I’ve been watching that interview between Jordan Peterson and Charlie Kirk, and their discussion about the concept of the sin against the Holy Spirit, which Jesus mentioned as the only one that’s unforgivable, struck me as very interesting.
Charlie said it’s about using the garb of religion as a bludgeon against people, and in service of your ego, basically, and Jordan said it might be about rejecting the call of God to fulfil your destiny, or the failure to “aim up”, towards God. I thought they both have a valid point there, but something else came to my mind as I was taking a shower now.
I think the Evangelical, “sola scriptura” attitude, is the sin against the Holy Spirit. It’s the attitude that Holy Spirit was present when the Bible was written, and then took a permanent vacation. It’s the attitude that you can ignore people like St. Augustine or St. Theresa of Avilla because they are not in the Bible, and only the Bible matters because it’s the word of God, and God somehow went mute after it was completed. It’s the attitude that you own God, that everything outside of your own religion is of lesser quality, that it’s something that can be summarily dismissed, that it can’t have been inspired by God, and even if it were, it can be only to a far lesser degree than what you have in your own religion. To sin against Holy Spirit is to reject it in all things that don’t fit the mental framework of your religious beliefs.
It’s also about rejecting the living presence of God when it confronts you, and you think you are safe in your scripture and your religious rites and customs. It’s thinking you are always the one whose position is to teach, because that’s what your religion assumes, even when you’re confronted with “the living Force” that is trying to tell you something. It’s the sin of the Pharisees, who would lecture Jesus and try to trick him, assuming they own God and he’s some upstart.
Yes, it’s definitely about rejecting the path that leads up, and not walking through the door God opened before you, and it’s definitely about using the idea of God as a tool of your ego, in service of your self-aggrandisement. It’s also having the keys to the heavenly kingdom, but neither using them to enter yourself, nor allowing the others to enter, choosing to make the door an obstacle instead of a place of passage. It may also be using gifts of the Holy Spirit in order to confuse others and lead them away from God. There are indeed too many candidates, and I think all those interpretations are valid in their own way. Rejection of transcendence in service of your own lower nature, and using the form people associate with transcendence in order to deceive them away from transcendence and to give yourself power over others, though, seem like the best interpretation.
I will change the original comment for two important reasons.
The intimacy of realizations in the sphere of spirituality is important, and from this arises a certain problem—namely, it is difficult to write about something and at the same time not write about it. That is why the comment on the photograph in another article is awkward, while the one here carried certain problems.
Secondly, if someone does not come to a realization on their own, they will most likely not even understand the dimension in question, regardless of the comment. Reaching a realization entails a certain chronology and evolution of experiences. If someone skips steps, it is clear that some will be missing, and that in itself is a danger.
There is also a third and fourth issue related to the intimacy of spiritual insight.
Namely, if an individual realizes or attains something, it means certain doors are open to them personally. Why aren’t they open to other beings? The reason is that their mind does not move through a certain landscape, they do not ask themselves questions, they lack a map, they are missing navigation, and where would they go if they have not gradually refined themselves?
Klokov would say: “: ))) see you next year!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cv_EWWDV2O0
The fourth issue concerns why religions and their practices exist at all. I was in Hungary yesterday; they have fantastic nature—national parks—one next to the other. The largest thermal lake in Europe and magical landscapes, with buildings beautifully integrated into nature.
They also have a Buddhist temple and a stupa on top of a hill, set in a forest and silence. I visited twice within a month because the location is excellent; typically, the temple is serene, large, and intimate. But on both occasions, I either witnessed total nonsense performed by two Buddhist students under the patronage of the local head monk, who had been installed there from abroad (they were circling, murmuring on the stupa floors with huge counting beads—japas—in their hands and spinning prayer wheels at the top—creating superficial and harmful mental and motor formations), or the energized acrobatics of a Hungarian yogi who treated the temple as a gym.
A slim, tall Hungarian, patiently and faithfully observed from a distance by his girlfriend, performed vigorous series of Sun Salutations, with the initial bow in each cycle seeming to offer homage to the deities at the temple’s front. He sweated and puffed through about twelve rounds to the point of having to catch his breath and briefly pause to continue with the same intensity. Pushing the body to extreme anaerobic limits while maintaining concentration on the deities? The temple is so well-designed that it is literally a place of complete silence, yet the Hungarian was squealing like a vacuum cleaner. I was almost certain this was a specific technique with a rationale behind its combination and expected him to explain the origin of the idea. Two or three quiet visitors were fed up with the “audacity” of this folkster and left the temple visibly irritated. I waited, as I was curious to hear about the content and meaning of it all. Finally, when I asked him outside why he was doing all of this, it turned out he was practicing hindu yoga. Even at the end of his acrobatics in the temple, when he lay on his back and remained there for several minutes, a concerned nun approached him because he looked as if he had fallen from the sky without a parachute, stuck to the temple floor—it was also comical : ))).
When Buddhism teaches compassion to complete laypeople, everything is turned upside down because they neither understand anything nor know the source of the phenomenon itself, yet they fight for followers of their philosophy, faith, or whatever it is in their trapped minds.
Another episode from the road in Croatia: I was driving behind a car at about 70 km/h when suddenly a rat appeared below and behind it, pressed by the air pressure under the vehicle like on an air cushion, sliding belly-down uncontrollably. I drove over it and looked in the rearview mirror; by then it was rolling across the middle of the road, untouched by the wheels but clearly paralyzed by fear. It didn’t appear filthy—just caught on dangerous, unknown terrain it had no knowledge of. I felt sorry for it; until that moment, its day had been ordinary. When I returned from Hungary, there was no trace on that part of the road—perhaps it survived. The helplessness of that being was vivid and overwhelming.
This is serious facepalm material. I mean, I know why he's doing it, I've seen that kind, and their place is in a circus because they are clowns.