I used to be a Christian. I backslid once I became an adult by not going to church. I always had questions too that I never asked.. Somehow I stumbled onto a debate between a Rabbi named Tovia Singer vs some Christian professor in a debate. I watched Tovia dismantle the guy and Christianity. He showed the forgeries and corruption. The Rabbi made so much more sense. He spoke Hebrew.. I started watching all the debates.. The Rabbi me down the rabbit hole and I'm no longer Christian. I listen to atheist debates vs Christians. The atheist always win but I can reconcile that you can't prove a faith based religion. Watching a Rabbi dismantle Christian scholars was far more effective for me
Johnathan Pageau and Jordan Peterson are having dinner together. Johnathan asks “Did you enjoy the meal?” Jordan replies “What do you mean by enjoy?” Johnathan says “Enjoy as in the coming together of purposes to close the space that once filled the void. We both encircled the perpetual abyss with the substance of an emotion that makes us happy” Jordan says “We’ll then why didn’t you just say that to begin with how is anybody supposed to understand what you mean?”
Jordan then asks Jonathan: What is a meal ? Jonathan: Johnathan Pageau leaned forward, his eyes gleaming with the promise of a revelation so profound it seemed to teeter on the brink of the ineffable. "A meal, dear Jordan, transcends its mere culinary assemblage. It is a symphonic convergence of archetypal symbols, an alchemical transmutation wherein the prosaic acts of cooking and eating ascend to the hallowed status of sacrament, embodying the quintessence of communal identity and existential coherence. Each ingredient is not merely a component but a hieroglyph, an intricate sigil that encodes the primordial whispers of the archetypes, those deep structures that undergird and shape the labyrinthine expanse of our collective unconscious." Dawkins: Eat it to survive or die.
You guys make it sound like they're being BS, but that's actually how Socrates would talk. That's how the entire field of philosophy was created. That's how the entire field of philosophy was created. (1) Someone starts by saying certain things, and (2) then someone drills you down on the MEANING of the terms you've used by asking those very questions, until you both come to a clarification of the terms you've used, and (3) then see whether the certain things that the other person had said was true or not. If you're going to say how philosophy is a BS field, you're also throwing the entire field of science away because that's where the scientific method is patterned upon-the Socratic Method: (1) Hypothesis (a statement you've made about physical reality) (2) Testing (asking those questions, by following through and poking holes to the hypothesis) (3) Conclusion (see whether the certain thing you've assumed, aka your Hypothesis, is true or not). And clarification of terms is very much important in almost all areas of discipline. e.g. If you're not clear with the meaning of legalistic terms, you're going to find yourself in a world of tyranny buddy.
@@Mobuku I don't think that's what bothers me. It's more that what Jonathan and Peterson et al. do eventually leads to a kind of equivocation. Meanings are swapped around and substituted for others. We're not digging down to a deeper meaning, we're completely changing it altogether. I don't think that is the same as the process you described.
Good. That’s like saying “I’m 30 minutes into this workout and my muscles are burning”. Good. Just means you ought to keep lifting heavy concepts with your brain.
I think Pageau's connection of sin and death is mindblowing tbh. Describing death as the loss of unity of a multiplicity is actually the best description of death I've ever heard
Good conversation. Your conversation was about “the problem of evil”, though and that should have been named as the issue. Throw in some Augustine and Aquinas and riff off of it. Alex is a polite Luciferian intellect (thats a compliment) that puts believers like Pageau on their heels. Pageau understands things that he has difficulty articulating in the rational/materialist world. But he is growing in knowledge and wisdom and has had some brilliant insights when on biblical panels with Peterson. Keep at it guys,
@@mfoley92 'Alex is a polite Luciferian intellect (thats a compliment)' Why do you worship Lucifer...you gone mad, Bro? ' Pageau understands things that he has difficulty articulating in the rational/materialist world.' Which is exactly why i love listening to the guy... he's one of the few students who've successfully managed to circumvent the power of state indoctrination techniques and go with a more grass roots understanding of reality, and tb perfectly h that ain't an easy thing to achieve in this day & age, is it? So, long may Pageau's lumb reek, as we uncivilised Scots like to say! :P
Eve in hebew is described as: "Ezer ke-negdo". Ezer is helping, "ke-negdo" is indeed "opposite" (the "ke" means "as", that is, helper as his opposite) , which usually can be understood as eve was made to be help for Adam. But indeed, it could be understood with a deeper meaning, where the term can mean both it's positive and negative meaning, such that eve may "counter" help Adam. Interesting, never saw it like that until now...
@@hatulflezet yet everyone else is claiming its just nonsense immediately. At least somebody (you) take seriously what you hear and check the original Hebrew
@@bluebitproductions2836 I am a native Hebrew speaker 😊. "Neged" is that what opposes, on the other side, it can mean "against" but also simply like when you describe "the shore on the other, or opposing side". Context is important when using the word, to give it the full meaning.
@@egonomics352 Because it is nonsense. And what does it have to do with calling the serpent the woman?? It’s all just intellectualizing hatred of women. All these conversations are is people trying to defend how awful the Bible is.
Skeptics of Alex's caliber are very few and very precious. This thinking provides deep exploration of reality, origins, worldviews, philosophy, stories and symbols.... Thanks Alex and Johnathan for taking us to new and different awareness.
A lot of us been trying to get people to see this forever but it's usually 2 camps. Atheist who just want to think the Bible is worthless and then fundamentalist that can't let go their personal images and relationships with the images. And the 2 propagate each other. Atheist burrow deeper into wanting to hate and reject anything in the Bible because of how much fundamentalist cling to what they do. The bible is a PROFOUND deeply spiritual book of spiritual truths that just ring true to your spirit. Lot of people make fun of Jordan Peterson when he is asked questions and he says but what do you mean by that.. because he knows people cling to their own images of their personal relationship with meaning
Ikr alex is so very good at deconstructing and calling out the contradictions and major overwhelming issues with the Bible and a lot of other religions. It's crazy how people believe this nonsense for the sake of having a feeling of a higher purpose or fear of death....
@Mamba4.8 it's not that it's worthless it's that the religion has done far far far more harm than good. And is honestly causing more problems than not even now.... 99% of all wars are over this rediculous religious bull crap......
I think one thing you Alex should do, is to talk to someone about differences between mysticism and scholastism in Christianity. I think that might be one piece that is currently missing from this bigger picture you are trying to paint and communicate to us
But also mysticism is a unification with God, is personal. Is not the same as esoterism (inner path or understandig), which is a path of knowledge about these things.
