Just like biblical and historical evidence proves that jesus and his apostles were vegatarians biblical and historical evidence also proves that the trinity, atonement, original sin and hell are very late misinterpretations and are not supported by the early creed hence its not a part of Christianity I pray that Allah swt revives Christianity both inside and out preserves and protects it and makes its massage be witnessed by all people but at the right moment, place and time The secred text of the Bible says ye shall know them by their fruits So too that I say to my christian brothers and sisters be fruitful and multiply Best regards from a Muslim ( line of ismail )
@@theguyver4934just like your hadith’s show that your prophet is from satan. And how a simple reading can show your slave to satan and that you are no brother of ours
Thank you deeply! For me this has beautifully woven together many views and thoughts with the immediate in person experience that we daily inhabit into a new profounfly deep sense of intuitive confidence, that yes Heavenly Glory is truly waiting for each of us and is to be seen- if only we keep remebering who we are in the scope of the Cosmic story and let God show us all the higher patterns present throughout the whole history until the level of our daily life and seeing the meaning and dignity in doing the dishes. Jonathan really simply and succintly shows how heaven is not just some abstract emotional or intellectial hope in God that we are either let in or kicked out at the end of personal earthly life based on some lottery or our merit. I also have a sense this video might really be very insigntful to someone approaching for the first time. (Though it took me 2 hour to watch this 10mins as i was writing a lot of it down reformulating ,expanding on the ideas and connecting with other ideas to really plant this deeply into the center of my heart and intutively go living in it.)
but is it ok to view the events of the resurrection the same as the fall in genisis (something that happened but through a symbolic lense and not nessesarily word for word dipiction of events), sorry if I'm not making any sense.
To me it seem that all the events of Christ's life are the full union of facts and actual events in time/history with all the patterns and meaning from above. Like every act Christ does every move of His hand and leg, every word He says embodies a cosmic pattern - Pattern - the Father and They are One. And it gets more and more con-densed to an absolutely incomprehensibly extreme way the closer we get towards the Passion and finally the Crucifixion where every little detail matters, everything has a cosmic significance to an absolute limit. So it seems to me for the story fo Christ's life to be what it is, it has to be understood also in as an actual incarnate event. For Christ to be Who He Is , He has to be fully incarnate and also literally ressurected in bodily form as well. Though that is only one level of its reality. And with this story we need to remember that it is so full of meaning that there is also not one single way of somehow conainting it in a single narrative description of what actually happened. Because the 'actually' dimension is only one level of its infinite scopes of meaning. That is also why we have for accounts of the Gospel some of which if viewed only in an actual way would contradict.
It definitely has to be viewed ALSO in the way you view Genesis. As an event that happens all the time on all the levels of being but in the Ressurrection it was the most unveiled it can be and the meaning explicitly manifested also in the most embodied way.
@@caiqueportolira I think that events can't "happen in a simbolic way". Rather, the Bible contains symbolic representations of many patterns that emerge from human activities, or events. Events aren't simbolic; representations (stories of the Bible) are. The stories of the Bible are real because they represent patterns that have manifested themselves in stories many times and -I would say- still do.
Every time I think I understand what's going on then I learn all over again that I know nothing. The question on lots of people's minds though is: given everything Jonathan says, did the physical dead body of Jesus become a living body? I don't care about the mechanics or the particulars of HOW that took place, what is crucial is if it DID take place regardless or my understanding of it. This one event in scripture is clearly on another level of importance than say the Garden. You may think that my insistence on the physical is materialistic and short sighted, but the truth of the physical resurrection makes all the difference in the world. If the physical resurrection of one particular man in one particular place at one particular time DID in fact occur than the symbolic structure really does pass through all levels of reality. Does this make any sense to anyone or am I insane and missing something?
Yeah I have watched my fair amount of Jonathan's videos and he never answers that question. Very few people care about the specifics of how the resurrection might've worked physically. What matters is if it did happen. Yes or no. What Jonathan does is dodge the question and obscure understanding. I know the resurrection means ALSO a lot of other things, it might be mysterious, but it IS the starting point where all of that flows from, so it's fair and important to be very clear about it. My conclusion regarding Jonathan's views is that this is the religion/tradition he likes best, and there's no reason why the Christian story or resurrection "contains all of reality" or is the "meeting place between myth and reality", those are just beliefs. It is really no different from other systems say Mormonism or similar (Jonathan has stated he has no problems with other religions as long as you hold to a real tradition and don't pick and choose parts from them and construct a weird new-agey makeshift religion), heck I would even put the quasi-religious marvel cinematic universe fanbase into that same category (Jonathan himself has faintly alluded to this in the past). Why? Because save few bits and pieces referencing real historical people or places, both the new and old testaments are works of fiction (yes, even if Jesus was a real historical person in the 1st century). I know this really really really annoys symbolic thinkers but that is the case, I'm sorry. Accuse me of left-brained enlightenment reductionist materialist thinking all you want. The evidence is clear. Archeological, historical and literary critical analysis of the texts yields those results. Like I think you're suggesting, I was willing to accept the old testament as purely symbolic and a backdrop for Christ. I thought "Well if the resurrection did happen, then that's enough for me". But the "evidence" for it is terrible, if you held a gun to my head I would never say that I believe in it, and that for me can't be what I base my worldview upon. I couldn't care less if Christ "resurrected" in some obscure esoteric symbolic sense ONLY. I am a human being with a body who experiences material reality and life and death. God was supposed to really reach down to us in the flesh. A naturalistic explanation of the events surrounding the resurrection and founding of Christianity is more than enough. If you're interested, I recommend this youtube video: How Christianity (Probably) Began... No Resurrection Required (Channel: Paulogia, all of his other resurrection videos are also good) And I also recommend MythVision's Podcast here on youtube. Top-notch explanations by real scholars for the historical and literary examinations that I was talking about. Even at the outset with Paul, multiple Christian communities believed something different about the resurrection, and it was only through the centuries where a clear emphasis on physical resurrection was instantiated to make it seem more believable, convincing or powerful. Sorry for the wall of text, I've spent too much time thinking about this. I end with this: "And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is worthless, and so is your faith." 1 Corinthians 15:14
@@300387ful arguing on strictly materialist grounds, how can you say that the evidence for the resurrection is “terrible?” It’s generally agreed that Jesus was a real person who lived and was crucified and who’s followers attested to seeing him risen to the point of being willing to die for that claim. What sort of other evidence would you think would be plausible to have for something that happened over 2000 years ago?
