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< Back The Big Bang David Cowles Mar 28, 2023 “We imagine Big Bang as though someone switched on a torch in the middle of a dark room; but of course, there is no flashlight, there is no room.” “Daddy, when was the Big Bang?” “About 14 billion years ago.” That was surprisingly easy, wasn’t it? Thank goodness Junior didn’t ask, “Why is the sky blue?” or “Where do babies come from?” Surprisingly easy – or should we say, ‘deceptively easy’? Something just doesn’t feel quite right, does it? So let’s dig a little deeper. (“Sorry, Junior, Daddy can’t play right now; he has to think about the Big Bang.”) We live in time. We count forwards and backwards. We can keep counting back until we get to zero, et voilà , Big Bang. But all this is from the perspective of here and now. What if we look at the same problem from the perspective of the Big Bang itself? That’s going to be a problem. Time originates with Big Bang. Time is a function of Big Bang. Next time Junior asks his fateful question, just say, “Big Bang is not a function of time.” See how easy that was? (Hopefully, Junior has a degree in Mathematics.) It is tempting to think of a universe before Big Bang, a void, chaos, negative vacuum pressure, whatever. We imagine Big Bang as though ‘someone’ (sic) switched on a torch in the middle of a dark room; but of course, there is no flashlight, there is no room. The ‘moment of the Big Bang’ is not a ‘moment’ at all. Big Bang is the origin of moments. Ultimately, it is ‘the set of all moments’; but it is not itself a moment. Those who advocate for a divine role in creation frequently ask, “Why did the Big Bang happen when it did?” The answer’s easy: “It didn’t happen!” In the ‘60s we were fond of saying, “Whatever happens happens.” Like any stopped clock, we were right – this time! All ‘happening’ takes place in time. The set of all ‘happenings’ is time-bound; each ‘happening’ is time-dependent. The Big Bang is not a ‘happening’ so it didn’t ‘happen’! (The ‘60s were good for something, after all.) But that doesn’t make Big Bang any less real. Big Bang doesn’t happen, it just is . Apparently, there is more to being than spatiotemporal happening. Big Bang is real, it ‘exists’; but it exists outside of space and time. The implications of this simple realization are literally ‘astronomical’. The premise of ‘bootstrapping’, the notion that Universe is causa sui , is defeated. Cause is a temporal concept; the idea itself presupposes sequence ( aka time). Universe has no cause. It just is. A cause is necessarily distinct from its effect. But nothing is distinct from Universe; it is, by definition, every thing. This is not a tepid rehash of Aristotle’s failed notion of an infinite universe. Infinite time is still time. We are proposing a Universe that exists outside of time entirely. Note : Initially, I wrote, ‘a Universe whose origin lies outside of time’; that’s wrong! It’s not the origin of Universe that is outside of time; it’s the Universe itself! While the constituents of Universe are time-bound, Universe itself is not. Surprisingly perhaps, this meditation has nothing to do with God or Creation. Those are other matters for other days. All we can say about Universe right now is, “It is! It just is.” We imagine that the primary function of intelligence is to discover what’s true; alternatively, the primary function could be to identify what’s false. We’re talking The Iconoclasm of Everyday Life (lie quiet, Freud) here. Peel away the layers of the onion. Break the first six seals ( Book of Revelation ); only then can you discover what the 7 th seal conceals . A major, if unstated, goal of 20 th Century physics was to develop ontological/cosmological models that do not require the existence (or agency) of ‘God’. Without prejudicing in any way the final answer to the God Question , we can say without qualification that these efforts failed. Every theory of cosmogenesis , to the extent that it masquerades as ontogenesis , is ultimately doomed to fail. Genesis offers a theory of cosmogenesis; it also falls short! It posits a state before fiat lux : “the earth was without form or shape, with darkness over the abyss and a mighty wind sweeping over the waters.” But of course, there can’t be anything before fiat lux . We can allow Genesis some poetic license here, but Roman Catholic doctrine has explicitly glossed this text to emphasize the fact that absolutely nothing existed prior to Creation ( creatio ex nihilo ). “It is! It just is.” Who thought this…before us? Oh yeah, the father of Western philosophy thought it. Parmenides believed this about Being (which he called Aletheia or Truth): “…what-is is not-generated and imperishable…whole, single-limbed, steadfast, and complete, nor was it once, nor will it be, since it is, now, all together, one, continuous… Thus, coming-to-be is extinguished and perishing, not to be heard of… And what need could have impelled it to grow later or sooner, if it began from nothing?” In a way Parmenides could never possibly have imagined, the detection of CMB in 1964 finally validated his 2500 hundred-year-old hypothesis. Speaking colloquially, it ‘proved the reality of eternity’. Of course, in our era, the concept of ‘eternity’ is fraught. Best think of it as a-temporality, the absence of time. Then we can say without reservation that spacetime is a subset of eternity, a ‘special case’. Eternity is not the sum of all events; it is the precondition of events per se . “No eternity, No time!” Thanks for this, Big Bang! 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“Divinity is a language unto itself, or as a five-year-old grandchild once explained to me, ‘God is outside the numbers’.” < Back The Probability of Nothing David Cowles Oct 15, 2024 “Divinity is a language unto itself, or as a five-year-old grandchild once explained to me, ‘God is outside the numbers’.” Riddle : How is language like Willie Mays? Answer : It rules center field! Of course, I am referring to ontological ‘center field’: the tiny, daily transactions (like photon exchange) that bind society (or the world) together. But language can play tricks on us…especially when it deals with stuff at the ends of the ontological spectrum. Take the word itself, ‘nothing’, for example. ‘Nothing’ is a noun and, as we know from primary school, a noun represents a ‘person, place, or thing’. Which of these does ‘nothing’ represent? None, obviously. The word itself tells you all you need to know about its meaning: ‘nothing’ = ‘no thing’. Now we have a word that fails to meet the definition of a noun playing the role of a noun in ordinary speech. What could possibly go wrong? Well, because we use the word, ‘nothing’, as a noun, we could begin to think of Nothing per se as something (some ‘thing’). This is an instance of what Alfred North Whitehead called “the fallacy of misplaced concreteness” - the fundamental fallacy of Western metaphysics. Then what is ‘nothing’? Today, we have a number for it: zero. But we didn’t have that number until the 13th century (Fibonacci) and it wasn’t universally accepted into arithmetic until the 18th century (Leibniz). If zero is a real number like other real numbers, then is nothing something? We also have another mathematical symbol for Nothing, ø, the null set. This notation insulates Nothing from the domain of real numbers. We are used to the idea of ‘Ineffable God’: God so far transcends our world that nothing we say about God can be true or even meaningful. Divinity is a language unto itself, or as a five-year-old grandchild once explained to me, “God is outside the numbers.” We’re not used to the idea of ‘Ineffable Nothing’. And yet, ‘nothing’ transcends all things just as God does. God, aka Being, Value, Love, is the ontological opposite of Nothing, which is the absence of ‘I am’ ( Exodus ), ‘it is’ ( Genesis ), ‘you are’ ( Gospel of John ). We begin, as all serious philosophical essays must, with Robert Frost , the ‘Quantum Poet’. In his best known poem, The Road Not Taken , he sets out the quintessential existential dilemma: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…” Happens a million times a day, every day! Frost, subject to the human condition , must pick a path, ‘sorry I could not travel both and be one traveler’. Frost makes his choice, ‘I kept the first for another day’; but hero that he is, Frost realizes that this is a forever decision, that the universe bifurcates at this point: ‘Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted I should ever come back’. Nor does our hero hide behind the rationalization of ‘objectivity’; he knows that the road