesday for five years. Although keeping the money would have been easier, the long-term benefits of doing the right thing were immeasurable. Years later, I crossed paths with the bass player who initially suggested keeping the money. He confided in me that his dishonest actions had led to being 'blacklisted' by numerous recording studios and clubs. While he didn't elaborate, it was evident his dubious behavior had consequences. In 2005, while touring with a world-renowned pop star, our band encountered a scenario at a Sydney studio. We discovered a bag containing $7,000 left behind. Without hesitation, I declared that we must act honestly, quoting not only biblical teachings but also recognizing the value of integrity. One of the band members, a young man from the Middle East, commended my wisdom in prioritizing honesty. In jest, I attributed it to Corinthians 8:21, highlighting the significance of honesty in actions. Returning the money proved fortuitous as it belonged to an Italian immigrant, his life savings inadvertently left behind. My decisions to uphold honesty were profoundly influenced by the teachings I held dear. This integrity didn't just establish me as a talented musician but also as an upright individual. It fostered invaluable relationships with tour managers, club owners, and studio staff, underscoring that success in the music industry wasn't solely grounded in talent but also in honesty. Magesh has written for “Lessonface,” “Aeyons,” “The Modern Rogue,” “Euronews,” “The Roland corporation,” “Penlight,” and “Elite Music.” He writes several monthly publications on music education. In the past, Magesh has written for parenting, humor, mental health, and travel websites as well. Return to our AI Issue Table of Contents Previous Next

< Back Re-Imagining the Magnificat Tawnie Olson "In our zeal to project our conceptions of The Ideal Woman onto this enigmatic first-century figure, we’ve strayed a bit from the little we do know." Considering how important she is to Christianity, it is surprising how little information the New Testament provides about the Blessed Virgin Mary. This is despite the fact that, even during Jesus’s lifetime, people held strong opinions about her. According to St. Luke, Christ’s preaching was once interrupted by a follower who shouted: “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!” To which Jesus gave the quelling reply, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!” (Luke 11:27,28 NRSV). Over the centuries, Jesus’s suggestion that Christians focus on our relationship with God, rather than speculate about Christ’s earthly family, has been widely ignored. Theologically, artistically, poetically, and musically, we have not been able to resist filling in the enormous gaps in the Gospels’ accounts of Mary with our own ideas about what a woman worthy of bearing the Son of God must have been like. Sometimes, in our zeal to project our conceptions of The Ideal Woman onto this enigmatic first-century figure, we’ve strayed a bit from the little we do know. Sandro Botticelli’s Madonna of the Magnificat, for example, portrays Mary as a stylish blonde Florentine aristocrat, surrounded by refined angel/courtiers as she coolly pens the Magnificat with one hand and dandles the infant Jesus in the other. It is a beautiful painting, far beyond my ability to praise adequately, but somehow, I just can’t imagine the woman it depicts giving birth in a barn. To finish the Re-Imagining the Magnificat, click here . Image: Madonna of the Magnificat, Sandro Botticelli. (Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons ) **This is a republication without modifications from blog.oup. Canadian composer Tawnie Olson is inspired by politics, spirituality, the natural world, and the musicians for whom she composes. She is the winner of the 2018 Barlow Prize, a consortium commission for The Crossing, Seraphic Fire, and the BYU Singers, and the 2021-2023 National Opera Association Dominick Argento Chamber Opera Composition Competition (for Sanctuary and Storm, libretto by Roberta Barker). She is currently working on a new piece for Grammy-nominated Sandbox Percussion, funded by a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts. Return to Yuletide 2023 Previous Next

“All gods are two faced…and that’s not blasphemy!” < Back Two-Faced God David Cowles Mar 1, 2023 “All gods are two faced…and that’s not blasphemy!” Mythology is literally littered with two-faced gods: Janus (Roman), Duir (‘Thor’, Nordic), Hercules (Greek), Llyr (‘Lear’, Anglo-Saxon). Being two-faced, these gods function as time-binders. They look back on the past and forward to the future, simultaneously. That simultaneity is what we call the present . God is Presence and, therefore, Godhead is omnipresent. Two-faced gods are best thought of as ‘doors’: Duir (Old Norse) = Door (English). Hercules is the ‘doorkeeper of the gods’. These gods bind past and future in the present; but as ‘doors’ they also regulate the flow of ‘traffic’, i.e., of time. They set its pace, opening wide to allow the past to flow into the future, then closing a bit to slow down that flow and to prevent ‘regurgitation’, aka time travel. Think of the Godhead as a sophisticated grid of traffic lights, data driven to optimize the flow of traffic, moment-by-moment, in some major metropolis. NYC could sure benefit from a taste of the Divine…perhaps in more ways than one. Note : Christians especially should be comfortable with this metaphor. After all, Logos (Ancient Greek) = ‘grid’ (English). ‘Divine doors’ are usually portrayed as males, but they are very often partnered with goddesses who function as their ‘divine hinges’. Janus, for example, is associated with the goddess Cardea, aka Eurynome, aka Rhea (in Crete). Janus is the door through which the old must pass in order to become new; Cardea is the hinge that enables and regulates Janus. Conjecture : Perhaps, ab initio all gods are two - faced. It may be a defining characteristic of Godhead, and that’s not blasphemy! Even YHWH binds time: “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.” ( Exodus 3: 6) Today, much is made of the so-called masculinity of God. There is a persistent thirst to locate a feminine element in the divine. The ancients had that problem licked with their door-and-hinge model. Llyr (above) is the ‘Lear’ of Shakespearean fame, the father of Cordelia, a goddess in her own right. According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, Cordelia buried Llyr at Leicester, a site sacred to the Roman god Janus (above), after Cordelia had obtained “the government of the Kingdom”. (Geoffrey writes happier endings than William.) Doors and hinges are inextricable. One cannot function without the other. Yet doors and hinges are very different from one another. The function of the door is to enclose, protect, defend; the function of the hinge is to open, to allow possibility to enter the world…but not chaos. The functions of the door require it to be in motion most of the time; the functions of the hinge require it to be immobile, all the time. This is an important reversal of typical Western ‘male dominance’. The hinge, immobile itself, is the source of all motion; timeless itself, it is the source of all time. Note : This reverses the scholastic’ ontological argument for the existence of God (i.e., if there is any ‘good’, then there must be something all Good.) Mythology says, “If anything is in motion, something else must be at rest. If anything is temporal, something else must be eternal.” (Perhaps a future ATM/TWS article will reconsider these arguments in light of Einstein’s Relativity…but that future is not