A Worldview in Aphorisms

I've wanted to publish a systematic exposition of my worldview for a long time, but the fear of being vain has made me hesitate. However, a friend really wants me to publish this kind of overarching philosophical perspective, and so I agreed.

What will follow is a line by line take on how I see the world at the present moment. This perspective will likely change in the future, so don't take anything I say here as definitive or authoritative. Think of it as a snapshot of my intellectual development. 

You can think of this worldview largely as a synthesis of three thinkers: Gottfried Leibniz in his Monadology, Ludwig Wittgenstein in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, and the Mormon theologian Adam S. Miller (as seen in his work Rube Goldberg Machines). Moreover, this work will be written aphoristically, or rather in the style of both Wittgenstein and Leibniz (and, at times, Miller).

Also, this post could be considered very dense. Be warned.

1. I will call the most basic constituent of reality an "intelligence".
2. Intelligences are without number.
3. All intelligences are simple and impenetrable.
4. All intelligences are conscious.
5. All intelligences exist independent of space and time (meaning that they are eternal).
6. All intelligences exist in a field of infinite possibility.
7. An intelligence's possibility consists in the possibilities of its relationships with other intelligences.
8. By an intelligence, I mean the same thing as Leibniz's monad, Wittgenstein's object/entity, or even Descartes' "I am".
9. In order for an intelligence to perceive other intelligences, it must group them.
10. I will call these perceptual groupings of intelligences "facts".
11. Most specifically, a fact is a way of perceiving intelligences in connection with other intelligences.
12. My "fact" is Wittgenstein's "picture". I differ from his conception in my belief that all "grouping" occurs through perception, and not in reality.
13. When perceived as part of a fact, intelligences lose certain possibilities.
14. In other words, to perceive an intelligence will negate certain possibilities or connections that it has in itself.
15. Facts can include each other.
16. You are an intelligence
17. The world you see around you is a fact, or the evidence of your relationship with other intelligences.
18. The world you see through your eyes is a fact that includes all intelligences that are visible (i.e. those that become perceptual through vision)
19. This works for the worlds of hearing, taste, touch, and smell, respectively.
20. The spiritual world is a fact including all intelligences that are visible to your spiritual eyes.
21. The spiritual world, as the spiritual world, cannot be perceived by the five senses. This means that intelligences cannot become perceptual through them, insofar as they become manifest spiritually.
22. The spiritual world is perceived though emotion. Your emotions are your spiritual eyes.
23. Your body is a fact. It includes the intelligences and facts that make up your organs, cells, molecules, etc..
24. Your spirit is a fact. It includes the intelligences and facts that make up your emotions, desires, etc..
25. A spirit appears to your emotions as a body.
26. Your soul is the fact that includes both your body and your spirit.
27. Jung's archetypes are spiritual facts that exist both within, alongside, and above your spiritual body.
28. Swedenborg saw this spiritual world, as have countless others.
29. The fact that our emotions, desires, etc. are visible through physical observation (say, through brain imaging) is due to the fact that certain intelligences are visible by both spiritual and physical eyes.
30. Intelligences can arrange themselves differently for different senses (hence the dissimilarity between a brain and a spirit body).
31. Space (or rather, extension) is a perceptual form of certain intelligences. That is to say, space is a way by which certain intelligences become manifest to other intelligences.
32. This is also true for time.
33. Though we see reality through facts, every fact excludes an almost infinite number of possibilities from our perception.
34. What we see is only a small fragment of what is.
35. In this respect Plato and Schopenhauer are correct.
36. However, this hidden world does not lie in progressively generic abstraction. It lies in what we exclude from our picture of reality.
37. This hidden world is greater than ours because it includes possibilities this world leaves out.
38. The atonement is, above all else, a connecting principle.
39. The atonement assembles facts.
40. Thus, the atonement brings to perceptual light those possibilities that are hidden or buried.
41. This is what is meant by repentance. Repentance is the unearthing of our excluded possibilities - our renewed ability to connect with other parts of being.
42. These observations can explain the Book of Mormon's peculiar historicity. The Book of Mormon is a fact that depicts previously unmanifest portions of history. It is history post-repentance.
43. To sin is to cling to a fact, and refuse to let the atonement displace it with something more comprehensive.
44. This is the essence of the Buddha's teachings on desire,
45. All sin is idolatry.
46. To sin is to negate possibility.
47. To sin is to refuse connection.
48. The result of sin is death. Death is negated possibility or connection.
49. Spiritual death is the negation of our soul's connection with God.
50. Physical death (the result of Adam's sin) is the negation of our body's connection with our spirit. Or rather, it is the negation of the fact that is the soul.
51. Resurrection is how the atonement reconnects the body and the spirit as a fact.
52. When we are resurrected, the facts of our spirit and our body are reunited in a new, greater, fact.
53. Resurrection makes the spiritual and the physical indistinguishable.
54. Every human relationship is a fact.
55. A relationship is a resurrection for both members. It participates both members in a new way of being.
56. It reveals new possibilities and connections for both people.
57. This resurrection, like all others,  is powerful to the extent that that there are differences to connect.
58. A homogeneous connection is weak to the extent that it is homogeneous.
59. Gay marriage is objectionable in this way: namely, that it tries to connect what is already identical.
60. For it is not primarily the man and the woman that connect in a marriage, but the fact that he is a man  and the fact that she is a woman.
61. Marriage should not thought of as a way to achieve satisfaction, but as a way by which a new fact can be manufactured.
62. A marriage is a way by which unique possibilities can be actualized.
63. Marriage as a fact can only occur through tension (i.e. incommensurable difference) between the sexes.
64. Eternal marriage respects all that is different without subjecting it to homogeneity.
65. This subjection is the problem that feminism objects to, and unfortunately, often perpetuates.
66. The only way to respect both sexes is to regard them as different. All else is chauvinism.
67. The homogenization of society is nothing more than a way by which people can see others as objects, or as tools for their own preferences.
68. Eternal marriage respects the most fundamental difference between people, and thus helps us refuse to subject each other to our own preferences and needs.
69. Eternal marriage is the only way we can respect the other sex as individuals, and not as objects to be desired or shunned.
70. In an eternal marriage, the partners do not lose their identity, but like the sealing room mirrors, reciprocally contain each other to infinity.
71. This reflection can only occur with enough distance to see clearly.
72. The family is a fact.
73. Humanity is a fact, but only insofar as it is composed of the facts made up by individual families.
74. The family is the perceptual form of humanity as a whole, much like a tree is the perceptual form of the tree's parts.
75. I will define God as that intelligence that organized the world's intelligences in a way that they appear consistently to each other.
76. Without God, the facts made by intelligences would be unpredictable (i.e. unorganized).
77. This is the essence of George Berkeley's theology.
78. This principle of organizing intelligences is, in principle, no different from creating a work of art. We differ only in power.
79. God is human insofar as he appears human to our senses. He is to a human body what a fruit is to a seed.
80. God is omnipotent in the respect that he dwells in a space of infinite possibility.
81. God is in one place at one time in the respect that he can appear to us in person. His infinite possibility precludes the limits of absolute space and time.
82. The priesthood is the potency of God's possibility.
83. When we overcome sin by means of the atonement, we perceive more and more of reality's possibilities and connections.
84. This happens to the extent that we live in the present, for the present moment is the point where finite facts dissolve into infinity.
85. The present is where the light of God's possibility shines through into facts.
86. Sin wishes to remain in the past or the future. No unclean thing can dwell in the present.
87. The Celestial Kingdom is a fact that includes all intelligences.
88. The lesser kingdoms include a smaller number of intelligences. 
89. A person can be so depraved to be a kingdom (or a fact) only unto himself.
90. In this respect, being in the Celestial Kingdom is a way of perceiving infinite possibility and infinite connection.
91. This is what is meant by the ability to create worlds: namely, the ability to perceive any number of facts within the sea of infinite possibility.
92. We exist eternally and unconditionally in connection with all things. God's work and glory is to have us see this.
93. Our existence is a journey from "being" to "seeing".
94. The celestial earth mentioned in D&C 130 is the universe as it appears to a celestial being - one where all things contain each other.
95. Our destiny is to see ourselves in all people, places, events, ideas, and works of art. 
96. Similarly, our destiny is to see all of those things in us.
97. This is eternal life: to be eternally connected to all things. We should settle for nothing less.