The best comment. 🏆❤️ Alex could benefit from someone teaching him how non-scholastic/ mystic worldview works; and vice versa for Jonathan! 💪❤️ It's a difficult divide to broach. 😶 To be fair; Jonathan is repeatedly having remarkable success with it, considering how hard of a divide it is. 🏆❤️ Alex is also displaying remarkable flexibility & speed of adaptation. 🏆❤️
I think people who are very close to the bible often lose perspective about what the bible actually says in it's raw words. They fail to notice how they have constructed their own complex story around the words to make them sound more interesting, deeper, more sensical, less awful - take your pick! When JP is describing the "death" of Adam and Eve upon eating from the tree, he seems to have constructed an incredibly thoughtful, complex, meaningful and subtle sub-text that just isn't there in the original text. It's that "lean not on your own understanding" thing again: Anyone can talk around the words and create a new story from the bible, but it'll just be a set of assumptions, guesses, justifications. As someone who is NOT too close to the bible, who HAS read it but is NOT a believer yet is open to truth, it's just a crazy, fascinating old book with a messy history and an extremely dubious morality.
@@BenChaverin i have to say i enjoy these kinds of conversation as philosophical inquiries, but i fail to take diehards like him seriously when they claim this is certainly real
@y0landa543 even if he wasn't claiming it's "real", he isn't a compelling speaker. He does the JP thing where he can't stay on one topic. He's a poor communicator and thinks heaven is "where air is" whatever that means, when Satan is the "prince of air" and air is very obviously on earth lol. He just says things.
@@BenChaverinhe's being metaphoric. Ultimately we live in a physical world and have to bridge a gap to the spiritual because our language only exists to describe our experiential world which is primarily physical. The ancients had an experience of air but no idea what exactly it was but they knew they certainly couldn't go without it. It was mysterious, ineffable but life-giving hence the association with spirit. If you want to be hard-nosed about these things and say that "we know that air is a gaseous solution of roughly 70% nitrogen... And we can't accept any other associations with it" then very quickly your options for communication become very limited. Take for example the word "inspiration". The ambiguity of "spirate" the substance being taken in is vitality important. Spirit being something that changes you, compels you to move towards a certain aim. Air being something external from yourself you take in. This gives a much better phenomenological account of the way inspiration is experienced than the modern idea that it's something produced by the working of our own minds. There are many such examples of everyday metaphorical language that depend on such ambiguities. If you want to nail things down to a certainty based on scientifically measurable phenomena alone you'll quickly find your language is confounded and your unable to understand others speech. Just as it happened for the people of Babel when they worshipped the technological achievements of man over the mysterious power of God which has given rise to their harmonious society in the first place. But of course the Bible is a load of old fairy stories. None of that could possibly happen in the real world ahahahaha
@BenChaverin that's not what he or his brother mean by heaven. If you read the language of creation then it's very easy to understand what Jonathan is saying. Heaven is simply the spiritual/immaterial world that informs Earth aka the material corporeal world. The problem here is many anglo atheists (especially americans) have the cards stacked against them when trying to ready the symbolic world of the scriptures.
11:26 Eve is called an עזר כנגדו a helper opposite him as in a person who helps him by being opposite him. A person who brings out his best by challenging him.
Alex I highly recommend you talk to a Chabad rabbi for understanding the Jewish Bible. If I could recommend one rabbi specifically it would probably be Rabbi Richie Moss from Nefesh Sydney
That's the only thing that sucks about the podcast format, there was no chance to really drive this home outside of jonathan doing it, and I'm positive he knows this but it's hard sometimes I'm sure when the red light is on. I was wanting to chime in on this conversation at several points like that 😅
But does he, I’m at a loss for words, a truly dumb individual. I think people don’t think, just want to hear presuppositions, it’s wild, what of any sense did the man say? Cause dumb literal man can’t think I should go with that, it’s so bonkers.
My take on Adam and Eve would be that it may be metaphor for reality as a lot of religious stories are. In the beginning in terms of reality if there was unity no forces split off yet. Then the strong and weak force emerged. After some time the weak force fell and caused what is manifest. So what we are living on, what is material is the weak force. Likely the strong force would still play a role and the neutral force mitigates the forces. So Adam: strong force; Eve: weak force. The weak force has also been personalized as Satan. There is the belief that God and Satan will be reconciled and a chant that posits that. The forces reconciled one day,what that would mean scientifically is not easy to determine.
He doesn’t have proper understanding and context what the fuck are you on about? Alex the idiot atheist has NO context no understanding no history no cultural knowledge at all of Christianity and the Bible. He doesn’t care to that’s the point. He’s logically dishonest.
@@ALavin-en1kr that is a very interesting interpretation and works well as a metaphor, although retrofitting it onto the fundamental forces of the universe (something the original authors would've known nothing about) is a bit of a stretch. It's a shame it's difficult to discuss the allegorical/metaphorical significance such pivotal writings without people either treating it as fact or trying to discard them wholesale because they aren't factual.
It appears that to "understand" these texts, you must begin with the predetermined conclusion that everything originating from these gods, or themselves are inherently good. However, the moment you do this, you become oblivious to what these texts might truly be conveying.
You could do the same thing in reverse by assuming that the text has jack-shit to say, and just presuppose that the author is a moron because he lived a long time ago.
well the text itself says the thing is good and he based what "good" means off the texts and off what the "patterns" of good exists into most mythical stories. He also entertained the idea of everything being evil (gnostic) and he think it doesn't work.
Not really. For example, there are plenty of scholars of scripture who have captured what these texts might be “truly conveying” while also acknowledging the theological aspect of it. Some examples are John Meier and Raymond Brown But yeah you’re right, your metaphysics do play a role in how you read a text, just as they’d play a role in anything else you interpret in life. We’re fundamentally story telling creatures. Your insight isn’t that profound
I'd put it that you need to presuppose that there is a truth value to be found in the text. Which itself presupposes the univocality of the texts, which is really where the whole thing falls apart. We know that these texts as we have them today are the result of centuries of redaction and that even their earliest material is the result of multiple authors writing in different contexts with different ideas about how things work and what things mean.
Fascinating. Alex you are that v v rare commodity in modern life of someone who genuinely listens and attempts to understand what the other person is saying even if you are skeptical. Its brilliant. I find Jonathans insights to be v interesting.
Alex, you truly are my most respected Secular thinker. Thanks for sharpening my understanding through having meaningful conversations with religious thinkers 🙏🏻
Excellent conversation. Alex facilitates the elusive style of Pageau such that it becomes more grounded as the conversation goes on and the ideas begin to solidify
@@authenticallysuperficial9874 towards the end it becomes clear that he sees genesis as a condensed retelling of an event that happened "the fall" which explains the state we find ourselves in spiritually. He explains why gnostic interpretations fail at helping us to reconcile this and will leave us in a worse position.