now.) 20 th century Process Philosopher, Alfred North Whitehead, often sites a single verse from a popular Anglican hymn as a summation of his work: “Abide in me, fast falls the eventide.” That work is focused on the paradoxical co-existence of permanence (hinge) and flux (door) in the phenomenal world. Modern cosmology accounts for the phenomenal world via a series of complementarities, like particles and waves or permanence and flux. Ancient mythology accounts for the world via its own version of complementarity, a door and a hinge. Either way, the concept of complementarity, supposedly a 20th century ‘discovery’, is seen to be alive and well and living the life of Zorba somewhere on the coast of the Mediterranean, several millennia before Whitehead. Doors move (“open, shut” as a one-year-old grandson never tired of saying); hinges enable doors to move while they themselves remain immobile. Hinges are the fixed points around which doors, and everything else, revolve. In Roman mythology, Janus (masculine, ‘the door’) is married to Jana (feminine, ‘the hinge’). According to Robert Graves ( The White Goddess ), these two rustic gods are actually countrified versions of Jupiter and Juno (Zeus and Hera). Therefore, the very essence of mythological Godhead is to be two-faced, a door and a hinge. Janus and the other two-faced gods of mythology are often associated with the New Year. At the turn of each year, God looks back on the past and forward to the future, all at the same time, i.e. ‘in the present’. At the stroke of midnight, as the ball descends in Time Square, the past and the future are co-incident. In reality, though, every point in time is simultaneously a beginning and an end, or more broadly, the culmination of the past and the launch of the future. Today is not the first day of the rest of your life. This moment is! “Now and at the hour of our death,” means now is the hour of our death. Model : Universe is a google-size set of tiny, narrow necked ‘hourglasses’, each of which opens up to the entire past and the entire future of the Universe. To be is to be the neck of such an hourglass. To be is to be the entire Universe, experienced from a particular vantage point (the neck). God bridges the ontological gap between past and future and constitutes a single timeless, motionless moment ‘where & when’ the entire Universe, past and future, can just be present. God is Presence. So we are the image and likeness of God. We, too, bind time, we too create a present, we, too, prehend the entire Universe (past and future) in a single act of being. But we do so from one particular vantage point within Universe. God doesn’t know from points ! God prehends the Universe from the anti-vantage of being “all in all”. (Paul’s First Letter to Corinthians 15: 28) Again, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth, the wizard Merlin prophesied to King Vortigern, “After this, Janus shall never again have priests. His door will be shut and remain concealed in Ariadne’s crannies.” According to Graves, ‘after this’ refers to the coming of Christianity and ‘Ariadne’s crannies’ refer to the Corona Borealis , aka the ‘Castle of Arianrhod’, a small constellation in the northern sky. Presciently, Merlin saw Christianity as a threat to pagan traditions; but had he read more closely the Nicene Creed and the Gospel of John , Merlin might have understood that Christianity was really a restatement of his own core beliefs, albeit at a deeper level. Imagine how different the course of history might have been, if Merlin had been at the docks to welcome Augustine upon his arrival in England! In our map of the Universe, Earth and the firmament that surrounds it remain separated by a vast topological gulf. Our moon shots and deep space probes are feeble attempts, at least so far, to bridge the gap between terra firma and the stars. In this respect at least, earlier civilizations were way ahead of us. In Nordic mythology, for example, there is no essential discontinuity between ‘heaven and earth’. Sky begins where Earth leaves off. Their cosmos is radically continuous, so no special feat is required for Janus to play hide and seek among the stars. All the kids are doing it! We are tied to the notion of an ‘orientable’ Universe. Therefore, according to our model, earth and sky are as separate and distinct as the obverse and reverse sides of a strip of paper. Ancients understood that Universe is ‘non-orientable’. Earth and sky are simply opposite orientations on a single continuous surface. This explains why celestial forms (e.g. constellations) are thought to mirror terrestrial forms and why celestial events are believed to influence terrestrial counterparts. Turns out, our ‘strip of paper’ (above) has a twist in it; turns out, it’s a Möbius strip! Where earth ends, sky begins. Therefore, when the cult of Janus is banished from Earth, it naturally reappears as a celestial phenomenon. Hiding in the stars is better than wandering through Hades…though perhaps a bit chillier. In the ‘Castle of Arianrhod’ ( Aranrot ) there is a silver wheel, the mill on which the entire universe turns and at the center of which lies an immovable pivot, a hinge! Does this have anything to do with contemporary cosmology or theology? Only everything! According to the Standard Model of Cosmology, time is a vector that is infinitely, or almost infinitely, divisible. Therefore, any past is separated from any future by an infinitesimal point, which we mistakenly call ‘the present’. This model is sufficient to account for all most all physical phenomena, but it cannot account at all for the phenomenon of experience . Turns out, each of us is two faced . (If that comes as news to you, get out more!) Like Janus, we bind past and future in a real present, but unlike Janus, we also look outward at the world and inward at our experience of that world. We operate with a 2 nd set of coordinates: polar coordinates. We are aware of what is (outward), and we are also aware that we are aware (inward). We are Janus on steroids. We are not well represented by a mechanical model (door and hinge). Our experience requires something more organic. As such, we are best modeled as membrane , permeable to the flow of time but also resistant to it; that resistance is presence. Are we not forever trying to hold on to the present? Memory, language, and the arts (including architecture, sculpture, and photography) have evolved, physiologically and/or culturally, to help us conserve and savor what is (or what has just passed). Along the universal timeline, the present looks back on the past and forward to the future. Within the present, time does not exist. The present is an immobile pivot around which time itself revolves. Itself immobile, it enables all motion. Timeless, it is the source of time (time = motion). All of cosmic history hinges on this hinge. (See what I did there?) This two faced but ever constant Presence is what human beings for tens of thousands of years have called “God”. Without this God, nothing exists; nothing can exist. The past does not exist; it is past . The future does not exist; it is future . All that exists is the present and according to physics, the present is an infinitesimal point with zero informational content. Therefore, nothing can exist; but something does… As ‘two-faced’, God incorporates both the past and the future in the Present. As ‘door’, God provides the continuity that connects past and future. As ‘hinge’, God makes the Present possible, lifting what is out of the rushing river of perpetual perishing, aka time (lie quiet Heraclitus), and making it real. Or perhaps God is just auditioning to be a character (“Two Face”) in the next Dick Tracy movie. Image: Statue representing Janus Bifrons in the Vatican Museums. David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Return to our Spring 2023 Table of Contents Share Previous Next Click here. Do you like what you just read? Subscribe today and receive sneak previews of Aletheia Today Magazine articles before they're published. Plus, you'll receive our quick-read, biweekly blog, Thoughts While Shaving. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing! Return to Table of Contents, Winter 2023 Issue Return to Table of Contents, Holiday Issue Return to Table of Contents, Halloween Issue Return to Table of Contents, Fall Issue Return to Table of Contents, Beach Issue Return to Table of Contents, June Issue

