That's why, when you just think about it, the idea of a uncreated, necessary, immaterial, boundless, transcendent person (God the Son/Word) having something analogous to a "wake-induced lucid dream" (Creation) wherein he personally takes on a "lucid dream experience" (Jesus), being born into and growing within the "dream" experiencing it from the "inside"...all while actively, actually sustaining the w.i.l.d. from the "outside."

It is ACTUALLY CONCEIVABLE.  Just put the lens on, Jeff.

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Repost...

Alexei Nesteruk
Light from the East: Theology, Science, and the Eastern Orthodox Tradition
Page 232

"The human nature in Christ was operating within the reality of empirical space and historical time, whereas Christ's divine nature was always beyond the empirical and intelligible aeons, in the uncreated realm of the kingdom of God, which can be expressed symbolically in terms of the boundaries of the created if these boundaries are seen from the vertical (divine) dimension. It is from this "outside" that Christ the Logos of God coordinated the empirical space where he indwelled in the body with the rest of the created universe. This helps us to understand the space-time of the physical universe as the manifestation of the hypostatic mode of the relationship between God and the world."

All this would seem to fit with the "two minds" view...where the Incarnate Word has the Uncreated Divine Mind and a created human mind (nous). In my own mind, the analogy is the wake-induced lucid dreamer who obviously relates with two distinct levels of consciousness in his lucid dream as singular personal experience. With this, the entirety of subjective and intersubjective activity of the individualized "residual digital self" within the lucid dream is directly attributable to the human mind of the dream experiencer creating it. This means that the dreaming person is one and only personal subject who experiences all of the RDS' experiences "from the inside" dream...and who also simultaneously experiences creating the dream "from the outside." Like so...

Post Edited (One Love) : 4/16/2012 10:58:05 AM (GMT-5)

Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeealy think about it, bro.

Post Edited (One Love) : 4/16/2012 11:02:06 AM (GMT-5)

Don't forget my thought you haven't responded to...

If someone (say, Greg) says that the threefold interpersonal conscious relationship is a NECESSARY feature in God's UNCREATED self-relationship (sans any Creation even), then that someone (say, Greg)--if they want to be LOGICALLY CONSISTENT--has to agree that the threefold interpersonal conscious relationship CANNOT FAIL to exist because is it necessary...even immediately post-Incarnation when Jesus is a zygotic group of cells in Mary's womb.

PS: I'm telegraphing here.  I'm betting that Jeff is gonna say that consciousness is NOT an "essential attribute" of the Uncreated, Necessary 2nd Person.  He's gonna say something like "Beings CAN have consciousness, but that doesn't mean that consciousness is "essential" to any beings. Consciousness is an 'accidental attribute' of beings, as I believe feelings are." and then use human sleep as an example, how we are "beings" while we still sleep.  In short, he's going to deny that there is any such thing as an "essentially conscious" being.  I would really hope I'm wrong about that potential response.  I REALLY, REALLY hope I'm wrong.  But...

Post Edited (One Love) : 4/17/2012 7:40:57 AM (GMT-5)

Post Edited (One Love) : 4/17/2012 9:00:35 AM (GMT-5)

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D: The (more despairing) analogy I used before was having a mosquito sting during an unsupassably intense, all-over orgasm. Would you still feel the sting? If your nervers are working properly, yeah. But it would be relativized unto virtual meaninglessness in comparison to the orgasm.

J: But the only way this can even make sense is if the two-minds view of the Logos is true.

Greg Boyd

What is "anti-kenoticism" but saying that the post-Incarnational, personal presence of the Eternal Son/Word of God the Father by the Spirit includes, yet transcends the creaturely reality of Jesus of Nazereth?

Post Edited (One Love) : 4/17/2012 3:17:02 PM (GMT-5)

Consequently, I'm not even gonna say that the Christadephians aren't bona-fide believers. I would just say they have a wrong interpretation of scripture. But they apparently do believe Jesus is Lord of Creation in the sense that we are obligated to serve him. And for all I know from scripture, that's all that is minimally required. Paul's sermon on Mars Hill wouldn't imply any more than that. And yet, presumably, bona-fide conversions could result from that sermon.

Post Edited (Similitude) : 4/18/2012 11:07:25 AM (GMT-5)

I was reading  William Coffin’s Credo. He writes, “And ‘God is love, and those who abide inlove abide in God and God abides in them’—that passage suggests that revelationis in the relationship.”

Revelation in the relationship. It’s stuck in my brainall day.

Impassibility (which for me just means the sense in which God remains supremely satisfied with and in himself, a satisfaction I can nomore diminish than I can be necessary to its existence) began to make sense tome when I began experience it, to taste it in relational terms. I chose to let the beliefthat there is supreme joy at the heart of all things inform my suffering—when my first daughter abandoned her faith followed by my second; when my father-in-law died unexpectedly followed by my own father, of cancer, followed by my mother, of cancer, all within a few short years.