@@300387fulcoincidentally, in the next video that came on after this one Johnathan does directly answer the question of the physical resurrection. It’s called “Science is not a Foundation” if you’re interested
@@IllogicalMachine I apologize for the wall of text. I don't believe in the resurrection for the same reasons I don't believe that Julius Caesar "ascended to heaven" (Romans believed this back in the day), or that God spoke to Muhammad, or that the Angel Moroni spoke with the founders of Mormonism. I fully agree with the first points, Jesus was a historical Jewish preacher who was crucified by the Romans, we have multiple pieces of independent evidence from roman authors that attest that. That's the historically reliable information, not "And he was really God and rose from the dead", those were legends spread about him that borrow literary motifs of the time (They had ~30 years to make up stories before the gospels were written by anonymous greek authors who never met Jesus, they weren't eyewitnesses) We also don't really have good evidence for his followers being given an opportunity to recant and choosing death willfully (Maybe just Paul, but he never met Jesus, just saw a vision, and the details of his death were lost to history), their lives went undocumented. And even if we did, it's not like people are not willing to die due to being sincerely mistaken (The Jonestown Massacre or the Heaven's Gate cult mass suicide are enough proof of that) I know those are bold and controversial claims, and they require a arduous explanation and examination. If you're interested, you could consult the 2 youtube resources I outlined in my earlier comment, they source their claims and host discussions with scholars (just look up "resurrection", "persecution", "jesus rose", etc in their channels search tab). I particularly liked the lectures about the first generations of Christians given by historian Dr. Steve Mason in the MythVision podcast, they're very elucidating. Those are just some of the many reasons why I think the evidence for the resurrection is terrible. It holds as much epistemological certainty as someone on the street claiming they are a god sent to earth or were abducted by aliens, or claiming that they saw Elvis alive after he was declared dead (Yes, people claimed stuff like that when it happened. That sounds kind of similar to the resurrection story to me) As to what would constitute good evidence, there's many answers. I myself would've been satisfied if after his supposed resurrection, he would've shown himself to the whole world. Communicating the exact same message in all world languages of the time, having the same apparition at the same time in the first century be recorded by all cultures in the world, would be rock solid in my view. But that didn't happen. Like with all other religions, his message or gospel was spread by word of mouth and occasionally by force, no supernatural force required. I value honesty and open and clear discussions regarding history, religion and the evolution of thought. I thought Pageau's content was interesting, but because of videos like this I stopped watching him and his circle, full stop. He's obscuring understanding on purpose, hiding uncomfortable information regarding the resurrection, and leaving things vague as to make his symbolic interpretation seem more plausible; and sorry, but I deplore that profoundly. Thanks a lot for reading, I ramble too much. That is my position, I hope you find it useful or informative.
yes.. He is The Resurrected Son of God... if you want physical evidence, it defeats the purpose of having faith. History is written by the winners. 2000 year and The Resurrection hasn't been debunked either.
The image and intuition we get and live in is more important i guess. Though i find that it really helps if you want to get a better sense of being able to tell others about it, go write it down and observe what words or combinations of words does he use that resonate something in you. Remember those ,reformulate them a bit inside you and it will get deeper into you. Its is a profound experience to see the ideas on paper being formulated by your hand. As to reflect it in such a way it first forces you to reflect and order it properly inside you. Explicit prayer is the same way. We dont just listen to a lecture or read the Scripture. We actively engage and reflect it in an active way with our own creative voice. We separate from the multiplicity of facts the higher patterns and perceive them in the fullest way if we speak them out ourselves. When we hear ourselves participating in them. He are most fully children of God when we speak to our Father - connect to the Highest Pattern in an aware way that we feel is comming from us as a reflection from above. Passively listening wont do it. It even seems to me that to actively listen and even to hear anyone or anything, to understand what someone is saying, we necessarily need to be actively repeating what they are speaking inside of us. And we sometimes do this even out loud when we havent quite got what the person means and reformulate it ourselves or ask it as questions. And i suppose it cannot be but in this reflective way that we are able to perceive things through all the senses. In the same manner we see and touch or smell.
I feel the same way. When people ask if I have a literal interpretation of scripture, or if the events "actually" happened, the phrase I use to say what I mean without understanding it is, "They happened as much as anything can happen."
I do believe that Jesus rose from the dead in the literal sense, however! Heh. And, isn't that amazing - living that symbolism at every level of reality down to the every day sense of reality all the way up to the highest level of meaning? Just about makes me want to cry, in the best possible way. : )
the reason that it's important is that the bible doesn't describe things how you did, the bible is put forward as a historical document and the miracles are used as legitimizing features. even if people saw things how you did, as this abstract layer of sacred meaning, i think they would not be well served to find that abstract layer of meaning in a book. i think it would be better for them to look within, as the hindus do, and embrace the multiplicity within.
The thing to understand is that the conceptualization of the Bible as a historical document is to say that it is making a claim of objective truth. It isn’t the sacred meaning found in scripture that is abstract, but the idea of objective reality itself that is abstract. Objective reality is an illusion created by the left hemisphere of the brain in order to grasp at truth. The symbolic language of the Bible is the best way at reaching these truths, which is why it’s persisted for so long.
@@IllogicalMachine I agree that something being historical says nothing about its relevance. I'm sure some roman legionare scratched his balls and we have no memory of it. Why? It literally happened, it was scientifically verifiable back then, it was historical. The pattern of the story is the important thing, not whether the story actually happened.
Saint Nikolai Velimirovich wrote a book called “The Universe as Symbols and Signs”. He speaks of all matter (like the Sun) being a symbol of something heavenly or otherwordly. But even if only the details decided by God Himself to be essential for our understanding and salvation were written in the Bible, it doesn’t mean that the events didn’t take place and they were only a placeholder for a new lesson. The body of Christ has been regenerated in a way hidden to us, Thomas was invited to put his finger in His nailed palms. The events are history and the way they are presented is such because that is how they convey the most to us, at each ones leves of discernment (a living Saint understand more because of a deeper communion with God, a Saint in Heaven even more so). This whole world is a symbol but let’s not mistake that with it not being real.
