Heavenly Fire

Hello all! This is going to be a short post, consisting only of my comparison of five quotations and a brief subsequent analysis. 

As you read them, pay attention to the ways (both obvious and not-so-obvious) that they are similar:

"Hear it all ye ends of the earth--all ye sinners, repent! Repent! Turn to God, for your religion won't save you, and you will be damned. I do not say how long, but those who sin against the Holy Ghost cannot be forgiven in this world or in the world to come; they shall die the second death. As they concoct scenes of bloodshed in this world, so they shall rise to that resurrection which is as the lake of fire and brimstone. Some shall rise to the everlasting burning of God, and some shall rise to the damnation of their own filthiness--as exquisite as the lake of fire and brimstone." -Joseph Smith, the King Follett Discourse

"If I accept the lowest in me, I lower a seed into the ground of Hell. The seed is invisibly small, but the tree of my life grows from it and conjoins the Below with the Above. At both ends there is fire and blazing embers. The Above is fiery and the Below is fiery. Between the unbearable fires grows your life. You hang between these two poles. In an immeasurably frightening movement thr stretched hanging welters up and down." Carl Jung, the Red Book

"Divine love and the divine truth that comes derives from it are like the sun's fire and the light that comes from it in our world. The love is like the sun's fire, and the derivative truth is like the light from that sun. By reason of correspondence, fire means love and light means the truth that comes from it." -Emanuel Swedenborg, Heaven and Hell, 13

“The student said, “What is love’s official duty in the nothing?” The teacher said, “This is love’s official duty: that it incessantly penetrates into the something, and when it can find a place in the something that stands silent, love takes the something and rejoices in it with its fire-flaming love more than the sun in the world. Love’s official charge is incessantly to kindle a fire in the something and burn up the something and hyperinflame itself with it." The student said, “Oh dear teacher, how shall I understand this?” The teacher said, “If it is the case that love were to kindle a fire in you, you would feel how it burns away your I-ness and how it greatly rejoices in your fire, so that you would rather permit yourself to be killed than to reenter your something. Furthermore, love’s flame is so great that it will not leave you. Even if it costs you your temporal life, love goes into death with you in its fire. Even if you enter into hell, love would shatter hell for your sake” -Jakob Boehme, The Life Beyond the Senses

"Our God also is a consuming fire. And if we, by love, become transformed into Him and burn as He burns, His fire will be our everlasting joy. But if we refuse His love and remain in the coldness of sin and opposition to Him and to other men then will His fire (by our own choice rather than His) become our everlasting enemy, and Love, instead of being our joy, will become our torment and our destruction." -Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

As I came across these quotes one by one over the past year, I was startled by how similar the authors' symbolism was. In all five cases, these mystical thinkers symbolically associated God and Heaven with fire. What's more, three of the five explicitly identify this fire with love. Notwithstanding the beauty of this symbol, I can't help but wonder how all five of them came up with the same image. As far as I am aware (and please correct me if I'm wrong), the Bible never explicitly associates God with a flame, still less that flame with love. And apart from the Bible, I can't think of anything that all five of these thinkers would have read. 

I take this case as evidence that all five thinkers received some kind of revelation from God. And while Swedenborg would identify this revelation with his concept of "divine influx", and Jung would likely pin it down to joint influence from the "collective unconscious", I think we can all agree that they're talking about the same thing.

A Swedenborgian Testimony of the Book of Mormon

As you all know, I've become quite enamored of Emanuel Swedenborg over the past year. As you all also know, he was a Swedish thinker from the 18th century who claimed that he had a direct line of communication with heaven, hell, and other parts of the spiritual world.