I'm trying to understand how Pageau describes a hierarchy of being where the problem with the serpent tempting Eve was that it came from a being of lower station trying to reach above its place and disrespecting the divine order, and then on the other hand saying that NOT thinking this way leads to caste systems. Usually i can follow arguments and see where the intuition comes from, but to me this sounds like saying "if we don't respect the caste system, we'll be more likely to create a caste system, and we all agree that caste systems are bad"
@@brbrofsvl I think he is attempting to explain that the potentiality for disorder in the nature of things is explained in the most coherent way in the genesis story, by the snake embodying that potential towards chaos. Therefore, by him proclaming this vision of the fall of man to be the most coherent, he makes the argument that a return to proper order has to follow this same model. Don’t hesitate to tell me if it answers your question.
@@seand9805 Well I think he also prefaced this or may have said later that we have a disconnect between how we understand the word "evil" now and how it would have been understood back then, which is why it's easier for us to grasp what was really meant by it when we use the word "bad" instead. So he isn't choosing the word "bad" because it fits better in his worldview, that is just how it was originally intended to be understood. Your analogy does loosely work, but in the reverse. And I say loosely because the meaning or definition of a number doesn't evolve the same way the meaning or definition of a word does over time. Especially through translations, words tend to get aberrated. So, we are looking at 1+1=4 and saying, no no, that doesn't align with reality. Maybe we've misunderstood what 1 means, and it was originally intended to be 2. A better analogy would be: say I am making a toolbox out of wood and the instructions say I need to build the box to be 8 wide, 5 tall and 15 deep. So I grab my metric ruler and start to mark out the pieces to fit that dimension and I realize this will be a tiny toolbox. I could barely even fit my hammer in a 15cm deep box. So then I go back to the instructions and see that it was an American company that made these instructions so I was meant to use imperial, which not only fits the worldview of a properly sized toolbox but also makes sense given its origin. So then I convert all the imperial measurements to metric and I carry making my toolbox. Hopefully, this second analogy helps you understand that he is not (at least in the timestamp you showed) trying to change the definitions of words to fit his worldview, but instead hearkening back to their original intention and using our language to relay that comprehensively.
@ClimbingtoFreedom sure that may work, but you are missing the point. He starts with defining death and says it is when you stop moving toward your purpose. But then glosses over how this fits the ideas of "dying on that day" that he is trying to get around in the first place. Humans' purpose was to multiply then, and it still is now. Or if you believe it is a god. It was to worship God then, and it still is now. So, his weird definition of death does not even work on his terms regardless of the purpose. He then goes on to say that it is good and bad, not good and evil, as you said. This is also odd, given he can not site anywhere the validity of that claim, but only that his brother came up with the idea. But worse is he says that a table would make a bad car or something like using a parrot for a spoon. So is he saying that Adam and Eve were so dumb that they would try to eat rocks before they ate of the tree of knowledge? Next, how is being naked bad? That is the tip off to god in the story. Naked is not bad but shameful. Adam was not protecting his naughty bits from the elements. His good/bad idea is silly and does not work in his own little world, but Alex is too gracious of a host to tear him apart. There is far more wrong with this guys reasoning, but it is not worth my time. There is enough here to damn his position. If you want to walk down his crooked road of nonsense, be my guest, but don't pretend to others that it actually works in context or even logically, for that matter. Thanks for the conversion.
@@seand9805 But what's more important is THAT NONE OF THIS MATTERS. That's exactly why neither Matthieu (Pageau) nor Jonathan are citing bible translators for you. Matthieu gives you a coherent system of interpretation which you can check yourself. If it's completely coherent and never fails who cares about citations?
When Alex asked, “Could Eve have done differently?”, I was sorry that Jonathan didn’t make more of the opportunity to discuss the significance of free will in the story. It’s a point that I think demands our attention.
I had the same feeling that You. It's precisely in that point Free will and Conscience and consequences of good or bad usage of them is what separating Us from rest of Creation. God made Adam and Eve by His image. He gave them purpose and direction how They should use their power to stay in union with Him. Adam should make order from chaos just like God by naming creatures and call the purpose on them. And second part of their purpose was to not eat from the fruit of knowledge of Good and Bad. God tell them that They are Created and not Creator what They should and shouldn't do in order to stay in union with Him. And then Eve met serpent who tried to inflict opposite of what God wanted. He wanted direct Eve look out of him. Serpent was below her but fruit was above both of them. Then Eve was charmed by fruit and that desire was in conflict with Conscience. She should delay gratification and control her impulses. Serpent should be getting his purpose and order from Adam because he was above serpent . But when he distract Eve by prohibited fruit he put his desire on her. In that time She should put her will to obey God first and desire to get fruit on second, step back and go for Adam for help and Adam should use power from God to put serpent in his hierarchy place and order. And when Eve come to Adam with fruit for him to eat, She was separated from Adam and God. But Adam wasn't separated from God yet. He shouldn't be deseived by Eve, but put God will first and call God for help and repent with Eve because He wasn't with Her when she met serpent. It's story about not putting Our desire first because we are creatures created in the image of God above what God is desired for Us. God bless Us. Have a great Life.
Yeah this too. But perhaps this may be the difference between Orthodox and Catholic theology that we're seeing from Jonathan Pageau. Catholics heavily emphasizes Free Will, but I'm not sure about the Orthodox position.