Interesting. And I agree that Adam and Eve probably didn't happen the same way that me eating lunch happened, but that it still happened. A distinction between the two must be made, though, because some things in the Bible happened in the same way that me eating lunch happened: there actually was an emperor called Nebuchadnezzar who conquered Judah, for instance. Luke says that he did investigative work, so we're probably not talking about complete fables (events that didn't literally take place, even though they could have figuratively taken place). And it is an interesting question, although not the most pressing one: which events in the Bible 'happened' in a modern understanding of the word? Also, if we say that the older stories didn't happen happen, how come that the timeline of the flood based on the information that we're given in Genesis 5 kind of makes sense? Matusalem and Jared died before the flood, if you believe the info in Gen. 5. If it really was all a fable, how come it kind of holds up in that sense? Do you maybe think that some Jewish authorities at some point decided to play with the years in Gen. 5 to make the flood make sense timeline-wise? Critics of the Bible have tried to point out that there is no evidence for a lot of stories in the Bible. But it turns out that Nineveh actually existed, even though its existence had come into doubt because no such great city had been found. So how much of it is based on 'physical/sensual reality' and how much is pretty much just a 'fable'?
The resurrection is as real as the sky is blue. Sure maybe it’s just photons being scattered by atmospheric molecules and angular refraction through the air, but … in functional, regular life… the sky is just blue.
Yes. But the main point here is this: literal vs. symbolic is a false dichotomy set up by the modernist way of thinking. "Symbolism is not opposed to a neutral, physical reality; rather, symbolism is the very manner in which we perceive and organize the unlimited field of information [in the world]." Symbolism, properly understood, is the way in which human beings perceive meaning at all.
@@NykuG its exactly what the video does. creates nonsense Paul wrote literally to the roman saints , they didnt sit around and look to make symbols out of his letter
Yes, the most certainly did take place... I don't have a clue what this guy is talking about? Do not be deceived by this guy's (old) new age crap... The entire Bible is the whole truth, every story really happened. This guy is one of those who believe that we don't actually exist 😳
@@jesusislife9259 You're a troll or braindead. Adam and Eve story took place, just not in the way you'd think if you take it literally. You really think a naked man in a garden from around modern day Iraq 6000 years ago, talked to a snake and ate a literal fruit that made him notice he was naked, and that somehow led us to have consciousness of ourselves?
@@jesusislife9259 Noah and the flood and the animals on an arch didnt actually happen dude .. just like holy water is merely just water. His channel is called the symbolic world for a reason
@@cnote3598 Yes, it did! You'd be hard pressed to find an actual geologist that won't tell you that there's actual, scientific evidence that the earth was once covered in water. I'm not Catholic, so I don't get your reference about Holy water...
Jonathan = “not causal in any scientific way” So if we don’t know how consciousness works because of our limited tools to observe , then I would assume Jonathan means that consciousness is not causal in any scientific way. Is this not God of the gaps? The word causal is definitely in the realm of science. Science absolutely deals with how things work, but just because we don’t know how something works doesn’t automatically mean God. However, if he means subjectivity is not caused in a scientific way, THEN what would be more clear than saying “not caused by science” is that you cannot derive an OUGHT from it IS. This would be more succinct and clear. Here, Jonathan, ironically, needs to be careful to use certain symbols when communicating to atheist or else he is just talking past them. Jesus did not share parables about fish to Desert nomads.
I think Sam Harris would not necessarily disagree with your view. He opposes only the claims that religious texts like the bible are historically accurate (which you also do). And he thinks we should make it more clear that these stories are to be understood symbolically. I mean he is some sort of a buddhist himself :D
sam Harris is not an idiot but maybe his pride prevents him from understanding things. The debate with Jordan Peterson was a good example of Sam Harris's perceptions just stopping. He refused to understand Peterson's point because he couldn't comprehend it. He didn't even try to understand it. He's like that with other issues as well. He can't see outside of his bias.
Jonathan doesn't "oppose the claims that religious texts like the Bible are historically accurate." If he did, he couldn't call himself a Christian. The fact that there is symbolic meaning in Scripture doesn't negate the fact that it makes historic claims. Orthodox Christians, including Jonathan, truly believe that God was born of a Virgin and died so that man could share in His likeness. Obviously, not every single story in the Bible is meant to be interpreted the same way, but the idea that symbolism somehow negates the historical dimension is simply false. Very often, the concrete historical reality is the very basis for the symbolic.
@@MicahMicahel and that is precisely why he is an idiot. Prideful people cannot move beyond where they currently are, which makes them functionally unintelligent.
Okay. Jonathan is saying that we only retell details of a story if those details are relevant to the purpose of telling the story. If we describe a car chase, and we want to describe how exciting it was, you would say, “It was crazy! The cars flew past mine like I was still!” If you’re describing the the potential cause of the chase, you may say, “It seems like the man driving was intoxicated, he was hitting things seemingly on accident.” Both statements are true. But that doesn’t change the fact that there was a car chase. That’s what I want to know. I love to hear hear meaningful stories, but I want to know if those meaningful stories are based on a causal event. Other wise, it’s just story telling for the sake of principle. The gospels are supposed to be the principle story telling from a causal event. That’s why most people don’t take Snow White or Harry Potter as sacred stories.
To me, you're still trying to divorce the physical sciences from human perception and meaning. It would be true Understanding if you had more to say about the relationship between the material world type of history, which is truth (presumably), and the symbolic nature of biblical history, which is truth of a different kind. If there is no relationship between these, then only one is true, since truth is one and there can be no such thing as the duplex veritas. But historical fact (independent of the author or scholar) is a valid kind of truth, so it must have a real relation to the symbolic world if it is to be taken as another valid kind of truth. What is it? That is where I believe your life's paradigm is weak, inasmuch as it is unclear: how does the symbolism of Sacred Scripture relate to the occurence in the past of the events described? Are you saying there was not a real tree planted by God? with a real fruit forbidden from man's use? If so, then upon what is this "cosmic memory" based? If not... could you be a bit more explicit, please? I think you owe it to Christ.
