Sacred Symbology part 4. God and his Embedded Revelation in Matter and Man

Sacred Symbology: Revelation in Matter and Man

This is not a stand-alone article, it’s one in a series.

Sacred Symbology part 1: Our Hidden Problem

Sacred Symbology part 2. Modern Origins of the Bad Symbol

Sacred Symbology part 3. Symbols and Revelation

Information is transmitted to God by everything that exists, to best be thought of as “symbols” of Him, in the first instance being one-dimensional reflectors of His existence as an objective presence in space. Matter in space is created to give in a sense a kind of information to God. This creation does not do this in the sense of increasing God’s knowledge, which is impossible but only in the sense of creation as a token of God who, in his power, moved into space where He was not represented before in objects. The things of creation are like new celestial banners of presence and ownership in both a kind of newly created and momentarily unclaimed land, being markers for its owner and all others like God who might subsequently see it and acknowledge it as such. These banners transmit, in one way or another, by choice or by nature, a sign of him in places which are not God, and indicate the word of the owner and an implied promise by Him.

The promise, one of the future disposition of the creation, is the same as God’s will in creation. If God executes his will and is unchangeable and single-minded, then whatever he wills come into being.  Him causing by direct action to form a  particular future and knowing the future are distinguishable only in the finite human mind, that sees history only on a linear plane and as the acts of a contingent and severely limited being.  Non-contingency to God is a sure promise of its eventual entropy and decay, and the same as the will of God initially forming any reality other than his own. But since creation is a symbol of God and the content of his will, creation of that which has a dimension that is non-contingent is a different kind of symbolic will and promise.  A contingency is created and it becomes what it is, subject to entropy, since a sovereign, unchangeable and single-minded God cant create for amusement, but only to reflect the nature of his mind. If he created something which has at least a spark of non-contingency, then his mind creates it for the promise of redemption from that which would extinguish it, which is what makes up his mundane world. Sentience is a promise of redemption, but because sentience is by definition that with free will, this is a provisional promise which cant force this creature or that would force him into a state in which he was not entirely created, contradicting the promise and the will for his creation. It’s a redemptive promise for the creature that must be fulfilled by God only on the condition that is is also fulfilled willingly, consciously by the creature, in minimally agreeing with God what phenomenon exists in his doomed world of any kind that shows God’s existence, power and good nature by his divine Will and Promise. This causes man’s non-contingent spirit and God to be connected by a meta-symbol of God that combines them in a symbol which is the same as God’s will and Promise, where the symbol and meaning are indistinguishable, and the claim of truth is also the same as its proof.

This is quite compressed. I will try to break this down into smaller units.

I say that matter, as symbols, represent the word of the owner and his Promise because they are manifestations of the expressed will of the owner and they are indications that the owner does not intend to stop building or expressing himself and stop at some arbitrary limit short of full fulfillment of his intentions for the universe. Since everything that is not God is in part expressive of God and nothingness, that this everything speaks of what is not God and what is God in a balanced proportion, these two are symbolic of something they imply, that everything is as much a guarantee of an eventual complete destruction of what is not God by God and an eventual complete revealing of what is God by God. God and the universe, one contingent and one not, implies purpose and a conclusion. If existence is conceived as a symbol, the universe is God’s symbol and the will and promise of God for it is its meaning, or signification.

As for the promise imbedded in matter of an eventual, or at least potential for, a full expression of God in those regions that did not before exist, this task could only be given over to that form of matter capable of independently observing ultimate causes and effects and imputing a meaningful connection between them, which fulfills the embedded promise in matter, that of God eventually staking a claim of ownership even into regions that did not exist before he created them, in regions that he creates but cannot claim unless upon the striking of an agreement with a kind of creation which is that region and which can deny Him. Man’s voluntarily spiritual space within him that becomes occupied by man’s full assent to realities that he need not affirm in order to survive as matter, but he does need to survive as and in that which is beyond matter. It is for man to freely recognize the promise and to fulfill the promise of revelation in Matter and fully agree with God, which completes God’s possession of all things, even those which have the freedom to even deny that God exists.