< Back Beholding the Gift of Messiah Donna Bucher "Fully beholding the gift of the Messiah enables me to see Him in the daily moments not only of Advent, but each and every day of the year." Clinging to Emmanuel brought me through many dark seasons; but the Holy Spirit invited me into a deeper connection with the blessings of the attributes gifted to me in the Messiah. Prophecy not only foretells his coming, but it fills us with wonder as we unwrap the exquisite gift of God with us. My current Bible reading plan includes reading through the Books of Isaiah and Micah along with the Gospel of Luke, throughout the month of December. Though many seasonal favorites greet me there, beholding the gift of the Messiah with fresh spiritual eyes reveals new delights. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6) While the prophet Isaiah speaks of the Messiah’s joy and victory in Isaiah 9:3-5, moving into verse 6, the prophet speaks of the birth of the Messiah. Reminding Israel, the victorious Messiah would be a man, but not only a man, a child, and not only a child, but a Son. Though in theory, an angel or God without humanity would suffice for a Messiah, neither option qualified the Messiah to be Savior and High Priest: the child must be born. Understanding for the first time, Isaiah’s unique usage of the Hebrew literary tool of repetition, I saw both Christ’s humanity and deity. “For unto us a child is born” speaks of His humanity, while “unto us a son is given “, speaks of the gift of the eternal Son of God, the second person of the Trinity. The marvelous truth of Jesus as the child, marks the starting point of his humanity. As the Eternal Son, he has no beginning and no end, and thus was “given” at a determined point in time. Beholding the gift of the Messiah as both fully human and yet fully God embraces us with the glorious truth of Father God’s provision of a perfect, infinite Being to offer a perfect, infinite atonement for our sins! Emmanuel, God with us. Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. (Isaiah 7:14) Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Isaiah includes five attributes attached to the fuller meaning of the identity of the Messiah. In keeping with semitic tradition, the names given to each person spoke of their character. “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6b) Meditating on these powerful traits of the Messiah took my understanding of Emmanuel to a deeper level. The Messiah is Wonderful. The glory and power of the incarnation coupled with all He has done and continues to do for me overwhelms me with sheer wonder and amazement. The Messiah is my Counselor. He knows and provides for all my needs. In counsel with the Father and Holy Spirit, He guides my life for my good and God’s ultimate glory. The Messiah is the Mighty God. “By Him and for Him all things were created.” (Colossians 1:16) As creator God, He is worthy of all my worship and praise. The Messiah is the Everlasting Father. Jesus, the author of all things as a member of the godhead, He literally possesses eternity. Jesus is “before all things, and in Him all things consist” (Colossians 1:17) He is “the author of my eternal salvation”, (Hebrews 5:9) and the “author and finisher of my faith.” (Hebrews 12:2) The Messiah is the Prince of Peace. Specifically, He is the conduit through which I have peace with God and man. Fully beholding the gift of the Messiah enables me to see Him in the daily moments not only of Advent, but each and every day of the year. Emmanuel offers me his Wonderful power and Presence when all around me appears languishing in ruin, he is my Counselor when I have lost my way and need wisdom, when my strength fails along the hard paths, he is my Mighty God, when this world’s pain, sin, and evil overcome me, he speaks eternity into my heart as my Everlasting Father, and when life’s tempests and satan’s attacks pour fear and turmoil into my heart, my Prince of Peace calms every storm. Yes, the Messiah came to redeem us from sin and an eternity in hell, but he came also as our Emmanuel: God with us, yea, God united to us. His coming redeemed us, uniting us with him, that in every action of our lives we begin, continue, and end in him. Perhaps the greatest gift in the Messiah is the union from which flows his comfort, enlightenment, protection, and presence both now and for all eternity. Donna is a passionate creative, writer, poet, speaker, retired missionary, CASA volunteer, experienced counselor and hospice and palliative care support personnel. Founder of Serenity in Suffering blog, and author of the Serenity in Suffering newsletter on Substack, where she shares articles, resources and counseling designed to help readers grow personally and find spiritual intimacy with Christ; ultimately finding purpose in the trials they face. Return to Yuletide 2024 Previous Next

< Back Being a Faith Chaplain in a Secular World By Rev. Dr. Anne-Louise Critchlow As a chaplain, I am allowed to talk about faith or pray with a client if that is what he or she wants. Like many people in our secular and even religious society, I am to be there for ‘those of all faiths or none.’ Like many of us, I work for a company that, while endorsing ‘good moral values,’ does not want to propagate Christian beliefs. So, why would this company want a chaplain to work with its staff and clientele? As far as my employers are concerned, they want me to be concerned with the well-being of their residents (over 55s, some of whom live in independent living units, while some in residential care houses). According to my terms of employment: I can show pastoral care by engaging with residents’ problems and worries; I can give bereavement counseling and advice; I can promote community events; and I can even contribute to their understanding of their own spirituality! However, ‘spirituality’ is a cover-all term for enjoyment of music, poetry, art, and nature. “Everyone has spirituality,” says those interested in this term, “But it may or may not involve specific beliefs or religion, and we should not try to impose our beliefs on anyone.” As a chaplain, I am allowed to talk about faith or pray with a client if that is what he or she wants. Like many people in our secular and even religious society, I am to be there for ‘those of all faiths or none.’ Those of all faiths or none… Have you heard this phrase before? It is very likely that you have because it is used by those who work in education, local councils, hospitals, and anyone in the caring professions. This phrase allows us to include everyone without discrimination (which is helpful), but it also appears to stop those who have a particular religious conviction from sharing it with others. It is a very common remit in the twenty-first century – a sort of catch-all label that means I should offend no one and treat all beliefs as if they are the same, thus supporting the idea that what is true for me may not be true for you. It appears to be the ultimate in tolerance, and tolerance is one of the gods of our secular age. So, how can I work as a chaplain while being true to my faith convictions? You might object, “Surely the apostles were very direct in the way they evangelized? Why can’t we be the same?” You can try being very outspoken if you like, but you will soon find you are dismissed from your job. It is also dishonest to agree to your terms of employment and then override them. As for the apostles, they weren’t being paid by a secular employer, and looking closer at some stories in the Acts of the Apostles, we see that Paul engaged with different audiences and different worldviews in a variety of ways, and we would be well advised to do the same. He discussed the Good News with those in authority in the synagogue, appealing to their knowledge of their own religion, but when he spoke to the citizens of Athens in the Areopagus, he was careful to quote their own poets, as a starting point in the discussion. (Acts 17:28) The early apostles started where their audiences were in terms of culture and understanding, and we can do the same. Listening to where people are in their understanding of life is always worthwhile. Once people feel valued by us, they may trust us to open up about what they really feel, especially about their spiritual concerns. It is a privilege to be invited into their world and their worries; however, we should proceed respectfully. “I’d like to chat to the chaplain, as long as she doesn’t mention God,” one of our residents told the housekeeper. I spent an hour listening to the tragic events of her life and the anxieties she had endured. I asked her the odd question, seeking clarification, but, as she had requested, there was no mention of God. The next time I met her, I listened again. Suddenly, she blurted out, “So, what do you think about believing in God when I have shared with you all of my sufferings?” “Are you sure you want me to talk about that?” I inquired carefully. “Yes, I do,” she replied. After a long discussion, she asked me to pray for her. All this from a resident who had asked me not to mention God! Her life story also points out the truth of the fact that we should not lightly dismiss suffering or sound as though we have easy answers for someone’s personal difficulties. Sometimes, just being alongside them is enough for them to know that they are loved and understood. Nor should we stereotype the sort of person who might be open to God. I had a request from a long-term alcoholic to pray for him, when all the more outwardly respectable people in the housing unit showed no interest in faith at all. The next time I saw him, he had turned his back on addiction – quite an answer to prayer! An ex-soldier suffering from PTSD and heaving drinking was behaving terribly to staff and residents alike. The business director was surprised by his request: “I want to see the chaplain.” We prayed together over a number of months, and when he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, he put his faith in Jesus. I was limited by my work agreement, but he was not limited at all in what he told his fellow residents about his hope of eternal life. In his will, he asked that I take his funeral – what a privilege! Events for residents – body, mind, and spirit I advertise such events with complete transparency so that residents can stay away if they are so inclined. By having a laugh together and sharing on a human level, they relax, and when I tell them a story about how God has forgiven me or if I share a parable or written prayer, they don’t turn away. My secular employer acknowledges that everyone has a spiritual part of their nature, and how true that is. I find that as people get older, they want to know more about their spirituality and experience God. The extraordinary power of prayer No government or company or department can legislate against prayer. I pray for all the places and people I visit, and God answers those prayers! One resident, Betty, was given two weeks to live, suddenly realized she didn’t know how she was going to meet God. She had only met me once when I had prayed for her, but now she felt the force of that prayer, and she asked to see me again. I told her the story of the lost sheep, and she asked to be found by the Good Shepherd. Another Christian resident was made to sign an agreement with her housing provider, affirming that she would not share her faith with the other residents. She was very upset, but she prayed for her fellow residents. On my next visit to her house, I presented an Easter experience event – again with a mixture of games, a quiz, and crafts, but also the power of the Easter story. Who does not need to know about forgiveness and the hope of eternal life? All the people she had silently prayed for came to that event. She said to me later, “Anne-Louise, I thought that God’s work through me had been stopped, but he sent you to do the work instead.” We agreed that we had an unseen partnership! The challenge of dementia Can you communicate the love of God to someone who has lost their mind and memory? God is not hindered, nor should we feel so hindered. While in a discussion with a group of residents about Easter memories, suddenly a resident with dementia, who could hardly speak, sang “There is a green hill far away.” We sang the hymn together, and she recounted what she had heard in Sunday school as a child. (This should be an encouragement to Sunday school teachers!) “Deep calls to deep.” (Psalm 42 v. 7) God speaks to people through recalled memory. We, too, can speak the truth to the memories in the caverns of one’s mind and heart. Restrictions are no barrier to the real work of God I have seen this truth in all areas of work. When I worked with Street Pastors, a Christian organization, we could not share our faith openly when in partnership with the Council and the Police on the streets and in the pubs, but we were allowed to answer questions and respond to requests for prayer. Again and again, we saw people relaxing when they were under no pressure, and we were guests ‘on their turf.’ Because of their feeling of authority, they shared their problems with us openly, asked for prayer, and thanked us for what we were doing. I told more people about Jesus on the streets under those restrictions than I did in the church building. I now wonder whether the politically correct restrictions on faith imposed in the workplace are as detrimental as I once thought. One thing is sure: God has his own way of speaking to people, whether we are ready or not. Let us not be afraid of secular employers and restrictions. No one can stand in the way of God’s work, of drawing His people to Himself. Rev. Dr. Anne-Louise Critchlow has been a teacher of English Literature, a church pastoral worker, and a chaplain in France, North Africa, Manchester, and Bristol (UK). She is married with four children and thirteen grandchildren. She now works southwest of England as a chaplain. Previous Next