chosen is in no way superior to the other, for ‘both that morning equally lay’. Standing at the point of divergence, at the moment of choice, both roads are equally real, equally attractive, equally effective, and therefore ontologically identical. Frost’s choice is apparently unconditioned. He is as likely to choose A as he is B. Initially, each option has a probability of P ≈ 50%. Since each P > 0, both exist! But whenever Frost’s choice of one path becomes irrevocable (P = 100%), then the alternate route (P = 0) ceases to exist…for Frost. It is no longer part of his Actual World. Proposition : ‘X exists, iff P(x) > 0’. Once P = 0, the alternate path no longer meets Gregory Bateson’s existential criterion: it’s no longer ‘a difference that makes a difference’. When there was no longer an option for Frost to pursue ‘the road not taken’, it ceased to exist… chez Frost. Much of Western philosophy is based on a false conception of Nothing. When we say ‘nothing’ we often have in mind something: a void or a vacuum, ‘nothing’ relatively speaking, but not absolutely nothing . Our ‘nothing’ tends to be ‘something…dimly lit’, a bit like Hades in Homer’s Odyssey . It’s even been called ‘a receptacle’, ‘a womb’, an ‘ether’, ‘pure potentiality’. Today, the cognoscente call it ‘negative vacuum pressure’. Nothing can’t be any of those things, not even metaphorically. Nothing can only be nothing. Nothing has no hair. It’s not a depression left in the fabric by ‘something’ when it departs. It’s not negative space, negative energy or negative vacuum pressure; it’s not positive or negative, it’s nothing. It’s good to know that we are not alone in our thinking. Perhaps we’re not mainstream (yet) but we’re definitely not flying solo . In fact, we share our perspective with Parmenides of Elea, the father of Western philosophy: “It is not to be said or thought that ‘it is not’…It is or it is not…let go the one (it is not) as unthinkable, unnamable, for it is not a real route.” ‘The road not taken’ cannot be ‘said or thought’ or even named because ‘it is not a real route’. When Frost reaches his destination, he is surrounded by reporters all with a single question: “Why did you choose that path?” To which Frost answered, “There was more than one path?” Parmenides viewed the World as both the ‘Realm of Things as they Appear’ ( Doxa ) and the ‘Realm of things as they Are’ ( Aletheia ). In the realm of Doxa , Frost confronts an apparent existential choice. In the realm of Aletheia , the apparent ‘choice’ is without consequence and so does not ‘exist’; it’s not a ‘difference that makes a difference’ because ‘both that morning equally lay’ and both led to the same destination. There was no objective reason to prefer one over the other. So there never was an existential dilemma because there was really only ever one path (a path and its mirror image). This perspective pops up all across ‘the fruited plain’ of Western philosophy, but for now, let’s stick with Quantum Mechanics (QM)! Hugh Everett’s ‘Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics’ states (roughly) that everything that can happen does happen…in its own universe. Corollary : Whatever did not happen could not have happened, because if it even might have happened, it would have happened. Try saying that 10 times! An entity’s worldline is its ‘route’ but apparent routes that pass through ‘counterfactual space’ are not real routes; their probabilities are all equal to 0. If it isn’t now, it never was, it could not have been, and it cannot come to be in the future. Only real routes are ‘real’. Everett channels Parmenides…2400 years later. There is ‘is’ and that’s all there is…no might, no should, no would, no could, just is. Let’s apply this way of reasoning to questions involving probabilities, beginning with a traditional Hasidic folk tale: Once upon a time, a certain Rabbi was on his way home from Schule when he encountered an elderly widow crawling on her hands and knees under a streetlamp. Not wanting to play the part of passer-by in a future production of The Good Samaritan and eager to perform one last mitzvah before going to bed for the night, the Rabbi offered to assist. "I've lost my shiny penny, the only thing I have left in the world," the widow wailed. "And is this where you lost it?" the Rabbi inquired innocently. "No," she replied. "I lost it over there." The quizzical Rabbi, still hoping to be helpful, asked, "Then why are you looking for it here?" "Because the light is better!" This story is often presented as a commentary on the widow's folly, but in fact, the widow is the hero of the story. She defies conventional wisdom. Why look for a lost penny in pitch darkness where there's no hope of finding anything? Unlit space is not part of the widow’s world; from her perspective it is Nothing. So the only ‘rational’ thing for her to do is to search under the lamplight where P > 0. Let’s rephrase: the probability of the penny being under the light is actually 100% (P = 1) because the penny has to be somewhere (P=1), and every other possibility has zero probability (P = 0): 1 – 0 = 1. But the probability of her finding the penny under the light is much, much less (P < 1)…but not zero (P > 0). Ok, this sounds officially crazy. How can the probability of the penny being under the lamp be 100% when we said earlier that the penny is probably not there? Once again, we find our answer in Quantum Mechanics. According to QM, everything is everywhere all the time and anywhere you look there is a finite possibility (however low) that you will find your quantum there…as long as you’ve confined your search to places that exist for you. Now that we’re comfortable applying Parmenides’ ontology to situations involving probabilities, we’re ready to apply it to the greatest floating craps game of all: ‘Pascal's Wager’ (1670 CE). Confronted with the God Question , French mathematician, Blaise Pascal, employed a forerunner of what is today called ‘Game Theory’. Pascal divided a sheet of paper into four quadrants. Across the top of the page, he wrote, “I believe that God exists;” down the left-hand margin, he wrote, “God does exist;” and then he filled in the appropriate truth values: (0,0), (0,1), (1,0), (1,1). Pascal reasoned that one of four things must be true: (1) I do not believe that God exists, and he doesn’t; (2) I do not believe that God exists, but he does; (3) I believe that God exists, but he doesn’t; (4) I believe that God exists, and he does. So God is ‘free’ to exist or not and you are free to believe or not. Yet, scenarios 1, 2, and 3 are effectively identical. They amount to the same thing. Believe whichever one you choose; it makes no difference. They are interchangeable because they each produce the same incremental value: (0*0) or (0*1) or (1*0), i.e. Zero. Only #4 (1*1) is different; only #4 generates incremental value. Quadrants 1, 2, and 3 do not meet Gregory Bateson’s criterion (for ‘being’, above). They produce zero incremental value so there is no ultimate value difference among them and their contribution of value to the world is null (ø). Since all other options generate 0 incremental value, P(4) must be 100% (P=1): 1 – (0 + 0 + 0) = 1. To quote a medieval Irish poet, “Naught (0) is all else to me save than Thou art!” Centuries later, Pascal proved that this is not just a statement of subjective faith…it’s a statement of objective reality. 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 dtc@gc3incorporated.com ress, Literary Journal Spring 2023. Return to Harvest 2024 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. 