After many years, I think I finally understand why I disagree

TheWhat? · Oct 19, 2021

It's been a long and bumpy ride, with far too many fights on all fronts. But now I think I see the historical divide between rationalists and mystics of the faith. The problem arises in that the Logos of the mystics, of Paul, of the early Christians, and of the prophets who preceded them, is not divine reason, alone. That is to say, the Logos is a Person, not only the mind of Jesus. And that Person, having had communion with the Saints from the beginning, though He was without body according to Athanasius, must have always possessed a kind of anatomy that the Saints could be united to Him, including Adam, from which Adam fell.

[1Ti 1:14 NKJV] 14 And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

To engage in heartless reasoning does not lead us in agreement with the love Christ instructed, nor can it. Paul's spirituality emphasized a faith of the heart to affect the renewal of mind and conformation to the likeness of Christ, and reason, without the love of Christ is not divine.

We should have always been turning to the apostles, prophets, scriptures, and Christ Himself as those who hold the keys of wisdom, rather than the philosophers.

Lastly, a closing thought:

[Jhn 11:35 NKJV] 35 Jesus wept.

Carl Emerson · Oct 19, 2021

Yep...

Jesus presented a simple Gospel that requires a heart response.

That means all mankind is on a level playing field and the intellect is not a factor that favours some...

Albion · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
But now I think I see the historical divide between rationalists and mystics of the faith. The problem arises in that the Logos of the mystics, of Paul, of the early Christians, and of the prophets who preceded them, is not divine reason, alone. That is to say, the Logos is a Person, not only the mind of Jesus.

And that Person, having had communion with the Saints from the beginning, though He was without body according to Athanasius, must have always possessed a kind of anatomy that the Saints could be united to Him, including Adam, from which Adam fell.

Of course. That IS the nature of God, and Christ is God.

Dave G. · Oct 19, 2021

In fact intellect or education even ( secular) gets in the way of child like faith. In fact so much in the way if let run amuck that Christian started colleges turn secular humanist or even atheist with atheist chaplains and even mystic or I'd say satanic. .

Don't feel bad though OP, it's taken me forever to come to terms with some of this, to find out my now deceased wife had it right all along, simple faith ! The simplest purist faith and with trust, God can do great things. And John 1:1 is absolute truth.

Sabertooth · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
...rationalists and mystics...

Are you talking about Cessationism vs. Continuationism?
("Mystics" is a term that is contrary to Christianity.)
That disagreement seems to be the New Testament version of
Sadducees vs. Pharisees.

Danthemailman · Oct 19, 2021

Dave G. said:
In fact intellect or education even (secular) gets in the way of child like faith. In fact so much in the way if let run amuck that Christian started colleges turn secular humanist or even atheist with atheist chaplains and even mystic or I'd say satanic..

Yes. The most trusting people in the world are children, which have not acquired obstructions, like advanced education, false religion and exposure to philosophies of men. Child like faith is how Jesus characterized conversion, which pictures faith as the helpless, trusting, dependence of little children who have no resources or achievements of their own to commend themselves with or get side tracked by.

2PhiloVoid · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
It's been a long and bumpy ride, with far too many fights on all fronts. But now I think I see the historical divide between rationalists and mystics of the faith. The problem arises in that the Logos of the mystics, of Paul, of the early Christians, and of the prophets who preceded them, is not divine reason, alone. That is to say, the Logos is a Person, not only the mind of Jesus. And that Person, having had communion with the Saints from the beginning, though He was without body according to Athanasius, must have always possessed a kind of anatomy that the Saints could be united to Him, including Adam, from which Adam fell.

[1Ti 1:14 NKJV] 14 And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

To engage in heartless reasoning does not lead us in agreement with the love Christ instructed, nor can it. Paul's spirituality emphasized a faith of the heart to affect the renewal of mind and conformation to the likeness of Christ, and reason, without the love of Christ is not divine.

We should have always been turning to the apostles, prophets, scriptures, and Christ Himself as those who hold the keys of wisdom, rather than the philosophers.

Lastly, a closing thought:

[Jhn 11:35 NKJV] 35 Jesus wept.