Why Wittgenstein Admired Mormons

On the evening of August 5, 1949, an ill Ludwig Wittgenstein took a walk with his friend and fellow philosopher Oets Bouwsma. 

Wittgenstein had agreed to Bouwsma's invitation to lecture at Cornell University, and he had arrived in the United States only a month previously. As a part of their exchange, Wittgenstein brought up an interesting topic, one that Bouwsma felt important enough to remember years later.

Bouwsma remembers their conversation in the following excerpt:

"As we approached the car, he asked me whether I had ever had any acquaintance with the Mormons. They fascinated him. They are a fine illustration of what faith will do. Something in the heart takes hold. And yet to understand them! To understand a certain obtuseness is required. One must be obtuse to understand. He likened it to needing big shoes to cross a bridge with cracks in it. One mustn't ask questions."

As both a Wittgenstein fan and a faithful Latter-day Saint, this isolated remark strikes to the core of my intellect and emotion. But this doesn't happen in a negative way. I have grown to trust Wittgenstein's judgments more than those of any other philosopher, and the fact that he respects my faith gives me comfort where other things might not. 

However, you might think Wittgenstein's statement near the end of the excerpt odd. If Wittgenstein does respect Mormons, why does he say that a thinker needs to be "obtuse" to understand them? This seems to present a problem, but I am familiar enough with his writings to see that his underlying themes present themselves here. For Wittgenstein has never thought it a shameful thing to stop asking questions. 

For instance, consider this:

"For an answer which cannot be expressed the question too cannot be expressed. The riddle does not exist. If a question can be put at all, then it can also be answered. [...]

We feel that even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all. Of course there is then no question left, and just this is the answer.

The solution of the problem of life is seen in the vanishing of this problem. (Is not this the reason why men to whom after long doubting the sense of life became clear, could not then say wherein this sense consisted?)" (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 6.5, 6.52, 6.521)

Or this:

"The real discovery is the one that makes me capable of stopping doing philosophy when I want to. The one that gives philosophy peace, so that it is no longer tormented by questions which bring itself into question." (The Big Typescript)

Or even this:

"The questions that we raise and our doubts depend on the fact that some propositions are exempt from doubt, are as it were like hinges on which those turn." (On Certainty 341)

Again and again, Wittgenstein depicts the truly wise person as one who has control over their question-asking. If (according to the early Wittgenstein) you try to think or say what cannot be said, or if (according to the later Wittgenstein, who is really saying the same thing) you use your language games beyond their intended scope, you will restlessly seek for meaning where there is none to be found. Words in our language such as "be" or "true", or phrases such as "the extent of space" or "the passage of time" will bewitch our human sensibilities until we see the universe as hopelessly incompatible with human meaning and values.