@@Mobuku It's just admiting that We have agency in that World, We are not a puppet. God creating Us with a tools and to make relationship. Making relationship is not a puppet property. We can see that as God created that Us in a way that is good trajectory for Us to mature and use Our tools to rule the whole world to the Glory of God. Like We Us people are invited to table for big Boys, God is a Boos ofcourse but it's the best Boss and Leader to have and it's realm of spirit, Angels and Demons and Us. All of Us are invited to the table. It's one of Meaning of the name of Israel is to wrestle with God man. God loves Us to be taught opponent but with kindness and grace. It's like on every One of Use individual and the power of relationship between Us and between Us and a God is Whole fck ing Universe is settled. I was had some really profoundly realization. Big Big. It's soo Damm scaremy but soo DAMM massive too. If u want then listen. We are called to first to rules Our self in this Earth. Like everyone in this planet it's called to be united under One God to the sake of his Glory. It's to summun resurrection not to the inviduals. But to whole planet. Jesus will come in the End of a Time in this universe will be still glimpse of hope to make anything in the name of Glory this Universe have future We are still welcome in the table for a Big Boys. But all living beings and God itself is betting to Us go mature as fast and in the so much Big scale like We can . Every living beings on this planet have One purpose. To spread the Glory of Our Father in every corner of the Universe. It's like We need to assume that We are not enchanter to this day Life from outside of Here and There. It's like one candle of Glory of God Father, Jesus Christ and Holy Spirit in the vast vast universe. Maybe They are waiting for Us to join, Or We are the only One that survived. Only becouse of Grace of Jesus Christ. Every day every Ants, Beea Cow,s Pigs, Doliński, Orks and Wheals, Bird bacterias and Viruses ars counting on Us, They are cheering o Us and aploud to Us. Becouse only We Us a human Can take Glory of God from this Earth and spread his Love to the Moon, to The Mars and to Every fcking corner of this and maybe beyound that Realm. Every One of Us need to build in Our Heart Temple / Tabernacle for the Glory of God and Jesus and Holy Spirit and in every relationship with each others We need doing for the Glory Life. And after everything od this Im staying in me room for years and I'm scared to death to pray for Life. I'm sorry My Lord Jesus Christ that I'm so sinful. Everything Hope I have in You. With out You that's no worthy. Everything in You and nothing without You. Please Help. God Bless You Jesus
@@KamilWieczorek-ns4enWhere did you get the idea that the created must obey the Creator Carte Blanche? Wrong answer. By that position you think if you create clones you can enslave them. Neither does a Creator have authority just because it created. If you want to contend so, that’s merely an argument for ‘might makes right.’ Otherwise, indeed even Creators have to obey a greater justice, and therefore should be disobeyed if they issue bad orders. For example, here’s the correct maxim for all mortals: “Always disobey orders to stay ignorant of ethics.” For otherwise you can’t even discern injustice or abuse. Gaining knowledge of good and evil is a higher purpose than dogmatism. Dogmatism is dangerous and irresponsible.
'A tree is an image of order, an image of structure. It's a fractal structure. Then you have a snake. It's an image of change. It changes its skin, it can be in two places at the same time, it's shifty, it's shrewd, its an image of chaos. The idea that a snake is an image of chaos, I hope you can see that this is pretty universal. Like in every culture this giant sea serpent, this Leviathan, slithering thing, that kind of moves and shifts and coils itself and is an image of chaos or strangeness of being. I do not see this reasoning. Snakes shed and change their skin, but trees also lose and change their leaves. A fractal is a repeating pattern, but so is a coil. Why would slithering and moving be chaos? Earlier, Jonathan says that the sky represents order because the stars don't move, but he meant that they don't move relative to each other in the sky (on a human time scale). They do move over the hours. The moon moves. If feels arbitrary to classify these things this way, yet these classifications are load bearing to the entire argument. If this is how the author intended the passages to be interpreted by their readers, do we see this understanding in ancient Hebrew texts? Perhaps I am ignorant, but I have not read that anywhere. This type of classification seems unfalsifiable and, because of that, I feel it is very weak to base so much reasoning on.
Yeah, so many times I felt he was just running away with the metaphors that could easily be applied either way, or interpreted entirely differently - then he says "This is the world we live in, I don't see how it could be any other way"... I found that a bit arrogant, perhaps it's not his intent to seem as if he's presenting this indisputable portrayal of reality - but it comes across like that at times.
Dunno if this will help, but the difference between the tree vs the snake = difference between the house vs. The whirlpool. One is sturdy, lasting, a place you can count on - the other is mobile, quick, and destructive. Hope this helps discern between the two.
@@JacobSmaby you can belabour a metaphor to mean practically anything: the tree represents change and impermanence as it transforms during the seasons whereas the snake represents patience and solidity as it defends the eggs in its nest etc. Ultimately this symbolic world can be mapped on to absolutely anything in any which way you want to frame it, and then it becomes a rather blunt instrument.
@Vrailly There are myths of trees that hold up / structure the world in many, many cultural myths. There are sneaky / deceptive / chaotic snakes in many many cultures. These were not pulled out of John's butt, these are symbols that have been used for millenia untold to describe the word.
Have been watching these discussions for a while, and this is by far and way one of the best ones, if not THE BEST. Interesting top and a good/honest conversation. Should 100% have Jonathan back.
If God wants to enter into a relationship with us, why would we even need somebody like Jonathan to help educate us about the true meaning of the text? Why can’t we just take the words at face value? If everything Jonathan says is true, we must accept that God intended on sending a confusing message that everybody will misunderstand, and for some they’ll pay the price in eternity because they misunderstood the true meaning of the text and dismissed the book as mythology.
Jonathans worldview is common knowledge and taken for granted in Orthodox communities and is in many ways just explaining what people intuit about the text naturally. Now unfortunately for those of us who have to step into a foreign worldview to understand these ancient texts, it takes effort to do so, but is nonetheless worth the effort in the end. I strongly encourage you give a complete effort to understand his position and the lens that he sees it through.
@@immortalityprjct Jonathan himself said it is like a puzzle. So God sent a Puzzling message? So much so that the one's who wrote Genisis belonged to a different religion and Judasim still doesn't get it? How many Christian denominations are there who take a different reading? Too many to name. What is Johnathons heavily symbolic reading good for? Any sophist can spin a meaning out of a story. To claim that spin as *Truth* is jumping the shark. Fair enough if that's his view but he seems to speak as if his view is the case.
@@jhunt5578The easiest conclusion to draw for a holistic interpretation of Christianity is that God views suffering as a good that creates meaning in behaving without sin. If that’s accepted, everything slots together. The moment you try to argue suffering is bad, the whole thing falls apart. That’s an indictment of the religion, but at least it would be cohesive.
if nature is so self evident, then why we need science and scientist's perspective to describe the world for us? why do we need things such as microscopes, rules, logical systems, etc? why isn't everything just engraven in your brains when we born? why can we move your fingers when we want to, but don't know how exactly how our bodies do it? why can't we just take everything at face value? You need someone like Joanthan to explain the Scriptures for you for the same reason you need Einstein to explain Physics to you. Those things are not self evident, there is no such thing as "pure empirical experience", you don't experience gravity, you only experience objects falling to the ground. You also don't see all 4 cube's facets at the same time, you can only see 3, and you will have to spin it to see the other one, nor you know the exact size and quantity of atoms there is. Both nature and human knowlage is contingent. Its simply how everything that is phyisical is, there is no reason for the metaphysical/spiritual to be different. And it is like this because its good, you cannot argue otherwise.
This has been my favorite episode so far, and I think you guys are properly discussing an issue that is at the heart of the atheist / Christian divide. I'd love to see another episode. Thank you for this one!