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“Mythology is common to all ages. There is no theology, philosophy, or science without it.” < Back Mythology Now! David Cowles Apr 15, 2023 “Mythology is common to all ages. There is no theology, philosophy, or science without it.” According to popular consensus, mythology is an artifact of prehistory. In this view, mythology was replaced, first by religion, then by philosophy, and now by science. Isn’t it marvelous how something so completely wrong can be so widely believed? Mythology is common to all ages. There is no theology, philosophy, or science without it. Each of these disciplines consists of a series of non-contradictory propositions. Each propositional edifice rests on a common set of normally unvoiced assumptions. That’s mythology – don’t leave home without it. This is hard to accept because from our over-intellectualized post-Enlightenment perch to say that something is a ‘myth’ or ‘mythical’ is to suggest that it is untrue or unreal or even silly. In fact, however, a myth is never either true or false, real or unreal… or silly. Myth is a way of understanding the world, a form of trans-verbal language. “Myth is a system of communication; it is a message…it is a mode of meaning.” (Roland Barthes) According to the Greek philosophical tradition, we understand the world in three ways: Gnosis , Logos and Mythos . Gnosis is knowledge. It is the first step back from raw experience. We organize what we think we know into large, internally consistent, but ultimately limited, bodies of knowledge ( gnoses ), e.g., science, philosophy, and theology. These intellectual disciplines are often thought to conflict with one another, but actually, they have a complementary relationship. We need multiple overlapping gnoses to begin to sew together a mappa mundi (a map of the world). The insatiably curious child is just building her map. Logos takes us a second step back from experience. Logos is the pattern formed by the elements of our various gnoses (above). It is because of logos that events can be defined, distinguished and ordered. Brute fact becomes useful knowledge ( praxis ). Genesis tells us about the world before logos : “…without form or shape, with darkness over the abyss and a mighty wind sweeping over the waters –.” With mythos , we take yet a third step back from raw experience. Mythos is an expression of our habits of mind, the unexamined assumptions that underlie logos ; they allow us to do science, apply reason, and practice religion. In a logical or mathematical system, mythos represents the undefined terms . Science reflects the perspective of the seeker, philosophy of the thinker and theology of the believer. Mythos aims to deliver a vision of the entirety from the perspective of the entirety. Mythology is how the world understands itself, what the world has to say about itself, with no scientist, philosopher, or theologian required. Mythos is recursion! Logos gives us tools to translate experience into understanding. Mythos works in reverse. Mythos embodies certain trans-verbal and non-verbal assumptions about reality that enable us to have experience and to organize that experience first as gnoses , then as logos and ultimately as praxis , the application of logos . Far from being fairy tales, myths tell us what’s real (and what isn’t), what’s valuable (and what’s not). A myth is not falsifiable. In fact, it is the nature of myth generally that it is not susceptible to ‘mere evidence’. Rather, it is mythology that defines what constitutes ‘evidence’ for any particular culture. As in Alice’s Looking-glass world, with mythos the verdict precedes the trial. There are four dominant mythologies afoot in the world today. The first is Empiricism . It underpins the scientific world view. It embodies as articles of faith certain basic attitudes about the world that make science possible. What you see is what you get, and it’s all you get. It’s all you can get! It’s all there is to get. This model is compatible with everything from Newtonian physics to Quantum Field Theory…but that’s the whole idea. We’re not talking about any one physical theory or model here; we’re talking about an attitude of mind that lies behind all such models and makes them possible. The second myth is Humanism . Humanity collectively and each human being individually is the center of the universe, morally if not physically. The origin of the universe is unimportant. What matters is that it exists now and has sentient beings in it. Those sentient beings are what give it meaning. Human experience is truth. The wellbeing of humanity is justice. The third myth is Rationalism . It judges systems of axioms and theorems, based on their internal consistency. The world is fundamentally a rational place, so human beings can rely on reason to find answers to their deepest questions. The fourth myth is Transcendentalism . It situates the space-time universe in the context of non-spatial, non-temporal eternity. It is that eternal realm that gives events in the temporal realm their value and, ultimately, their meaning. Values have a transcendental origin and so per se are absolute, although their expressions, applications, and interpretations will vary from culture to culture…and from person to person. Values are sub-structural; essence precedes existence. Values are not relative nor merely normative; they are generative. Entities are not incidentally good; they are because and to the extent that they are good. Value is not an extrinsic measure of an entity; it is the intrinsic source of its being. We need to know what’s real and what’s valuable. This is our primal question, and no gnosis (knowledge) or logos (intellect) by itself can answer that. For better or worse, we are ultimately dependent on unverifiable mythos to guide us through life. Before we deduce a verdict from the evidence, we have to know what counts as ‘evidence’ and what doesn’t. That’s the function of mythology. We are swimming in uncharted (and unchartable) waters. Like Kierkegaard, we all make our own leap of faith, our own leap in the dark, however unwittingly and unwillingly; and as we do so, mythology is our only guide. 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 Holy Days 2023 Table of Contents, 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. 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< Back Abraham Lincoln and the Book of Judges David Cowles Jun 30, 2022 “If time travel is perfected in my lifetime, I know exactly where…and when…I’ll visit first!” “…That government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.” – Abraham Lincoln ( Gettysburg Address ) Shall not perish ? Where can I find this imperishable utopia of which Mr. Lincoln speaks so reverentially? I’m googling it…waiting…ah, got it, Israel. Ok, but Israel between 1250 and 1000 B.C. Well, if time travel is perfected in my lifetime, at least I know exactly where I want to go… and when ! “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in their own eyes,” (Judges 21: 25) During this period, Israel had no formal political authority. It was ruled by so-called ‘Judges.' Caveat lector ! Do not confuse these Judges with the sober men and women, often unelected, often with life tenure, who preside over our courtrooms, gods of guilt. Old Testament (OT) judges were nothing like that ! In the absence of traditional institutions of government, charismatic leaders emerged from among the people to secure and advance the collective welfare of the people. These leaders relied for their authority, not on power, but on (1) their devotion to the law of God (Torah) and (2) the popular, if informal, consent of the governed. In our era, a variety of actors compete to fill the role of an OT judge: populist politicians, military heroes, movement leaders, mob bosses, even celebrities. But the influence of these modern day pseudo-judges , unlike ancient Israel’s judges, is tightly circumscribed by our formal institutions of government. During the period of Judges, there were no formal institutions of government in Israel. People did what was right in their own eyes and the Judges were their instruments. OT judges did not make law! It was assumed that all laws had already been made…with direct input from God. These are the 613 statutes, the Torah, now recorded in the first 5 books of the Bible. Judges ruled Israel from the death of Joshua (following Moses) to the coronation of Saul (prior to David). They settled disputes and they defended Israel ‘against all enemies, foreign or domestic.' Along with the priests, they saw to it that God’s statutes were observed, but they were less about enforcement than they were about consensus. For 250 years, Israel prospered under informally chosen, but popular, Judges. But the Israelites looked around and saw the pomp and power of neighboring nations, all of whom we governed by kings. So, Israel wanted a king…and eventually they got one: Saul. And the rest as they say is ‘history,' quite literally! **** Image: Gideon Gathering His Army, Scene from the Book of Judges. Etienne Parrocel (French, Avignon 1696–1776 Rouen), Formerly attributed to Anonymous, Italian, first half of the 18th century. As part of the Met's Open Access policy , you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes. Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API . Thoughts While Shaving is the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine ( ATM) . To never miss another Thought, choose the subscribe option below. Also, follow us on any one of our social media channels for the latest news from ATM. Thanks for reading! 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.