The Matter and Anti-mater of Man

Now, the problem with mere matter is that it can act as a good symbol of causation, but it can only act as a symbol of transmission one-way. This is because, although it is a symbol, it is not the kind of symbol that is capable, like our necessary idea of God as causing a product and a reason for it to exist, of transmitting any other aspect of God’s being than His power and sovereignty over all things. It, therefore, can’t be a symbol of anything more about God than proving He is all, or perhaps that His plan. He has set some reason, whatever it is, into motion. Matter then does not fully represent God, or the reason God chose to create in the first place, or the extended meaning for creation which is implicit in the creation of matter. If Man is a symbol of God, then, in order for man to fulfill it, neither can his belief be in matter, or anything like it, and neither can he be only Matter.

Now the word “meaning” deserves some more thought. How does man represent at least the potential fulfillment of a revelation of God’s full meaning imbedded in creation? It’s good to dwell on this the distinction between definitions and essences in an understanding of meaning for a bit. Let me do this and come back around to Creation and God’s reasons, forming a relationship with us secured through our reasons which are the same as his.

The word “meaning” is usually understood in two senses: one is the definition of a thing. This is the common use of the word. What people say a word means. “Table” means an elevated surface meant for the placing of objects to be close at hand, often to eat food upon. However, just as the full nature of a table is not contained in the definition, and lies underneath its exterior, the symbol we are looking for which must fully represent God’s being and meaning for creating it must be something beyond matter and a definition and lie equally in the essence of the thing that holds meaning.

The first thing we note about the meaning of “meaning” is that in dictionaries the word is presented to be almost synonymous with “definition.” “Definition” is a statement that explains the meaning of word or phrase. But it was clear to Aristotle that a definition of a man-made linguistic token, like ‘goat-stag,’ tells us what it is but does not tells us anything of its ‘essential nature.’ It does not have to contain all of the attributes of its ‘essence’ to be a definition, but for it to be truly meaningful it should at least be a real essence.

“He who knows what human-or any other-nature is, must know also that man exists; for no one knows the nature of what does not exist-one can know the meaning of the phrase or name ‘goat-stag’ but not what the essential nature of a goat-stag is. But further, if definition can prove what is the essential nature of a thing, can it also prove that it exists? And how will it prove them both by the same process, since definition exhibits one single thing and demonstration another single thing, and what human nature is and the fact that man exists are not the same thing? Then too we hold that it is by demonstration that the being of everything must be proved-unless indeed to be were its essence; and, since being is not a genus, it is not the essence of anything. Hence the being of anything as fact is matter for demonstration; and this is the actual procedure of the sciences, for the geometer assumes the meaning of the word triangle, but that it is possessed of some attribute he proves. What is it, then, that we shall prove in defining essential nature? Triangle? In that case a man will know by definition what a thing’s nature is without knowing whether it exists. But that is impossible.”[1]

Now, this thing about essences obsessed and burned up scholastic philosophy from the Middle Ages to the modern age. We will not revisit it in that way. But we can whittle it down for our purposes, and get some use out of it.

Our point is that you can have a belief in a thing only through its definition, but this belief also does not have to contain one about the real essence of that object of belief. A real definition should be accurate, but also refer to a real thing, shown by demonstration, to be the deepest possible definition, and therefore make a good belief.

Aristotle made the distinction between definition and essence by distinguishing between “nominal essence” and “real essence.” A definition should state the difference, and so should a belief. In order for an object to be fully qualified to receive a definition, and therefore belief, it must be presumed to have a nature of some sort, and its known nature determines whether it is qualified to receive a full definition with a nominal essence and a real essence. If using the word Chupacabra, I identify the existence of that strange creature that is reported to be half-animal, half-man down in Mexico that attacks animals at night and sucks their blood. But this is a real and meaningful definition only by its nominal essence, not its real essence, which we do not know. We gave it a name and a definition, and we may believe that these creatures exist, but the meaning of the creature, and our faith in its reality, is incomplete by the definition alone. Even if we had one of these mystical creatures at our feet, that name would not tell us anything about its nature, but only the assumption that it has a kind of essential essence is necessary to giving it a name. If I, on the other hand, use the word “man,” this has a nominal essence as well a real essence.

