Tom from another thread...

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Do I mean anything ‘unique’ to God? Do I mean something to God that, say, D does not mean to God? Likewise, does D mean something to God that I don’t mean to God? I think the answer to these questions is clearly yes, and the uniqueness is of a personal nature too, not just incidental crap. What’s unique about me in ‘personal’ terms is what I mean to God that no one else means to God when I relate in love to God. And surely there’s content to that. It would be like asking Mozart if Daniel’s rendition/interpretation of his music meant anything special to him, even though thousands of others have done the same thing (viz., interpret Mozart). Of course Mozart can say, “Nobody has ever interpreted me quite THAT way before.” See both the ‘givenness’ and the ‘uniqueness’? And that creative offering uniquely shapes what Daniel ‘means’ to Mozart in. It’s Mozart who is ‘given’ to Daniel to ‘uniquely’ interpret. The end product is a uniquely shaped givenness. A uniquely shaped identity. The given of ‘sonship’ common to us all is uniquely determined by me so that I become a unique son, a unique person.

[Digression: This is why (a) I think ‘creativity’ is a necessary attribute of God and (b) I define human destiny in the eschaton in terms of unending, free creative expression. With regard to (a), the Son does more than ‘simply’ empty (kenosis) or surrender himself to the Father eternally. He does that, yes. But the Son’s kenotic gift of himself to the Father and the Father’s love of the Son are mediated (I’m smoking pot here, OK?) via the ‘Creative Spirit’. The Son forever offers himself to the Father via the Spirit in creative expression. So it’s ‘creative kenosis’, D, NOT the ‘kenosis of creativity’. And this is also why (b) I fought so hard to define human destiny in terms of ‘unending free creative expression’, unlike D who chose to express our destiny in terms of relinquishing all such expression in favor of sheer kenosis. That’s because sheer/absolute kenosis is all D sees occurring Son-to-Father in the Trinity I guess. But if the gift of one’s self to the other is mediated by the Spirit, you get an ‘unending creative gift of self to the other’. So, interpersonal love is necessarily creative. The Process folk are right in a way—contingency is a necessary feature of God’s essential life. It’s just that this isn’t fulfilled by a non-divine creation. It can be fulfilled by the infinitely creative re-expressing, re-posturing of divine persons vis-à-vis each other in the dance of love. There can be contingent states of affairs that contribute to defining God as the infinite plenitude of personal being. I’m saying that God is the infinite plenitude of ‘creative’ personal being.]

“Who I am” then is “what I mean” to God, and “what I mean to God” is the combined product of what God gives and what I make of it and give back to God. In the end it’s just “the effect I have upon God” given what I do with the possibilities inherent in what God gives me. My ‘person’ is my ‘identity’ and my ‘identity’ is my ‘meaning’ in the world. Nobody is ‘who’ I am because nobody has the exact same “effect I have upon God.” Nobody else has “my meaning to God” but me.

Post Edited (One Love) : 6/11/2009 1:31:27 PM (GMT-5)

D: It seems that you took my statement about contemplation of uncreated logoi...and thought that THAT's how I see complete actualization of God's subjective aims for the human being. Untrue.

Tom: Molto bene! Thanks for correcting me on that.

D: If the ground of my own unique particularity in becoming is ALSO the ground of ALL OTHER particular becoming...AND I REALIZE THIS...then relationality with my ground cannot be separated from my relationship with the entire created order “outside” me. Why? Because otherwise I would NOT be relating to the ground IN REALITY. In other words, I cannot fully relate to the Logos as such without acknowledging openness and reception of the world that the Logos is constantly sustaining from the center of each particular existent.

Tom: I like it. It needs be stated in a way that anticipates questions and/or objections, but yeah. I think you’re right on. And this is good for me to hear.

See, D, I didn’t doubt that you agreed we actually live out our existence in relationship toward the created world. I only read you as saying our ‘personhood’, our ‘personal becoming’ was completed and fulfilled only in the inward moment and only goes on display in creation outwardly. See? What I’m saying is that our ‘personal becoming’ itself isn’t complete without world-composition.