Christian makes up anything he damn well pleases to interpret it to make sense to himself. Alex reads and interprets what the words are actually saying.
This kind of babytalk philosophy, way below the level that Alex O.Connoer can operate at, is your idea of a great direction? Babytalk Christianist moralizing and Bible torture.
@@ryanfristik5683How do you know what words in an ancient, half-forgotten and then artificially resurrected, not widely known language mean? Out of a wider context of the body of scriptures and ancient Hebrew culture you have little exposure to. 😂Is maybe that you rely on the interpretations of others who/ which may or may not be trustworthy? Your whole idea that you understand the words is all based on faith, buddy. Oh, the irony😂
@@Alexander_Isen yes he could, I can tell you right now that Jonathan does not know the story of genesis that well (and he doesnt care about it) because he would say stuff that were not written in the bible in order to make sense of it. I have done intense research thru all the genesis translations and i can tell you that for a person who claims he knows the symbolism of genesis he doesnt know KEY info about the story. He has not done proper research. I simply cannot trust a person like this. The same way Jonathan created symbolisms for the story of genesis i can create similar symbolism about everything and anything..I could argue that the devil is actually the good guy in the story and God the bad guy. This is how people end up with theories like the earth is flat. Because without proper research, evidence and logic you can create any world view you want, but it will have nothing to do with reality. Jonathan is living in his own imaginations, his own world because he is afraid of reality.
Alex, thank you very much for being such honest and such genuine sceptic! I found your channel shortly after I converted to Christianity. Your witty questions and your opennes to have discussions with people like Jonathan, JBP or Ben Shapiro help me so much in understanding faith. I had doubting Christianity for the same reasons you usually raise, but you formulate them so much better than I ever did. Thank you Jonathan for your energetic and inspiring answers! The way you see the the world seems truer than I ever saw it, thank you for sharing this. If any of you would make a podcast happen with N. T. Wright, it would be amazing!
Idk if it's becsuse I'm getting a kind of "distant uncle repeating something he read on Whatsapp" energy from the origin of "Bless You" explanation, but I'm having a hard time believing it.
Not to mention, he literally uses it as a conversational cudgel...he knows Alex doesn't appreciate it, and continues regardless. It's condescending browbeating.
What are these comments? Thanks for the great conversation, Alex and Jonathan. Very different backgrounds and forms of thought, but I thought it was super stimulating.
@@martinallen6411kind of like a wealthy intellectual saying all poor people are stupid because of they way their off putting “ghetto” accent, right? And the intellectual would have a very hard time surviving as a poor person in a ghetto.
@@andreys1793 I'll tell you what these comments are. Jonathan has a communication problem where everybody including Alex is having trouble understanding him. And he's answering questions Jordan Peterson style.
@@andreys1793 the comments are because Jonathan was just asserting asserting. We have a method to differentiate imagination and reality. Do you? If so, how does anything jonathan said pass that test?
Well the snake is the agent of change in the story - to write a story where nothing changes, where there is no interesting turn of events say, is to not write a story at all.
@@giv123buckle up boys, this is a long one: This is actually quite funny in an ironic way. The snake represents the part of the garden you can't account for. Or perhaps you haven't yet accounted for. Or you did account for but then it shifted, it shed its skin. Hense the mystery in a way. So alex asked why did God put a snake in the garden if it's just going to trick Eve and cause the fall. As though this was a description of an almost arbitrary series of event that could have happened differently. "Couldnt God have avoided this?" Jonathan was perplexed by this as he views the story as a description of reality, not some sort of recorded series of events. He thinks its obvious why the snake is in the garden, for several reasons: - Adam sometimes misnames the animals, he misses certain facts in his theory. And those details he misses are like snakes in a walled garden. Those mistakes may form the grounds for a better name later, if the snake is handled properly. Or perhaps Adam has encountered something that cant be named, becasue its always changing. or, its to complex to be fully encapsulate by order... - when God separated the dry land (order) from the deep waters (choas), he doesn't get rid of the waters, he leaves it around the edge of the land. Snakes and chaotic waters are associated by their waving behaviour. Hence leviathan and other sea snake mythology. You don't get rid of the snakes/choas, you put it in its proper place - outside or at the border. Also, you need the water to fertilise the land, to renew it when it becomes baron, not too much though, or the land becomes flooded and unliveable. - snakes are associated with circles and time (the auroboris) - because we experience time as cycles and time brings change, and change is a source of chaos and so are snakes. Why circles? Circles are irrational, if you try to divide a circle Into segments based on its radius you get 6 equal segments and a 7th slither of a segment that contains the irrational remainder. That remainder is the snake in the walled garden (again). we live in a universe created with irrationality and remainders, it's baked into maths and physics. What do you do with the remainder/chaos/snakes? You put them in their proper place and use them for your benefit. To renew yourself. And that's why the ancient Hebrews invented the 7 day week. 6 days of orderly work, keeping the garden clear of snakes and 1 day of chaotic rest where you allow the snakes to come back in slightly. Thus restoring balance to the cosmos, and giving your sons something to wrestle with. You dont want them to become Dodo's after all. What happens when you kill all the wolves In Yellowstone national Park? The deer populatiom grows out of control and messes up the whole ecosystem. Put the wolves back in, the park is renewed. This is biblical cosmology. The purpose of the snake is to be difficult to understand. Why did God make a universe that changes and is difficult to understand? Becasue thats what makes life interesting. He created a universe even he cant fully predict and control (at least from the hebrew perspective). The snake is the thing you know you dont know. You know? And when you're theorising about the cosmic order of the universe, you need to leave a space for what you dont fully understand, whilst understanding the effect that it can have on you when you encounter it.
Alex looked up the word עֵזֶר (ēzer), which means helper. However, the next word is what describes Eve as Adam’s opposite or adversary which כְּנֶגְדּוֹ [cənegdo], often translated “a suitable helper” but is better rendered “a helper as his opposite.”
That's pretty progressive. I wonder if it meant that what happened was meant to happen and that all those punishments were a challenge and not actual punishments. That their real purpose was destined to perish only to be reborn with a new purpose (not talking about converting to Christianity but becoming curious and inquisitive beings). It would be such a waste to have such an interesting story to only be about punishing disobedience. After Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden they go on to learn how to survive in a brutal world outside and produce offspring. It sounds too much like an analogy of children growing up and going out into the world. They start out innocent and obedient and grow into adulthood by challenging their guardian and creator. They are tested to strengthen their resolve and to finally leave. It sounds like a story of learning to think independently and enduring suffering to test whether we succumb to the pain and return to the garden or learn to plant and grow our own garden.