I only say that definitions at best describe only the attributes of a thing. Its nature is deeper and underlying its essence. Therefore the possibility of limiting a thing to a description, of which induction is only capable, can miss most of its reality.

I am not playing into the hands of the atheists. My idea of induction is not limited to matter. Scientific induction describes reality and gives us the ability only to identify things and give them definitions and put them in a taxonomic class. It can never tell us anything about its ultimate nature or origin or meaning. However, is this not a good reason to reject the idea of a real essence to the universe, since such real essence can’t be demonstrated?

The atheist says he can’t accept God because there is no evidence for Him, and this is very righteous as long as the atheist is not artificially limiting evidence to things of only nominal essence, and placing his belief in things which are only capable of a limited kind of information and a limited amount of information about it.

I also don’t think that the theist has a good basis for faith in God and believing in divinity without it being based on some kind of clear observation,  whether directly or through history, based on real essence, and not only through intuition and deductive algorithms.

I only make the statement that God must have a nominal essence and a real essence. His real essence is demonstrable, not merely a result of faith in theological or personal definitions.

Now, this distinction is necessary for understanding what and who God is, and also with the cause and effect of the universe, where matter contains nominal essence but has a real essence, although it is directly unstated by matter or that part of anything which reveals only its most apparent dimension. But we can say that what is implicit in the creation of mere matter, and symbolic of a vital aspect of God’s totality is that matter implies an “unstated reason” for its existence, that reason being both where it came from and what function it is in existence to ultimately do as intended by God. That unstated reason, this lack of knowledge and lack of belief that is implied by matter but which matter does not necessarily speak it by its nature, is a good way to look at the difference between carnal man and a truly spiritual man, and I think that both the scientist and the theist are missing this.

This unstated reason, the “meaning,” when known and spoken, along with its bare definition, is what we call a “complete meaning” or definition of a thing. We can’t forget that we are talking about symbols. What I am describing is simply that full dimension of symbolic creation which is patterned after the full dimension of its creator, but does not necessarily “speak” it by choice. All things first “mean” ultimately that they stand in signification of a part of God’s essence that demands that He has power. Power is the minimal requirement of a Being that brought the universe into existence. However, if they stand for anything else about God they have to do it independently and by choice, as an outside observer, because, as I have shown, the action of attributing a certain effect back to a causal force, especially an ultimate one, requires such an outside observer.

So, I said that man is a nominal and real essence. The symbol which God would create to fully represent Him would have to be another being, and observer, like himself, who, in addition to having creative power, would have to have as much ability to digest and speak its meaning as God does to create something which has the potential of fully representing Him.

Being’s have immateriality, and this immateriality is the first requirement for making a symbol fully expressive of God’s nature. What is in view now is the point that if matter is an effect and God is a cause, then matter at a minimum must, by virtue of its existence, demand God’s. Yet matter alone is evidence of God’s existence alone. Existence is the simple objective reality of a thing. Matter says nothing for itself and nothing about God by itself. The creation of matter is symbolic of this unstated reason for God’s existence that is not independently and willfully stated by matter itself. Something of God’s real essence then must join with this matter but also be present in a newly created being, that can allow Man to make this statement. This thing that must join with matter is not only what we call “soul” or “spirit.” This is only Man’s natural media for the statement. It is also not to be said to be the Holy Spirit from God. This is only God’s substance that will be placed within the media. What we want is a symbol between them, a certain piece of knowledge that is agreeable to His Spirit as man’s, but also directly contains and, on application, completes, the promise of God embedded in the matter of man, and establishes him, by this symbol between them, as that ultimate fulfillment of the symbol of God having finally claimed all space, even voluntary space.

Again, the symbol that is exchanged is generally the transcendent type, containing transcendent knowledge that man cannot know on his own and that God cannot keep for himself and expect that they will still be joined together as Creator and that Creator’s greatest symbolic representative.

[1] Posterior Analytics, Book II.7