(LONG READ) HOW TO BEAT THE MEANING CRISIS
And now for something entirely different. After exploring the meaning crisis, we are going to do a deep dive into the solution. The process of demoralization to total nihilism is not a trend that started with 'wokeism', but is the work of centuries of pernicious ideas on a varying scale of malignity. But in the last few decades the process has been helped along by groups of people who profit by it in various ways. The people who think they are acting in the service of what is good, has been reduced to a social stratus best described as useful idiots. While the traditional Churches in the West have collapsed, the marginal Eastern Orthodox Churches are experiencing a marked uptick in interest, especially by young men searching for meaning and maturity in their lives. No worry! We are going to give you meaning! In the video Father Andrew Stephen Damick and Jonathan Pageau are discussing the issue.
May 9, 2024 Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick: The Meaning Crisis and the Gospel - with Jonathan Pageau.
In present blog we have been alluding a number of times to the idea that the Greek world view on the universe differs distinctly from the conceptual framework of reality in the West. While it is a vexing subject to explain, the result is well worth the effort, under certain conditions.
It is well possible that various other cultures in the world, or other Orthodox nations have come to adopt the same conceptual framework by other means. We can't tell at this point. It is doubtful however, given that its roots are buried deep in Greek pagan history.
Neither world, West or East, seems to be aware of the fundamental differences between them. However, you know them by their fruit. It is possible that the early Christian Church Fathers have acted as mediators and spread the holistic concept through patristics and theology to other parts of the Orthodox world.
Please note that this is not a scholarly treatise on anthropology. I am just thinking out loud, trying to share my life's experiences and thoughts. We will have to resort to unorthodox methods to explain something that may seem an abstraction to most people, but which we can assure you, is very, very real indeed. That is the point.
June 30, 2015 Orthodox Christianity 101: Finding the Church Jesus Built - Seminar 6 : Holy Sacraments.
In the video above Father Ezra of the St. Elijah Orthodox Church in Oklahoma is engaged in a heroic effort to explain the holistic concept to a class of katechoumenoi, deeply steeped in Platonic dualism.
Western Europe has largely followed the Platonic philosophical schools through influential early Church Fathers, like North African Berber, St. Augustine, whose rationalistic ideas did not take much root in the East. But the Western Germanic world greatly loved his hell and brimstone approach to original sin (more).
After the Schism of 1054 the Platonic school had free reign in the Roman Catholic realm. Except for a brief interlude in the early Renaissance when Aristotelian based ideas entered the West through Byzantium, Platonic dualism remained dominant.
As Father Ezra explains, Platonic binary thought presents concepts as opposites: body versus soul, heaven verses earth, good versus evil, and so on. The problem is, these are false opposites. These dichotomies imply two opposing, irreconcilable positions, enforcing a false choice that does not exist in reality.
We can see by the current state of societies where that gets you. Various identity groups are at loggerheads with other identity groups. With Governments egging on the differences for their own political interests. We know it as 'divide and conquer'.
Going by the same example, the cosmic implication is that we live in a physical body on earth and after we die our spiritual soul lives on in heaven. The two worlds do not touch, except when we dabble in the occult, which we don't encourage.
Greek philosophy is historically more influenced by Plato's student, Aristotle. The Aristotelian school tends to emphasize synthesis, experience and ontology, leading to an entirely different world view and way of life. The synthesis leads to heaven AND earth, body AND soul instead of opposing concepts.
Aristotle was Alexander the Great's tutor. Aristotle's ideas spread with Alexander's march through Eurasia all the way to India! After Alexander's death in 323BC at the age of 32 the Empire was carved up in parts by his successors.
The Seleucid Empire (link) was by far the largest, but the Egyptian Ptolemaic dynasty (link) was probably the most influential philosophically and culturally. To get an idea about Alexander's Empire, read here how it touched the religion of the Hellenistic Jews and why it matters (link).
How influential Hellenism has been, is further illustrated by the rising number of Christians in Syria and Lebanon claiming Greek heritage today, after over 1.300 years of separation (source)! A similar situation is happening in southern Italy. Here a short explanation of Hellenism in terms of genes.