< Back Arithmetic David Cowles “I want to repeal all the fundamental laws of Arithmetic.” In the age-old battle between primary school students and their ‘minders’, we come down squarely on the side of the little Cherubs. Teachers never tire of drilling the rules of Arithmetic into their reluctant pupils’ skulls…even though Zeno proved 2,500 years ago that Arithmetic cannot adequately model any universe that includes motion . A pretty big miss, wouldn’t you say? Arithmetic may apply to any universe with ‘continuous structure’ (remember the real number line ?) but we don’t live in such a world! As Democritus conjectured and Planck, et al. proved, our Universe is quantized. “Whoa!” you say, “Calculus solved that problem.” And so we all thought…until Bertrand Russell showed that tacking Calculus onto Arithmetic doesn’t help at all. Both Arithmetic and Calculus are ‘non-physical’. They are useful tools for calculating certain quantities, but they are structurally inconsistent with the real world . They treat the world as if rather than as is …which is fine, so far as it goes: Euclidean Geometry does the same thing. That’s okay for most purposes. We make simplifying assumptions all the time. We treat the Earth, for example, as if it were a perfect sphere – it isn’t. Zeno could not reconcile the continuous nature of real numbers with the discontinuous (quantum) nature of reality. Neither could Stephen Hawking! But I have a somewhat different bone to pick. I want to repeal all the fundamental laws of Arithmetic. If I have my way, Jack and Jill will no longer have to hear about Commutative, Associative, or Distributive Properties, but I want to start my crusade with the Transitive Property (TP): If a > b and b > c, then a > c. Seems pretty innocuous, doesn’t it? Unless you’ve seen an episode of Doctor Who . According to the BBC, our wide but finite world contains a certain average-sized phone booth (or ‘box’)… remember them? The best adjective would be ‘cramped’; but inside this box, known as the Tardis , space is infinite: World > Booth (exterior) > Booth (interior) > World. Clearly, TP does not hold in the ‘real world’, at least not as it is defined by the BBC. Turns out, it doesn’t hold anywhere , no matter who’s defining it – all of which makes the 5 years kids spend in elementary school (US) ‘problematic’ at best. BTW, I pointed out this apparent anomaly to an avid eight-year-old Doctor Who fan. I expected, “Aha!” To my surprise, this bright kid just stared at me and shrugged. He was struggling to be polite. He did not see this as a contradiction. He was not yet TP-poisoned. He was still neuroplastic , and I am grateful to him for showing me the limitations of TP. Axioms (like TP) are funny things. They are assumptions, not subject to logical proof or requiring empirical validation. An axiom is falsified when normally intelligent people no longer see it as ‘obvious and incontrovertible’. An eight-year-old showed me that a ‘normally intelligent’ person can doubt the universal validity of TP. I’m afraid if I say that the transitive property (TP) is the root of all evil, you will stop reading this post, so I won’t. However, I do have (t)issues with TP. (No snickering, under 12s!) TP’s the very model of a modern ‘meritocracy’; it makes ‘hierarchy’ a fetish. I’m better than you, but that’s OK because you’re better than someone else – right? You were abused by your father because he was abused by his, but don’t worry, you’ll get even; you’ll abuse your own children someday too. Fair enough? The Untouchables is not a reference to Eliot Ness but to India’s ancient caste system. Fortunately, we don’t live in a world like this! To whatever extent the world is like this, we alone have made it that way. This is not the state of nature we inherited from Genesis…or from Jean-Jacques Rousseau. But you know that! How often have you said, “What goes around comes around”, and so it does. But then you go right back to teaching TP to your eight-year-old. Shameful! I propose we build a new mathematics, replacing TP with a new paradigm, the Circular Property (CP): a > b, b > x … x > a. CP describes a Chain of any length. The initial term and the final term of the Chain must be the same, and that term cannot appear anywhere else in the Chain. Whenever any initial term reappears as a final term, a complete Chain (loop) has been formed. Any term can be the initial term (or the final term) of a Chain - alphabetical order not respected. “Pick a card, any card!” It’s like that cool trick your dad tried to teach you when you were small. At the end of the day, every Chain forms a loop. Any term in one loop can be a term in multiple other, intersecting (tangent) loops. The fabric of the universe may be a tight weave of such loops: Penelope and the Norns! Weaving as Sacrament: the whole is represented by, and instantiated by, the part. Knitting is liturgy! CP corrects TP’s hierarchical bias. Imagine the social impact if we all knew that every subject is the ultimate object of its acts. Being as boomerang! No more child abuse, that’s for sure! Little crime, few murders. On the economic front, no more Class War. Workers win when owners win, and owners win when workers win! Instead of late-night bargaining sessions in smoke-filled rooms across from chanting picket lines and cops, negotiating teams will meet on the company lawn and sing Kumbaya – police welcome to join in. You’re chuckling. It’s one heck of a vision, that’s for sure. “But it’s not real,” you say. “It’s not physical.” Except it is! It’s entirely physical: Every action entails an equal and opposite reaction (Newton). Every action! Today, bleeding-edge scientists are working with a state of matter they call Time Crystals . In these event chains, time is effectively suspended (‘crystallized’). Process occurs outside of time. It mimics CP: If this sort of order is so natural and so clearly advantageous, why hasn’t anyone ever tried to build a social system around the CP Principle? Well, have you heard of the Lex Telonis , an eye for an eye? It’s an attempt to implement CP, but it requires a huge, unmanageable intermediary apparatus: a police force, a judiciary, and, of course, executioners willing to blind a man with a hot poker. What could possibly go wrong? Ok, then, how about the Beatitudes : “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” Again, what goes around comes around. Jesus dispenses with the administrative burden of a secular state, but he injects the process with his own intermediary, God. Christianity accepted God as the Uber-Omega but added back an infrastructure: Eschatology, Church, Clergy, Sacraments, etc. One can imagine Jesus, channeling Prufrock, “That is not what I meant; that is not what I meant at all”… or not, but that’s what Ecclesiology is all about. David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Click the cover image to return to Spring 2024. Previous Next

< Back The ‘O Antiphons’ David Cowles “We are asking Christ to come… to teach us, rescue us, shine on us, free us and, repeated three times, to save us.” Can you imagine an Advent Season without the ‘O Antiphons’? If so, perhaps it’s because you don’t recognize them in the famous Christmas carol, O Come, O Come, Emmanuel ? At least since the 8 th century, these seven antiphons have been an important part of Roman Catholic liturgy. Each antiphon is built around a title given to the Messiah in the Old Testament. O Wisdom ( Sapentia ) of our God Most High, guiding creation with power and love: come to teach us the path to knowledge (understanding). The first antiphon captures the first three sefirot of the Kabbalah: Crown (Godhead), Wisdom and Understanding (knowledge). Christ (Logos) is the Wisdom (Sophia) of God. O Leader ( Adonai ) of the House of Israel, giver of the Law to Moses on Sinai: come to rescue us with your mighty power. This antiphon links three contrasting concepts: Leadership, Law, and Liberty (‘rescue’). While secular laws may be enslaving, God’s Law (Torah) is always liberating. It rescues us, not only from our enemies, foreign or domestic, material or spiritual, but it also frees us from ourselves…from our addictions, our attachments, our idols. Law is necessary, but it is