< Back Plutarch +/- Christ David Cowles Oct 23, 2025 “What direction would Western philosophy have taken if Christianity had not come along to divert the course of history?” Our earliest records of ‘professional philosophers’ in Europe date from 6th century BCE Greece. The ‘naturalists’ (e.g. Thales) were quickly followed by the pre-Socratics (5th century), Plato (4th century) and Aristotle (3rd century). That was a lot to digest in a short period of time; we’re still burping. It is as if Europe were working double time to make up for a slow start: philosophy had already been around for a millennium in China, India, Persia, Palestine and Egypt. After Aristotle, Greco-Roman philosophy was dominated by the Stoics, the Skeptics, and the Epicureans. Toward the end of the 1st century CE, Christianity began to breathe new life into Western philosophy, but it was not until the 5th century that Christian Europe found its Plato…Augustine of Hippo. Between Aristotle and Augustine (750 years), there were dozens of important philosophers, both Christian and Pagan but the polymath Plutarch (c. 100 CE) may help us answer a crucial question: What path would Western philosophy have taken if Christianity had not come along to divert the course of history? Best known for historical biographies, Plutarch’s philosophical, cosmological, and theological writing is often overlooked. Unbeknownst to many, toward the end of his life (c. 120 CE) Plutarch served 20 years as one of two priests responsible for maintaining the Oracle at Delphi. This gave him the opportunity to examine the relationship between traditional Greco-Roman polytheism and the Eastern monotheisms he had encountered in the course of his extensive travel and study. One of his most insightful works is also one of his shortest: On the Cessation of Oracles . As if he were reading from the transcript of a 21st century episcopal synod, Plutarch notes declining public interest in the ideas and practices of ‘established’ religion (sound familiar?) and he even bemoans the potential impact on the financial prospects of future clergy. (Am I reading Jane Austen?) Surrounded by his cadre of 1 st century Greco-Roman influencers, Plutarch asks the timeless question: Why is religious belief and practice in such decline? (Or, “What’s the matter with kids today?”) He suggests several possible answers: (1) The gods have withdrawn their support and aid in the face of humanity’s persistent transgressions. (2) It was never the divine intent to manage the affairs of human beings beyond a certain stage in their development. Reason was given to humanity to enable it to wean itself off reliance on the miraculous. (3) It is the natural course of events, akin to what we today would call ‘entropy’: “Nature produces a wasting away and a deprivation… God gives many good things to men (sic), but not one that is everlasting, so ‘the things of the gods do die but not God’.” (Sophocles) Sometimes, it can be hard to distinguish 1st century Delphi from 20th century Cambridge (UK or US). And speaking of the 20th century, Ammonius and Theophrastus are clearly channeling Wittgenstein when they question whether things possible but unproven should be given weight and, if not, whether it is safe to ignore them entirely. One problem remains unsolved, chez Plutarch. How do the divine and human worlds communicate and interact? According to Plutarch, miracles, rituals, sacrifices are not the province of the gods per se but of an intermediary class of beings (‘daemons’, our angels & devils) who facilitate and effectuate divine-human communication with no guarantee of permanence or even benevolence. This is an unattractive aspect of Plutarch’s thinking but really, is it all that unusual? Our tendency, even today, is to plug any hole in our intellectual wall by positing a brand new class of being(s) to fill it; can you say aether …or dark matter …or multiverse …or? Every God is a ‘god-of-the-gaps’…as is everything else. To be is to fill a material gap; to know is to fill a cognitive lacuna. Even so, most philosophers find Plutarch’s solution unsatisfactory. Daemons may facilitate communication between God and World but who or what facilitates communication between God and Daemon and/or Daemon and World? The doctrine of ‘intermediaries’ just kicks the can down the road. The crystallizing Christian doctrine of Trinity avoids this pitfall. The Holy Spirit is ‘intermediary’ between Father and Son, but Holy Spirit is also God. Each of God’s personae (persons) is God, whole and entire. Communication is not intermediation; it’s a state of being. That’s one reason why John, the evangelist, calls Christ, logos (‘word’). Nonetheless, the doctrine of daemons opens a window onto the theological churn of the era. For example, in Cessation , one of Plutarch’s interlocutors, Cleombrotus, suggests that there exists a single ‘God’ backed by a multitude of ‘gods’ who function as daemons, angels, heroes (Norse), and superheroes (Marvel). Homer attempted to invest his Olympians with transcendent powers and immanent appetites. The result is great literature but poor theology. By the time of Plutarch it was still possible to apply the word ‘god’ to a nymph whose life is co-terminal with a particular tree or spring. It was also possible to refer to our sun as ‘god’ or to Apollo as ‘sun-god’. And it was beginning to be possible to speak of god more abstractly: “The True One…does not behold an infinite vacuum nor contemplate himself in solitary grandeur…but looks down on the many operations of god and men (sic).” Plutarch testifies to a theological crisis in progress: the categories of Western philosophy are not yet up to the task of balancing immanence with transcendence. John and Paul offered a ‘first of its kind’ solution to a very real philosophical problem. At the time of Plutarch, the twin doctrines of Incarnation and Trinity were still ‘in development’. Jesus’ life and teachings gave us all the necessary data points…but we’re dense. It took 300 years for us to catch on. Even so, Plutarch had better models available to him than Daemonology. It is hard to imagine that Plutarch had not come across the Christian doctrine of Incarnation. “Who are those folks being eaten by lions?” But if not, he certainly had access to the ideas of Anaxagoras: Pan in Panti “Everything in everything!” Anaxagoras gave us the raw intellectual material we needed to formulate a Trinitarian theology…but nobody made the connection, not even Plutarch. When a proliferation of entities fails to solve your problem, the best thing to do is to invent even more entities, obviously…right? Isn’t that the ‘definition of sanity ’ – to repeat the same thing over and over and expect a different result each time? No, it’s not! So, next stop, other worlds ! Plutarch considers the possibility that our universe is one of an infinite number of universes… or one of 5, or of 50 or 100. Can you say multiverse ? In this context, Plutarch considers a model that grabs our attention: “…What absolute necessity is there for there being several Jupiters…and not one Ruler and Director for the Entirety…a God possessing Reason and Intelligence…entitled Lord and Father of all?” This is dangerously close in concept, and even in vocabulary, to the doctrines emerging in Christianity. It is tempting to assume that we are seeing its influence in Plutarch’s work…but there’s zero evidence to support that interpretation and numerous reasons to suspect it. Of course, it is always possible that Plutarch was unintentionally and perhaps unwittingly influenced by an unrelated third party. But it is also possible that we are seeing evidence here of convergent evolution. The time was right for radical monotheism! *** Image: Hilma af Klint’s Altarpieces (Group X, 1915) mark the culmination of her spiritually guided abstract series, presenting radiant geometric forms that ascend toward unity and divine order. The three large canvases use gold, blue, and rose tones to symbolize the merging of spirit and matter into a higher consciousness. Together, they serve as visual “portals” between earthly existence and transcendent realms—an abstract expression of multiple, coexisting planes of reality. 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.

