Comments on: Theonomist Doesn’t Even Rhyme with Terrorist

By: Bob Cheeks

Bob Cheeks — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:44:56 +0000

Daryl,
I do hope Stegal comments and your opening was managled (I do it with a certain, and frightening regularity) that I’m not sure exactly what you meant.
I’m pleased you’re a fellow EV’er and I’m concerned now that I’ve misrepresented certain of his writings but by my reading of EV the entire point of his writing is to explicate the Neo-Platonist, Platonic, Greek idea of the metaxy. That is that our existence in reality is the In-Between of an existential tension defined by the poles of immanence and transcendence, where we participate in time and eternity and in fact ‘belong’ to neither one or the other. My guess is that this probably isn’t taught by the Presbyterians or United Methodists, yet the real philosopher is moving from reason to revelation where he/she enters into the metaleptic event, the communion with Logos.
EV defines the human being in terms of the metaxy, which opens the door to “…the plausibility to the religious experience of charismatics…”
The charismatic is merely ‘experiencing’ the phenomenon related to the metaleptic relationship of God and man. They may very well chose to use the symbols of their faith, which I’m sure, as a Christian you’re familiar with, but the experience has been described for several thousand years. Man has always had access, in a very real way to God, the Lord, Jesus.
I’m not sure what, exactly, you mean or what your problem is related to: “…but if Protestants are people of the book, squaring words with ecstasy is not a feat readily accomplished.” But, for me, the Book, the Word of God, the exposition of the Logos, is not primarily a doctrinal device, rather a dialectical device, a means to unite being and Infinite Being in concert. And, any real relationship with the Lord, God of the Universe is one predicated on one form of ecstasy or another. I don’t think it’s possible for a human being to come into the presence of God, in whatever form you’d care to contemplate, without experiencing ecstasy and I don’t know why Christians are embarrassed by this.

By: dgh

dgh — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 13:56:01 +0000

Bob, I don’t Caleb will like hearing this, but if Voegelin gives plausibility to the religious experience of charismatics, then I’m not reading EV any more. You may have a point about the nature of charismatic religious experience, and you may also be right about certain tendencies of school theology, but if Protestants are people of the book, squaring words with ecstasy is not a feat readily accomplished. And words are pretty important for preserving the forms that are essential to the kind of cultural order that a figure like Weaver advocated. Call me a formalist — my wife does all the time — but formality and prescription are cultural goods that charismatics generally undermine.

By: Bob Cheeks

Bob Cheeks — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 09:57:33 +0000

Gas, your attitude is admirable!
So, in the spirit of speculation devoid of substance allow me to remark that those ‘people’ that you’re referring to are in fact frauds, wannabees, and psycho/pneumo-pathologically derailed (nuts or sinners). In this case (gnosticism) I rather lean toward the Satanic end as the cause for the imperfections that make up the particular passions of life related to the phenomenon, that swirl about us in our ongoing intellectual/spiritual quest.
Call me silly but I think it has to do in “THE FALL” (Schelling: The Truth is in the myth) and all that that entails in our quixotic search for utopia or perfection we drag along a two ton glob of libido dominandi and superbia vitae that inevitably results in collapse, disintegration, and failure as we repeat over and over the quest…or at least the good (spoudaioi) ones do.
“It’s still the same old story, a fight for love and glory…”
I’m looking forward to your future caustic observations and comments.

By: GAS

GAS — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:37:51 +0000

Cheeks,

Don’t think of me as a competitor so much but as a co-conspirator in the cause of vague generalizations and hyperbole.

Staying in form then, generally speaking, these “prophets” speak of a calamity that will befall the “alien earth” in the next day, week, month, year. Whether or not this is caused by their “metaleptic experience” I can’t say for sure but I’m probably not as charitable to the metaleptic experience as you are.

If you want detail, differentiation, and detail I encourage you to visit their colorful websites.

By: Kevin J Jones

Kevin J Jones — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:52:37 +0000

I’m still smoldering over Blumenthal’s shallow analysis of the Colorado mass murderer Matthew Murray. It was published in the Nation last month.