@@thatscrazy1965 Admittedly, I'm no scholar, neither am I a spiritually or philosophically trained, let alone proficient, but I will offer you my position/perspective as you ask. I believe that the events in Scripture that read as history are true history. I believe primarily (specifically) that the Gospels, the Acts, the Historical books, and the stories of the Pentateuch are all unapologetically intended to be historical accounts of events that happened in our world, and therefore ought to be analyzed as such by the world and believed as such by the Christian, even though not every meticulous/superfluous detail with which we moderns would like to "corroborate" Revelation is presented, even though much of it is couched in mysticism, even if some of the witnesses are unique sources among the canon of historians, or even if the witness is God alone (who else could it be?) in, for instance, the case of Genesis 1. I further believe that Scripture attests to this literal understanding in many places, but in no place more strongly than the words of Jesus, the Christ, Who, for example, defends His teachings on the nature of conjugal relations, and concomitently of marriage, by appealing to His own words, His own deeds, which He spoke in Genesis. I believe that, in order that the "meaning" of the events described in Scripture be one that corresponds to our real lives in this world - in order that the meaning be *true* - the events as described must be historical. If they are not, it's just one way of looking at some deeper reality. And even if it is the best of signs, it's still not having direct access to the signified truths themselves (whatever they are, whether or not we can possess them unmediated), so it can always be further perfected, then outgrown, and then abandoned.... Maybe God is not yet a perfect concept of the fundamental truth. But I believe that the historical events *are themselves* that deeper reality (not by virtue of merely being events, but by virtue of being part of Creation). The historical events of Scripture are the Incarnation of meaning. Therefore, the meaning that they have is undeniably correct because it is history, because it is "universally subjective" - true from everyone's particular perspective due to the fact that we are all human beings: animals, matter, body; and persons, form, spirit. Our personal perspectives all have the same reality as their object; the "objective perspective" is that which is common to all "subjective perspectives". ...Barring the insane. That's the real definition of insanity: to see the world as it is not. Speaking of which.... If there will ever be a real piece of evidence for the "theory" (really an as yet unvalidated hypothesis) of the evolutionary origin of species, I might have to reconsider my point (depending on the nature of the evidence). As it stands, I don't see why we should keep taking this theory on faith, for granted, like we historically have been doing: uncritically (unscientifically); presumptuously; dogmatically. Where's the experiment(s) that prove(s) it? I'll keep waiting... sincerely. Thus, I see no reason left, apart from raw mistrust of Scripture, to reject a literal sense of Genesis. Feel free to object in your turn, but (for the love of Truth) do so substantially.
Yes. And that is dangerous for people. Symbolic thinking shines best for poetic imagination or writing novels or stories, not for a real framework of assessing reality.
@@MiB365 Sure. The other day I was thinking about this myth of the middle ages being all ignorant and backwards and stuff that polemicists and atheists like to spread, which is based on faulty historical reality and hearsay. It is a false invented conception of reality. And I thought, what method of inquiry do we use to reach the conclusion that it is false? Symbolic thinking? Or "Reductionist modernist materialist post-enlightenment" historical methods? After all, the enlightenment philosophers and historians were drawing on their intuitions and shared enlightened mythology to spread that narrative which they wrote on their books, and if you do a surface level intuitive observation of reality (like atheists or other people do) of those claims it seems like yeah, I guess people back then really were stupid, look at the rise of science, look at these weird things these medievals believed! But all of that was pretty much fiction, and the romantic, poetic portrayal of it sure helped to make it seem plausible. Symbolic thinking in my estimation, is completely hopeless against things like this, it can't really honestly "debunk" them without drawing on modern historical methodology. Symbolically, for the people on the enlightenment, that myth was completely true and it still prevails today because it taps into "something" that resonates with people. Edit: I also wanted to add that if you take symbolism as presented without tethering it to Christianity or Orthodox tradition (which can be done, sometimes Jonathan talks about pagan stories for example), it's dangerous because everything goes. All other stories are valid, all other "fictions". So like the original comment Dave made, it's dangerous to blur the lines between fantasy and reality.
@@joshuasy10 Exactly - Christianity includes and fulfils and expresses all truths that paganism merely gropes towards, in infinite richness. But maybe Ryan Winn has noticed that pagans and traditional Christians share something that the secular world and many protestantised Christians lack - a belief in the symbolic world, an appreciation of myth as profound truth instead of falsehood or fiction, a knowledge of the power of images to transform and heal and reveal.
one reason is that we don't have any Pagan religions that survived. All the Pagan religions today are reinventions by creative snake oil sales people. Fairy tales are a better source of Pagan beliefs than anything you'll find in a New Age bookstore. The Pagans were mostly illiterate and their religion was banned.
Jonathan is inspired here. He makes the distinction between the secular and the sacred beautifully and usefully clear.
Just like biblical and historical evidence proves that jesus and his apostles were vegatarians biblical and historical evidence also proves that the trinity, atonement, original sin and hell are very late misinterpretations and are not supported by the early creed hence its not a part of Christianity I pray that Allah swt revives Christianity both inside and out preserves and protects it and makes its massage be witnessed by all people but at the right moment, place and time
The secred text of the Bible says ye shall know them by their fruits
So too that I say to my christian brothers and sisters be fruitful and multiply
Best regards from a Muslim ( line of ismail )
@@theguyver4934just like your hadith’s show that your prophet is from satan. And how a simple reading can show your slave to satan and that you are no brother of ours
Wow, thank you, that was profound. Very helpful.
I think this is one of your best videos and probably should be one of the first anyone approaching your channel should watch
Absolutely! This needs to be heard by everyone in todays world so desperately. What a Gift to us all Jonathan is!
You nailed something important here.
Thank you.
God bless you Jonathan
Thank you deeply! For me this has beautifully woven together many views and thoughts with the immediate in person experience that we daily inhabit into a new profounfly deep sense of intuitive confidence, that yes Heavenly Glory is truly waiting for each of us and is to be seen- if only we keep remebering who we are in the scope of the Cosmic story and let God show us all the higher patterns present throughout the whole history until the level of our daily life and seeing the meaning and dignity in doing the dishes.