Take just a bit of what you just said above: “If the ground of my own unique particularity in becoming is ALSO the ground of ALL OTHER particular becoming...AND I REALIZE THIS...then….” You didn’t have this in mind, but let me try to make a point from this. One could argue that if (a) the ground of my ‘unique particularity’ as a person is also the ground of all other unique particular persons, then (b) there’s really nothing ‘unique’ or ‘particular’ about me which distinguishes me as a person from you as a person. THAT is what I want to argue against. I saw this inherent in what you have been saying, but I’m glad if you’re not saying it. I saw it in your appraoch; basically if (a) the ground of us all IS God (and that much IS right), and (b) nothing about ‘who’ we are is derived from anything contingent about us (memories, thoughts, race, gender, histories, etc.), then (c) it would seem to follow that we all become different embodiments of the same person. To avoid (c) we have to tweak (b). It can be that 'who we are' is utterly determined by God in that inward moment of grounding. What makes me personally 'unique' and 'distinct' can’t be the ground and source of our personhood, God, because that’s the same for us all, right? That much is what we all share in without distinction—the filial relation of love in Christ, mediated by the Spirit of Sonship. Nothing unique there. So if we’re each unique, and God is grounding the filial relationship equally to us all across the board, then it has to be each of us, freely grounds the determination of creative expression, who grounds what's personally 'unique' about us. That’s what completes the movement and makes us each a ‘unique’ meaning-maker, world-composer.

Can you feel me?

D: Some people think that the “inward moment” is really separatable from outward involvement with one’s environment...but this can ONLY be the case for the self-reflected self...NOT for the self that is transparently related to its divine ground, which is the Center of all centers of particularity.

Tom: Great! Then we should be able to find define the two moments (inward and outward) of an undivided movement of personal becoming. The question now is whether human beings, properly grounded in Christ via the Spirit inwardly, must freely determine the shape of creative expression in order to avoid us all being carbon copies of each other when it comes to outward expression—or not. I say the differentiation of human beings “as unique” requires the creature to determine creative expression. Where else are you going to locate the determination of creative expression which grounds my unique particularity from yours?

D: Something else: I want to make sure that you'd agree with this statement, with respect to your own self-understanding: The core of who I am (as created person) is my unique, indeterministically-expressed interpretation of who God is.

Yes? I want to be ABSOLUTELY sure on this. Tom from another thread...

Tom: I’m gonna comment on this without having read my own previous comments. I’m interested in comparing the two. This’ll make you happy D, I know, because reading my comments back then now, I’d definitely qualify myself. I’m still saying “indeterministically determined creative expression” is a must. But I would NOT now say it’s the CORE of who I am. Because I’ve just say for the past two pages that ‘who’ we are is a movement involving TWO moments. And in this quote of me I only mention one moment, the outward moment of creative expression. But the outward moment CAN’T be the “core” of who we are. Maybe the problem is the language of “core,” because now I want to say that being a person involves BOTH moments. How can you have a CORE to two moments? You can’t. The problem is that it’s all RELATIONAL—all the way down the rabbit hole. There is no undivided CORE to who I am, if by CORE you mean having to identify one unrelated entity as the core. There are no unrelated entities. But for sure, D, the inward moment is the GROUND. I just want to avoid making the same mistake by calling THAT moment the core. The core IS a movement involving two moments. The CORE is relationality.

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Now, let me jump into those older comments of mine:

Tom THEN: Do I mean anything ‘unique’ to God? Do I mean something to God that, say, D does not mean to God? Likewise, does D mean something to God that I don’t mean to God? I think the answer to these questions is clearly yes, and the uniqueness is of a personal nature too, not just incidental crap. What’s unique about me in ‘personal’ terms is what I mean to God that no one else means to God when I relate in love to God.

Tom NOW: Dayyim! I think this is still right on. Here I’m clearly focusing on the second moment of outward expression where we (like I said above) freely determine what’s unique about us. I’d just add now that now only do we mean something unique to God, but we mean something unique to others. BUT…this uniqueness is created by us AFTER we all embrace the same ground in the same inward moment of self-denial and surrender. It’s the human person, purged and come out the other side of the inward moment who then BECOMES free to exercise the gift of God’s creativity in ways unique to us—spontaneous, free, and without risk.

Tom THEN: “Who I am” then is “what I mean” to God, and “what I mean to God” is the combined product of what God gives and what I make of it and give back to God. In the end it’s just “the effect I have upon God” given what I do with the possibilities inherent in what God gives me. My ‘person’ is my ‘identity’ and my ‘identity’ is my ‘meaning’ in the world. Nobody is ‘who’ I am because nobody has the exact same “effect I have upon God.” Nobody else has “my meaning to God” but me.

