aa5874

And Clement of Alexandria has an even better quote about shedding of blood and sacrifice.

Exhortation to the Heathens 3.[quote]..

storytime

What is worldliness? What was Christs ideal vision other than his own Jewish interest - Judaism? But was Jesus trying to transform the world so as to harmonize with Judaism? Or, did Jesus believe his Judaism was to remain separate from the world?

No Robots

I guess the only way to appreciate Brunner is to have a pretty good background in literature and philosophy, particularly with regard to Spinoza. Here is Spinoza on sacrifice:

As to the fact that the patriarchs offered sacrifices, I think they did so for the purpose of stimulating their piety, for their minds had been accustomed from childhood to the idea of sacrifice, which we know had been universal from the time of Enoch; and thus they found in sacrifice their most powerful incentive. The patriarchs, then, did not sacrifice to God at the bidding of a Divine right, or as taught by the basis of the Divine law, but simply in accordance with the custom of the time; and, if in so doing they followed any ordinance, it was simply the ordinance of the country they were living in, by which (as we have seen before in the case of Melchisedek) they were bound.—Spinoza / TTP Chap. 5: Of the Ceremonial Law.

Sacrifice is a barbaric relic of pre-Biblical superstition that the prophets fought against, and that Christ ultimately transmuted into its exact opposite.

Yes, he did want to change people spiritually. He recognized, though, that not all are amenable to spiritual awakening.

We Brunnerians are trying to create a community of spiritually minded individuals seeking a way of thinking and living in the world that doesn't absolutize our own egoistic interests. Many of Brunners most devoted disciples became scientists precisely as a response to his doctrine of spiritually-modified praxis.

This is about relativizing our egoistic interests.

I don't see that.

The goal is not to scold, but to try to stimulate spiritual awakening in the few individuals who are amenable to it.

The people are fine to live as they do. Some of us, though, want to live differently, and want to encourage others to do so.

No Robots

I think it is important to point out that freeing oneself from worldliness does not mean rejecting the material world. As I pointed out, many of Brunner's disciples were or became scientists. The argument is that it is only by freeing ourselves from worldliness that we can truly enjoy, understand and improve the world. In order to deal with the world effectively, you have to put yourself out of it in some measure. But lest there be any doubt about Brunner's position, here is how one of his followers reported something he said:

The truly interesting thing is not the spirit, but rather the world. Is it not so? There is nothing at all to the spirit. One can say nothing about it: if you wants to speak about it, you have only a single word-: One!—And that's it. The spirit thus is boring, no? Only the world is interesting; that is, varied and multi-hued and complicated and very exciting. And it is also mysterious; where does it come from, and where do all its individual things come from? But also in the whole: how does it actually come to pass that the world is in the world? It is all in essence entirely obscure—in spite of all science. We can find so much within it, and where would we be without it?! But finally all is nevertheless a mystery; the entire relative world is pure mystery. Only the absolute spirit has not the slightest mystery. The absolute is entirely clear. It is precisely that, the Absolute, that is: it is without all relations and therefore—simply boring.—Constantin Brunner, as quoted in "Nirwana und die Substanz" / George Goetz. In his Philosophie und Judentum. My translation.

Elijah

Looks again, like allowing a superstitious understanding of god and sacrifice to get in the way of a rational understanding of Christ’s act. Understandable coming from a philosophical background but a completely incorrect understanding of a much more sophisticated act.
What percentage of people do you think are “amenable to spiritual awakening”? I think it’s faith like in Johan with the men of Nineveh that spread through them without understanding from one man. Just like it was faith in Christ that spread out from him and his one act… it wasn’t a spiritual disposition that he left us.
That’s fine but I’m more focused on what Christ intended with his sacrifice. I’m not faulting what you are doing just that it isn’t going to lead to any world solution and isn’t what Christ intended with his death.
If you see him as an eastern mystic maybe, but if you see him as a Jewish Messiah trying to free the people with his life then no.
Try reading John again from the perspective of a messiah sacrificing his life that expects imitation. Try to understand him as a Jewish messiah trying to establish a new meme/spirit. That’s not a spiritual person up there trying to get common folk to be more spiritual. It’s a spiritual person trying to get common folk to have faith in him as the messiah because as long as the people are worshiping earthly authority or are waiting for a messiah to come save them they won’t even think about trying to free themselves.
I just don’t see what you hope to achieve with this strategy. What’s your plan for when Rome comes knocking on your little utopia’s door? The problem isn’t building a peaceful/worldlinessless society it’s a peaceful society surviving the non peaceful empire.