Jonathan really simply and succintly shows how heaven is not just some abstract emotional or intellectial hope in God that we are either let in or kicked out at the end of personal earthly life based on some lottery or our merit.
I also have a sense this video might really be very insigntful to someone approaching for the first time.
(Though it took me 2 hour to watch this 10mins as i was writing a lot of it down reformulating ,expanding on the ideas and connecting with other ideas to really plant this deeply into the center of my heart and intutively go living in it.)
I. Really needed this!
When I look up at the sky through the branches of tree tops bare, I see growth patterns of eternal reaching for love's source.
Your words validate my sanity.
but is it ok to view the events of the resurrection the same as the fall in genisis (something that happened but through a symbolic lense and not nessesarily word for word dipiction of events), sorry if I'm not making any sense.
To me it seem that all the events of Christ's life are the full union of facts and actual events in time/history with all the patterns and meaning from above. Like every act Christ does every move of His hand and leg, every word He says embodies a cosmic pattern - Pattern - the Father and They are One. And it gets more and more con-densed to an absolutely incomprehensibly extreme way the closer we get towards the Passion and finally the Crucifixion where every little detail matters, everything has a cosmic significance to an absolute limit. So it seems to me for the story fo Christ's life to be what it is, it has to be understood also in as an actual incarnate event. For Christ to be Who He Is , He has to be fully incarnate and also literally ressurected in bodily form as well. Though that is only one level of its reality. And with this story we need to remember that it is so full of meaning that there is also not one single way of somehow conainting it in a single narrative description of what actually happened. Because the 'actually' dimension is only one level of its infinite scopes of meaning. That is also why we have for accounts of the Gospel some of which if viewed only in an actual way would contradict.
It definitely has to be viewed ALSO in the way you view Genesis. As an event that happens all the time on all the levels of being but in the Ressurrection it was the most unveiled it can be and the meaning explicitly manifested also in the most embodied way.
VERY important topic
Profound and on point in relevance today. The arguing of activist atheists is as interesting as the homework of a 4:th grader on the topic.
Short answer: Yes, but it's not that simple.
So it happened in a symbolic way? Couldn't he just say it? He is clearly trying to deceive us.
@@caiqueportolira how so?
@@caiqueportolira the odds of you understanding what symbolism means is really low
@@caiqueportolira That is what he's saying. He's just adding how it connects to reality and memory etc.
@@caiqueportolira I think that events can't "happen in a simbolic way". Rather, the Bible contains symbolic representations of many patterns that emerge from human activities, or events. Events aren't simbolic; representations (stories of the Bible) are. The stories of the Bible are real because they represent patterns that have manifested themselves in stories many times and -I would say- still do.
You are dangerously smart brother LOL
Every time I think I understand what's going on then I learn all over again that I know nothing. The question on lots of people's minds though is: given everything Jonathan says, did the physical dead body of Jesus become a living body? I don't care about the mechanics or the particulars of HOW that took place, what is crucial is if it DID take place regardless or my understanding of it. This one event in scripture is clearly on another level of importance than say the Garden. You may think that my insistence on the physical is materialistic and short sighted, but the truth of the physical resurrection makes all the difference in the world. If the physical resurrection of one particular man in one particular place at one particular time DID in fact occur than the symbolic structure really does pass through all levels of reality. Does this make any sense to anyone or am I insane and missing something?
Yeah I have watched my fair amount of Jonathan's videos and he never answers that question.
Very few people care about the specifics of how the resurrection might've worked physically. What matters is if it did happen. Yes or no. What Jonathan does is dodge the question and obscure understanding. I know the resurrection means ALSO a lot of other things, it might be mysterious, but it IS the starting point where all of that flows from, so it's fair and important to be very clear about it.
My conclusion regarding Jonathan's views is that this is the religion/tradition he likes best, and there's no reason why the Christian story or resurrection "contains all of reality" or is the "meeting place between myth and reality", those are just beliefs. It is really no different from other systems say Mormonism or similar (Jonathan has stated he has no problems with other religions as long as you hold to a real tradition and don't pick and choose parts from them and construct a weird new-agey makeshift religion), heck I would even put the quasi-religious marvel cinematic universe fanbase into that same category (Jonathan himself has faintly alluded to this in the past).
Why? Because save few bits and pieces referencing real historical people or places, both the new and old testaments are works of fiction (yes, even if Jesus was a real historical person in the 1st century). I know this really really really annoys symbolic thinkers but that is the case, I'm sorry. Accuse me of left-brained enlightenment reductionist materialist thinking all you want. The evidence is clear. Archeological, historical and literary critical analysis of the texts yields those results.
Like I think you're suggesting, I was willing to accept the old testament as purely symbolic and a backdrop for Christ. I thought "Well if the resurrection did happen, then that's enough for me". But the "evidence" for it is terrible, if you held a gun to my head I would never say that I believe in it, and that for me can't be what I base my worldview upon. I couldn't care less if Christ "resurrected" in some obscure esoteric symbolic sense ONLY. I am a human being with a body who experiences material reality and life and death. God was supposed to really reach down to us in the flesh.
A naturalistic explanation of the events surrounding the resurrection and founding of Christianity is more than enough.
If you're interested, I recommend this youtube video:
How Christianity (Probably) Began... No Resurrection Required (Channel: Paulogia, all of his other resurrection videos are also good)
And I also recommend MythVision's Podcast here on youtube. Top-notch explanations by real scholars for the historical and literary examinations that I was talking about. Even at the outset with Paul, multiple Christian communities believed something different about the resurrection, and it was only through the centuries where a clear emphasis on physical resurrection was instantiated to make it seem more believable, convincing or powerful.
Sorry for the wall of text, I've spent too much time thinking about this.
I end with this:
"And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is worthless, and so is your faith."
1 Corinthians 15:14
@@300387ful arguing on strictly materialist grounds, how can you say that the evidence for the resurrection is “terrible?” It’s generally agreed that Jesus was a real person who lived and was crucified and who’s followers attested to seeing him risen to the point of being willing to die for that claim. What sort of other evidence would you think would be plausible to have for something that happened over 2000 years ago?
