God Beyond Religion: A Christ, Taoist, Idealist, Panpsychist Ontology

The lyrics of John Lennon’s “Imagine” is something to consider and even move toward. A siblinghood of humanity that is inclusive and not exclusive. This could be achieved without sacrificing various kinds of spirituality as long as the exclusive nature of them is eliminated. Whether it is religion, philosophy, or national division and divisiveness it is unnecessary with the simple addition of tolerance. Tolerance and acceptance should be at the heart of any ontology. Beating swords into plowshares is a noble goal. It is in this vane that I would suggest the above title. It is not designed to start another divisive religion, but rather to provide a way in which people can honor their traditions, by embracing the best and eliminating the worst of belief systems. Letting go of terms like dogma, orthodox, and heterodox, and further letting go of the ideas that exist behind the terms is the first necessary step.

Still, there is nothing wrong with holding onto spiritual explanations of the nature of reality. For example, the Christ concept is a reasonable one when considering that it is the Christ of the Logos, or in other words, the anointing of creative consciousness. Christ as Richard Rohr has so eloquently stated is not Jesus of Nazareth’s last name. It is important to realize what the terms meant within their original language and too their original audience. Christos was an anointing, a rubbing on of an ointment as done for anointing kings. Logos was a word but in the Greek philosophical sense it was creative consciousness. So, the universal or cosmic Christ is a description of the anointing or the presence of the Logos. Jesus taught that it was the natural state of humanity. While he acknowledged his Christ, he also saw it as being for everyone. He did not think it was unique to him but available to all. This is one of the main themes of John’s gospel.

A concept that fits well with the Christ of the Logos is the Tao. Simply stated, the Tao, pronounced Dao is the creative conscious source of the universe and is similar in nature to the Hermetic concept of “the-all.” It should be noted here that most all civilizations had in one way or another the concept of the universal creative source. Many of the indigenous tribes, especially of the Americas called it the great spirit. While it is easy in retrospect to romanticize the concept of the great spirit. The indigenous tribes certainly had their share of wars, violence, and inhumane practices it is interesting that the concept was essentially similar to the concept of pneuma or qi (chi.) The life force and breath have been ubiquitous in cultures over millennia in describing the prime source of life and energy.

For an ontology to be plausible it needs to have consistency in agreement across multiple areas. It must at the very least take account for previous spiritual traditions and recognize the truth that is embedded with all of them to one degree or the other. It must also take into consideration scientific thought, theories, and established data. However, it is important to be able to recognize that science too has dogma, and dogmatic factions that make it difficult for the non-scientist to easily filter out the dogmatic from the exploratory and theoretical. When one recognizes that within the scientific community, especially within quantum and astro-physics, that there is a wide variety of disagreement. Likewise, when it comes to the nature of consciousness there is equally a wide range of theories. While there is currently an effort to advance those aspects of science, consciousness itself is a difficult topic to study with mathematical precision. Some are trying, especially Dr. Donald Hoffman, but it is in the infancy stage, and most are locked into the dogma of physicalism and believe that consciousness is an evolutionary product of the brain. However, in so doing they simply bypass the hard problem of consciousness.

This in my view devalues the purview of logic and epistemology. There are things that can be knowable that are not mathematically provable or modeled. It is especially in this area that panpsychist idealism offers a more plausible explanation of reality than the materialist, physicalist explanation that stops short of explaining the why of existence. In a nutshell, the Panpsychism Idealist view sees consciousness as the foundational basis for reality. It is not completely out of the question given the nature of the quantum field of waves that collapse into particles based on observation.

Further, it explains the many paranormal and supernatural occurrences that are common over millennia that have been reported ubiquitously across cultures, eras, and among a plethora of reliable people. If you name the anomaly, Panpsychist Idealism explains it.

God Beyond Religion: Does Spiral Dynamics point toward a benevolent creator of the universe? Spiral Dynamics and Theodicy

Spiral Dynamics and Theodicy

There was a song written in 1995 that asked this question. “What if god was one of us?” It went on to ask, “a slob like one of us, a stranger on a bus?” There is a way in which that song rings far more true than at first hearing. In fact, it is plausible that it could indeed be true. Let’s assume that the creator of the universe is collective consciousness. That the reason for calling it collective is it is made up of individual conscious agents in a collective that are jointly and severally divine. I will show later on in this article that this idea is indeed the most likely of all possible scenarios. Further, I will show that heretofore all of the mystics that religions were built upon were simply misunderstood, and that their message was coopted. It is my view that the orthodox Christian view of the creator is the least likely scenario with respect to reasonable plausibility. That view makes theodicy impossible.