never enough. Even after giving the Law to Moses, YHWH continued to govern the House of Israel directly through a sort of Constitutional Theocracy (The Book of Judges). O Root ( Radix ) of Jesse’s stem, sign of God’s love for all his people: come to save us without delay! Christ is descended from King David, but Christ is also the root from which David’s father, Jesse, sprang. True God and True Man, Christ fuses the temporal and the eternal, history and the Kingdom of God. Only Jesus can justly sing that ole country standard, “I am my own great-great-great Grandpa.” O Key ( Clavis ) of David, opening the gates of God’s eternal Kingdom: come and free the prisoners of darkness! We’re all living our lives in supermax. Our bodies are mortal, our minds are shrouded in impenetrable ignorance, and we are randomly subject to hideous physical and psychological torture at any time. O Radiant Dawn ( Oriens ), splendor of eternal light, sun of justice: come and shine on those who dwell in darkness and in the shadow of death. At the moment of conception, each of us is sentenced to death. Execution may take place immediately…or 100 years later…it depends on how good a lawyer you can afford. But in the final analysis, it doesn’t make much difference; we all end up in the same place eventually. It turns out that life is the shadow of death. O King ( Rex ) of all nations and keystone of the Church: come and save us humans whom you formed from dust. Christ is King, King of the Universe. All secular authority is a reflection of divine authority, and it is valid only so long as, and to the extent that, it projects Christ’s values into the world. Ideally, the Church is society reimagined, i.e., with Christ as its cornerstone. O Emmanuel ( Emmanuel ), our King and Giver of Law: come to save us, Lord our God. The O Antiphons are prayed along with Mary’s Magnificat on the seven days leading up to the Vigil of Christmas. Built around seven Messianic titles from the Old Testament, the antiphons take pains to connect those titles to the babe who is about to be born historically in Bethlehem and reborn eternally in liturgy. Interestingly, the first letters of the Messianic titles (in Latin, of course), E mmanuel, R ex, O riens, C lavis, R adix, A donai, S apientia—spell out ‘ERO CRAS’, meaning, "I will come tomorrow!" Were these antiphons the inspiration for Annie : “The sun will come out, tomorrow?” We must not get lost in the beauty of these antiphons; we need to remember that they are first and foremost prayers. We are asking Christ to come… to teach us, rescue us, shine on us, free us and, repeated three times, to save us. But as we pray, so we believe. T he O Antiphons embody a comprehensive theology: Sapentia connects the Power and Love of God with human Wisdom and Knowledge. Adonai celebrates the liberating Law of God given to Moses in the Sinai. Radix reveals Christ as the origin (root) and destiny of all things. Clavis reveals Christ as ‘keeper of the keys’: the key that unlocks our mortal prison and the key that opens the gates of heaven. Oriens reveals Christ as the ever-recurring and eternal Light that overcomes darkness. Rex pays tribute to Christ as Ruler of the World. Emmanuel sums it up. God is not just over us; God is with us. The Incarnation turns the Universe inside out. The whole becomes part of itself; therefore, the whole (God) is with all of us (fellow parts), individually as well as collectively. David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Return to Yuletide 2023 Previous Next

“John’s Utopia is a 20th century version of Friedrich Nietzsche’s flat universe.” < Back Imagine! David Cowles Sep 1, 2022 “John’s Utopia is a 20th century version of Friedrich Nietzsche’s flat universe.” In 1971 John Lennon, and his co-writer and life partner, Yoko Ono, exhorted us to ‘imagine there’s no heaven’; they assured us that ‘it’s easy if you try’. Ok, I’m imagining, or at least I’m trying to, but…it’s not all that easy. John’s Utopia is a 20 th century version of Friedrich Nietzsche’s flat universe . Listen to what Nietzsche had to say in 1888: “One belongs to the whole, one is in the whole – there exists nothing which could judge, measure, compare, condemn our being, for that would be to judge, measure, compare, condemn the whole…But nothing exists apart from the whole!” — Twilight of the Idols . Note that Nietzsche’s World explicitly lacks values : “There exists nothing which could judge, measure, compare, condemn our being.” In John’s words, there’s “nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too.” One thing you could say both of Nietzsche and of Lennon: They paved paradise and put up a parking lot . Their flat universe represents the hierarchical cosmos of Judeo-Christian tradition, squashed. Of all Western philosophers, Nietzsche’s vision is the most penetrating. He knew only too well that his flat universe would make any Halloween House of Horrors seem like a kiddie ride at Disney World, but that didn’t stop him. Whatever else you might say about Nietzsche, he had the courage of his convictions; he always philosophized in good faith. When Nietzsche pronounced his death sentence on Value (he had already done so on God), he did it with a heavy heart and a twinge of regret. He knew he was destroying a magnificent edifice…and he got no pleasure from it. When John Lennon did the same, he celebrated! Let’s unpack John’s lyrics: Nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too. Ok, nobody likes to think about killing or dying . Either way, it’s the ultimate sacrifice. But it may be that there are things you would kill or die for (at least you’d like to think you would), things you value more than you value your own life. By denying that possibility, John turns the world in on itself; it becomes Nietzsche’s ‘whole’. And religion? The function of religion is to identify things that someone might be willing to kill or die for, i.e., to identify values…and then to curate those values. We can’t have any of that, can we? So , no religion too . John’s message in Imagine is the same as Nietzsche’s. Live now, die later. We are our own highest value. This sounds benign enough, but it isn’t: If we have no values beyond ourselves, there is no reason for any of us not to head straight for those tempting Deadly Sins: Pride, Greed, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Wrath and Sloth. There’s even a combo pack, one of each vice; it’s what all the kids are asking for this year for The Holiday that Used to be Called Xmas , and it’s even on sale this month at Costco. Pick up a pack for me while you’re there. We’re often told that death is one of only two certainties in life. We will all die someday and if we are our own highest value, then our highest value (ourselves) will also cease to exist. But how can a value cease to exist? How can a value cease to be a value? By definition, values are universal, eternal and immutable. They apply, period, even in a Multiverse. Suppose we value Honesty. Ok, not everyone is honest; someone can be honest today and dishonest tomorrow. But even if everyone was dishonest all the time, it would not diminish the Value of Honesty. John & Yoko are taking us down into the Valley of the Shadow of Death (i.e., Nihilism) and at the same time they are depriving us of the Good Shepherd who was supposed to meet us there. How cocky we once were, “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are by my side.” In other words, the Good Shepherd and I can handle anything life throws at us. Afraid of the valley? Heck no, I rule that valley! As long as I have my wingman with me, I’m good. The problem is that if there is nothing