And this kind of thing has been the one thing that has bothered me most in my mind and heart: that Christians often just go at each other, making digs at each other, often making little effort to understand one another, pushing for precedence among other Christians for influence, and sometimes, even burning each other at the stake, condemning each other with a plethora of invectives about how one or the other is "going to hell" because there's some kind of disagreement.

And I've always wondered, "Why does this have to go on to this extent"?

Danthemailman · Oct 19, 2021

2PhiloVoid said:
And this kind of thing has been the one thing that has bothered me most in my mind and heart: that Christians often just go at each other, making digs at each other, often making little effort to understand one another, pushing for precedence among other Christians for influence, and sometimes, even burning each other at the stake, condemning each other with a plethora of invectives about how one or the other is "going to hell" because there's some kind of disagreement.

And I've always wondered, "Why does this have to go on to this extent"?

You made some valid points and keep in mind that there are genuine Christians and there are "nominal" Christians. There are genuine believers and there are make believers.

Dave G. · Oct 19, 2021

Yep generally it comes down to the true blood bought born again believer who tends to be still and just know He is God and want to get a simple salvation message out.. The Rest are fighting a battle of denominational doctrines and or personal beliefs polluted by all sorts of man made features.. And it's rather sad.

2PhiloVoid · Oct 19, 2021

Danthemailman said:
You made some valid points and keep in mind that there are genuine Christians and there are "nominal" Christians. There are genuine believers and there are make believers.

Sure. I fully understand that, Dan. But I think that some Christian individuals resort to an uppity posture over other Christians (from other denominations) first before offering compassion, flexibility, insight, grace and love to his/her fellow Christians. They want to have influence and power (in the name of "truth") over other people, even over fellow Christians.

It's like, some Christians are SO concerned--fixated, really--on the fact that there may be a few heretics among us that they think they've been especially designated as the 'church purifiers' who will purge the Church of all variance of opinion, valiantly leading the charge to assert absolute truths for things that even Jesus Himself and His Apostles didn't leave a certain word about.

Personally, I've always been of a more Ecumenical type mind and I just accept that, as there is with many things in life, a variance of perspective on certain subjects and topics. This doesn't mean I'm a better Christian than others, but this fact is where I've always tried to start when speaking with other Christians, even those fellow Christians with whom I may strongly disagree.

OldWiseGuy · Oct 19, 2021

Matthew 7:3
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

This advice has helped me greatly.

Petros2015 · Oct 19, 2021

Danthemailman said:
There are genuine believers and there are make believers.

I like that. Good way to put it.

“Faith is not the supposition that something might be true, but the assurance that someone is there.” [and that the character of that person is Good]
― Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Way

TheWhat? · Oct 19, 2021

Sabertooth said:
Are you talking about Cessationism vs. Continuationism?
("Mystics" is a term that is contrary to Christianity.)
That disagreement seems to be the New Testament version of
Sadducees vs. Pharisees.

The difference, I'd argue, is largely epistemological, and as such, resurfaces throughout history in a few places, such as in the debate between empiricists vs rationalists of the enlightenment period, or the mystics vs the scholastic rationalists of the medieval church, though Catholics have somehow managed to hold it together, which I assume is in part because the Catholic church subscribes to no single philosophy and also because they see merit on both sides of the fence.

Really, it's about the foundation of anything we might call knowledge. It's like an argument between Descarte, who was applying reason to find the most fundamental axiom which all knowledge can rest upon, and Hume, an empiricist, taking a more Aristotelian stance on sensory experience as the source of knowledge. Paul evidently would have been on the side of empiricism and the medieval mystics, as would the prophets, pointing to experience as a source of knowledge in scripture, though that's not to equivocate modern day empiricism with holy reasoning.

According to historic christianity, mystics are not contrary to christianity. I'd be interesting to know where you heard that they were. There are many that have been canonized, and arguably, Paul was much more of a mystic than a rationalist. I'm curious to know if the suspicion arises from one of these historic debates.