Wittgenstein says that you can solve this problem by making making your questions disappear, for only if you stop trying to solve the "riddle of the universe" will you actually understand the answer to it. This takes faith. You must be confident that meaning will arise even if you don't seek it, that the inexpressible will indeed show itself. For the faithful person doesn't ascend to Heaven by their own efforts; he waits for Heaven to descend upon him. And this is why Wittgenstein admired Mormons.

When Wittgenstein talked about the requisite obtuseness to understand Mormonism, all he meant was this ability to cease our questioning by faith. The Mormons who endured persecution at the hands of mobs, the Mormons who crossed the plains in handcarts, or the Mormons who endured centuries of ridicule by popular culture; they don't waste time asking unanswerable questions. This noble people has faith that the universe is ultimately meaningful, and this faith bears observable fruits.They don't doubt; they live. 

We don't believe in a big abstraction at the heart of reality, whether you call it "the laws of nature", or soften it by giving it the name of an impersonal God. We instead agree with Wittgenstein when he said that "the world and life are one", (Tractatus 5.621) for we assert that the universe is not cold and absurd, but intimate and personal. Furthermore, the doctrine that God is a man allows us to declare together with Wittgenstein that the limits of the world are human, for they were, in a sense, made by a human God. Indeed, we also agree with Wittgenstein when he says that:

"As long as you imagine the soul as a thing, a body in the head, this hypothesis is not at all dangerous. It is not the crudity and incompleteness of our models that brings danger, but their vagueness." (The Big Typescript)

After all, what comes more naturally to Mormons than the idea of an anthropomorphic soul? And what is more hostile to the ethereal vagueness of certain popular models of the self?

The greatest philosopher of the twentieth century not only admired Mormons, but preached a philosophy that resonates with the essentials of the Mormon faith. He taught that we should not reach beyond the confines of our humanity, declaring that such intellectual hubris would only cause us pain. In similitude to Mormon beliefs, he also taught that the only world we could ever know was one of humanity, for the only way he thought we could encounter the world is through the human phenomenon of language. In short, both Wittgenstein and the Mormon faith declare the world to be compatible with human longings and ideals. If it is the case that we feel existential anxiety when looking at the world, they say it is likely because we misperceive its inherent humanity

For if we cease our striving for answers on earth, they will come to us from heaven. If, whether by exhaustion or by choice, the question disappears, the answer will immediately appear. This is faith, that virtue which Wittgenstein found so overflowing in the Mormon people. And what better expresses that virtue than the most famous Wittgenstein saying of all?:

"Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent." (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 7)

The Nature of Sin

I've recently had a really cool insight into the psychological nature of sin, and I'd like to share it with you all.

Everybody knows that a sin is a sin because it transgresses the will of God. However, most people never stop to think of what we mean by the phrase "God's will." Is it just an arbitrarily imposed mandate upon us? Is sin, then, just to go against the whims of an unpredictable God? In my opinion, God's will is something far more fundamental. Namely, I believe that the will of God is truth.

But even this is too vague; "truth" also needs a definition. When we say that something is "true", we normally refer to an intellectual proposition of some sort, but that's not what I mean. Instead, I believe that the best definition of truth would be something like: "the nature of something as it is in itself." This more broadly means that a being who partakes in truth would be free from compulsion, "free" being the crucial word here. You could use even more words to describe this state, including: "authentic", "unconstrained", or even "spontaneous."

To be free from sin is to be free from compulsion. Thus, I will define sin as anything that impedes your ability to act from your authentic nature as a human being. But this hardly means that you should be able to do whatever you want - most of the time, our desires are a manifestation of constraint itself. To be truly free from sin is to have your actions be yours, and not the result of some mental compulsion. After all, sin compels us to act against what we really want, to place our stock in something that does not reflect our true nature and wishes.

The individual who sins has a false image of who he is. He paints for himself an overly simplified self portrait, ignoring those things that don't jive with his ideals or his perceived strengths. But it is just those things he ignores, just those parts of himself that he chooses not to identify with, that compel him to act sinfully. 

To see this, I'll conjure up an imaginary person for you. Suppose that there is a woman who, above all else, identifies herself as a "people person". She focuses exclusively on the human aspects of life, meaning that there is nothing more important to her than emotions, feelings, and personality. Naturally, she wants as much social harmony as possible. But this woman doesn't realize that she is ignoring a crucial aspect of her nature as a human being. Because she detests the idea of interpersonal conflict, those parts of her which rightfully long for healthy objective criticism will "get angry", and rebel against her. Normally, this will mean that she gets out all her criticism in single, emotional bursts, and it is precisely her rejection of criticism that leads to its dominance over her.

This tendency for criticism is her sin. Until she learns to value those parts of her that need to view things objectively and critically, they will rise up and subjugate her. But if she is wise enough to value those parts (and humble enough to let go of her strengths, to an extent) they will stop controlling her, and she will be free of them.