to kill or die for, then there can’t be anything to live for either. In Lennon’s universe, killing and/or dying can’t be the ultimate expression of value because per se they have no value. We are all going to die someday. In that sense, we are all the same; and we all come to the same end. We are all conceived ex minimis , and our future is a common, unmarked grave. And all that comes in between? According to Shakespeare, it will be “melted into air, into thin air… the cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn temples, the great globe itself…shall dissolve.” ( The Tempest , Act IV, Scene 1) We live “now (and) at the hour of our death.” We should all be prepared to give that a great Amen at any time. So ‘to be or not to be’ is not on the table. Our common fate is ‘to be and not to be’, and, as Hamlet realized, there’s nothing we can do to escape it. I am because I am writing this article and I am not because I will soon perish. Only values can give our fleeting lives meaning. The sense of purpose, anathema to Nietzsche, was celebrated by Victor Frankl, psychiatrist, philosopher, and Holocaust survivor. He replaced personal happiness as the goal of life with ‘purpose’, dedication to something outside oneself, i.e., dedication to Values. Not John Lennon’s favorite philosopher, I’m guessing. D avid Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com. Share Previous Next Do you like what you just read? Subscribe today and receive sneak previews of Aletheia Today Magazine articles before they're published. Plus, you'll receive our quick-read, biweekly blog, Thoughts While Shaving. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing! Click here. Return to Table of Contents, Winter 2023 Issue Return to Table of Contents, Holiday Issue Return to Table of Contents, Halloween Issue Return to Table of Contents, September Issue Return to Table of Contents, Beach Issue Return to Table of Contents, June Issue

“Nobody believes in Hell anymore…and that’s a good thing.” < Back Hell David Cowles Mar 1, 2023 “Nobody believes in Hell anymore…and that’s a good thing.” Nothing makes our post-Enlightenment hair bristle more than talk of Hell. Like a tween being threatened with corporal punishment, we cry out, “We’re too old for that!” And too wise and too sophisticated and too… Nobody believes in Hell anymore…and that’s a good thing. According to Sister Mary Therese (fourth grade), to be in Hell is to burn forever in unquenchable fire. Dante’s Inferno is a honeymoon destination compared to Sister’s version of the underworld. Today, people who believe in God frequently don’t believe in Hell precisely because they cannot imagine a merciful, loving God subjecting anyone, not even Adolf Hitler, to such a Draconian punishment. Color me in this group…at least on my best days. I’ve often wondered what happened to my fourth grade classmates. Did we split into two camps? On one side, those who retained a belief in God, but not in Hell, and on the other, those who retained a belief in Hell, but not in God, at least not in the compassionate, merciful Judeo-Christian God. Turns out, Sister Mary Therese was her own worst enemy. She taught an all too tangible Hell in hopes of reinforcing faith in a maddeningly intangible God. The strategy backfired, of course, big time! Either because we believe in God we can’t believe in Sister’s version of Hell, or because we believe in Hell, we can’t believe in a kind and just God. Imagine a ‘Pascal Matrix’ with four quadrants, i.e., four possible ‘solutions’: God/Hell, ~God/~Hell, ~God/Hell, God/~Hell. As with Pascal’s famous wager, the only solution that is a win for us is the fourth one (i.e., there is a compassionate, merciful God and therefore there is no fourth grade version of Hell). So we have only a one-in-four chance of ‘winning’, but fortunately for us, the payout is huge! Do the math: (.25 * 0) + (.25 * 0) + (.25 * 0) + (.25 * ∞) = ∞. I’ll play in that casino any day. Religious Ed for us (1955) was like watching a horror movie is for you. It scares you out of your wits but when it’s over you make yourself a snack and go to bed. The terror, though palpable, is too terrible to be real. We can’t accept that we live in a universe like that…and if it turns out that we do, then there’s nothing we can do about it and nothing that we do makes any difference or has any meaning anyway. The nightly news should keep you up, not ‘Chuckie’! Those of us who grew up in the ‘50s grew up in a forest of dos and don'ts. Water this tree…or else; don’t touch that tree…or else. Our forest was the Garden of Eden on steroids. No wonder we all related so easily to the story of Adam and Eve. We were living it. ‘Or else’ is the key. Everything came with an ‘or else’ attached. Kind of like a Canadian ‘eh’. Even if unspoken, ‘or else’ was presumed to complete every sentence…at least every sentence uttered in the Imperative Mood. Survival hinged on the ability to deconstruct the vague and all-inclusive ‘or else’. This was our introduction to inverse functions…at age five. The more Draconian the ‘or else’, the less we had to worry about it. “I’ll murder you, I’ll tar and feather you, I’ll boil you in oil, I’ll skin you alive” meant “pay some attention but don’t get carried away." On the other hand, when the ‘or else’ was some specific, finite, all too imaginable consequence, that was the time to be afraid, very afraid. Infinite consequences with infinitesimal probabilities do not motivate (or inhibit) behavior. Finite consequences with high probabilities do. Sister Mary Therese swung for the fences…and missed. How about people who don’t believe in God, or who ‘don’t know’, or who don’t care, or who don’t let ‘horror movies’ ( aka religion) spill over into their real lives ? Of course, they don’t believe in Hell; why would they? Or…why wouldn’t they? The 20 th century has given us many contemporary, secular versions of Hell. For Sartre and Beckett, Hell is people; for Ionesco and Camus, it’s absurdity; for Ibsen and O’Neill, it’s illusion;; for James Joyce, it’s history; for victims of the Holocaust, it’s the concentration camp. Another mainstay of Sister Mary Therese’s theology was her belief that the fate of one’s eternal soul was dependent on the ‘spiritual condition’ of the person at the moment of death: “Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death .” Since all of us ‘live in time’ and since we know that none of us will ever actually experience death (or know what it’s like to be dead), it requires no great leap to imagine that the content of our consciousness at the moment the external world pronounces us ‘dead’ is the version of who we are that will enter us into ‘eternity’. Sidebar : While it ‘requires no great leap’, it is not obvious either. By definition, ‘the hour of our death’ is a function of time; eternity, obviously, is not. Why should anything that happens in time carry over, intact, to eternity? Apples & oranges! In parochial school, we were taught to ‘pray for a happy death’; well and good. But that is not always something we can control. It is hard to imagine that a child immolated in a burning building, or a mother crushed to death under the rubble of an earthquake, had happy deaths. Are we prepared to consider that their agony at that moment might be who they are in eternity? Eternity is not infinite time (immortality), nor is it Σ T (the sum of all time); it is the utter absence of time! Therefore, it would not be a respecter of any temporal order. There is no reason why any single moment in a person’s life should be more ‘eternal’ than any other moment. To think otherwise is to succumb to the ‘tyranny of