aa5874

You may be getting a bit spiritual, but it was an historical event that changed people's view on Jesus Christ on a large monumental scale, not a spiritual event.

It was when Constantine saved Jesus.

If the NT is true then for 300 years the spirtual message only caused suffering and death, until Constantine, all of a sudden the persecuted became the persecutors. Christians became the physical and spiritual rulers.

No Robots

Here's how Rufus Jones puts it:

It looks as though there were two quite diverse types of man, though it would be truer to fact to say that the distinction is probably one of degree rather than one of type. There is, on the one hand, the person who has little or no interest in a Beyond. He responds to the world which his senses report to him and in large measure he confines himself to that world. He lives biologically and seems to care little about intrinsic values, and is for the most part unconscious or dimly conscious of transcendent Realities. This type of man, however, is not completely what the Gnostics called a hylic man, devoid of spiritual capacity and composed entirely of material stuff. His unconcern is due more to the influences of nurture and social pressure than to an original bent of mind. This unconcerned and seemingly "biological man" may some day be shaken awake, may set his feet on the way back to the Fatherland, and may become a genuine citizen of it.—The flowering of mysticism: The Friends of God in the fourteenth century by Rufus Matthew Jones. New York: Macmillan, 1940: p. 7-8.

From my point of view the crux is not imitation, but reproduction. What Christ wants is for his followers to participate in his project of spiritual awakening. The biggest obstacle to this project is the inertia and resistance of established authority. But Christ shows us how to deal with that, not by attacking it directly, but by circumventing it and going straight to the people. Why do you think I post on the Internet, rather than trying to promote all this in academe or in the established media?

The Brunnerian community underwent the supreme test under Nazi persecution. Many perished. But the community survived. The community has a beneficial effect on popular society by serving as a model.

Elijah

I understand there is a dichotomy in people. While I may not agree with the particular spiritual/nonspiritual duality because I see the main duality/type classification as introvert/extrovert but that’s off the point. I was asking what the percentage of people you think are capable of spiritual awakening? What are the capabilities and expectations of this group within the larger community/world? How are they going to coexist with the non spiritual people without there being conflict or animosity due to the divide between the two types of people?

I’m a firm firm believer that spiritual people should keep a low profile while trying to help the people. Once you realize that the majority of the people have little hope in switching over to a spiritual outlook then the question comes back to why are you trying to get them to change in the first place?

The goal should be for the spiritual person to make themselves like the common folk and do as you wish them to do and hopefully they follow suit. You can’t tell people to become spiritually focused (or reject worldliness) and expect them to actually be able to change their nature. While the spiritual person may not be able to change their nature either they can act like one of them and try to get the common folk to change their behavior, but not their nature. In the case of Christianity, getting them to serve a spitirual authority instead of an earthly one. Trying to get the common people to change their spots and become spiritual is not a realistic plan for any spiritual individual.

What I do encourage though is spiritual people trying to behave like the common folk because the difficulties between the two comes from an underdeveloped social ability in the spiritual individuals IMO. The more time you spend turned inward reflecting on philosophical interests the less time you are developing socially with the common folk until there is a noticeable difference in behavior and people are distrusting of other people who act different.