@@300387fulcoincidentally, in the next video that came on after this one Johnathan does directly answer the question of the physical resurrection. It’s called “Science is not a Foundation” if you’re interested
@@IllogicalMachine
I apologize for the wall of text.
I don't believe in the resurrection for the same reasons I don't believe that Julius Caesar "ascended to heaven" (Romans believed this back in the day), or that God spoke to Muhammad, or that the Angel Moroni spoke with the founders of Mormonism.
I fully agree with the first points, Jesus was a historical Jewish preacher who was crucified by the Romans, we have multiple pieces of independent evidence from roman authors that attest that. That's the historically reliable information, not "And he was really God and rose from the dead", those were legends spread about him that borrow literary motifs of the time (They had ~30 years to make up stories before the gospels were written by anonymous greek authors who never met Jesus, they weren't eyewitnesses)
We also don't really have good evidence for his followers being given an opportunity to recant and choosing death willfully (Maybe just Paul, but he never met Jesus, just saw a vision, and the details of his death were lost to history), their lives went undocumented. And even if we did, it's not like people are not willing to die due to being sincerely mistaken (The Jonestown Massacre or the Heaven's Gate cult mass suicide are enough proof of that)
I know those are bold and controversial claims, and they require a arduous explanation and examination. If you're interested, you could consult the 2 youtube resources I outlined in my earlier comment, they source their claims and host discussions with scholars (just look up "resurrection", "persecution", "jesus rose", etc in their channels search tab). I particularly liked the lectures about the first generations of Christians given by historian Dr. Steve Mason in the MythVision podcast, they're very elucidating.
Those are just some of the many reasons why I think the evidence for the resurrection is terrible. It holds as much epistemological certainty as someone on the street claiming they are a god sent to earth or were abducted by aliens, or claiming that they saw Elvis alive after he was declared dead (Yes, people claimed stuff like that when it happened. That sounds kind of similar to the resurrection story to me)
As to what would constitute good evidence, there's many answers. I myself would've been satisfied if after his supposed resurrection, he would've shown himself to the whole world. Communicating the exact same message in all world languages of the time, having the same apparition at the same time in the first century be recorded by all cultures in the world, would be rock solid in my view. But that didn't happen. Like with all other religions, his message or gospel was spread by word of mouth and occasionally by force, no supernatural force required.
I value honesty and open and clear discussions regarding history, religion and the evolution of thought. I thought Pageau's content was interesting, but because of videos like this I stopped watching him and his circle, full stop. He's obscuring understanding on purpose, hiding uncomfortable information regarding the resurrection, and leaving things vague as to make his symbolic interpretation seem more plausible; and sorry, but I deplore that profoundly.
Thanks a lot for reading, I ramble too much. That is my position, I hope you find it useful or informative.
yes.. He is The Resurrected Son of God... if you want physical evidence, it defeats the purpose of having faith. History is written by the winners. 2000 year and The Resurrection hasn't been debunked either.
Jonathan, what other videos of yours adds to this video?
I understand what he’s saying but I can’t explain it myself
Precisely.
The image and intuition we get and live in is more important i guess.
Though i find that it really helps if you want to get a better sense of being able to tell others about it, go write it down and observe what words or combinations of words does he use that resonate something in you. Remember those ,reformulate them a bit inside you and it will get deeper into you. Its is a profound experience to see the ideas on paper being formulated by your hand. As to reflect it in such a way it first forces you to reflect and order it properly inside you.
Explicit prayer is the same way. We dont just listen to a lecture or read the Scripture. We actively engage and reflect it in an active way with our own creative voice. We separate from the multiplicity of facts the higher patterns and perceive them in the fullest way if we speak them out ourselves. When we hear ourselves participating in them. He are most fully children of God when we speak to our Father - connect to the Highest Pattern in an aware way that we feel is comming from us as a reflection from above. Passively listening wont do it. It even seems to me that to actively listen and even to hear anyone or anything, to understand what someone is saying, we necessarily need to be actively repeating what they are speaking inside of us. And we sometimes do this even out loud when we havent quite got what the person means and reformulate it ourselves or ask it as questions. And i suppose it cannot be but in this reflective way that we are able to perceive things through all the senses. In the same manner we see and touch or smell.
I feel the same way. When people ask if I have a literal interpretation of scripture, or if the events "actually" happened, the phrase I use to say what I mean without understanding it is, "They happened as much as anything can happen."
I do believe that Jesus rose from the dead in the literal sense, however! Heh.
And, isn't that amazing - living that symbolism at every level of reality down to the every day sense of reality all the way up to the highest level of meaning?
Just about makes me want to cry, in the best possible way. : )
the reason that it's important is that the bible doesn't describe things how you did, the bible is put forward as a historical document and the miracles are used as legitimizing features.
even if people saw things how you did, as this abstract layer of sacred meaning, i think they would not be well served to find that abstract layer of meaning in a book. i think it would be better for them to look within, as the hindus do, and embrace the multiplicity within.
The thing to understand is that the conceptualization of the Bible as a historical document is to say that it is making a claim of objective truth. It isn’t the sacred meaning found in scripture that is abstract, but the idea of objective reality itself that is abstract. Objective reality is an illusion created by the left hemisphere of the brain in order to grasp at truth. The symbolic language of the Bible is the best way at reaching these truths, which is why it’s persisted for so long.
@@IllogicalMachine I agree that something being historical says nothing about its relevance. I'm sure some roman legionare scratched his balls and we have no memory of it. Why? It literally happened, it was scientifically verifiable back then, it was historical.
The pattern of the story is the important thing, not whether the story actually happened.
Saint Nikolai Velimirovich wrote a book called “The Universe as Symbols and Signs”. He speaks of all matter (like the Sun) being a symbol of something heavenly or otherwordly. But even if only the details decided by God Himself to be essential for our understanding and salvation were written in the Bible, it doesn’t mean that the events didn’t take place and they were only a placeholder for a new lesson. The body of Christ has been regenerated in a way hidden to us, Thomas was invited to put his finger in His nailed palms. The events are history and the way they are presented is such because that is how they convey the most to us, at each ones leves of discernment (a living Saint understand more because of a deeper communion with God, a Saint in Heaven even more so). This whole world is a symbol but let’s not mistake that with it not being real.