2PhiloVoid · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
The difference, I'd argue, is largely epistemological, and as such, resurfaces throughout history in a few places, such as in the debate between empiricists vs rationalists of the enlightenment period, or the mystics vs the scholastic rationalists of the medieval church, though Catholics have somehow managed to hold it together, which I assume is in part because the Catholic church subscribes to no single philosophy and also because they see merit on both sides of the fence.

Really, it's about the foundation of anything we might call knowledge. It's like an argument between Descarte, who was applying reason to find the most fundamental axiom upon which all knowledge can rest upon, and Hume, an empiricist, taking a more Aristotelian stance on sensory experience as the source of knowledge. Paul evidently would have been on the side of empiricism and the medieval mystics, as would the prophets, pointing to experience as a source of knowledge in scripture, though that's not to equivocate modern day empiricism with holy reasoning.

According to historic christianity, mystics are not contrary to christianity. I'd be interesting to know where you heard that they were. There are many that have been canonized, and arguably, Paul was much more of a mystic than a rationalist. I'm curious to know if the suspicion arises from one of these historic debates.

I think your focus here is a good one, but I also think the problem we see between so called "mystics" and "rationalist" is endemic to the nature of human psychology. This is even in the case of the debates and disagreements we Christians might have among ourselves.

There have always been smart people and not-so smart people on all sides of various epistemic divisions, but the main problem, I think, is that there are those who try way too hard to assert that some positive absolute (or supreme axiom) ultimately obtains (~ feelings, revelation, deductive certainty, sense experience, etc), whether that positive absolute is asserted by an Empiricist, a Rationalist, or even an Intuitionist, among other existing viewpoints.

I don't know that Paul would be on the side of Empiricism exclusively, but at the same time, I don't think we can say that Paul was merely "mystical" either since his reliance upon what he thought 'he saw' rationally was still via the O.T. Scriptures (and via revelation) and was central to his argument and admonition of Peter.

Maybe I'm saying something along the same lines you are, but you'll have to tell me if you feel we're on the same page or not in this.

Bible Highlighter · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
The difference, I'd argue, is largely epistemological, and as such, resurfaces throughout history in a few places, such as in the debate between empiricists vs rationalists of the enlightenment period, or the mystics vs the scholastic rationalists of the medieval church, though Catholics have somehow managed to hold it together, which I assume is in part because the Catholic church subscribes to no single philosophy and also because they see merit on both sides of the fence.

Really, it's about the foundation of anything we might call knowledge. It's like an argument between Descarte, who was applying reason to find the most fundamental axiom upon which all knowledge can rest upon, and Hume, an empiricist, taking a more Aristotelian stance on sensory experience as the source of knowledge. Paul evidently would have been on the side of empiricism and the medieval mystics, as would the prophets, pointing to experience as a source of knowledge in scripture, though that's not to equivocate modern day empiricism with holy reasoning.

According to historic christianity, mystics are not contrary to christianity. I'd be interesting to know where you heard that they were. There are many that have been canonized, and arguably, Paul was much more of a mystic than a rationalist. I'm curious to know if the suspicion arises from one of these historic debates.

Sorry, I am going to have to disagree. A Christian rationalist will seek out God because the Bible tells the believer to do that. However, the moment a believer steps outside the Bible’s instructions is the moment they are swimming in dangerous spiritual territory. Mysticism is just another way of saying New Age. New Age practices has made it’s way into Christianity or the church over the past few decades. Contemplative prayer, labyrinths, chanting, lighting candles for a deeper spiritual experience are just a few of the disgusting New Age junk that has snuck it’s way into the church in these last days. New Age theologies has creeped into the church, as well. For example: The thinking that all roads lead to Heaven, or we are like mini gods, etc. are New Age. Then there is the New Age non-sense that takes place like what we have seen at the Toronto Blessing. That’s where all this mystic junk leads to. People being thrown around like they are possessed by devils.

There is a huge difference between experiencing the one true God and being influenced by a spirit that is not in line with what God’s Word (the Bible) says. Many people like the Bible, but they only go so far in accepting it in what it says. They like the idea of God, but they want to make God in their own image and liking and they do not want to submit to what His Word says.