< Back Relationship David Cowles Jul 30, 2021 Following up on an earlier post, in an I – it relationship, the ‘I’ has complete dominion over the ‘it’. The ‘it’ is merely a passive receptor for the actions of the ‘I’. Therefore, this model ascribes infinite intrinsic value to the ‘I’ and zero intrinsic value to the ‘it’. But can such an arrangement be called a relationship? Following up on an earlier post, in an I – it relationship, the ‘I’ has complete dominion over the ‘it’. The ‘it’ is merely a passive receptor for the actions of the ‘I’. Therefore, this model ascribes infinite intrinsic value to the ‘I’ and zero intrinsic value to the ‘it’. But can such an arrangement be called a relationship? Intrinsic value is derived from relatedness: relatedness to God, to the cosmos, to other human beings and/or to any other being within the cosmos. This might seem strange: if the value is intrinsic, how can it require relatedness? Nietzsche wrote: “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!” Nietzsche denied the reality of God…or of anything that might “transcend” the immanent world. Unlike A.J. Ayer, Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre and many, many others, Nietzsche had the intellectual honesty to understand that his ideology necessarily ruled out any “eternal values”; he did not attempt to reintroduce values through a “back door”. For Nietzsche, all relationships are ‘I – it” (or “it – it”) relationships. Value can only emerge in the context of an “I – Thou” (or “Thou – Thou”) relationship. Every Thou transcends every I. There is something about the Thou that stands outside the immanent world of the I. Solipsism excludes value! There is no value outside the context of relationship. Then in what sense can we say that “value” is intrinsic in every being? The intrinsic value of every being lies in its potential to enter into an I – Thou (or Thou – Thou) relationship. The extrinsic value of every being lies in the actual Thou – Thou relationships it enters into. It is not obvious that beings in a cosmos would automatically have the potential to form Thou – Thou relationships. Such relationships are only possible in the context of transcendence and eternal values are only possible in the context of such relationships. Thomas Aquinas offered 5 proofs for the existence of God (transcendence). The only one that is still of interest to modern philosophers is the fourth, a proof based on the existence of values in the world. Aquinas was on to something! 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.

< Back Fifth Grade Slump, Eighth Grade Cliff “We must surrender the notion that adolescence is a dress rehearsal for adulthood. It’s not; it’s real life! David Cowles If you are a regular reader of Aletheia Today , you know that I am not a fan of childhood. Children, Si! Childhood, Non! Recent studies of tweens/teens have reinforced my thinking. For me, 1960 was a watershed year. I entered as a 12 year old (7th grade) trolling near the bottom of my class. and left at age 13 (8th grade) newly engaged in the enterprise of life. What happened in the middle of that fateful year, I would describe as my ‘discovery of agency’. Like most children, I chafed at the impotence of childhood and literally dreamed of making an impact in the adult world. In 1960, I found my first ‘real’, if minimal, outlets. Politics was my game. At age 9, I rang neighbors’ doorbells and asked them to vote for Ike; then I stood at a local polling station, unauthorized by any campaign, handing out election day fliers for candidates I’d barely heard of. In answer to your question, yes, I had some sense of how ridiculous I was…but that was not enough for me to curtail my activities. Better ridiculous than impotent! My thirst to play an adult role, to impact however slightly the course of history, was just too strong. 1960 was the year things changed. I got appointed by the Johnson for President organization as an official ‘volunteer campaign worker’ for Boston. More impressively, I managed to get myself named co-chair of Youth for Saltonstall (a U.S. Senator) for my ward. Finally, I was making a mark, however trivial, on the ‘real’ (i.e. adult) world. Ok, I was an odd duck…and I knew it. But it didn’t matter. That fall, I bought time on a broadcast radio station to promote my (unsuccessful, wonder why?) campaign for Class President and I was in the audience of a controversial nighttime radio talk show. Finally! Only much later did I discover that I was not alone. Apparently, most 8th graders yearn for adult status, respect, and real world relevance. Our greatest fear? You guessed it – being patronized by adults. Over the past couple of decades neuroscience has dramatically changed our understanding of the structural and functional changes in the brain during adolescence. Studies emphasize adolescents' concern with status and respect, their evolving sense of self in relation to the wider world, and their need to contribute to society, i.e. to have a purpose. Being told that they are ‘in training for adulthood, still at least a decade away’, is uniquely unhelpful. You’ve lived 10 – 12 years and now, just as you’re discovering your need for independence and your hunger for purpose, you’re told that you must wait another 10 – 12 years. I don’t think so! Is it any wonder that teenagers engage in risky, almost nihilistic, behavior? Put yourself in their shoes! Wait, you have been in their shoes? Oh, yeah, I forgot! So you have… and how did you survive? Unscathed? Recall the story of Jacob in Genesis . He is forced to work 14 years for his father-in-law-to-be, Laban, before marrying the spouse of his choice and gaining full economic independence. If you were fortunate enough to be ‘churched’, I’ll bet you were outraged by this story. Well, consider this: You are Jacob! We are all Jacob. We all face an enforced, involuntary, 12+ year incubation period between childhood and adulthood. “We are Spartacus.” Scarry! How did we get ourselves into this pickle? Evolution has designed our bodies to mature in the 12 to 15 year old window. And for many millennia society recognized this fact. This is the window for Bas-Mitzvah and Bat-Mitzvah, it is the time of the sweat lodges. Malatesta (c. 1450 CE) entered the army as an officer at age 13, working his way up to commander-in-chief at 15. And don’t get me started on Joan of Arc. Today, when adolescents are untimely forced to play adult roles, the results are usually less heroic: trafficked slaves, exploited workers, child soldiers. In the later half of the 1960’s I lived in a community that had hit upon a unique, if imperfect, solution. The ‘children’ were infantilized through the age of 15 but on their 16th birthdays – exactly – everything changed. Yesterday, you were treated like an 8 year old; today you’re like a 24 year old. In this subculture, you were effectively emancipated at 16. You were instantly free to drop out of school, get a permanent, full time job, rent an apartment, drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes, drive a car, own a gun, engage in sex, and (soon) join the army. Not all these behaviors were strictly legal, but they were the cultural norm in that enclave. It wasn’t ideal but it wasn’t a total disaster either! For better or for worse though, this system was already crumbling when I left in the early ‘70s. For decades much of the research on adolescence focused on its dark side. Not surprisingly, it often brings alarming increases in rates of accident, suicide, homicide, depression, alcohol and substance abuse, violence, recklessness, eating disorders, obesity and sexually transmitted disease. But a different interpretation of adolescence is possible. Neuroscientists have shown that puberty ushers in a period of exuberant neuronal growth followed by a pruning of neural connections that is second only to the similar process that occurs in the first three years of life. Adult brains vary in their patterns of neural connections, whereas children's variations are much less distinctive. Differentiated patterns of connection begin in adolescence. This is when you become thee and I become me . No wonder children have an easier time making new friends than adults do. All eight-year-olds are the same; they are virtually interchangeable. But no two 88-year-olds have have anything in common. From an evolutionary perspective, much of adolescents' behavior pushes them to leave the safety of family to explore the larger social world—a step on the way to becoming independent adults. Biblically speaking, we are all Abram, we are all Ruth, we are all Mary, we are all John. But we don’t live in Biblical times. Still, research shows that modern adolescents retain a need to contribute to society and that doing so makes them feel valued and can safeguard against anxiety and depression. Learning how to contribute to the social world is Job One for the adolescent. As I found, it is the time when young people first become capable of making consequential contributions. Unfortunately, we’re not buying what they’re selling. We cling to a vision of adolescence as a kind of unpleasant apprenticeship for adulthood. As guardians of our young people, we are concerned with their educational achievement, career