The common folk are quick to imitate but they need something to actually imitate and not just someone preaching a rejection of worldliness, which is completely vague, but an actual action, like sacrificing your life for your conviction. Something like martyring yourself the common folk can imitate, but they can’t just turn more spiritual by seeing a spiritual person because that is a product of the life that person lived. Jesus didn’t expect Paul to go from fisherman to mystic; he expected him to believe in him and that faith to spread thru the people just like in the story of Jonah. Conviction is contagious.
I don’t know anything about this community that you belong to. Is it an actual community you live in or is it just speaking of individuals who collectively support Brunner’s philosophy? Is free thought encouraged within the community or is it strictly for those who agree with Brunner’s mystic understanding of Christ?

I don’t agree with creating an alternate society or offshoot society to serve as an example to society as a whole. That’s 1960’s hippie commune thinking that doesn’t address the real world problems/obstacles we are facing and it would face in the future. I think it’s best to create the changes you want to see within the society not from outside it. Instead of trying to create your own version of society that you hope they replicate ideologically. Whatever good ideas your society does have will be assimilated into the empire’s mode of operation only after it destroys the threat to its survival, that being the society you are trying to create.
What did your community learn from that though? What is its plan to prevent that from happening again or what to do if it does?

Elijah

If you can’t beat them join them. Constantine is certainly the moment that Christianity went mainstream but you’re being overly paranoid if you think that was anything more than the standard politician doing and saying what he needed to in order to stay in power or get more of it. You can’t beat a rebellion that grows stronger by being defeated so you have to discredit it or use it to your advantage. In this case Rome managed to do both.

Like if Obama suddenly proclaimed Muhammad the last true prophet it won’t be because of a conspiracy theory; it will be because it’s political advantageous to him. Either in helping with peace or for gaining political support.

You also shouldn’t view it as much as a single act of conversion but an inevitable result brought on by the rise in popularity of a politically active group within Rome. Like when the Mormons get one of theirs in office it will be because they have enough political and economical power to do so. It doesn’t take as much political capital as it takes a desire to see one of your own in the highest seat. The Mormons here I wouldn’t say are very politically minded even though their economic clout certainly affects us politically on a multitude of issues, but the faith itself isn’t that politically oriented.

Christianity on the other hand can be very political minded especially on the orthodox side. Most ideologies have some type of teaching you need to believe or behavior to follow but for the orthodox Christians just faith in Jesus as the Christ was all that was needed. You didn’t need to understand philosophy/gnosis or behave a certain way/follow the law, you just had to have faith in Jesus as the one true lord. This type of ideology is going to fuel an incentive to see the living kings of this world agree to that since that is about as close as they are going to get Jesus to the throne. That the Christians eventually got an emperor to give Jesus his props should be expected due to the nature of their beliefs.

No Robots

I think that many are capable. However, in over a decade of effort I have not recruited a single person to active Brunner-centered work.

You answer your own question here: the way for the spiritually-oriented to get by is to not make any outward showing of themselves, to live as much as possible like other people.

The idea is not to change people, but to group together those who are of a spiritual orientation. For now, this work has to be done in fora dominated by those who have no interest in it. Eventually, critical mass should be achieved, allowing a high degree of independence from mass society.

Quite so.

True. My hope is that once critical mass is achieved, this will become less of a factor. Hermann Hesse's book, The Glass Bead Game, describes the problems of social behavior faced by a spiritually-oriented community.

Well, the common folk are free to imitate Christ, but some of us want to engage in positive reproduction of his project. I think that Paul was, in fact, a mystic and a genius, btw.

The community is very small, about a dozen people scattered around the world. We have lively discussions and some disagreements. All of us understand that the goal is to create a community of spiritually-oriented people centered around the work of Brunner.

I am utterly convinced that this spiritual separatism is the only way for those of a spiritual orientation to lead decent lives. I am also convinced that it is impossible for the empire to eradicate it.

It learned that it cannot be eradicated.

The plan, as far as I can see, is to continue to build the community. If persecution comes again, well, we already have a model for how to deal with it.