The Holy of Holies

“The Truth is clever. The minute we create an idol for it, it becomes a lie.” -TPT



Is rule by fear as used by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Hussein or Taliban/Iranian theocracies et al. any different than that of the Biblical Jehovah, held by dogma to be an object of fear? Are we not taught by biblical scripture to fear God?

In I Samuel 8—“God” begrudgingly accedes to the selection of a king to reign over Israel. Why did the Israelites desire a king against "God’s wishes" for continued rule via the priests, prophets and judges with Saul as “God’s” spokesman? Because the theocratic priesthood used the name of God to justify their corruption. Samuel warned the people of the power of a king but didn’t mention that corruption would be just as much of a problem with a king as it had been with the priests and judges. The people didn’t disagree with Samuel’s warnings, so we are left to conclude that the corruption of their theocracy was worse than the picture he painted of life under a king.

History’s most successful and revered leaders lead through respect earned by demonstration of ability and integrity, not fear.
The temple in Jerusalem was designed to represent the source of fear and awe the theocracy wished to project, but it’s Holy of Holies was as empty of Truth as are all such shams created to validate the power of its custodians. It was itself an idol, and as with all idols, a lie; the great temple, adorned with flowing sacrificial blood, was constructed to shelter fear in a barren room to perpetuate and reinforce a lie. A building is a building unless it is said to be holier than the rocks and stones around it. Then it becomes an idol.  You can’t enshrine Truth in a temple or behind an altar--only in our minds and hearts.

Truth itself is the Holy of Holies, the universe its temple and the souls who seek it are its apostles.

Thoughts

Faith is important, in fact, it is vital.  It consists of the positive emotions which motivate us to pursue the path reason indicates—emotions such as courage, energy, honor, nobility, patience, prudence, judgment, respect, self-reliance, sensibility, stability, grace under pressure, conviction and warmth.

Faith is the engine; reason is the operator at the controls.

Without reason we are blind; without faith we are dead.

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If you want to deal with or believe only in the subjective, be an artist.

If you want to deal with or believe only in the objective, be a scientist.

If you want to understand the big picture, be a veritologist, a pursuer of Truth.

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Wherefore angels?

What purpose would they serve? As assistants? Why, when God is omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient? As companions?  Wouldn't that be like having your hand as a companion?  Their "thoughts" would be divine pretense.

Which brings up another question, why demons? Don't we have enough trouble on our own with natural catastrophes, internal temptations, neighbors with their temptations, and our inevitable deaths.

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We wonder at this Creation and its cause, but it’s becoming apparent that the real wonder is how perfectly that cause has been obscured.

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As surely as we honor Truth as our god, we worship God--if God exists.

 

Corollary to Enlightened Self-Interest: We can't love anyone more than we love ourselves. If we dislike/hate ourselves, the best we can feel about others is nothing.

If Truth is God, what is Truth.

What is your ultimate ideal?  Is it love, power, fame, knowledge, courage, loyalty, wealth, lust, justice, art, beauty?  Even the positive examples can become a detriment if they overwhelm and consume us as an obsession.  Any one of them can  become your god, your driving principle, your ultimate ideal.  And what if there is a God, where does "It" fit in?

This site is dedicated to the proposition that the ultimate ideal, our overall driving pursuit, should beTruth, wherever that leads.  It may eventually lead us to a Cosmic Creator or it may not, but with Truth as the ultimate goal, if we can define it well enough, we'll be on one of many correct paths and moving in the right direction. 

I believe Truth has (at least) four aspects, knowledge, justice, love and beauty--moving from pure objective Truth to pure subjective Truth.  Yes, they both exist, at the ends of the figurative spectrum, innto which they blend in the middle.  Knowledge deals, through science, with universal natural law.  Beauty deals, through art, with individual imagination and creativity.  Justice is the objective determination of what is moral, and the subjective determination of the proper legal punishment within a society for immoral behavior.  Love is (or should be) a commitment to support the well being of another, driven and supported by any number of emotions, the strongest of which are familial bonds and physical attraction.

So which is primal, reason or emotion?  The answer is neither and both, they are a team.  I use the analogy of a car.  The driver is reason at the controls, and the emotions are the motivating force or engine.  Without proper control of the emotions, the car careens out of control and into the ditch.  Without the engine, the car goes nowhere.  To paraphrase Einstein, emotion (faith) without reason is blind, and reason with out emotion is dead.  Perhaps there is something to that trite but profoundly simple yin/yang symbol after all.

So, is there a God, a big Kahuna spirit being in the sky that the pursuit of Truth will lead us toward, but probably to which we'll probably never arrive?  The answer is on the far side of Creation.  We've acquired a lot of knowledge about the natural universe on this side of the Big Bang, but we don't have the first  bit of evidence for what preceded it or caused it.  God with a capital "G" is a 50/50 proposition.  I personally believe that God created it that way for a reason, a reason we'll get into next; which has to do with THE question that no revealed religion can answer--"Why?"