preparation, etc. These are not, instinctively, the priority concerns of most teenagers. Are you familiar with ‘the fifth grade slump’ or ‘the eighth grade cliff’? Disengagement with education starts slowly c. age 10 with a dip in grades and participation. This often accelerates so that those same students are failing three years later. We’re not entirely insensitive to the problem. We’ve given our teens a few secondary outlets. For example, we allow them to participate in the school play, to play sports on the school’s teams, to hold down a part-job, to volunteer in the community. These outlets may be helpful, they may release some steam from the pressure cooker, but do not lose sight of the fact that these are merely an extension of the childhood concept of ‘play’. These ‘make-do’ activities cannot compete with stealing a car or selling dope on the corner. They also cannot compete with more constructive achievements: a published poem, a play performed off, off, off Broadway, a movement started, a business founded, etc. So, what to do? First, beginning by 5th grade, if not earlier, all education needs to be self-directed, managed by a tutor, assisted by a personal AI Bot. Our schools must become ‘centers of learning’-- Wonder Schools . Children have questions. It’s part of their existential condition. Let them ask. See where they lead. Provide resources for kids who decide they need to learn French, or Trig, along the way…but don’t require it. Remind me, what’s a ‘secant’ anyway? Second, we must search for ways that adolescents can make genuine marks on the world. Lord knows, as a society, we have a lot of needs and, if we’re honest, many of them can be met just fine by an empowered 15 year old. Call it building the City of Dioce ( Ecbatan ) or the Kingdom of God, tweens and teens have tons to contribute. We need to facilitate their contribution, empower them, and step aside. But first, we must surrender the notion that adolescence is a dress rehearsal for adulthood. It’s not; it’s real life! 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 dtc@gc3incorporated.com Return to Table of Contents Previous Next

< Back 03/17/2022 What does a person do who is no longer learning to live, no longer learning to be ‘people’, no longer living other people’s lives? Such a person ‘reflects’…she reflects on what she’s learned, on how she’s lived, and on who she’s been. Does she have something to say that hasn’t already been said by countless others? Does she have something to do that hasn’t already been done? After 75 years, you’ve earned the right to make your own unique contribution to civilization. Now if I could just figure out what that unique contribution might be… More later… -David What does a person do who is no longer learning to live, no longer learning to be ‘people’, no longer living other people’s lives? Such a person ‘reflects’…she reflects on what she’s learned, on how she’s lived, and on who she’s been. Does she have something to say that hasn’t already been said by countless others? Does she have something to do that hasn’t already been done? After 75 years, you’ve earned the right to make your own unique contribution to civilization. Now if I could just figure out what that unique contribution might be… More later… -David Previous Next

“Zohar and Whitehead, separated by more than 500 years, both deliver us a map of the world where X marks the spot of the eschatological treasure.” < Back Whitehead and Zohar David Cowles Jun 1, 2023 “Zohar and Whitehead, separated by more than 500 years, both deliver us a map of the world where X marks the spot of the eschatological treasure.” The Zohar is a work of Jewish mysticism, steeped in ancient Kabbalah and closely related to modern Hasidism; it appeared out of whole cloth in the city of Leon, Spain, c. 1400 CE. It is surprising then to see similar ideas at work in the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead, a 20 th century British philosopher and an Anglican Christian. To recap, The Zohar is the story of our search for God and God’s search for us, mediated by what Kabbalists call the Tree of Life : Keter (Crown): Le Neant , Nothingness Hokhmah , Wisdom Bihah , Understanding ZA (God’s essence): Love, Justice/Judgment, Beauty, Eternity, Splendor, and Righteousness Malkhut (Shekinah ): Kingdom, the World The structure that Zohar identifies at the heart of Being is not imposed on Being or deduced from beings ; it is Being per se ! ‘To be’ is to be a ‘piece of fruit’ on the Tree of Life and by extension (fruit = seed), the Tree of Life itself. (The fractal structure of the Universe.) Keter ‘manifests’ as Hokhmah , Wisdom ( Sophia ), a single point of light. Hokhmah ‘inflates’ (Big Bang style?) and manifests as Binah , Understanding. Understanding encompasses Wisdom; it is the ‘reception’ of Wisdom. Binah provides the ‘space’ needed for the marriage of Hokhmah and Malkhut to occur. Fast forward to Century 21. Roger Penrose (of Hawking-Penrose fame) proposed a Cosmology ( CCC ) in which Heat Death (maximum extension) and Big Bang (minimal extension) are mathematically equivalent. In the language of CCC , the 5 branches of the Tree of Life are congruent. Binah is the womb of all things ( Malkhut ). Think Logos in the Christian tradition (John 1: 3). It faces Hokhmah on one side and Malkhut on the other. Keter (nothing) and Hokhmah (point) are eternal; so is Binah (extension). But within the eternity of Binah lies spacetime, a mode of extension, i.e., Malkhut , the Kingdom, our World. Binah is where Wisdom meets World; but between the two lies ZA , God’s essence…which is God. ZA consists of the 6 virtues (qualities, behaviors) of Emmanuel (‘God with us’). God’s essence is God’s substance. Keter/Hokhmah may be ‘ what God is,’ but ZA is ‘ who God is.’ What of Whitehead? His cosmology is built around a single God manifested in two Persons ( Personae ): God’s Primordial Nature (PN) and his Consequent Nature (CN). Personae because each Nature, by itself, is fully God. Yet the two Natures are radically distinct, they have no common elements. PN consists entirely of concepts (values) while CN consists entirely of entities (events), yet each Nature is implicit in the other. The Primordial Nature of God is ZA , the totality of God’s values. The Consequent Nature is Malkhut , the totality of events as they are redeemed in Binah . Ultimately, Malkhut , clothed in ZA , unites with Keter/Hokmah and the promise of Universe is fulfilled. Events originate in Malkhut (Whitehead’s ‘Actual World’) on account of the teleological attraction of Hokhmah , felt as the qualities of ZA . The unfolding of each such event in the cosmic womb ( Bihah ) is driven by God’s values ( ZA ). To paraphrase W.B. Yeats, “Its hour come round at last, ( Malkhut ) slouches toward Bethlehem ( Binah ) to be born.” Malkhut is the nexus of every event that is or ever was. Absent Hokhmah , Binah and ZA , events would occur haphazardly, revealing no pattern and disclosing no values. Such a world is not actually possible, but if it were, it would be featureless…and terribly sad. Fortunately, our world is not that world. Zohar and Whitehead, separated by more than 500 years, both deliver us a map of the world where X marks the spot of the eschatological treasure. Amazingly, the two maps overlay almost perfectly. Yet there’s no evidence that either mapmaker was even aware of the existence of the other map. Is this evidence of authenticity? Either way, in the intellectual history of the West, Whitehead and Zohar converge! 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 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

“The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds find shelter in its branches.” (Matthew 13: 31 – 32) < Back The Mustard Seed David Cowles Sep 1, 2024 “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds find shelter in its branches.” (Matthew 13: 31 – 32) Jesus’ parables are a mixed bag. Some are clear and incredibly insightful. Others are opaque, serpentine, and hard to interpret. Even the apostles couldn’t make head nor tail of some of them. I do not mean to give Jesus ‘notes’. He had issues! As has often been pointed out, he could not relate to his followers using only the abstract concepts of ‘professional’ philosophers and theologians. He needed to give his audience something they could relate to and so he needed to rely on imagery familiar to everyday Palestinians in the first century CE. But that was a secondary motivation! More importantly, Jesus needed to ‘code’ his message. At the beginning of his public ministry, he tried proclaiming it directly in the synagogue in Capernaum and barely escaped with his life. “Won’t make that mistake again. So much for 40 days in the desert wrestling with Satan. Time for Plan B!” Beginning with Matthew the Evangelist, Christians have gone to great lengths to situate the Christian message as a logical continuation of themes found in what we now know as the Old Testament. And rightly so! But this laudable theological exercise blunts our realization of just how radical Jesus’ teachings were . Supported only by a ‘gang’ of men and boys recruited from remote, hillside villages in the Galilee, Jesus was preparing to take on two global