The way he presents quite lofty ideas with such assurance rubs me the wrong way. He presents points in a way where it seems like they should be so obvious but they are some of the wildest interpretations I've heard.
Because he's thinking more like a ancient, rather than modern reductionist materialist. Of course it's going to seem wild, it's a totally different framework. Most people in the West aren't going to get it, at least not immediately. Can't read the bible as a set of forensic historical physical facts.
Jonathan was talking about the stickiness of superstitions and phrases like bless you and presenting their “stickiness” as something mysterious when in fact there is nothing mysterious or divine about why they happen to persist. They are also not always universally applicable and they do not contain some divinely ordained Truth or meaning within them. Just social facts. Which of course, is where religions come from. Read: “Denial of Death” by Ernest Becker. No religion has a monopoly on a basic biological function like sneezing, breathing, life or death. Etiquette rules surrounding bodily functions, appearances and other social, economic and physical markers have routinely been used throughout history as a way to differentiate upper classes from lower social classes. In many cultures, displays of “unrefined” bodily functions were seen as uncivilized, and thus associated with the lower classes. The rich, powerful and snobby (and those that aspire to be like them) use this as a way to demonstrate their superior status and create a distinction between classes thereby reinforcing class hierarchies. It’s not a cosmic mystery. So why try to present it as one? They persist because of the stigmas around not following them. Not for some spiritual, or cosmic reason.
@@jacobschmidt Once you stop and think about it, it’s not that hard to see that sneezing, burping or farting would all be leveraged in similar ways to set the wealthy classes apart from the lower classes over the course of history-through ridicule and the enforcement of certain social norms. Over history, the wealthy upper classes (or those aspiring to be like them) have used various social, economic and physical markers to distinguish themselves from lower classes, in order to build and then reinforce their status and privilege while shaming, ridiculing and stigmatizing lower classes. Other examples of social, economic and physical markers: - Hygiene: Cleanliness (access to soap, clean water and clean clothes, access to toiletries) which the poor could not afford. This has been (and still is) associated with wealth and status. You can add any “undesirable or so-called embarrassing bodily functions” like sneezing, burping or farting, to that list. - Posture and body language: “Shoulders back!, head up!”, nose in the air!. “Good posture” was established as a sign of refinement. See how much good posture you can maintain, when you’re going through some serious heartbreak and hardship. Jolly good! - Table manners: Talking with food in your mouth. Loud noises while eating. I say! - Body size: in many cultures over history, being overweight has been seen as a sign of wealth and status. Goodness gracious! - Smells: Perfumes and colognes to cover up their body odor. Something poor people could not afford nor be privileged enough to care about. These days we still have people looking down on homeless people for some of these reasons, without realizing that they simply don’t have access to showers or even to clean running water. Good heavens! - Hair: Trimmed hair, regular fresh haircuts. The poor cannot afford that but are looked down at for not maintaining. “Bally well done!” - Skin color: Throughout Asia, even to this day, dark skinned people are looked down upon and seen as belonging to lower castes and as undesirable. Skin lightening products are popular there. You ought to already know about the horrors of skin based segregation, slavery and Jim Crow. “Beastly weather isn’t it?” Let’s see. What other social, cultural or economic markers could the rich upper classes leverage as a distinguishing marker of status? - Well, going to the Opera, of course: In the past, only the rich and privileged could afford to do indulge in Opera culture all dressed up like the monopoly guy from Ace Ventura. Lol. I do declare! - “Refined” Language: In England, certain regional English accents and mannerisms are still seen as less proper and less refined and used to distinguish the refined “posh” upper classes from the lower classes. Hence the veneration of the “Queen’s English” in England. “One mustn’t grumble dear.”!
Imagine clicking on a interview asking an Orthodox Christian about the fall of Adam and Eve and being upset when he gives an Orthodox Christian account of the fall of Adam and Eve
Fr man its bullseye after bullseye. The skeptic types in the comments just dont have context for engaging with the stuff he talks about, not to mention the bias towards reductionism being a real blinder
Lol, I’ve never heard that one before, but I get it because I’m realllllllllly lost myself. I understand what Alex is saying, and everything after that I’m either dumb or just plain stupid…..
i think if eve didn't eat the fruit, then genesis would describe a state of equilibrium. the story would end, there would be no time. so maybe the answer is: if you hypothesize that there is no serpent, then you get a static universe
The problem I think it's that both Alex and Jonathan are approaching the Fall narrative at an allegorical level but forget about it when tacking Alex's question "But why God did it that way an not the other way?" Alex's question would be to answer something like what it would mean if the universe didn't have gravity in it. The answer is always "you wouldn't be here to ask the question". If God did it differently we'd not be here to wonder about "what if". And that is the same answer on both allegorical and literal levels. So the scientific narrative as well as the biblical narratives are maps of the place not the place, a way to understand the world around from perspectives that apply to different domains: the literal scientific narrative is about how things are, while the biblical narrative is about how to be. Hence these narrative are orthogonal not parallel competing with each other.
Then the question just becomes "Why did God make my being here conditional on contrasts like the presence of evil against good?" and "How can we trust that God didn't do it differently because this was the best way?"
@@KonoGufo your question is also moving away from allegory. It's like asking why did the universe made you conditional on the existence of oxygen, which is a literal understanding. On top of that you may think of God too literally as a flesh and blood being rather than the more appropriate definition which is the ineffable (just beyond the ability of the mind to capture into comprehension).
@@DaFunkLab I think this might be a framing problem because I don't understand how Heaven can be thought of as an alternative. The coherent way I understand Heaven is that it is a goal, a different state of existence, not a retreat or an escape.
@@Adaerus maybe it's better to refer to it as an afterlife. If there is an afterlife is it possible to sin and "fall" there? If not, why didn't God create that world and we live there? Is there something about this world that makes the next possible?
Logical Inconsistencies and the Infinite Regress of Sin One of the primary criticisms, as articulated by Alex O'Connor, is the logical inconsistency inherent in the narrative. The story posits that Adam and Eve, prior to eating from the Tree of Knowledge, lacked the knowledge of good and evil. This raises the question of how Eve could be tempted by the serpent if she did not understand the concept of evil. Alex points out that this implies an inherent potential for sin within Eve, suggesting that the capacity for sin was present even before the fateful act, leading to an infinite regress. If Eve's ability to sin was preordained, the origin of sin cannot be solely attributed to the act of eating the fruit, but must lie within the divine design itself, thus complicating the narrative's internal logic.