Let me give another example: imagine a man, who, instead of being a "people person", identifies himself as a "steward of ideas". He would spend his days coming up with abstract theories to explain things, and nothing would give him more pleasure than to find the latest new perspective. However, a focus on abstract possibilities nearly always entails deficient attention to the facts of concrete reality. This person would repress any and all capacity for dealing with the world of concrete facts and the world of his senses, and so, like the woman above, the parts of him which identify with that concrete reality would rise up in rebellion. This could lead him to engage in several bad behaviors, such as obsessing or binge diving into sensual pleasures, but they would all take the form of an over-correction into concrete reality, to make up for his lopsided psyche.

Whether it is anger in the woman or sensual desire in the man, the point is that sin comes from what we refuse to see in ourselves. If you have an overly simplified picture of yourself, the parts of you that the picture leaves out will not stop harassing you until you correct it. In practice, this often means being realistic about your desires and your needs. You must be brave enough to see yourself as you are, a task which can often be very frightening. 

Practically speaking, you must use two things to be ready to abandon sin: humility and love. If you are humble, you are willing to see yourself as you are, a being with both strengths and flaws. This humility gives you the capacity to stop relying as much on your established strengths, for it is these strengths that oppress the parts of you that you neglect. In truth, it is often these neglected parts that cause our weaknesses, as we forgo a hidden well of talent or strength when we refuse to develop them. But humility is nothing without love. Giving up sin means that you must be ready to love those neglected parts of you unconditionally and without regard to worth. This does not come on its own, however, for only God's love is up to that task. To truly abandon sin, we must do what is necessary to receive the light of divine love, for only the nourishment it brings can heal the neglect we have caused ourselves.

This popular quotation from the Book of Mormon pretty much hits the nail on the head:

"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." (Ether 12:27)

All sin comes from self-neglect, or rather, by acting on a false image of who you are. But if you pray to God, asking Him faithfully and fervently to show you your true identity, He will set you on a path to find it. It will take great humility and patience, but at the end of the journey you will find yourself as you are. It may not be what you expected, but you will realize God has given you your identity for a grand purpose of which we cannot now understand. But most importantly, when you see yourself, you will find that you no longer have to pretend. You won't have to chase after phantoms or idols of self-identity, but will be content to "be what you will be" (see Exodus 3:14). At that point sin will have lost its appeal; you'll see that all sin is a deceiving mirage. Then, stepping into the light, you will be happy, and you will be you.

On the Effects of Prayer

Hello, all. In this post, I'm going to say a few brief words on prayer and on how it can affect our lives.

Regular prayer is probably the most important thing you need to do to grow closer to God. The more you pray, the more you will realize that you are not alone in this world, and that a kind and loving God watches over every step you take. Prayer can give your mind peace when there isn't any to be found in the everyday world. It helps you learn to be faithful, optimistic, and loving. But above all, every prayer you make brings you closer to God, ensuring that you will be able to rely on Him even in the darkest of worldly nights.

That said, I think I should talk about the specific effects of prayer. Rather, I'll talk about the effects of prayer's various parts: thanksgiving, asking for blessings (both for others and yourself), and repentance

1. Thanksgiving: The more I have lived life, the more I have become aware that I can do nothing of worth on my own. Every time that I try to raise myself above my failures or shortcoming by my own effort, I sink just as fast into the misery that preceded it. Without God, I can do nothing. My Father in Heaven gives me everything that I need to live a full and happy life, but the more I ignore my blessings and have vain ambitions, the more I fall into despair.

I know that the more you use prayer to express your gratitude for blessings, the more you will feel happy with what you already have. You will realize that the act of "gaining more" has never made anyone happy, for the more someone desires things for himself, the further away his satisfaction recedes. Happiness cannot occur without gratitude, and there are many things for which one cannot be grateful without God. Thus, the act of expressing gratitude to God lets you truly be happy where you are. This is humility, and I believe that you can become more humble when you sincerely express gratitude to your Heavenly Father.

2. Asking for God to bless others: When I ask my Father in Heaven to bless those who need help, I feel a greater sense of love and concern for them. This is not accidental. In fact, I believe that the more you humbly ask your Father in Heaven to bless those in need, the more you will feel a Christlike concern for them. This is the Pauline virtue of charity, and this part of prayer stands as one of the best ways to let it grow within you.

3. Asking for God to bless you: I used to feel ashamed when I asked God for help in temporal things, but I now realize that I saw things incorrectly. When you ask God for blessings in your life, it isn't a manifestation of pride. Rather, it's one of faith. If what you ask for is good for you, the act of asking for it in prayer will help you have faith that it will happen. Or more accurately, this type of prayer will increase your hope in future blessings, while building your faith in God's ability to help you.

4. Repentance: Everyone does bad things, but not everyone realizes why those things are bad. True sin always causes suffering, and this suffering is the reason we call an action a sin. However, most people are willing to turn a blind eye to the long-term fruits of their sinful actions, focusing more on the immediate pleasure that the sin affords them. Repentance, or rather the act confessing your sins to God in prayer, helps you connect the sin and its fruits. If you tell God that you're sincerely sorry for your bad actions, He will help you remember the suffering that they cause. By examining yourself and bringing your sins all before God, He will help you escape from the endless loop from sin to suffering and back again, even if it only happens bit by bit. This kind of prayer will make you more and more conscious of the effects of your actions, fulfilling King Benjamin's exhortation to "watch yourselves, and your thoughts, and your words, and your deeds" (Mosiah 4:30).