Blumenthal tried to support his grand narrative of Christian authoritarianism with an argument based on Murray’s self-serving internet persona and a few newspaper articles about the murderer.

The Nation has long been vulnerable to “looming theocracy” fearmongering. Paul Blanshard, author of American Freedom and Catholic Power, was once its associate editor.

By: John Lofton, Recovering Republican

John Lofton, Recovering Republican — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:58:37 +0000

Rushdoony-admiring site; visit us, please; comment.

TheAmericanView.com

JLof@aol.com

By: Bob Cheeks

Bob Cheeks — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 17:23:08 +0000

Thanks Gas! However, I’m the king of vague generalizations and hyperbole here so if you want to write “I’m not convinced that the Charismatics quite escape the gnostic charge with their daily “prophecies” of the imminent destruction of the earth,” that’s fine. But, I’d really like a little more detail, differentiation, and explication.
The charismatics I’ve known and I’ve long been in love with one, are folks who live in an “open” existence. That sort of existence that is required not only for philosophers but for those who metaxically speaking are moving toward a dialectical communion with God; the good, old metaleptic experience, which is quite different than gnostic lust for a “knowledge” that more or less defines gnosticism. The charasmatic does not abandon the immanent, rather it is a way of living within the Platonic metaxy, the tension of existence as created by the Creator, living as man was intended to live.
Tell me of the ‘prophecies?’
I look forward to your comments.

By: D.W. Sabin

D.W. Sabin — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:22:08 +0000

BOO! always gets the attention of the weary reader. Dumbing down is one of the few bipartisan initiatives of the age.

By: GAS

GAS — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:10:23 +0000

Cheeks,

Good analysis although I’m not convinced that the Charismatics quite escape the gnostic charge with their daily “prophecies” of the imminent destruction of the earth.

By: Artie

Artie — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:30:00 +0000

“But I sleep relatively well each night…because I know born-again Protestants…believe in…the sixth…commandment.”

I’m glad you sleep well. If I lived anywhere within a thousand miles of Baghdad, I know I would take no solace from the idea of a Protestant in the White House.

By: Bob Cheeks

Bob Cheeks — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:18:47 +0000

What I’ve appreciated about the religious right, or charasmatics, or evangelicals is that they represent the wide swath of Christianity in search of what Voegelin might describe as existential consciousness not only acknowledging but seeking the metaleptic communion with the Logos. What these disparate groups signaled was their dissatisfaction with the mundane and meaningless recitations of doctrine brought about by the dominance of school theology, that inevitably “led to the modern spiritual crisis.” And, what they sought was nothing less than the Christ; living, real, experienced.
The fact is they did not derail via existential consciousness into a gnosticism that described an “alien earth” but rather embraced a Savior who opened paradise to the “poor.”
Ironically while ‘mainstream’ Protestant churches sometime engage in a bitter critique, mockery, and belittling of the “religious right,’ similar to the remonstrations of a dying beast, it is the secularists in their embrace of the Enlightenment and technology who are their most ardent foes having rejected not only the Gospel as an “event in the drama of revelation,” but any understanding of a non-existent reality or the transcendent. However, given that the secularists have failed miserably in their efforts to recapture the existential tension of existence and derailed into ideological disorder and madness one might be tempted to describe the cultural divide as: the derailed secularists and their dreamworld populated by epigonic Marxists, the so-called “mainstream” Christians and their dessicated doctrine, or the sundry components of the ‘religious right,’ always seeking the experience or the Lord, God.

By: Rob G

Rob G — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:02:13 +0000

Blumenthal’s potted and slapdash history isn’t even worthy of being called “connect-the-dots” — what he’s doing amounts to forcing the lines together first THEN drawing in the dots. Anyone with a half-way decent handle on the history of Evangelicalism and the Religious Right can rip his “thesis” to shreds.

By: Someday there will be a good book on Rushdoony’s influence – but not yet « Russ Patrick Reeves

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:28:41 +0000

[...] will be a good book on Rushdoony’s influence – but not yet October 13, 2009 Darryl Hart makes quick work of the latest connect-the-dots religious right “analysis” coming from the left, this [...]