Tom NOW: I have to qualify this because I was too one-sided. “Who I am” can’t ONLY be “what I mean to God.” If personhood is a synergistic creative achievement, then “who I am” has to include “what God means to me.” Ha. Perhaps, D, this is all we’re really saying (thank you Jesus):

The inward moment is where we embrace “what God means to us” (as ground, Lord, giver of grace, granter of sonship, and us as “created,” as God’s canvass, as “art,” etc.). On the other hand the outward moment of creative expression is “what we get to mean to God” (as creators, artists, and determiners of loving expression). So ‘who we are’ encompasses BOTH what God means to us AND what we get to mean to God. Personhood as one's MEANING in the world is comprised BOTH of what God means to us and what we meant to God. So in a sense it's only PARTLY true that "only God can tell you WHO you are." In terms common to us all--our grounding--yes, that's true. But in terms of the concrete personal existence which is unique, it's only half the truth. The other half is that "only we can determine WHO we are" when it comes to determining what the sonship common to us all LOOKS LIKE uniquely in me. So the whole truth is: Only God and you can say who you are, since who you are is 'what God means to you' + 'what you get to mean to God'.

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D: Could we say that self-emptying is not purely a negative event of pure renunciation. Rather, it is part and parcel of creative self-giving to the other...leaving the self-giving one "empty" to receive the gift of the other FROM the other. This is what happens with the persons of the Trinity. They "re-express and re-posture" through being themselves and transcending themselves by filling each other's self-created emptiness (through self-giving) and receiving each other's self-given gift of fullness of being.  Perichoresis.

Would you agree with this?

Tom: Gotta rap my head around it first. There are a lot of moving pieces. It sure sounds like something I’d agree with!

T

Post Edited (Tom) : 6/11/2009 8:13:58 PM (GMT-5)

D: Could we say that self-emptying is not purely a negative event of pure renunciation. Rather, it is part and parcel of creative self-giving to the other...leaving the self-giving one "empty" to receive the gift of the other FROM the other. This is what happens with the persons of the Trinity. They "re-express and re-posture" through being themselves and transcending themselves by filling each other's self-created emptiness (through self-giving) and receiving each other's self-given gift of fullness of being.  Perichoresis.

Tom: I think I’m following ya. Let me ask you this—What’s going on here that’s ‘creative’? Is there any determination of will occurring which is not simply the choice to renounce self (the choice to ‘empty’ one’s self to receive)?

I’ll think on it more. It's only 4 AM. Just woke up for some reason from a sound sleep.

Tom

I think, D, you want to explore how the two moments relate in one movement, right? How does the inward moment of ‘self-surrender’ to our ‘ground’ relate to the outward moment of ‘self-determined’ creative expression? Let’s think in terms of a double asymmetry (or would it be double symmetry? Whatever). The inward moment is the ground for which the outward moment is the consequence. The inward grounds the outward as its goal and purpose. The inward is constitutive of the outward as any ground is to its consequence. But the latter is constitutive of the former as any fulfillment is to its anticipation. The outward moment (creative expression) is the goal and fulfillment for which the inward moment (grounding) is the necessary precondition. There’s double asymmetry here in that you can’t reverse the order BUT each nevertheless participates in constituting what the other is and means. See my point? Grounding is prior, yes. But this grounding is incomplete in as much its very design and structure are anticipatory and purpoeful. Like any seed that is planted, the seed must surrender itself to death to realize its purpose in fruitfulness.

This way we can affirm the best of what you’re been emphasizing and the best of what I want to emphasize. We’ve each seen a part of the truth and have wanted to make it (perhaps?) the whole truth. What will separate us, though, is your rejecting my claim that the latter ‘outward’ moment that completes the movement to fulfilled human personal being MUST be a creaturely self-determined moment of creative expression (whose specific movements are not chosen by God; rather God specifically chooses NOT to choose in this instance and in so doing creates space for the creature to determine what she will mean to God, for her to shape that her ‘unique particularity’ in the world). I’m still hoping to win you to my side on this point. If self-determining freedom is abandoned in the second moment, dude, there just is no second moment and thus no place to locate each creature’s ‘unique particularity’.

Does that help?