Unlike many people both within the Church and apart from it, I believe Swedenborg's claims wholeheartedly--his teachings not only display a highly developed philosophical sophistication, but they have also helped me develop as a person. Thus, if we take the Book of Mormon's claim that "all things which are good cometh of God" as true, it becomes unambiguously apparent that Swedenborg wan't lying. Because his works are good, and because they have caused good in me, I don't believe that anyone who participates in the Mormon belief system can justifiably doubt the truth of his works. That isn't to say that there aren't apparent inconsistencies between his teachings and those of the LDS church, though, for while the vast majority of his teachings are compatible with Mormon ones, there are a few places where the pieces don't seem to fit. But for this problem I appeal to Swedenborg himself, who taught:

"However numerous these truths of faith are and however divergent they appear,, they are united by the Lord who is the Word [...] The truths of faith are various and appear divergent to us. [...] Yet they are united in the Lord, and the Lord unites them in us, the way one vine unites many branches. The Lord connects scattered and divided truths into one form so that they present one picture and form one action." (True Christianity, 354)

He says that, however many apparent divergences there are between two bodies of truth, the fact that they are true ensures that God will unite them into something greater. So, despite the fact that Swedenborg taught a few things at odd with Mormon doctrine, I am confident that a "least common denominator" of sorts will come along to reconcile the two bodies. In fact, I've experienced the process happening already.

But that's not what's important. This is a very special post, because I'm going to do something that I don't think has ever been done before (please inform me if I'm wrong). You see, while I've talked ad nauseam about Swedenborg's compatibility with Mormon doctrine, I haven't ever used him to support it. But that's exactly what I'm going to do. Specifically, I'm going to use Swedenborg's own systems to show that the Book of Mormon's symbolism displays all the characteristics of what he would call an inspired text. By doing this, I hope to provide evidence for both the Book of Mormon's truth and Swedenborg's claim. For if two separate works independently come up with the same truths, they can't help but support each other.

To begin, consider this quotation:

"The Word has a spiritual core because it came down from the Lord Jehovah and passed through the angelic heavens. As the Word came down, the divinity itself, which was originally inexpressible and imperceptible, became adapted to the awareness of angels, and, further on, to the awareness of human beings. As a result the Word has a spiritual meaning that is present within its earthly meaning much the way our soul is present in us, the thoughts of our intellect are present in what we say, and the feelings of our will are present in what we do." (True Christianity, 193)

Swedenborg says that the Word we read in the scriptures is the result of divine truth descending from heaven and adapting itself to the minds of human beings. While he does not go very deeply into the process by which the inexpressible Word becomes scripture, he tells us that the "literal meaning" that comes out of it acts as a body to the soul that is the Word's "spiritual meaning". He explains later on that this spiritual meaning is hidden within every verse in the Bible. In fact, he says that "For all those who have formed the state of their mind from God, Sacred Scripture is like a mirror in which they see God, although each in a different way." (True Christianity, 6)

All the stories and images found in scripture signify an underlying spiritual meaning. What's more, he claimed that each image in scripture coheres more or less consistently to the facets of this meaning--the sun and its heat always signifies divine love, the sun's light always signifies divine truth, etc.. If we take Swedenborg at his word, one would expect these correspondences to apply to the Book of Mormon as well. But we don't immediately see how we could test this hypothesis, for you can only compare a set of symbols and meanings if you have them available for both texts (the Bible and the Book of Mormon). Fortunately, there is one place in the Book of Mormon that presents a rigorous interpretation of symbols--Nephi's vision of the Tree of Life. 

In fact, almost all of the symbolic interpretations that the angel gives Nephi correspond to those found in Swedenborg's writings. I'll now go through them one by one.

First, the Book of Mormon's passage about the Tree of Life:

"And the angel said unto me: Behold the Lamb of God, yea, even the Son of the Eternal Father! Knowest thou the meaning of the tree which thy father saw? And I answered him, saying: Yea, it is the love of God, which sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men; wherefore, it is the most desirable above all things." (1 Nephi 11:21-22)

Now, take Swedenborg's interpretation:

“A tree symbolizes perception; a tree desirable in appearance, perception of truth, and a tree good for food, perception of goodness. The tree of lives symbolizes love and the faith it leads to; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil symbolizes faith based on evidence from the senses, that is, on secular knowledge.” (Secrets of Heaven 102)

Now the second Book of Mormon symbol:

"And it came to pass that I beheld that the rod of iron, which my father had seen, was the word of God [...]" (1 Nephi 11:25)

And Swedenborg's interpretation:

"Clearly iron symbolizes truth here. Truth is considered strong because nothing can resist it. So iron, which symbolizes truth, or the verities of faith, is said to crush and bruise, as in Daniel 2:33, 40. [...] An iron rod is the truth in the Lord's Word [...]" (Secrets of Heaven 426)