Here is the description of the model of deity that I believe to be the most plausible and reasonable of all possibilities and likewise, I will explain why the scenario, of not having a conscious creative source, is probably the worst of all possibilities. Eternal consciousness exists and has always existed and is dark energy that produces dark matter. This is the first and only miracle needed. The materialist view also needs a first and only miracle and that is the existence of hydrogen atoms. So, in this both theories begin with a miracle or at least an unknowable circumstance. Dark energy contemplates all the dimensions and dark matter is continuously expanding and sustaining material creation. It is by conscious energy that the waves of potentiality are collapsed into particles. We then, jointly (the collective) and severally (individual conscious agents) collapse the waves of potentiality into the particulate matter of the corporeal world.

We create these modalities of existence to expand consciousness. Further, we are divine and eternal being a part of the collective. This eliminates completely the concept of an all wise and potent creator apart from us and creates us as divine agents experiencing the expansion of consciousness. All of the various religions have created metaphors to explain the collective. The metaphors are father and mother, and the individual conscious agents are the offspring or the children. It is in this realm that free will exists. It is likewise in this realm that eternity exists and therefore, being eternal, no actual lasting harm can come to any. While suffering is real in some realms of existence it is not eternal and all experience it. Likewise, what one could call fortunate, pleasurable, and beneficial, though not eternal is experienced equally by all from time to time as expanding consciousness dictates. This is not meant to minimize the suffering or the contentment, but rather places each in perspective of the eternal purpose of expanding consciousness. It makes conscious agents masters of their own fate with free will. This alone provides complete theodicy.

So where does spiral dynamics enter the picture? It is evident in the upward spiral of humanity over the millennia.  Individually and collectively, we are creating a better, more loving, more equitable world. Further, consciousness is expanding toward a more widespread and eventually enlightened reality. Examples are everywhere. Medicine and quality of life is expanding, equity of opportunity is expanding. Statistics bear this out. The amount of people living in extreme poverty has dropped from 2 billion in 1981 to 1.2 billion in 2011 according to the World Bank Poverty: the past, present and future | World Economic Forum (weforum.org). We have progressed from the archaic, through the tribal, the authoritarian, ethno-nationalistic, democratic, and are heading toward the democratic social stage. I realize that there are remnants of many of the stages still present or coinciding with the highest achievement, but that is the way spiral dynamics works. In addition to this, there are more and more people headed to the tier two aspects of spiral dynamics, with the ultimate being enlightenment.

Here is an image that shows the stages of spiral dynamics.

So then, of the three explanations of reality, the emperor god, atheism, or panpsychism, the latter is by far the best choice, and it completely eliminates theodicy. One can equate monotheism with the emperor god and of course atheistic physicalism speaks for itself, there is no god and no purpose just accidental evolution, and with the panpsychism explained in this article there is a purpose and a reasonable explanation of good and evil, and more specifically the existence of evil. Both moral evil and natural evil (earthquakes, disease etc.) are a natural result of the material corporeal experiment but conscious agents being eternally divine experience an "evening out" of suffering and comfort.

The reason that the panpsychist view is superior is that it ultimately produces hope and a reason to love. While the emperor god view promotes trauma, guilt, and shame, the atheistic physicalistic view is ok for those who are encountering even a modicum of comfort but, it is devastating to those who were born into poverty and harshness. In those cases, atheism can lead naturally to one becoming a murderous outlaw. It increases crimes against people and property. Without eternal hope and understanding, deep suffering can produce a complete disregard for life.

Let’s examine the three positions in terms of what they provide most individuals that have ever lived. The emperor god cannot be absolved of creating suffering no matter how one looks at it. It is a view that makes the divine creator arbitrary and capricious and no, giving human’s free will and choice does not eliminate culpability. So many people have been born into poverty and suffering, or just vary hard living conditions that overall life was not that great a gift. They would have been better off not existing.