At first I had to compartmentalize the joy off in a corner and try to embrace it by taking a break from my pain, switching back and forth. But eventually (and I’m so poor at this) the joy and delight of God’s presence filled the room and the pain was relegated to a corner as the joy transcended my circumstances. I totally suspect that eventually the joy will define the pain into relative meaninglessness...just like Richard Wurmbrandt experienced.

I suppose that’s what’s at the heart of this. We're simultaneously confronted with reasons to rejoice and reasons to suffer. So we just choose to settled on an overall felt quality of experience which is the difference between the two (all our reasons to rejoice minus all our reasons to sorrow). The math isn't itself the problem. It's that we fail to perceive the TRUTH about our reasons to rejoice. So what happens is we default to suffering because we've not a perspective on things capable of transcending our pain. But why should we not be as eager to imagine the reverse—that joy be primary and define all else? That suffering become less and less determinative of our well-being and identity because the reasons to delight are more abiding and definitive? Truly, if our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that shall be revealed in us, how are they comparable to that glory as it presently obtains as God’s own self-sufficiency?

“God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.” Really? Who shall wipe away God’s tears? Who shall save a God who suffers essentially in the core of his essence?

It’s all about how inclusive of the truth our prespectives are, because all suffering is a failure of perspective before it's anything else.. If Anita goes shopping and I am without her for one hour, I suffer nothing. If she’s gone for a few days I suffer “some” measure of discomfort. If she dies and I lose her presence for the rest of my life, I suffer greatly. But surely it’s conceivable that the SAME perspective which renders her absence of an hour incapable of diminishing my joy is capable of rendering her absence of 20 years incapable of diminishing my job. Perspective. What perspective could enable me to rejoice without diminishment in spite of death’s taking her from me? The same perspective that enables me to rejoice when shopping takes her from me for an hour—viz., the confidence that I will see her again, that nothing can ultimately separate us, that a fleeting 20 year separation is not worth comparing to the glory that shall be revealed in us. The only question is whether it's conceivable that my present persective can be sufficiently informed by future promises. But even if I fail at it now, it's certainly conceivable. The bigger question regards God's NECESSARILY all-inclusive perspective.

“Sorrow not as do others who have no hope.” (1Th 4.13) Does this mean that the promise of resurrection empowers us MERELY to suffer LESS than those who have no hope? Really? We suffer the same sorrow they do but just hurt less because we have hope? That’s it? Or does it mean weare capable of not suffering their sorrow, i.e., of having a perspective so defined by our security and acceptance in Christ and future promise that no circumstance is capable of generating within that perspective a moment of negation or diminishment?

On what basis would we argue that no perspective definitive of one’s aesthetic satisfaction is conceivable that could render all instances of suffering incapable of diminishing that satisfaction? Greg in T&P argued that such a perspective IS conceivable. Such a joy could only be diminished if the perspective that grounds it is first skewed or limited. But no such limitation on God’s perspective is possible. Hence, all present instances of suffering are “defined by” that all-inclusive perspective (as opposed to that satisfaction being defined by the limited perspective which grounds suffering); i.e., defined away into "relative meaninglessness." That's exactly what Paul is saying in Romans. To be incomparable to the glory that shall utterly define us is to be meaningless to that glory. But in God’s case this perspective NOW includes the knowledge that no worldly event can threaten his existence or well-being (which limitation of perspective is responsible for ALL our suffering), NOR can it ultimately threaten the fulfillment of his loving purposes for created sentient creatures given UR.

So how could the divine perspective suffer?

Tom

Post Edited (Tom) : 4/25/2012 7:04:41 AM (GMT-5)

T: I was reading William Coffin’s Credo. He writes, “And ‘God is love, and those who abide inlove abide in God and God abides in them’—that passage suggests that revelationis in the relationship.”

J: If God is not longsuffering, I have no clue what the bible is saying about anything, including the verse you quote there.

T: Impassibility (which for me just means the sense in which God remains supremely satisfied with and in himself, a satisfaction I can nomore diminish than I can be necessary to its existence) began to make sense tome when I began experience it, to taste it in relational terms. I chose to let the beliefthat there is supreme joy at the heart of all things inform my suffering—when my first daughter abandoned her faith followed by my second; when my father-in-law died unexpectedly followed by my own father, of cancer, followed by my mother, of cancer, all within a few short years.

At first I had to compartmentalize the joy off in a corner and try to embrace it by taking a break from my pain, switching back and forth. But eventually (and I’m so poor at this) the joy and delight of God’s presence filled the room and the pain was relegated to a corner as the joy transcended my circumstances. I totally suspect that eventually the joy will define the pain into relative meaninglessness...just like Richard Wurmbrandt experienced.

J: I think "weep with those who weep" means actually feel some sympathetic suffering. As such, I think it means TAKE ON suffering, albeit without casting away the joy we have in our hope.