Now the third Book of Mormon symbol:

"And the large and spacious building, which thy father saw, is vain imaginations and the pride of the children of men." (1 Nephi 12:18)

And Swedenborg's interpretation:

"The fact that a tower is self-worship can be seen from the symbolism of a tower. Self-worship exists when we set ourselves up above others, so much so that we seek to be worshiped. As a result, self-love--which is conceit and pride--is called height, loftiness and elevation, and it is depicted by anything that is high up." (Secrets of Heaven 1306)

Now the fourth Book of Mormon symbol:

"And the mists of darkness are the temptations of the devil, which blindeth the eyes, and hardeneth the hearts of the children of men, and leadeth them away into broad roads, that they perish and are lost." (1 Nephi 12:17)

For this one Swedenborg gives an interpretation that, while it might seem divergent at the beginning, actually reflects a correspondence:

"By 'darkness' falsities are signified, because 'light' signifies truth; that 'darkness' signifies falsities, by which are evils, and 'thick darkness,' falsities from evils"

The reason that this correspondence is not as divergent as it appears is that Swedenborg considered truths as falsities to be the "foot soldiers" of good and evil. In the battle in our minds that make up temptations, we will be tempted not by feelings, but by falsities or seeming truths. For instance, suppose that in a situation where you were supposed to be fasting on a Fast Sunday, you get a thought in your head that says "It's OK if you skip it just once". Everyone has been in that type of situation, and everyone would identify it as a temptation. But what's crucial about it is that that thought is a seeming truth, a falsity that we must believe to be true in order to commit a sin. Hence, I cohere with Swedenborg's thinking when I say that, for him, temptations are falsities (see this post for a more extensive discussion of Swedenborg's treatment of temptation, if you don't believe me). 

Now, the fifth Book of Mormon symbolic interpretation:

"And the angel spake unto me, saying: Behold the fountain of filthy water which thy father saw; yea, even the river of which he spake; and the depths thereof are the depths of hell." (1 Nephi 12:16)

This one is a little more difficult, seeing as I can't find any place where Swedenborg talks about flowing water in such a negative sense. But if you take the word "depths" (a word found in the Bible in various places, referring to the depths of the ocean), we can get an idea of what he would have said:

"By the deep, and by the sea and the depths thereof are here signified the hells."

That's about all the major symbols there are in the text, but there are a few additional ones that go along with the ones mentioned above. For instance, if you consider the path that went along the iron rod:

"Words used to describe truth include way, path, road, street, and lane, because these lead to truth." (Secrets of Heaven 627)

What could be more appropriate, considering that the path guides us along the Word of God?

The only image I found that doesn't correspond with Swedenborg's interpretation is the following:

"The fountain of living waters [...] which waters are a representation of the love of God."

Swedenborg asserts, on the contrary, that a fountain of living waters refers to the Lord, the Word, or or to divine truth (the complement to divine love). But considering Swedenborg's assertion that all water represents some kind of truth, you could say that the idea of a fountain (the source of a river, like the four mentioned in Genesis) brings to mind his description of love as the "purpose" behind truth, which is always the "means" toward an end. But I don't want to push it too far.

Even if we take the fountain passage to be an exception, of the seven images found within the text: four of them correspond exactly, five of them correspond nicely (including the darkness/temptations passage) , and six of them roughly correspond (including the passage about the filthy river). Even taking it at its minimum, the fact that the majority of the symbols in the text correspond line-for-line with Swedenborg's interpretation is astounding. After all, I find it highly unlikely that Joseph Smith would have had the means, the know-how, or the time to read Swedenborg's multi-volume Arcana Coelestia (mostly where these interpretations are found). The books are enormous, and the fact that there are eight of them precludes the possibility that a country bumpkin like Joseph Smith could have delved deep enough to find the required references (he didn't have the luxury of control-F!).

So, from this situation three possibilities emerge: first, that neither Swedenborg nor Joseph Smith had a divine connection, and that the correspondences emerging here are just coincidences. But I find this happenstance too meaningful to explain by sheer happenstance. How many other things could Joseph Smith had interpreted the symbols to mean, after all? 