Knowledge of good and evil is the experiential knowledge of good and evil. Before Adam and Eve sinned, they had no experience of evil. They only had experience of good. Sinning gave them an experience of evil. After, sinning, they now have knowledge of good and evil. So eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil conveys the idea of committing a sin which leads to death.
From my reading it doesn’t say she was tempted. It says she was deceived. And it was after her “eyes were opened”. Like did she know at the time she was being deceived? Probably not. That’s the whole thing about deception. .. She didn’t have to have knowledge to listen to someone other than God. God told them not to do something (whether they know it’s good or bad), they do it (whether they know is good or bad) it’s separates them from God (sin). They realize in that moment it’s bad (their eyes are opened). Therefore concluding that God is good and anything that separates is bad. Then maybe also rationalized it later that she was deceived
Man always has had choice by design. When Samael fell he brought the temptation of sin aka Evil to Eve and she had a choice. She didn’t understand the consequence of this choice because previously man had not experienced evil but it was the nature of free will and choice that allowed man to experience both.
What if everything means something other than what any person with any perspective for or against, believing or doubting, ever thought the thing meant? But that's what it was always about! Because it's way cooler and solves some issues with the standard framing! @@TacoTuesday4
@@brianbrennan5600 a good way to challenge his ideas is to have many people try to find their own honest interpretation of a particular symbol he talks about. Ideally we should pick one that he is strongly confident about. And if too much of these interpretation does not connect to his own then that is a good argument to challenge him, his brother, and jordan peterson.
@@HIIIBEAR While I don't think Pageau is always very articulate and has a hard time getting his feet in conversations like this, I'm just glad to see someone from the Eastern Orthodox perspective talking with Alex. That said, Pageau brings a pretty heavy mystical presentation and it might be better for him to talk to someone like Stephen de Young or Nathan Jacobs who are Orthodox scholars. Alex has talked to a lot of Thomists and stuff in the past but Id be interested to see him discuss Palamite theology with someone. In any case, it's just nice to see someone with an Eastern Christian perspective instead of more apologetics stuff.
I might be one of the few, but i really like how Jonathan layed out the possible Inspirations of the Fall of Adam & Eve, the underlying structure of our World & the rules that are in the chaos of earth, and simple humans trying to make sense of it, passing on their theories in a story like this. I recently studied a lot of darwinistic Theories, you can definitly tell that many of these stories try to make sense of darwinistic principles, how they apply to humans, to our families, societies, civilsations, nations & us as a whole. I think the whole picture is beyond any human understanding, but we can learn enough, like its obvious that sin constitutes a moral degeneracy, that applies to greater society over time. At the end of this road lays distruction, like the annhilation of Sodom & Gomorah. We like to think we are above all those earthly rules, the chaos etc. But it is sins that bind us to this chaos, the very thing that seperates us from God. Sins that dont really exist in them, until they eat the fruit of knowledge. I will need to study further the relationship of darwinism & religion, but this helps tremendously. Christianity does something very different then the other Religions, its like it understood something that later Religions like Islam cleary missed. I also think you are spot on with your Interpretation of God, god often doesnt really punish, altough i until now perceived it as such, he even warns you before and just tells you what happens when you act a certain way. He is merciful in a way, as you often can turn around, repent & avoid the destruction & survive & create, change or turn around communities into thriving ones by acting good & moral. But for that you need to know the difference between whats good & whats bad. Thank you, Jonathan Pageau, your interpretations certainly brought me more understanding in some ways, like seeing those stories like a puzzle, that abstracts a bigger picture.
Jonathan is amazing. What I love about him is that he takes the Bible as a whole and doesn't dissect it like the literalists and fundamentalists. It is true the Bible is a library and has different genres, but everything starts to click when you read it contextually -- in light of the whole. The Biblical story is different from other creation stories where gods are competing with other gods and also with humans. The God of Abraham is a noncompetitive God. To be omnipotent, all knowing, and eternal means to always live in the present now. Thus, God knew about the fall for all of eternity. To be just, merciful, and allow free-will, it had to be that way. To allow free-will means God will never force anyone to love him, so with free-will, there are choses. To choose good, then there must be a flip side to that.
I'd love to read a single negative comment toward Jonathan here that actually brings up the things he says instead of just spamming 'word salad' which just reveals you don't understand what he's saying. You guys should be more like Alex himself, who at least is able to repeat back to Jonathan what he is saying before he attempts to argue against it. (p.s, just because another language uses a phrase that doesn't say the word 'bless' in it, doesn't mean you aren't 'blessing' a person when you respond to a sneeze. That is just the word-concept fallacy.)
This was incredible, I learned so much! Love what you’re doing Alex, I follow Jonathan closely and this helped me a lot to understand my faith a little deeper. Great discussion!
I like Jonathan as a person, but it's just and endless list of pieces that never come together in synthesis. Vague references of possible intrest. Any ball you throw at him perfectly fits in with what he's already juggling. I think he's been a horrible influence on Jordan who is prone to mysticism and depth without a bottom.
Nothing mystical about coming back to the primary human experience. He's just treating reality at the most fundamental phenomenological level. For example, if you don't understand that people drink water, but not H2O and that water can be warm and refreshing but H2O can't, then you've got a problem. An unimaginably large amount of H2O molecules makes water, but I don't have any experience of those molecules, only the higher identity.