The same thing rings true for the atheistic view. If there is no purpose and life evolved for no reason, then this view is the most toxic of all. It leaves everything in life to chance. If one was born into wealth and comfort, great but if not, they simply lose. Further, when you consider the numbers of people who were born prior to the last two centuries it was really an unfair plight to have been born.

Finally, the panpsychist view, that all is consciousness and is created by consciousness is a view that offers eternal equilibrium and justice. If we are in fact all divine and individual conscious agents that participate in developing the material corporeal experience, and also have a multitude of other dimensions, worlds, circumstances that cannot even be imagined, we then have a narrative that will allow all to feel that over time and development all will experience the expansion of consciousness by participating in each creative experiment available to conscious agents that is ever expanding in an upward spiral. Further having each dimensional experience adding to the whole in the same way that humanity has developed as viewed by spiral dynamics and seeing that the potential for growth is well beyond imagination. In my view this is the best possible scenario, and it resonates well with me.

It is my belief that all of the mystics and masters of the past were actually trying to communicate this idea but were misunderstood. Sometimes it was from real misunderstanding and in some cases, it was purposefully misrepresented to favor those who were passing on and writing down the message. Those who wrote their own like Lao Tzu and Rumi had a clearer more pure message, and of course, Jesus who had all of his teachings passed on by second hand and third hand messengers was likely the least clear. However, with our intuition and the divine spirit that indwells each and every one of us, even there the real message can be discerned.

God Beyond Religion: Kenosis misunderstood and a Fresh Look

Php 2:5-8  “Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus,  (6)  who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited.  (7)  Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man,  (8)  he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross.” ~CSB Version

If you can remove all of the toxic connotation that tends to pop up from toxic evangelical dogma and look at what Paul realized in this particular passage of his writing. He is saying this. YOU have the same mind that Jesus did. Realize, that in coming to this earth plane you emptied yourself of your divinity, that is you have forgotten it for a time, you have lost track of your true identity. When you begin to gain it back by mystical revelation, don’t exploit it with hubris, love and serve your fellow human, not at the expense of yourself necessarily, but do not use it for prides sake.

So, what would that mean for us? First off it could mean that the story of the fall in Genesis chapter’s two and three is an inept metaphor for the condition here in material reality that provides fertile ground for death and pathological behavior. The so-called fall could as easily and in my view more correctly be explained as the kenosis or emptying oneself of one’s divinity. The garden analogy could be a metaphor for our oneness in the ALL or the creative source. We as a unified part of the whole is the state where non-duality is experienced. Paul’s mention of the cross is in the general scheme of things beside the point. Jesus, in emptying himself of his divine status and incarnating in the earthly plane demanded that he experience death. Whether at age 33 on a Roman Cross, or at age 70 as the result of natural atrophy, death was inevitable, and I for one am glad because eternity in this plane would be taxing, tiring, and ultimately exasperating.

However, stints within material reality can be challenging and rewarding and can increase our body of knowledge. The only way it could be challenging is if we emptied ourselves of our divine knowing. If we limited our view of the eternal, put a big question mark at the end of what’s next, and allow our challenges and life plan experiences to move us toward our recovery of divinity. It appears from spiral dynamics, and the evolution of culture types that it is a slow but ongoing process. The first challenges are to overcome the natural consequences of material reality such as predators, poisonous plants, earthquakes, violent weather, feeding ourselves, finding shelter etc. As we develop technology to accomplish these basic survival tasks, we make room for contemplating deeper questions.

It must be noted that during each of these advancing spiral stages we are sent mystics from the creative source to awaken our knowledge of who we are. Most of the time, this effort is stagnated by making a religion out of the mystics’ revelation.  And yet, over time we are able to remember more and more of who we are. Thus, the mystical revelation leads to greater and greater awareness of who and what we are. Eventually we grow weary of exploring challenges and we simply rest only to find a new challenge that will ignite our quest for self-knowledge.

This makes sense from the mystical revelation we have already received. The concept of as below so above and as above so below, stated differently on earth as it is in heaven, leads us to accept the fact that cycles are natural occurrences both in the natural material world and in the spiritual world of ultimate creative consciousness.