The second possibility is that Swedenborg and Joseph Smith got these symbols from a secular common source. Again, I find that highly unlikely. Though I have not done a complete pass-through of the Bible (not yet!), I find the specificity of these correspondences too eery to discount. Joseph Smith could have figured out that an iron rod stood for power to defeat evil (or something like that), but to associate it specifically with the Word of God--it defies all secular causal explanations.

Considering the sheer unlikelihood that Joseph Smith read the voluminous Arcana Coelestia, only one possibility remains: that both Joseph Smith and Emanuel Swedenborg had a special connection with God, and that they both received these symbols as a part of revelation. If two people stand on opposite sides of  the globe, and if one had no way of influencing the other, the only other option is something non-temporal and non-spatial (to use Swedenborg's terminology) binds them together. This is God, and I see both Swedenborg's works and the Book of Mormon as a glorious testimony that He lives and that He endows truth upon those who humbly seek him. 

Why Mormonism is Awesome

Upon listening to some of the talks that have been given so far in General Conference, I suddenly feel compelled to tell you all what I love about my religion.

Mormonism can sometimes be difficult to believe in. Not only does it have some iffy spots in its history, but it is quite easy to perceive it as sexist, homophobic, and socially regressive. To many, the Church is little more than a joke--a system of doctrines and institutions, that, while established by a fraud, has been re-purposed to oppose progress and maintain the conservative milieu. 

However, the people who see the Church this way ignore the living reality that emanates from within it. While it is true that the LDS church seems hopelessly regressive by modern social standards, behind this tough exterior it contains it a brand of divine truth that I have not found anywhere else. This doctrinal take on reality is so powerful, so remarkably revolutionary that the fact more people don't know about it frustrates me beyond belief. 

So I will try to share this truth with you. In the course of a single blog post, I hope to paint at least a brief sketch of what makes the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints so powerful. Don't think of this post as a testimony--rather, it is my attempt to summarize what has already been said, to see the overarching truth in so many established truths. And I think that the best way to begin this project is to examine the following quotation:

"Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God. And again, if ye by the grace of God are perfect in Christ, and deny not his power, then are ye sanctified in Christ by the grace of God, through the shedding of the blood of Christ, which is in the covenant of the Father unto the remission of your sins, that ye become holy, without spot. And now I bid unto all, farewell. I soon go to rest in the paradise of God, until my spirit and body shall again reunite, and I am brought forth triumphant through the air, to meet you before the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah, the Eternal Judge of both quick and dead. Amen." (Moroni 10:32-34)

This quotation comes from the very end of the Book of Mormon, and it is arguably the most powerful few verses in the entire book. Not only is it astoundingly well-written, but it immediately strikes to the heart of those who read it. But why? Why is this passage so powerful? The answer seems to be this: these verses, unlike anything in pre-Mormon scripture, directly address the reader. Though long dead, in this passage Moroni speaks directly to you, wherever and whenever you happen to read them. Think of that! Though you might deride yourself as insignificant, these verses (and with them, the whole Book of Mormon) indicate that you can have a personal connection to the long-dead men of God. They are not gone--when you read the Book of Mormon, these ancient prophets, generals, and scribes take on a new life, addressing you as though they were standing right next to you. And this is the key to the whole mystery.

You see, the divine reality behind all of Mormonism's unique truths seems to be this: that you are connected to every person, place, artifact, and event, and that it is our destiny and our duty to unearth these connections by the grace of God's atonement. This is the linchpin, the truth that binds together everything wonderful about Mormonism into a staggering, awe-inspiring whole. For just as Moroni can come across the impassable ages to address us directly, no boundary is so absolute that God cannot bridge it with his atonement. 