superpowers: Rome (political) and Jerusalem (religious). Not that these two elites had much in common. The Jesus Story is firmly embedded within a much longer conflict between Israel’s two ‘masters’. Pontius Pilate to his credit tried to maintain a modicum of ‘peace’ between the two parties; of course, he failed! Ironically, about the only thing the political and religious forces could agree on was their mutual disdain for Jesus. So let’s recap. On one side, we have Rome’s ‘global’ political hegemony (Empire) supported by overwhelming military might. On the other side, a millennia old theology and religious tradition, fundamentally theocratic and anarchic, rapidly gaining converts all the way from the Euphrates to the Pillars of Hercules. “And then came Maude” (aka Jesus of Nazareth)! I wonder how William Hill™ would have handicapped this 3 way race. Spoiler Alert : Over the next 400 years, the ‘glory that was Rome’ faded out. Efforts to revive it (800 CE, 1500 CE) were never fully successful. Judaism continued to spread and became an important world-wide religion but, for various reasons, failed to reach ‘critical mass’. Only Christianity achieved ‘escape velocity’. The Jesus Story often presents the political and religious establishments as a collection of bungling fools, too preoccupied with their own interests to respond effectively to Jesus’ challenge. Nothing could be further from reality. Just ask Jesus’ cousin, John, the Baptist, arrested, imprisoned and beheaded. Or the two prisoners crucified alongside Jesus on Calvary. Or Barabas whose life became a bargaining chip. Imagine his shock when he learned that he was being released as part of a comprehensive ‘deal’ to kill Jesus. For one brief evening, the Roman Governor (Pilate), the local ruler (Herod), and the Chief Priest joined hands and sang Kumbaya . That’s how much of a threat Jesus was to political order and religious orthodoxy. In fact, far from dropping the ball, the forces of reaction dogged Jesus from the very first days of his public ministry. To survive even three years, Jesus needed to deploy a complex strategy: Stay out of the big cities, avoid the limelight, take the roads less traveled. Stay out of Judea, until the end, and even minimize time in Galilee. Jesus was most at home in the region north of the Sea of Galilee, from the shores of Lebanon (Type and Sidon) to Syria (Golan) and along the East bank of the Jordan, including the Greek cities of the Decapolis – areas where sway of the political and religious powers was weakest. Swear witnesses and beneficiaries to secrecy. Encode his teachings in the language of parables, only explaining the unencrypted meaning to his closest disciples. 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 . purpose and devotion. Return to 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 Mary Magdalene, The Witness Rachel Held Evans "That Christ ushered in this new era of life and liberation in the presence of women, and that he sent them out as the first witnesses of the complete gospel story, is perhaps the boldest, most overt affirmation of their equality in his kingdom that Jesus ever delivered." Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news:“I have seen the Lord!”—John 20:18 The story of how Mary Magdalene became known as a prostitute is a complicated one. One of six Marys that followed Jesus as a disciple, she was distinguished from the others through identification with her hometown of Magdala, a fishing village off the coast of the sea of Galilee. According to the gospels of Mark and Luke, Jesus cleansed Mary of seven demons, (a backstory infinitely more complicated and mysterious than prostitution, if you ask me), after which Mary became a devoted disciple, mentioned by Luke in the same context as the twelve, who traveled with Jesus and helped finance his ministry. In 597 pope Gregory the Great delivered a homily on Luke’s gospel in which he combined Mary Magdalene with Mary of Bethany (Martha’s sister), suggesting that this Mary was the same woman who wept at Jesus’ feet in Luke 7, and that one of the seven demons Jesus excised from her was sexual immorality. The idea caught on and was perpetuated in medieval art and literature, which often portrayed Mary as a weeping, penitent prostitute. In fact, the English word maudlin, meaning “weak and sentimental,” finds its derivation in this distorted image of Mary Magdalene. In 1969, the Vatican formally restated the Gospels’ distinction between Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany, and the sinful woman of Luke 7, although it seems Martin Scorsese, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Mel Gibson have yet to get the message. A cynic might suggest that this mistake and its subsequent popularity represent a deliberate attempt to typecast and discredit a woman whose role in the gospel story is so critical and so revolutionary that the eastern orthodox Church refers to Mary Magdalene as equal to the apostles. Although she appears to have been a critical part of Jesus’ early ministry, Mary Magdalene’s extraordinary faithfulness shines most brightly in the story of the passion. After Jesus’ arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, his male disciples abandoned him. Judas delivered him over to the authorities for a bribe. Peter denied him three times. And only John, described as “the apostle whom Jesus loved,” was present at the crucifixion. But Mary Magdalene and the band of women who followed Jesus and supported his ministry are described by all four gospel writers as being present during the savior’s darkest hours. Even after Jesus took his last breath, and all hope of redemption seemed lost, the women stayed by their teacher and their friend and prepared his body for burial. It is precisely because they were present, loyal even through failure, that the women who followed Jesus were the first to witness the event that would define Christianity: the resurrection. Gospel accounts vary, but all four identify Mary Magdalene as among the first witnesses of the empty tomb. According to the synoptic Gospels, she and a group of women rose early that fateful morning, three days after Jesus had died, to anoint the body with spices and per- fumes. When they arrived at the tomb, they were met by divine messengers guarding the entrance, who declared that Jesus had risen from the dead, just as he said he would. The women immediately left the tomb behind and, “with fear and great joy” (Matthew 28:8), ran to tell the other disciples. Luke notes that on their way, they remembered what Jesus had taught them about resurrection, confirmation of the fact that these women had been present for some of Christ’s most important and intimate revelations and that they took these teachings to heart. But when the breathless women arrived at the home where the disciples had gathered, the men did not believe them. Women were considered unreliable witnesses at the time (a fact that perhaps explains why the apostle Paul omitted the women from the resurrection account entirely in his letter to the Corinthian church), so their proclamation of the good news was dismissed by the men as an “idle tale,” the type of silly gossip typical of uneducated women. Perhaps the men invoked the widely held belief that, just like their sister Eve, women were easily duped. A few, however, were curious enough to take a look at the tomb, and so, according to John’s account, Mary returned with peter and another disciple to the place she had encountered the messengers. The men saw for them-selves an empty grave and a pile of linen wrappings folded neatly within it, and conceded to the women that the tomb was indeed empty. However, John 20:9 notes, “they still did not understand from scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.” The men returned to report what they had seen to the rest of the disciples, leaving Mary behind. Perhaps disciples posited the theory that Jesus’ body had been stolen, for John wrote that Mary, once so full of breathless excitement and impassioned belief, now stood outside the tomb, crying. Angels appeared and asked her what was wrong. “They have taken my Lord away,” she told them, fully accepting the disciple’s dismissal of her “idle tale." The angels were then joined by a mysterious man, whom Mary assumed to be the gardener. He, too, asked why she was crying. “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him,” she pleaded. Only when he called her by her name, did she recognize the man as Jesus. “Mary,” he said. “Rabboni!” she cried. “Do not hold on to me,” Jesus urged as she fell before his feet, “for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” And so again, Mary Magdalene ran to the house where the disciples were staying and told them she had seen the risen savior face-to-face. “I have seen the Lord!” she declared. But it was not until Jesus appeared to the men in person, allowing them to touch the wounds in his hands and side, that they finally believed. Far from being easily deceived, women were the first to make the connection between Christ’s teachings from scripture and his resurrection, and the first to believe these teachings when they mattered the most. For her valor in twice sharing the good news