As a final note to all of this, I think that it's extremely important that you consider how you say your prayers. For myself, my prayers aren't nearly as effective when I do it passively, or just rambling off what I need to say. If I could give one piece of advice to you on the subject, I would say this: make sure that you really mean your prayers. For me, this means that I have to stop after each item in prayer, and try to really feel what I'm trying to say. If I say that I'm thankful for such-and-such, I will try to really internalize the gratitude that I'm expressing. If ask for God to bless others, I will take a moment to try to feel more love for them than I do at my default. If I bring my sins before God in repentance, I will try to feel true regret, or godly sorrow, for my bad actions. And finally, if I ask God for temporal blessings, I try to exercise a firm faith in the future fulfillment of that blessing.

By doing all these things, you can open myself up to the light of God in a way that isn't possible otherwise. When you really mean your prayer, you "turn up its volume", so to speak. If you "put yourself out there" in prayer, you won't be disappointed. You'll discover that God has always been behind the scenes, and that you'll discover Him to the extent that you look.

Silence

I've been interested a lot lately in the idea of silence. You might not think much of this concept, especially seeing as silence is getting harder and harder to come by in today's world. But there is something sacred about the absence of sound, an explicitly divine character which I find difficult to explain directly. Thankfully, others have done it for me. In what follows, I will quote the works of several philosophers and show you their take on what makes silence such a spiritually-important phenomenon.

First, I will quote the beginning of 19th-century philosopher Søren Kierkegaard's short work Lily of the Field, Bird of the Air:

"From the lily and the bird as teachers, let us learn: silence, or learn to be silent. Surely it is speech that distinguishes humanity above the animal, and then, if you like, far above the lily. But because the ability to speak is an advantage, it does not follow that the ability to be silent would not be an art or would be an inferior art. On the contrary, because the human being is able to speak, the ability to be silent is an art, and a great art precisely because this advantage so easily tempts him. But this he can lean from the silent teachers, the lily and the bird: "Seek first God's kingdom and his righteousness." But what does this mean, what am I to do, or what is the effort that can be said to seek  to aspire to God's kingdom? Shall I see about getting a position commensurate who my talents and abilities in order to be effective in it? No, you shall first seek God's kingdom. Shall I then go out and proclaim this doctrine to the world? No, you shall first seek God's kingdom. But then in a certain sense it us nothing I shall do? Yes, quite true, in a certain sense it is nothing. In the deepest sense you shall make yourself nothing, become nothing before God, learn to be silent. In this silence is the beginning, which is to seek first God's kingdom."

In the scripture from which Kierkegaard's treatise gets its title, (Matthew 6: 25-34) Jesus encourages his disciples to forgo seeking food, drink, or clothing for the eternal goal of salvation. And while this goal may involve reading your scriptures, going to church, or praying, Kierkegaard here observes that the kingdom itself is not identical with any of these things. If we seek to read the scriptures simply for the sake of reading the scriptures, we miss the point of spirituality entirely. These spiritual activities are merely lenses through which we can perceive divine light, meaning that to focus on them alone ignores the overarching goal to which they allow us to come closer. 

To have true peace, we must cease desiring things for their own sake and instead seek first God's kingdom. The desire for Heaven must thus lie at the very forefront of our will, meaning that we should not strive to do anything unless it lies within our desire to follow the will of God. But Kierkegaard doesn't just mean this in the most obvious sense. Instead, we must abandon even our desire for spiritual peace and freedom from sin, for even these are manifestations of our selfish will to change.

You may wonder, then, what it is that a person should do. How can we follow the will of God, after all, if we act selfishly whichever way we turn? The answer, it seems, lies in silence. We must let the loud buzzing of our selfish will subside into quiet stillness, and allow the love of God to work silently within us. For only this love can bring peace.

Next, consider this quotation from the beginning of 17th-century mystic Jakob Boehme's work The Suprasensual Life:

"The student said to the teacher, 'How may I come to that life beyond the senses that I may see God and hear God speak?' The teacher said, 'If you can swing yourself up for a moment into that in which no creature dwells, then you will hear what God speaks.'

The student said, 'Is that near or far?' The teacher said, 'It is within you. If you could remain silent from all of your willing and sensing for one hour, then you will hear unutterable words of God.'

The student said, 'How may I hear when I keep silent from sensing and willing?' The teacher said, 'If you keep silent from sensing and willing of your self, then the eternal hearing, seeing, and speaking will be revealed within you, and God will hear and see through you. Your own hearing, willing, and seeing hinder you, so that you do not see or hear God.'

The student spoke, 'With what shall I hear and see God, if God is beyond nature and creaturely life?' The teacher spoke, 'If you would remain silent, then you are what God was before nature and creatureliness, that from which God created your nature and creatureliness. So hear and see with what God saw and heard in you, before your own willing, seeing, and hearing began.'"