You may not believe me at this point, so let me give some examples of how this principle manifests itself in Mormon doctrine:

1. Our duty to do family history work is nothing less than an exhortation to commune with our ancestors across the boundaries of time and place. By doing saving ordinances in their place, we take time not only to remember our ancestors, but also to establish a connection with them. This causes the boundary between life and death to become thin. Just as Moroni spoke to us across so many years and miles, when we do these ordinances we can, in a sense, meet our ancestors. Though they may have lived centuries ago in a far off place, by doing their work we let them live again through us. By taking on their name, we let some of their identity become part of ours, just as some of our identity become a part of theirs.
2. Nephi's exhortation to "liken the scriptures" unto yourself (1 Nephi 19:23) is more than mere moralizing. It is a metaphysical claim, saying that the author’s intended audience does not decide who the text is actually for. You see, artifacts are not dead--they are alive with meaning and interpretation. Though the work may have been composed millennia ago, and though anyone who wrote it may be long dead, there is absolutely nothing that prevents that text from being about you. This is not egotism; on the contrary, it is a profound affirmation of the idea that time and place do not put limits on meaning and connection. Meaning and connection are actually the primary facet of existence, and time and place only exist in a subservient relation to them. In any case, Mormonism's emphasis on searching for this personal application in scriptures and general conference talks is a profound manifestation of the principle that connection can be found anywhere and in anything. 
3. The Mormon idea that you should develop a personal relationship with God is not only stunningly unique, but it is also a magnificent manifestation of just the principle I have been discussing. Unlike the mainstream Christian notion that the age of revelation is over, Mormon belief states that anyone and everyone can receive truths from God through a personal relationship with Him. By developing this relationship we can unearth a connection that exists between us and God, by which we find ourselves in Him, and find Him in ourselves.
4. Inherent to the Mormon belief system is the idea that truth is never final or complete. We believe in continuing revelation from God, declaring that we will always have more to learn from Him about the nature of the world. Whether these truths come from science or revelation, and whether they come through a prophet or just another person, we believe that all truth is welcome, for it all comes from God. Moreover, this belief is a stunning affirmation of the aforementioned principle that all things are connected, for it says that we can find God wherever we look. No matter what the truth happens to be, by the very fact of its being true we can be sure that it is a mask hiding a connection with God.
5. The doctrine that men and women are destined to be married to each other for eternity is a deep affirmation of the interconnection of all things. The male and the female quite possibly constitute the biggest boundary which we face as human beings, whether you think of them as the actual biological sexes or as the mental attitudes that roughly (but not entirely) correspond to them. The fact that men and women are separate from each other—that men don’t know what it’s like to be a woman, and women don’t know what it’s like to be a man—indicates a vast chasm that divides humanity from itself. This is a problem, and many people (such as, say, those involved in the feminist movement) do the best that they can to deal with the fallout from this division. But to me, one of the biggest pieces of the gospel’s good news is that atonement can bridge this gap, too. You see, just as we are spiritually dead when we are cut off from God, we are dead in a way when we are cut off from the other gender. But the atonement defeats death. By uncovering the invisible ties that bind men and women together, eternal marriage can help us discover the glorious good news that the woman is in the man, and that the man is in the woman, forever onward to infinity.
6. Though the idea that men and women can become as God strikes many people as odd, it is actually a superb example of the idea that all things are connected. You see, the doctrine that you have godly potential affirms the idea that you are important in the eternal scheme of things. Joseph Smith once said that the notion of man's creation from nothing "lessens man in [his] estimation". Think of that--Joseph Smith once found an idea offensive because it lessened man! Think of all the self-effacing Catholic and Protestant writers who thought that God could only deign to shed his mercy upon his wretched creations, and compare it to the notion of a God who loved His children so much that He let them become like He is! It will then become brilliantly clear that Mormonism has been about the importance of mankind all along, for it says that it is God's work and glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. What could be more glorious than this--to believe that God will give us the ability to exist as He does, to exist as truly all in all? Nothing really comes to mind.

Mormonism has taught me that I am connected to all things. The unique light that is my intelligence sheds its beams throughout the entirety of existence, dancing, refracting, and intermingling with other lights to create the masterpiece of an infinite spectrum. Or to use an old Buddhist metaphor, I am a drop of dew in an infinite spiderweb, and I reflect within myself the image of every other drop of dew, ad infinitum. Whether I find myself in my scriptures, in history, in seeming coincidences, in friends or family, or even in God, Mormonism has shown me again and again that the universe is not a system of insurmountable boundaries. It has taught and continues to teach me that God, through his atonement, binds everything together in a magnificent dance of light and truth. And that, dear reader, is why Mormonism is awesome.

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.