Deep brother
Interesting. And I agree that Adam and Eve probably didn't happen the same way that me eating lunch happened, but that it still happened. A distinction between the two must be made, though, because some things in the Bible happened in the same way that me eating lunch happened: there actually was an emperor called Nebuchadnezzar who conquered Judah, for instance. Luke says that he did investigative work, so we're probably not talking about complete fables (events that didn't literally take place, even though they could have figuratively taken place). And it is an interesting question, although not the most pressing one: which events in the Bible 'happened' in a modern understanding of the word?
Also, if we say that the older stories didn't happen happen, how come that the timeline of the flood based on the information that we're given in Genesis 5 kind of makes sense? Matusalem and Jared died before the flood, if you believe the info in Gen. 5. If it really was all a fable, how come it kind of holds up in that sense? Do you maybe think that some Jewish authorities at some point decided to play with the years in Gen. 5 to make the flood make sense timeline-wise?
Critics of the Bible have tried to point out that there is no evidence for a lot of stories in the Bible. But it turns out that Nineveh actually existed, even though its existence had come into doubt because no such great city had been found. So how much of it is based on 'physical/sensual reality' and how much is pretty much just a 'fable'?
how idiotic this gets. can not read the Bible its too "material"
This really feels like the Holy Spirit is speaking through you, praise the Lord
8:29
Did the Resurrection literally happen?
The fact that you're still asking the question points to you missing the message of the video. Maybe you should watch it again.
The resurrection is as real as the sky is blue. Sure maybe it’s just photons being scattered by atmospheric molecules and angular refraction through the air, but … in functional, regular life… the sky is just blue.
Yes. But the main point here is this: literal vs. symbolic is a false dichotomy set up by the modernist way of thinking.
"Symbolism is not opposed to a neutral, physical reality; rather, symbolism is the very manner in which we perceive and organize the unlimited field of information [in the world]."
Symbolism, properly understood, is the way in which human beings perceive meaning at all.
@@NykuG its exactly what the video does. creates nonsense Paul wrote literally to the roman saints , they didnt sit around and look to make symbols out of his letter
Yeah okay but did they take place though?
Yes, the most certainly did take place... I don't have a clue what this guy is talking about? Do not be deceived by this guy's (old) new age crap... The entire Bible is the whole truth, every story really happened.
This guy is one of those who believe that we don't actually exist 😳
@@jesusislife9259 You're a troll or braindead.
Adam and Eve story took place, just not in the way you'd think if you take it literally. You really think a naked man in a garden from around modern day Iraq 6000 years ago, talked to a snake and ate a literal fruit that made him notice he was naked, and that somehow led us to have consciousness of ourselves?
@@jesusislife9259 Noah and the flood and the animals on an arch didnt actually happen dude .. just like holy water is merely just water. His channel is called the symbolic world for a reason
@@drooskie9525 hahah. exactly .. SYMBOLISM
@@cnote3598 Yes, it did! You'd be hard pressed to find an actual geologist that won't tell you that there's actual, scientific evidence that the earth was once covered in water.
I'm not Catholic, so I don't get your reference about Holy water...
Death feeds life
Not
Life feeds death.
Jonathan = “not causal in any scientific way”
So if we don’t know how consciousness works because of our limited tools to observe , then I would assume Jonathan means that consciousness is not causal in any scientific way. Is this not God of the gaps? The word causal is definitely in the realm of science. Science absolutely deals with how things work, but just because we don’t know how something works doesn’t automatically mean God.
However, if he means subjectivity is not caused in a scientific way, THEN what would be more clear than saying “not caused by science” is that you cannot derive an OUGHT from it IS. This would be more succinct and clear. Here, Jonathan, ironically, needs to be careful to use certain symbols when communicating to atheist or else he is just talking past them. Jesus did not share parables about fish to Desert nomads.
I think Sam Harris would not necessarily disagree with your view. He opposes only the claims that religious texts like the bible are historically accurate (which you also do). And he thinks we should make it more clear that these stories are to be understood symbolically. I mean he is some sort of a buddhist himself :D
Sam Harris is an idiot
sam Harris is not an idiot but maybe his pride prevents him from understanding things. The debate with Jordan Peterson was a good example of Sam Harris's perceptions just stopping. He refused to understand Peterson's point because he couldn't comprehend it. He didn't even try to understand it. He's like that with other issues as well. He can't see outside of his bias.
Jonathan doesn't "oppose the claims that religious texts like the Bible are historically accurate." If he did, he couldn't call himself a Christian. The fact that there is symbolic meaning in Scripture doesn't negate the fact that it makes historic claims. Orthodox Christians, including Jonathan, truly believe that God was born of a Virgin and died so that man could share in His likeness. Obviously, not every single story in the Bible is meant to be interpreted the same way, but the idea that symbolism somehow negates the historical dimension is simply false. Very often, the concrete historical reality is the very basis for the symbolic.
@@MicahMicahel and that is precisely why he is an idiot. Prideful people cannot move beyond where they currently are, which makes them functionally unintelligent.
@@Kingfish179 “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.”
Okay. Jonathan is saying that we only retell details of a story if those details are relevant to the purpose of telling the story.
If we describe a car chase, and we want to describe how exciting it was, you would say, “It was crazy! The cars flew past mine like I was still!”
If you’re describing the the potential cause of the chase, you may say, “It seems like the man driving was intoxicated, he was hitting things seemingly on accident.”
Both statements are true. But that doesn’t change the fact that there was a car chase. That’s what I want to know. I love to hear hear meaningful stories, but I want to know if those meaningful stories are based on a causal event. Other wise, it’s just story telling for the sake of principle. The gospels are supposed to be the principle story telling from a causal event. That’s why most people don’t take Snow White or Harry Potter as sacred stories.
To me, you're still trying to divorce the physical sciences from human perception and meaning. It would be true Understanding if you had more to say about the relationship between the material world type of history, which is truth (presumably), and the symbolic nature of biblical history, which is truth of a different kind. If there is no relationship between these, then only one is true, since truth is one and there can be no such thing as the duplex veritas. But historical fact (independent of the author or scholar) is a valid kind of truth, so it must have a real relation to the symbolic world if it is to be taken as another valid kind of truth.