Boehme also believes that silence is divine, but  makes some bolder claims to that effect than Kierkegaard ever does. He believes that Jesus spoke more or less literally when he said that "the Kingdom of God is within you", and that you can access the Kingdom if you perceive themselves as you truly are. But the more we follow the whims of our individual will and the demands of our senses, the more we separate ourselves from this inner connection to God. This also means, of course, the more we abandon our own will and way of looking at things, the more we become able to see past the shallow surface of our ego to the divinity that lies deep within. And this happens through silence.

Silence is more than just the absence of sound. For Kierkegaard and Boehme, it actually represents a viewpoint in which nothing separates the soul from reality, where the dichotomies of great and small, sacred and common, and even subject and object become erased. When we become silent, we bring heaven down to earth, or rather, we perceive that heaven and earth were never really separate to begin with. For all dichotomies are a form of noise, an oscillating vibration that becomes still in the embrace of silence.
 
Silence lies at the very heart of reality. When a person rests in silence, they never concern themselves with going anywhere; they realize that they have only ever been here, and they are perfectly content with that. They realize that silence is the mother of all opposites, and that being silent is a way of transforming opposition into love. Finally, they see that this world is much greater than it seems to most. For behind all the traffic, the pedestrians, and the TV, there does not only lie silence, but the brilliance of God's light. 

To achieve this transcendent state, we must offer up to God our selfish desire to change the world by our own efforts. This world, after all, belongs to God, and our attempts to usurp His power merely add ripples on its figurative surface.The only way we can ever hope to achieve peace, hope, or salvation is to silence our individual will, and so let the eternal will of God become revealed in us. The world, after all, is a kind of river, and the will of God is the current that continually ushers us forward to our individual destinies. If we try to swim in a direction that makes sense to us, we will only end up exhausting ourselves in an effort to swim upstream. For the only real way to be at peace in this life is to stop striving for it. We must learn to be still and trust the stream, knowing beyond all question that God will always lead us forward to the place we are meant to be. 

Embracing silence is hardly naivité or blind faith. It is rather a profound trust of reality, a deep acceptance of God's biblical declaration that "the world is good" (Genesis 1:31). When we find peace with the silence behind all things, we will suddenly find that the world becomes noticeably smaller: not in a claustrophobic way, but in the sense of knowing that "all things will work together for our good" (Romans 8:28). Instead of feeling the existential anxiety that comes from seeing the world as absurd, the silent person comes to see the universe as nothing more frightening than a nursery in which to grow and learn. And instead of perceiving the conflict of opposites, they will see each form of opposition as a kind of embrace.

Forms of Meditation

In one of my recent posts, I talked about how I use the Book of Mormon as a form of meditation. I have thought about this idea at great length, and it occured to me a few days ago that I could put together a whole post on the subject of meditation and its various forms. So that's what I'm going to do.

I should probably give you a definition of the term, shoudn't I? While I may wax ambitious by trying to define something as broad as meditation, I believe that all forms of meditative practice have a simple and overarching commonality. I will present this shared trait in the form of a quotation from the Book of Mormon:

"For he hath answered the ends of the law, and he claimeth all those who have faith in him; and they who have faith in him will cleave unto every good thing [...]" (Moroni 7:28)

When you "cleave unto every good thing", you don't just display a naive optimism or cheeriness, but rather exercise one of the primary fruits of faith. Since all good things come from God, this occurs because having faith in Him will cause you to have faith in all of his creations. Everything would therefore gain an almost infinitely greater value, since you would see a divine hand in all things. 

This "looking for the good" constitutes the essence of meditation. More specifically, I believe that meditation involves looking for the good where it isn't immediately apparent. By trying to find value in things they would otherwise neglect or pass over, the student of meditation will eventually learn to find value in everything around them. Moreover, this process involves actively trying to avoid judgment, for only if a person becomes willing to avoid prejudice will they find good in the things they previously rejected.

That said, I will divide meditation into two overarching categories: "inbound" meditation, and "outbound" meditation. Practicing "inbound mediation" involves placing yourself in a nonjudgmental attitude toward the external world. Every moment you live your life, you take in incredible amounts of data from the people, objects, and activities that surround you, and it is precisely this intake of information that constitutes the essence of our experience as human beings. However, this faculty of perception hardly occurs uniformly. As a part of the human condition, you and all other human beings favor some perceptions above others, and this naturally means that some perceptions will get suppressed. For example, we here in Utah have long since forgotten what it's like to look at our mountains with "fresh eyes". We think of them as simply "there", meaning that we can never experience the outsider's wonder at, say, Mount Timpanogos.

Inbound meditation is how you avoid favoring some experiences above others. Through its various forms, it can teach you to see the good in all outer phenomena, regardless of their outer appearance or worth in the eyes of the world. Naturally this leads to a greater enjoyment of life. Because it can cause you to have less of a prior prejudice against certain types of experience, inbound meditation gives the practitioner a greater appreciation for all things virtuous, lovely, or of good report.