Dec. 5, 2018 Masaman: Genetics of the Greeks: European or Middle Eastern?
In how far the holistic approach to life is still holding in the Levant under Islamic pressure or in southern Italy in the Roman Catholic sphere of influence, is hard to fathom. What we can say for sure is that the holistic perspective on creation is alive and kicking in the confines of the Greek Orthodox national ethos.
Father Ezra is using a white board to explain how two concepts that are being presented as 'opposites', like the visible AND the invisible, can be merged into one reality at the same time; how events can take place on the physical earth AND in the spiritual realm (heaven) simultaneously.
Two things happen here at the same time: the physical becomes inextricably linked to the spiritual, while the spiritual becomes anchored to the physical. The two realms merge into one universe. It happens during every church service. It may seem weird and hard to imagine at first. But if you try and succeed, an entirely new reality opens up to you.
What you see. What really happens.
The physical world is no longer a flat, drab experience, but becomes an exciting place, animated by an invisible spirituality that gives it depth and above all, meaning. Any event in the physical world however small, becomes of cosmic importance. The meaning crisis that has been plaguing the West would disappear 'inexplicably'.
The influential early Church Father, St. Maximus the Confessor (AD 580-662) (Wiki) takes it one step further. He explains in Ambiguum 7 that body and soul are inseparable:
"[Therefore] the human being is composed of soul and body, for soul and body are indissolubly understood to be parts of the whole human species. Soul and body came into being at the same moment and their essential difference from each other in no way whatsoever impairs the logoi that inhere naturally and essentially in them.
For that reason it is inconceivable to speak of the soul and body except in relation to each other. It is only as they come together to form a particular person that they exist. If either existed before the other, it would have to be understood as the soul or the body of the one to which the other belongs. The relation between them is immutable."
So what happens after death, you might ask. In the Orthodox cosmology death is temporary and an unnatural situation brought about by Eve and Adam's fall (talk by Father Seraphim Rose: video). If they had remained in Paradise, outside time, they would have become sinners forever, ending up on par with the fallen angels.
Temporary, physical life offers humanity the opportunity to repent and change because of free will, which is not possible outside time in the realm of eternity. More on this page.
One would wish we had mental exercises in holistic consciousness, but since no one even seems to be aware of the differences in these paradigms, it's every man for himself. The first thing of course is to get out of the Enlightenment paradigm, that is, the rationalistic, legalistic and scientist fallacies prevailing in the West.
We could once again revert to Father Ezra and his mnemonic devices to get out of our mental boxes.
June 30, 2015 Orthodox Christianity 101: These Things I Believe - Seminar 1 : The One Thing I Know.
But a word of caution is in order. If the visible and the invisible world are to merge in our consciousness, we need both populated with entities that have been proved real by experience and reason. If we let our imagination run amok, the results can be dangerous, disastrous even.
In fact, Orthodox spiritual fathers have been known to reject even serious spiritual experiences, advising their charges to ignore them. What we are not doing here, is dabbling in the occult or the use of drugs of any sort. In the top video, Pageau is also cautioning.
We do advise to do a lot of research and talking to knowledgeable people before taking the plunge. Be aware that the heart of Orthodox Christianity is ascetism. Mount Athos is not for all, but everyone is supposed to keep Great Lent before Pascha and prior to Christmas, plus the fast on Wednesdays and Fridays of every week. Suffering is seen as an opportunity for salvation.
Another point of caution is not to engage in theological debates before we are ready to understand the Orthodox phronema, which approaches issues quite differently from the legalistic and rationalistic way prevaling in the West.
Already we see debates on social media developing in the wrong direction (video). Those born in Western societies can't help it. It takes years to understand the Greek phronema and to shake the Western way of approaching an issue.
Prof. Eugenia Constantinou has a good lecture series on the subject (part 1). Her comment on this development (video). She has also written a book about Thinking Orthodox (bookfinder).
Greek Orthodoxy is no highway to Nirvana by any means. On the contrary.
Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
Matthew 7:13-14
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