to the skeptical male disciples, the early church honored Mary Magdalene with the title of Apostle to the Apostles. That Christ ushered in this new era of life and liberation in the presence of women, and that he sent them out as the first witnesses of the complete gospel story, is perhaps the boldest, most overt affirmation of their equality in his kingdom that Jesus ever delivered. And yet too many Easter services begin with a man standing before a congregation of Christians and shouting, “he is risen!” to a chorused response of “he is risen indeed!” Were we to honor the symbolic details of the text, that distinction would always belong to a woman. *** This was an excerpt from A Year of Biblical Womanhood. This piece was republished with permission from rachelheldevans.com . *** Image: "Christ and St. Mary Magdalen at the Tomb." Rembrandt Van Rijn (1606-1669). Royal Collection Trust. Rachel Held Evans was a New York Times best-selling author whose books include Faith Unraveled (2010), A Year of Biblical Womanhood (2012), Searching for Sunday (2015), Inspired (2018). Hailing from Dayton, Tennessee—home of the famous Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925— she wrote about faith, doubt and life in the Bible Belt. She was featured in The Washington Post , The Guardian , Christianity Today, Slate, The Huffington Post, The CNN Belief Blog, and on NPR, The BBC, The Today Show, and The View. She served on President Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and kept a busy schedule speaking at churches, conferences, and colleges and universities around the country. Rachel and Dan welcomed their second child in 2018. Rachel passed away in 2019. Return to our Holy Days 2023 Table of Contents, Previous Next

“I’m willing to bet there are some people out there (actually, a lot of people) who would literally love to spend their careers revealing the presence of God to others.” < Back Sacramental Priesthood David Cowles Apr 15, 2024 “I’m willing to bet there are some people out there (actually, a lot of people) who would literally love to spend their careers revealing the presence of God to others.” Prior to 1800, it was more or less taken for granted that human life had some sort of transcendent purpose or value. After 1800…not so much! Popes Leo XIII, Pius X, and John XXIII each made a valiant, but largely unsuccessful, effort to win back the hearts and minds of the ‘once faithful’. The high water mark of this renewal was Vatican II (V2), the Church’s 20 th century effort to reinvent itself. For all its good intentions and fine documents, V2 did not accomplish its objective. In retrospect, JP2 probably did more to make the church relevant . Today, the Church is adrift. Even a generally popular Pope like Francis seems oddly out of touch. The Church’s structural and institutional problems are serious and well known but they are not the root cause of this cultural schism. That goes to something much deeper: Christians believe… or are expected to believe, things that fly in the face of everyday common sense : that God, the Maker of Heaven and Earth, is also a human being, born of a virgin to a working class family in first century Palestine; that he cured the sick, raised the dead, turned water into wine, wine into blood, and bread into his body; that he rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. Non-Christians… believe in science. See the problem? Believers and non-believers do not just disagree about things like Abortion; they disagree about what the World is ! What the meaning of ‘is’ is! Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away, science and religion coexisted, albeit uneasily. Science had its realm, religion had its, and never were the twain to meet. If this ‘two state solution’ ever worked, it certainly doesn’t today. Science strives to be a Theory of Everything (TOE) and, frankly, Theology should do the same, not excluding science, not co-opting it, but incorporating it. The scientific world view - logical, empirical, material and practical - has permeated every nook and cranny of civilian life. 8 year olds today are doing science that was unimaginable for 80 year olds a generation ago. It is hard to imagine a role for religion in such a world. However, we also know that the scientific world view is ultimately unsatisfying. Despite stupendous material progress, people are at least as unhappy today as they ever were. Stress, anxiety, depression, boredom, and self-harm are symptoms of an even deeper malaise – the loss of meaning and purpose. I mean a universe that comes into being spontaneously, evolves randomly, and vanishes without a trace is hardly reassuring. May I be excused for at least asking, “Could something else be going on?” I mean, if it turns out that everything is worthless and nothing has any meaning, then fine! But don’t expect me to go gentle into that no good night. Science offers no ultimate explanations; it can’t. It’s not in its nature. Now don’t get me wrong: science does an outstanding job of explaining things , one thing at a time, in terms of other things, one thing at a time. Any Best of Science highlight reel must include a shot of a billiards table. But why are there things to explain in the first place? Not a cue! (Oops, clue.) We have everything…we are nothing! Materialism has proven to be the first cousin of nihilism; so re-enter Christianity? Most Christians believe in science – deeply! It’s Nature after all. It’s the Mind of God. In 1000 CE, Pope Sylvester II was said to be the finest scientific mind in all Europe. In Jewish tradition, the Torah is thought to have been given twice: once as Written Torah (first five books of the Old Testament) and once as Oral Torah (nature, logos , the cosmic order). One law, two expressions! Science and religion don’t conflict…or even complement; they reinforce. A knowledge of science can and should lead to a deeper understanding of religion… and vice versa! But this is 2000, not 1000, CE, and it’s certainly not 500 BCE. Science reigns, religion is in exile. The priesthood itself, the scaffolding of the hierarchical Church, is an endangered species. There are no priests! And religious? Forget about it. What can a priest do? He (sic) can educate, heal, counsel, administer; he can perform the Works of Mercy…but so can others . A priest can ‘also’ facilitate the Seven Sacraments. These are 7 ‘moments’ or ‘stages’ in someone’s life that can bring a person into closer contact with the Transcendent. Generally speaking, this is something others can’t do! Beyond the 7 Sacraments, most of what the Church does can be laicized, subbed out, or snubbed out. Much can and should move to the public sector and/or to non-denominational charities. Where the Church wishes to retain a role, e.g. in education, there is no need for ordained clergy to be involved. Imagine a Church with two ‘tracks’: (1) the lay track for those primarily interested in public service, education, administration, charitable work; (2) the ordained track for those wishing to devote themselves to manifesting God’s presence through the Sacraments. We are all called to be Priest, Prophet, and King . Absolutely! But perhaps in our professional lives, we should be priest, prophet, or king. For example, reimagine the priesthood as a loose confederation of men (sic) welcoming newborns and converts, strengthening faith, hearing confessions, celebrating Mass (Eucharist), marrying couples, ordaining clergy, and easing the way for the sick and the dying. Not the worst job description! To whom could we compare such a ‘reformed’ clergy? To Robin Hood’s Merry Men, to Worker-priests, to Medieval troubadours, to Jack Kerouac’s Dharma Bums? Wait, I’ve got it, how about we compare the new priesthood to Jesus’ band of disciples (Gospel of Mark), wandering the border regions of Galilee, performing good works and manifesting the presence of God. In other words, the Church as Jesus and the Apostles lived it. How about that? Of course, in the process of carrying out these spiritual functions, priests would overlap with lay practitioners and even civil servants as the latter perform their material and/or social duties: caring, counseling, educating, et al. It could be no other way! Each Sacrament is not only an encounter with Christ; it is also an encounter with, and an unmasking of, the world ( Aletheia ). Sacraments strip away the world’s phenomenal veneer to reveal its noumenal essence. They hijack Parmenides’ Doxa and shine its ‘bright light’ on Aletheia . This is Neant without Etre , Dasein without Wassein , the unheard sound of a tree falling in a forest, the unheard sound of one hand clapping. Imagine officiating at these moments of sacramental epiphany…and doing it for a living! Doesn’t appeal to you? You’d rather shuffle papers? No problem. I’ve got plenty of work for you . But I’m willing to bet there are some people out there (actually, a lot of people) who would literally love to spend their careers revealing the presence of God to others. And if I’m right, Eureka! We have priests again! Maybe John Webster was right, “Better days are coming,” after all! 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 Holy Days 2024. 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