But how does one practice it? I actually think that many activities capture the spirit of inbound meditation, but they all have a common structure, which goes as follows: the practitioner focuses on something he or she thinks is inconsequential, and by repeatedly trying to find the "good" in it, the person finds that they can better find the good in all things. Generic mindfulness meditation falls quite nicely into this category, for when people focus fully on some object of focus like the breath, they generally find it increasingly easy to enjoy sensations in the world (or "be present"). The breath does not hold a monopoly on this kind of meditation, though. Even when seated in traditional meditative positions, you can also choose to focus on a specific spot in your field of vision, a repeated short phrase or "mantra", or even a simple, repetitive song.  (See this article for an excellent treatise on mantras in a Mormon context)

Inbound meditation need not always have such an oriental character. From my perspective, any object in the external world which is both simple and constant can act as the requisite focus for this kind of activity. I have already mentioned the Book of Mormon as such an object, but in fact, many activities can have this effect. For instance, I believe the process of coming to believe a doctrine or teaching qualifies as inbound meditation. Likewise, the act of loving someone in a romantic context can have this kind of effect (perhaps the reason why a certain Beatle didn't hear the bells on the hill "till there was you").

However, you can also practice "outbound" meditation. Just as inbound meditation involves being nonjudgmental of those things that come in at you from the world, you practice its opposite when you avoid judging those things that come out into the world from you. This might strike you as odd, seeing as most people think that we should avoid saying or doing certain things at all costs. But we cannot avoid the fact that most, if not all of us repress certain things about ourselves. In other words, there are parts of you that, despite the fact that they exist and have needs, are buried and repressed by the conscious mind. 

To give an example, suppose a person identifies very strongly as a clear-headed intellectual. He or she would picture themselves almost exclusively as a person who can reason through ideas logically and deductively, and this person's self-image would depend entirely on their capacity for thought and reason. However, since human beings are almost never completely lopsided, this hypothetical intellectual (who, by the way, is not me) would almost certainly repress a  human capacity for emotion and connection. This is not something abnormal, however. In fact, it is the very fact of their talent that ensures the presence of a corresponding weakness.

Though I intend to talk about this much more in a following post, it should suffice to know that everyone favors certain things about themselves at the expense of others. However, those rejected parts of your identity are far from dormant; they want very badly else to have more of a voice in the congress of your conscious mind and to have a say in what you do. The process of listening to it and giving it what it wants is essential to psychological well-being, and I believe that what I call "outbound" meditation is the best way to do this. 

In short, outbound meditation involves being nonjudgmental of whatever comes out of your mind. In the process of our day-to-day lives, we explicitly reject certain thoughts or behaviors because they are somehow "unacceptable" or "irrelevant". However, more often than not these spontaneous eruptions from your mind represent the cries of its buried unconscious, and you will not achieve much psychological progress until you learn to find the good in them. 

The way to do this is simple: pick a medium of art, and spontaneously and uncritically create. Don't care about how good you are or about whether or not people will like it; all you need to do in order to practice outbound meditation is to treat everything that comes out of your mind with value. However, you should also try to somehow create from a feeling, as if you let that feeling create for you. In this way, the psychological "energy" that lies behind it can have a means of expression, by which it can vent off some of its inner pressure.

The famous psychologist Carl Jung called this process "active imagination". He believed that it was a manifestation of a sort of mental "transcendent function", by which the conscious and the unconscious parts of your mind work together. As a result of this cooperation, he says that you build a bridge between those warring parts of your psyche, so as to better "integrate" those parts of you with which you don't identify.

But this is all very theoretical. To speak more practically, know that I practice this kind of outbound meditation, and that I have benefited greatly from it. By writing directly from my inner centers of conflict and stress, I am able to come to a greater understanding of what that part of me wants, and moreover, what to do about it. I am a writer, but this also works in the context of painting, sculpture, dance, and music. It can also occurin a religious context. When I kneel down to pray, I pour forth to my Father all of my worries and and my inner conflicts, and almost immediately I feel a greater sense of inner peace and calm. Moreover, the journal-writing which the general authorities have encouraged us to do fulfills this same function, for it lets us relieve externally much of the pressure we feel internally.

To sum up, these two kinds of mediation are mirror images of each other. One of them takes a divided and lopsided perception of the world and unifies it by bringing it into our consciousness, and one of them takes a divided and lopsided consciousness, and unifies it by bringing it out into our perception of the world. By using these two forms of meditative practice, I have found my life much more enjoyable and easier to manage. I would wholeheartedly recommend both of these activities to anyone who finds that their life is hard, or even to anyone at all.

Observations on the Book of Mormon, Part 2

Hello again!  As promised, here goes the second part of my Book of Mormon analysis. This post will differ from the previous one in that it will focus on the process of gaining a testimony, as opposed to merely the text itself.

3.  Gaining a testimony is a way of accepting the unknown

While I am quite interested in the efforts of Book of Mormon archaeologists, I can't help feeling that they are somehow missing the book's point. They may find a great deal of similarity and correspondence between this work of scripture and the history of ancient Mesoamerica, but there will always remain equally powerful arguments against the book's historical validity. This is as it should be. The intellectual arguments for and against the Book of Mormon's historicity will always invalidate each other, meaning that humble seekers after truth have nothing to rely upon except faith.

The Book of Mormon's historical reality is what I like to call an "epistemically neutral proposition". Because no one can find a conclusive argument to prove or disprove it, anyone who wishes to decide one way or the other will inevitably find frustration. If someone wishes to get out of this double-bind, they must choose one of two options. 