Clare73 · Oct 19, 2021

TheWhat? said:
It's been a long and bumpy ride, with far too many fights on all fronts. But now I think I see the historical divide between rationalists and mystics of the faith. The problem arises in that the Logos of the mystics, of Paul, of the early Christians, and of the prophets who preceded them, is not divine reason, alone.

And it is the same for the born again today. . .always has been and always will be.

2PhiloVoid · Oct 19, 2021

Bible Highlighter said:
Sorry, I am going to have to disagree. A Christian rationalist will seek out God because the Bible tells the believer to do that. However, the moment a believer steps outside the Bible’s instructions is the moment they are swimming in dangerous spiritual territory. Mysticism is just another way of saying New Age. New Age practices has made it’s way into Christianity or the church over the past few decades. Contemplative prayer, labyrinths, chanting, lighting candles for a deeper spiritual experience are just a few of the disgusting New Age junk that has snuck it’s way into the church in these last days. New Age theologies has creeped into the church, as well. For example: The thinking that all roads lead to Heaven, or we are like mini gods, etc. are New Age. Then there is the New Age non-sense that takes place like what we have seen at the Toronto Blessing. That’s where all this mystic junk leads to. People being thrown around like they are possessed by devils.

There is a huge difference between experiencing the one true God and being influenced by a spirit that is not in line with what God’s Word (the Bible) says. Many people like the Bible, but they only go so far in accepting it in what it says. They like the idea of God, but they want to make God in their own image and liking and they do not want to submit to what His Word says.

I hear what you're saying, but I tend to think that what Winfried Corduan has said about the topic is not only informative but thoughtful and probably offers a more balanced view in assessing the varied ways in which 'mysticism' in the Christian faith can be conceptualized. You might find his book to be interesting as well.

Winfried Corduan - Mysticism: An Evangelical Option? (1991/2009)

klutedavid · Oct 19, 2021

Carl Emerson said:
Yep...

Jesus presented a simple Gospel that requires a heart response.

That means all mankind is on a level playing field and the intellect is not a factor that favours some...

Matthew 11:30
For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.

Bible Highlighter · Oct 19, 2021

2PhiloVoid said:
I hear what you're saying, but I tend to think that what Winfried Corduan has said about the topic is not only informative but thoughtful and probably offers a more balanced view in assessing the varied ways in which 'mysticism' in the Christian faith can be conceptualized. You might find his book to be interesting as well.

Winfried Corduan - Mysticism: An Evangelical Option? (1991/2009)

Mysticism is New Age. Why would I want that when I have God and His Word (the Bible)? New Age is like junk candy. It gives you a rush, but it is ultimately bad for you in the end. The real deal is not enough for some and so they seek out other experiences that are not in the Bible.

TheWhat? · Oct 19, 2021

Bible Highlighter said:
Mysticism is just another way of saying New Age. New Age practices has made it’s way into Christianity or the church over the past few decades. Contemplative prayer, labyrinths, chanting, lighting candles for a deeper spiritual experience are just a few of the disgusting New Age junk that has snuck it’s way into the church in these last days.

Hey now, you're talking to someone who has a replica of the labyrinth at Chartres as a woodcarving made by his late grandfather. I don't use it for spiritual exercises, but it's hardly new age. It's from the 1200's.

I've also been around Catholics a bit in my life and in case you didn't know, Catholics have a thing for candles and chanting.

Call it whatever you will, but you can hardly qualify it as "new age."

But that does bring me to a point: from whence does the suspicion arise? I'm still looking for a concrete answer on that one -- and that's all we can really do as there is so much misinformation out there.

In the interest of dispelling misinformation, here's a video I bumped into that I thought was a decent intro:

I don't agree with all of its assertions, especially on neoplatonism which can get anyone into hot water. Neoplatonism was hugely influential on the culture surrounding the church earlier in its history, which makes it relevant, but it was never something christianity endorsed, and I think it's an unfair comparison to say that mystics are neoplatonists. They have similarities, which they also share with Paul, who precedes neoplatonism.

After many years, I think I finally understand why I disagree

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