T: I suppose that’s what’s at the heart of this. We're simultaneously confronted with reasons to rejoice and reasons to suffer. So we just choose to settled on an overall felt quality of experience which is the difference between the two (all our reasons to rejoice minus all our reasons to sorrow). The math isn't itself the problem. It's that we fail to perceive the TRUTH about our reasons to rejoice. So what happens is we default to suffering because we've not a perspective on things capable of transcending our pain. But why should we not be as eager to imagine the reverse—that joy be primary and define all else?

J: The answer for me is because the bible says we are to be strengthened unto ALL longsuffering and endurance WITH joy. The joy makes the ability to suffer more and more POSSIBLE.

T: Truly, if our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that shall be revealed in us, how are they comparable to that glory as it presently obtains as God’s own self-sufficiency?

J: Note what the verse actually says. Our sufferings NOW are not worthy to be compared with the glory WE WILL (future tense) RECEIVE. This is why Paul can say that if we hope in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most miserable (assuming, i.e., we're actually living a holy life) and that if there is no ressurection, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die. You've turned verse after verse literally on its head.

T: “God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.” Really? Who shall wipe away God’s tears?

J: Don't know about you, but I don't cry all the time. That's because the necessary and sufficient conditions of sorrow/pain are not always instantiated in my life. When our pain is brought to an end, a perfectly sympathetic Being will be absent any conditions for sympathic suffering as well. It's that simple.

T: Who shall save a God who suffers essentially in the core of his essence?

J: Who said conscious experience of suffering is an essential attribute of God? I, for one, have denied it over and over.

T: It’s all about how inclusive of the truth our prespectives are, because all suffering is a failure of perspective before it's anything else.. If Anita goes shopping and I am without her for one hour, I suffer nothing. If she’s gone for a few days I suffer “some” measure of discomfort. If she dies and I lose her presence for the rest of my life, I suffer greatly. But surely it’s conceivable that the SAME perspective which renders her absence of an hour incapable of diminishing my joy is capable of rendering her absence of 20 years incapable of diminishing my job. Perspective. What perspective could enable me to rejoice without diminishment in spite of death’s taking her from me? The same perspective that enables me to rejoice when shopping takes her from me for an hour—viz., the confidence that I will see her again, that nothing can ultimately separate us, that a fleeting 20 year separation is not worth comparing to the glory that shall be revealed in us. The only question is whether it's conceivable that my present persective can be sufficiently informed by future promises. But even if I fail at it now, it's certainly conceivable. The bigger question regards God's NECESSARILY all-inclusive perspective.

J: When I think of verses that tell us to weep with those who weep and to bear burdens of others and to be full of compassion, what you are describing sounds like just plain old lack of sympathy. If we suffer with him we will reign with him--a constant NT theme. Jesus, though the Son, had to learn obedience by the things he suffered. Like I said, I have no idea what the bible is saying about righteousness or holiness if you're right. On the other hand, growing that fruit of the Spirit called joy IS necessary to grow IN longsuffering and endurance. In short, the quantity of pain we can handle GROWS as our joy GROWS.

T: “Sorrow not as do others who have no hope.” (1Th 4.13) Does this mean that the promise of resurrection empowers us MERELY to suffer LESS than those who have no hope? Really? We suffer the same sorrow they do but just hurt less because we have hope? That’s it?

J: Clearly that's one possible interpretation, grammatically. And it's a lot easier to reconcile with other verses than is the view that we would never suffer if we were only obedient.

T: On what basis would we argue that no perspective definitive of one’s aesthetic satisfaction is conceivable that could render all instances of suffering incapable of diminishing that satisfaction?

J: On what basis could we define free-will if that view is correct? What could possibly constitute a motive to freely choose any other experience since you've ruled out a distinguishable conscious sentient experience obtained from ANY conceivable choice? Moreover, even if can't prove God is free as I conceive of freedom, you can't prove he's not. So what difference does it make?

T: But no such limitation on God’s perspective is possible.

J: That's certainly true. But that doesn't imply your other claim at all. 

T: Hence, all present instances of suffering are “defined by” that all-inclusive perspective (as opposed to that satisfaction being defined by the limited perspective which grounds suffering); i.e., defined away into "relative meaninglessness." That's exactly what Paul is saying in Romans. To be incomparable to the glory that shall utterly define us is to be meaningless to that glory. But in God’s case this perspective NOW includes the knowledge that no worldly event can threaten his existence or well-being (which limitation of perspective is responsible for ALL our suffering), NOR can it ultimately threaten the fulfillment of his loving purposes for created sentient creatures given UR.

So how could the divine perspective suffer?

J:  Paul is saying a FUTURE glory will render PRESENT sufferings relatively meaningless. He did NOT say PRESENT joy renders PRESENT sufferings meaningless. Those are two completely distinguishable ideas. Thus, PRESENT divine suffering is perfectly conceivable by that very analogy. It's teleology 101.

Post Edited (Similitude) : 4/26/2012 6:16:37 AM (GMT-5)