seriality’. Alternatively, perhaps only our ‘best moment’ is eternal; or perhaps every moment is eternal. Is eternity the foundation of time? Or is time the foundation of eternity? Is eternity time, evaporated? Or is time eternity, precipitated? Or all of the above? In my experience, people who have successfully kept the ‘God Concept’ out of their day-to-day lives, believe things like, “When it’s over, it’s over!” How ‘Yogi Berra’ of them! But like many of Yogi’s malapropisms, this may sound deep , but upon analysis, it doesn’t make sense . Applied to something like a baseball game, it’s perfectly OK to say, “It’s over.” And “When it’s over, it’s over,” is not wrong…just redundant. We can say it because we are outside it. We speak either as a fan or as a player in the locker room after the game. But life is not like a baseball game. It’s not a spectator sport. We are never outside our own life. We’re in it and, as Bill Clinton said, we’re in it ‘til the last dog dies. Absent of some mystical experience, we can’t stand outside it, and so we can’t ever meaningfully say, ‘It’s over ’. No one can say, “It’s over,” unless they do so from a vantage point outside of what is ‘over’. Applied to life, if you’re able to say, “It’s over,” then it can’t be over, can it? The act of saying ‘it’s over’ testifies to the fact that it’s not over, constitutes that fact that it’s not over, and ensures that it’s not over. Of course, I can say that another person’s life is ‘over’ provided I’m willing to reduce that life to the ontological status of a baseball game. Camus famously said that the only real philosophical question is the question of suicide. He sure knew his Hamlet …or did he? Even the Prince of Denmark realized that suicide was no solution. Suicide eliminates the future…but not the past that led up to it. Suicide vitiates the possibility, however remote, of a ‘happy death’. At the same time, it enshrines the circumstances that led to the suicide, and worse, it ensures that those circumstances can never be altered or transcended. To choose suicide is to embrace inanimate determinism; it is to make a fetish of the past: now the future is the past and the past is the future. We have exchanged the insecurity of the ever-widening gyre for the horrific impotence of a House of Mirrors. No wonder, then, that some Christians used to consider suicide to be an unforgivable sin; it is indeed a sin against the Holy Spirit, “the Lord, the Giver of Life” ( Nicaean Creed ). To paraphrase Dante, it is to ‘abandon all hope’. In the Church’s first millennium, various anti-Christian sects sought to eradicate this ‘novel heresy’ by demolishing its holy sites and building pagan temples over them to make sure that later generations of Christians would not be able to rebuild. Thank you! History owes a debt of gratitude to these iconoclasts. Their X marked the spot of those early Christian sites, thereby preserving them for millennia to come. In my experience, folks who profess Yogi’s Creed generally don’t accept the dire implications of their faith . Without resorting to ‘the God Hypothesis’, they nonetheless find ways not to accept the notion that Universe itself could be mercilessly cruel. Often, they will add some sort of qualifying proposition. Do any of these sound familiar? “I had a good life and nobody can take that away from me.” “I’m leaving the world a better place than I found it.” “I’ve helped other people live richer, happier lives.” Where’s Waldo? Can you locate the incipient eschatology in each of these statements? There is an implicit assumption that what I have done, or just experienced, endures in some way ‘beyond the hour of my death’. The impact I have had on the world and on other people’s lives is somehow meaningful and enduring. Of course, the Standard Model of Cosmology and the Second Law of Thermodynamics say otherwise! If Universe is a solo act and if, as we now believe, it comes from nothing and returns to nothing, and if there is nothing beside or beyond it, then none of these modifiers makes sense. We are uncomfortable in our skins. We desperately want to believe that Universe is what it is, that what you see is what you get, period. But we also want to believe that our lives are real, that they matter, and that they don’t cease to matter at the moment of death. Well and good, but we can’t have it both ways. Nietzsche boiled it down to what amounts to a simple syllogism: Meaning only happens when a signifier transcends that which it signifies (that’s what we mean by meaning ). But nothing transcends the world as we know it. Therefore, nothing has meaning. Nietzsche certainly had the courage of his convictions! I greatly admire his thinking, but I am not willing to sign on to his ‘Manifesto of Nihilism’, are you? Oddly, nihilism does permit the existence of Hell, though it needs to be defined as ‘Hell on earth’. Non-theism, including atheism, is not necessarily nihilistic. Far from it! Most non-theists seek to preserve meaning, i.e., transcendence, without the assumption of a transcendent being ( aka God). Theism, almost by definition, assumes that there is more to the world than its appearances, that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophies. Theists go even further; they assert that there is an actual being (i.e., God) that transcends the world as we know it. Assuming this being to be benevolent, and world-relevant, the Hell Hypothesis is ruled out. Here, many non-theists (provided they are not strict nihilists), converge in their thinking with most theists. Regardless of mechanism, Hell, the infinitely horrible, is precluded by any universe, theistic or otherwise, that contains even the slightest tilt toward the Good. Image: The Map of Hell painting by Botticelli is one of the extant ninety-two drawings that were originally included in the illustrated manuscript of Dante's Divine Comedy. Sandro Botticelli. Mid-1480s-mid-1490s David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Return to our Spring 2023 Table of Contents Share Previous Next Click here. Do you like what you just read? Subscribe today and receive sneak previews of Aletheia Today Magazine articles before they're published. Plus, you'll receive our quick-read, biweekly blog, Thoughts While Shaving. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing! Return to Table of Contents, Winter 2023 Issue Return to Table of Contents, Holiday Issue Return to Table of Contents, Halloween Issue Return to Table of Contents, Fall Issue Return to Table of Contents, Beach Issue Return to Table of Contents, June Issue

Formal Christian Prayer is a cornucopia of spirituality. Yet in the Roman Catholic tradition at least, two prayers stand out: Jesus' prayer, the Our Father, and the Hail Mary (Ave Maria). < Back The Structure of Prayer David Cowles Jun 1, 2023 Formal Christian Prayer is a cornucopia of spirituality. Yet in the Roman Catholic tradition at least, two prayers stand out: Jesus' prayer, the Our Father, and the Hail Mary (Ave Maria). David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com . Return to our Summer 2023 Table of Contents Previous Next Share Do you like what you just read? Subscribe today and receive sneak previews of Aletheia Today Magazine articles before they're published. Plus, you'll receive our quick-read, biweekly blog, Thoughts While Shaving. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing! Click here. Return to Table of Contents, Winter 2023 Issue Return to Table of Contents, Holiday Issue Return to Table of Contents, Halloween Issue Return to Table of Contents, September Issue Return to Table of Contents, Beach Issue Return to the Table of Contents, June Issue