The first is to tell yourself that the Book of Mormon has no evidence (a proposition which is absolutely false) and by doing so cling only to those things which are undeniable "common-sense". But when someone rejects the Book of Mormon, they do so because they are uncomfortable staying in the no-man's-land of intellectual ambiguity, and this occurs in turn because they do not like the idea of the "unknown". This presents a problem. Not only is the historicity of the Book of Mormon empirically unkowable, but also many things which are crucial to our existence as human beings - the future, the unconscious part of our psyches, and even groups of people with whom we are unfamiliar. If a person has an adversarial relationship to the unknown, they will face these uncertainties with fear and hostility. They will take drastic efforts to control things which cannot be controlled, will try to beat all parts of themselves which they do not like into submission, and consider all strange people as enemies. This is the basic human condition, the scriptural "natural man". When someone rejects the Book of Mormon, they merely perpetuate the adversarial attitude of all natural men and women toward things they do not know or understand. However, there is another way.

When someone believes the Book of Mormon to be true despite all epistemic ambiguity, something remarkable begins to happen. Instead of rejecting those parts of the book which lack evidence or don't make sense, he or she learns to wholeheartedly embrace them, and show faith even when it seems impossible. By continuing to read this book regularly, they work at their acceptance of the unknown like training a muscle. Soon, their attitude toward the world begins to change, allowing them to become more loving of others, more accepting of themselves, and more able to go with the flow of life. I have felt this process myself. The more I read the Book of Mormon, the more love and acceptance I can show to both other people and myself, for real love requires the same patience and faith we exercise while reading that amazing work of scripture. In all honesty, I can think of no better way to overcome fear and hatred than by using the kind of practice inherent in this struggle for faith.

4. There are two Books of Mormon

I previously quoted Grant Hardy as saying that the Book of Mormon is "better than it sounds". Since then I have reflected upon this quip, and it suddenly struck me that his remark has more truth than meets the eye. How so? I actually believe that it is true because there are not one, but two Books of Mormon.

Seeing as the number of the book's copies far exceeds two, you may become confused at this point. However, instead of actually counting the number of books in physical existence, I simply mean that every edition of the Book of Mormon contains two versions of the text within it: one external, and one internal. The external Book of Mormon is a tediously-written story about the origins of the Native American people. It is awkwardly-worded in parts, potentially racist in others, and contains an overall sense of condemnation. This external text is all some people will ever know about the Book of Mormon, for many only concern themselves with what lies on the intellectual surface. Little do they know that such "chloroform in print" (to quote Mark Twain) conceals another book within.

To reuse an idea from the Little Prince, no one can read the "internal" Book of Mormon with their eyes. This inner book escapes all attempts to read it critically or while trying to compare it to external criteria, for we can only learn its teachings with an eye that "cleaves unto every good thing". This principle of "looking for the good" in all things is actually the key to the Book of Mormon. In fact, I daresay that it is nothing less than a Urim and Thummim for we who read. When we exercise this love for all things good, the Book of Mormon suddenly changes from a mass of incoherent language to a beautiful testimony of all that is good and true.

If you allow me to speak directly, you stand in Joseph Smith's place. Each and every reader of the Book of Mormon has been invited to unearth an ancient record from beneath the built-up earth of time, and while it may take years of patience to actually be in a place to comprehend its teachings, we can all eventually begin the arduous task of translating it. By using the twin interpreters of love and faith, you can slowly begin to peel back the seemingly objectionable surface, until you finally stare face-to-face with what lies within. And what lies within is glorious. Beneath each and every flaw lies pure goodwill, incommensurable truth, and above all, the blazing fire of love. But this fire does not stay put. Its embers constantly fly out to those in its presence, and when you behold it in even portion of its glory, it will captivates you with an erupting flame. Soon after everything catches fire, and you will begin to see in everything the brilliant love of God's heaven. Everyone around you will become nobler, each and every idea will contain more truth, and even the very colors surrounding you will shine will a brightness you haven't seen since the days of your childhood. 

Conclusion

That's that. I've actually decided that this will be the last post in this series, as opposed to the three that I tentatively promised you. But before I go, I'd like to say a few words to you in summary.

If you learn to have faith in the Book of Mormon despite all its imperfections, you can better see past the imperfections of all things. This wondrous work of scripture is a perfect laboratory, a remarkable training ground in which you can fearlessly grow the seed of your faith until it blossoms into a veritable Tree of Life. But with faith comes love.   By embracing the strange and the unknowable, the arms of your love can reach even farther than you can see with your eyes. In fact, the Book of Mormon will teach you not only how to extend your love to the unkown reaches of the world, but also to that strangest thing of all - yourself. 

I bear your my testimony that the Book of Mormon is true. While it may seem strange and needlessly complicated, it conceals within it a roadmap to the eternties, not only in the hereafter, but in each and every moment. It is the iron rod, and by clinging to it through the darkness of doubt and temptation, it can lead you straight to the source of all good and truth: the love of God. I have tasted this love. As such, I can testify to you that it is greater than all things, for it not only burns brightly beneath this book's pages, but in your heart, and in the eyes of each and every one of God's children.

I am suddenly inspired to offer a challenge to you, the reader: if you love only what you can see with your eyes, or if you fear and despise what is strange or unknown, I invite you to step out of your comfort zone. Read the Book of Mormon, and if you encounter something that  rubs you the wrong way, bring it to God. Either vocally or in your heart, bring the contention you feel to Him, and He will turn it to peace, love, and openness. By doing this you will learn to love without prejudice all that is good and true. You will face the obscurity of fear and hatred, and you will find that it suddenly turns into the brilliance of love.

This I testify in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.