Tom

Post Edited (Tom) : 6/12/2009 3:41:01 AM (GMT-5)

I'm thinking the "tropos" aspect is what you will like, Tom...

Oh yeah baby. The more languages you can say it in, the better! The section of Logos & Tropos on pp. 26-28 is ON THE MONEY. Of course, if you ask Ed Moore whether Maximus worked this out consistently, he’d say no. I haven’t heard Maximus say the created gets to determine tropoi. But let that slide for now. Dude, several lines there are almost verbatim what I’ve been posting (viz., my idea that “a creature’s ‘unique particularity’ is located in that creature's free determination of creative expression” and his idea that “tropos expresses the individual aspect, that which differentiates the particular from the general…” — same idea).

I gotta get Maximus now, dog. Dang, you’re making me spend money.

I totally got with this by Maximus:

“The difference in person is made known through the manner (tropos) in the action.”

Yes! Dude, do you not see my insistence upon creaturely determined creative expression here? If God determines what the tropoi of all creatures are to be, ‘how’ each creature is to move, and then mediates this to each creature, even if the creature is willing, the result is that all creatures are a function of the divine person(s), for that is where the determination of tropoi originated. In that case, there’s no differentiation of creatures in personal terms. It couldn't be, since one and the same person (God) would be determining all tropoi. So no creature would get to determine anything about what they mean to God in terms of tropoi. But if the tropoi settle what’s unique and particular about us, and if this uniqueness is to be personal in nature (that is, if we’re to be unique and particular persons, not the same person acting variously in you, in me, in her), then the determination of the uniqueness that differenatiates between created persons has to lie with those persons thus differentiated. Whoever determines tropoi is the bearer of personal distinction! FRICKIN AYE!!!! Please God let this be it!

And just like I said above about the double asymmetry between inward and outward moments constituting a single movement of personal becoming, so logos and tropos are inseparable but mutually defining. There is no concretizing of logoi apart from tropoi. Tropoi just ARE the actualized forms of logoi.

One last point. He says “logos stands for the universal” too. Exploring this, we might want to consider something I mentioned a while back, that there’s one universal logos for human being, a single logos for ‘human being’ per se, a type-specific intention for the class ‘human being’, and THAT same logos is at the core of every human being. But being a reflection of an irresistibly creative being, this single logos admits a infinite variety of tropoi or ‘ways’ it can be instantiated. And WE are those tropoi, an infinite variety of freely determining expressions of a single KIND of being—human being. I’m less sure about whether the logoi of human beings are in fact a single logos. Just thinking out loud. This part doesn't matter.

Tom

Post Edited (Tom) : 6/12/2009 10:02:43 AM (GMT-5)

Post Edited (One Love) : 6/12/2009 10:10:26 AM (GMT-5)

D: What if we keep your "interpretation" language and say this... The relationship between the Christian and Christ is Holy Spirit of Christ-empowered MIMICRY and RE-PRESENTATION of Christ's Spiritual Presence by the Christian in their particular inter- and intra-personal contexts. Mimicry and re-presentation are INTERPRETATIONAL activities. And as I understand it, it's biblical to think about "mimicking" Christ and "re-presenting" Christ to all people…. Now the believer.If the beliver "mimick" and "re-represents" Christ in her particular intra- and inter-personal contexts, then she is using her tropos indeterminately, in self-emptying, self-giving relationship to the Spirit of Christ within her. Over time, she can become so Christ-like that, like St. Francis of Assisi, be called "another Christ."…

So...NO exhaustive determination of the human "tropos" by the Spirit of Christ...but openness to perfect mimicry and re-presentation of Christ from one's own personal love relationship to Christ.  Our "tropoi" becomes a true self as it transparently re-presents Christ in it's own becoming.

How's this? This is about as far as I can go.

Tom: That’s plenty far enough. Dude, I think I’m gonna cry. REALLY.

I'm totally down the mimicry and re-presentation.

So...you're really cool with the necessity of creaturely determination of tropoi AND with the sense in which this contributes to defining a) personal distinctions between us and b) that space in which God allows us to determine something of our unique meaning to him?

T

Post Edited (Tom) : 6/12/2009 10:20:56 AM (GMT-5)

Wowzers!  She's a preacher.

So, Brother Turtle.  What's next?

Post Edited (Asher) : 6/12/2009 10:17:26 PM (GMT-5)