What is it?
That is where I believe your life's paradigm is weak, inasmuch as it is unclear: how does the symbolism of Sacred Scripture relate to the occurence in the past of the events described?
Are you saying there was not a real tree planted by God? with a real fruit forbidden from man's use? If so, then upon what is this "cosmic memory" based? If not... could you be a bit more explicit, please? I think you owe it to Christ.
@@thatscrazy1965 Admittedly, I'm no scholar, neither am I a spiritually or philosophically trained, let alone proficient, but I will offer you my position/perspective as you ask.
I believe that the events in Scripture that read as history are true history.
I believe primarily (specifically) that the Gospels, the Acts, the Historical books, and the stories of the Pentateuch are all unapologetically intended to be historical accounts of events that happened in our world, and therefore ought to be analyzed as such by the world and believed as such by the Christian, even though not every meticulous/superfluous detail with which we moderns would like to "corroborate" Revelation is presented, even though much of it is couched in mysticism, even if some of the witnesses are unique sources among the canon of historians, or even if the witness is God alone (who else could it be?) in, for instance, the case of Genesis 1.
I further believe that Scripture attests to this literal understanding in many places, but in no place more strongly than the words of Jesus, the Christ, Who, for example, defends His teachings on the nature of conjugal relations, and concomitently of marriage, by appealing to His own words, His own deeds, which He spoke in Genesis.
I believe that, in order that the "meaning" of the events described in Scripture be one that corresponds to our real lives in this world - in order that the meaning be *true* - the events as described must be historical.
If they are not, it's just one way of looking at some deeper reality. And even if it is the best of signs, it's still not having direct access to the signified truths themselves (whatever they are, whether or not we can possess them unmediated), so it can always be further perfected, then outgrown, and then abandoned.... Maybe God is not yet a perfect concept of the fundamental truth.
But I believe that the historical events *are themselves* that deeper reality (not by virtue of merely being events, but by virtue of being part of Creation).
The historical events of Scripture are the Incarnation of meaning.
Therefore, the meaning that they have is undeniably correct because it is history, because it is "universally subjective" - true from everyone's particular perspective due to the fact that we are all human beings: animals, matter, body; and persons, form, spirit. Our personal perspectives all have the same reality as their object; the "objective perspective" is that which is common to all "subjective perspectives".
...Barring the insane. That's the real definition of insanity: to see the world as it is not.
Speaking of which....
If there will ever be a real piece of evidence for the "theory" (really an as yet unvalidated hypothesis) of the evolutionary origin of species, I might have to reconsider my point (depending on the nature of the evidence). As it stands, I don't see why we should keep taking this theory on faith, for granted, like we historically have been doing: uncritically (unscientifically); presumptuously; dogmatically. Where's the experiment(s) that prove(s) it? I'll keep waiting... sincerely.
Thus, I see no reason left, apart from raw mistrust of Scripture, to reject a literal sense of Genesis.
Feel free to object in your turn, but (for the love of Truth) do so substantially.
@@thatscrazy1965 Check out Hugh Ross' talks on Genesis and how it matches contemporary astrophysics
bs.....our ancestors didnt write scripture. you dont teach scripture at all lets talk exegesis and hermeneutics. you will not have a coherent system
This guy is incapable of discerning the mostcommonplace distinction between fantasy and reality.
How?
Yes. And that is dangerous for people. Symbolic thinking shines best for poetic imagination or writing novels or stories, not for a real framework of assessing reality.
@@300387ful That is a statement, can you back it up with arguments?
@@MiB365 Sure. The other day I was thinking about this myth of the middle ages being all ignorant and backwards and stuff that polemicists and atheists like to spread, which is based on faulty historical reality and hearsay. It is a false invented conception of reality.
And I thought, what method of inquiry do we use to reach the conclusion that it is false? Symbolic thinking? Or "Reductionist modernist materialist post-enlightenment" historical methods?
After all, the enlightenment philosophers and historians were drawing on their intuitions and shared enlightened mythology to spread that narrative which they wrote on their books, and if you do a surface level intuitive observation of reality (like atheists or other people do) of those claims it seems like yeah, I guess people back then really were stupid, look at the rise of science, look at these weird things these medievals believed!
But all of that was pretty much fiction, and the romantic, poetic portrayal of it sure helped to make it seem plausible.
Symbolic thinking in my estimation, is completely hopeless against things like this, it can't really honestly "debunk" them without drawing on modern historical methodology.
Symbolically, for the people on the enlightenment, that myth was completely true and it still prevails today because it taps into "something" that resonates with people.
Edit: I also wanted to add that if you take symbolism as presented without tethering it to Christianity or Orthodox tradition (which can be done, sometimes Jonathan talks about pagan stories for example), it's dangerous because everything goes. All other stories are valid, all other "fictions". So like the original comment Dave made, it's dangerous to blur the lines between fantasy and reality.
@@300387fulDid you watch the video?
I've watched a few of this guy's videos, and based on his own logic, I don't understand why he isn't a pagan
Why? 😂 What pagan belief is more intricate and verifiably true than christianity?
@@joshuasy10 Exactly - Christianity includes and fulfils and expresses all truths that paganism merely gropes towards, in infinite richness. But maybe Ryan Winn has noticed that pagans and traditional Christians share something that the secular world and many protestantised Christians lack - a belief in the symbolic world, an appreciation of myth as profound truth instead of falsehood or fiction, a knowledge of the power of images to transform and heal and reveal.
Because pagan myths are mostly lies told by salty demons, or else dim memories of the full truth of Christianity
one reason is that we don't have any Pagan religions that survived. All the Pagan religions today are reinventions by creative snake oil sales people. Fairy tales are a better source of Pagan beliefs than anything you'll find in a New Age bookstore. The Pagans were mostly illiterate and their religion was banned.
@@aelbereth6690 Great reply!
I'm sorry, but you're seriously wrong, and confused. 😳
How so?
hows that?
Lol young earth creationist fundamentalist I take it?