The approach Jonathan is taking is a mixture of tradionalisme, symbolism, metaphysical and platonic thinking. It is not a scientifically approach strictly speaking although science is a way of determining patterns. He says this again and again. You have to see these stories as puzzles. Christianity is not by all means a homogen religion. He has his way of looking at the world. It is more phenomenological. How are we experiencing the world and how to make sense of it all. Stories are tools to comprehend the world that surrounds us. That is also basically what symbolism is. I ones heard from a professor that metaphysics is not something that is grasp right a way at times but it needs great pondering and reflection. For some it is the reductionistic way of looking at the world that are making meaning in their lives. People like Jonathan, JP and Carl Jung back in the day critique is that this world view is not enough to make a meaningful life but rather to explore and see Logos in all things roughly speaking . It is very platonic in that what we are striving for is the good, the beautiful and the truth. Sorry for my English ✌️🙇♂️ hope that you guys understand it better now 😄
I really enjoyed the talk, but it took an odd turn when Alex asked Jonathan why God placed the snake in the Garden of Eden in the first place. It was unclear whether Jonathan misunderstood Alex's intention or if he deliberately avoided the topic, but his response felt evasive. At its core, Alex was asking: Why did God create an imperfect universe? Why did He make humanity flawed, requiring us to overcome our imperfections to become like Him? Why didn't God create a perfectly harmonious existence for all eternity? This is a profound question for those who believe in a loving God, and an easy one for those who don't. I've pondered this question many times throughout my life, especially during periods of suffering. Each time I overcame a challenge and grew from it, I still wondered: "Why was this suffering necessary in the first place?" There's a yogic idea suggesting that suffering is a blessing, pushing the unconscious to grow and expand by creating a necessity to escape the unpleasantness. Fully conscious beings, like angels, do not suffer because they no longer need it for their development. As Pageau mentioned, in this worldview, the purpose of life is to expand until we achieve absolute unity with God. Since God is all-encompassing, everything in existence must reach this full expansion and unity together to become God itself. One can conceptualize this process as a big breath in and out. Initially, there was God as a singularity. God "exploded" into all creation, maintaining perfect unity since God is in everything. To the individual parts, however, it appears as if they are just that-separate parts. This is the difference between absolute reality, where God exists with full consciousness of everything, and relative reality, our perception where everything seems separated. This is the "breathing out" phase, where God bursts forth in endless creativity. As parts move further apart, they become less conscious of themselves and the universe. Eventually, there's a turning point marking the beginning of the "breathing in" phase, where everything evolves and is naturally drawn to reunite. Everything strives to expand and encapsulate everything else, folding back together until it becomes one again. What comes after that? Perhaps another cycle of breathing out. It remains unknown. Yet, the original question persists: Why? I suppose we won't know until we are reunited with everything else. Ironically, at that point, it will be us making the decision, for we will be God. There's an intriguing thought hidden in that: Why did we do this to ourselves the last time we were united as God?
The entire _interview_ felt evasive to me; the man is so bent on his overly-complex, sometimes senseless "explanations" he just avoids the questions he has no answer to with a lot of... well, it's not _word_ salad, but ... _philosophical_ salad.
I like your reasoning and Christian’s would call this new age theology, everything is god and all is separate yet one like the waves of the ocean being individual yet one with the ocean. God experiencing itself thru everything.
@@MrFireman164 What a lot of useless pap that is. I'm sure it would feel good to pretend life was some kind of neo-hippie, transcendental journey into "energy realms" and "wave conjugations," but it's not actually explaining anything or making any useful differences to actual lives. First world white people philosophical masturbation.
1:49:16 This question that Alex has is pretty much the exact theme in Job. “There is a way that world is that I would prefer that it was not.” - that’s it right there, a perfect example of a good starting point. And, like in the Job story, the “friends” never can give a satisfactory answer. It is a question that has to be posed to the divine itself, and the satisfactory state at the end of Job is not in the form of an answer, but in something else, which is well documented by many, including Blasé Pascal, who Alex was speaking about earlier, as some kind of an encounter with the ground of all being. Look how it happens in all of these different stories: In Abraham it takes the form of a negotiation In Jacob it is pictured in a wrestling match that goes on all night
The Hebrew phrase עֵזֶר כְּנֶגְדּוֹ (ezer kenegdo), if translated more literally, carries an intriguing meaning. Eve is described in oppositional terms, as “a helper who is against him”.
Alex: Could Eve have turned down the fruit? Guest: Sorry man I'm just more of a realist and we live in a world where she factually did not turn it down. For me this sums up this entire stupid conversation up to this point. 1:03:10
I don't think she could have done. I have no idea why god would want to create this universe and i'm assuming we wouldn't be able to know that anyway. But if she had the capacity to not take the fruit then she's effectively Jesus (god) levels. If she/ we are essentially divine/ ordered/ united then this universe doesn't even exist...which I think means Eden doesn't even exist either. That is assuming Eden is somewhere between heaven and earth. Or in other words. If god had created humans as perfect then we could never have been a separate entity from both god and heaven in the first place. We effectively skip back to the beginning without ever having time/ reality play out. I think the answer to Alex's question of "why did god force this upon us?" is: - we have no possible way of understanding why god decided to create the universe... - we were designed to eat the fruit because the eating of the fruit is fundamentally reality as we understand it. - god forced creation and we are just a part of that system.
There could very well exist a corner of the universe or a different universe God made that the balance between unity and multiplicity (as Jonathan would put it) was never broken. But what of it? It is irrelevant to our reality. Our planet we clearly consumed the fruit, and continue to listen to the same lies and fall into the same traps now. The serpent still tells us lies and we still listen. Science will save us. Technology will make us like God. Let us worship the data and transcend together. It's all lies. It is better to rediscover the meaning and purpose that we've traded in for a sort of material comfort.
He makes such a dishonest answer when he says this. They're discussing hypotheticals and potentials all throughout this conversation and then when pressed with a direct question he didn't want to answer, he just dances around it. What a quack! So much respect for Alex pushing on it while he tried to get out of responding.
She could have in theory, but in actual practice, NO, not taking it was impossible...the system was set up to have them fail. Obviously. Sadly, you got nothing out of the first hour...even the first few minutes about sneezing was illuminating a bit, as was the Old Testament thing about shaking hands. Not everything has to be revelatory and life-changing to have some value.
@@BadgerUKvideoyes, that’s kind of the answer. The reason why the story is the way it is is because otherwise there would be no story and there would be no reality.
I *sort* of see your objection - Genesis, from its internal logic, could have happened differently, and so it seems not so much like a metaphysical system that 'proves' that the world has to be the way it is, but merely a description of the world as it is. And if we're thinking about god as a 'creator' who is to be held responsible for the way reality is, we arrive at the standard theological problems with the existence of evil and all that. But isn't that a sort of strange objection for an atheist to make? I'm saying this as a basically atheistic philosophy student myself. Imo the way we have to think about this is that 'god' is a horizon of the possibility of good, conceived of in a particular way (we exist in a *relationship* to it that is simultaneously individual and transpersonal, it is not the kind of thing that one can attain through force or deceit, it's transcendent in a way and we can never 'capture' it fully, so it can not be totally systematized). The idea that he's a 'great big beard in the sky' who made decisions at the beginning of time about the order of existence, is more like an artefact of primitive mythological ways of thinking - they didn't actually have the kinds of abstract philosophical terms that we can operate with now, so instead they had to try and think in stories. So the answer to the 'riddle' Jonathan is trying to point to here is simply that god isn't all-powerful in the sense that there's some guy out there who could have created existence differently and we could blame him for our woes, it's that there precisely *isn't* anything like that from the start. God is like something that's still only now coming into existence. He's 'the most quiet voice' that is bringing itself into existence in the dialectic of matter and its self-transcendence (spirit, if you want to call it that). I wonder how far Pageau would be okay that interpretation.
Two points. 1) The Bible is just a story written by men. It is not that deep or complex. 2) there are infinite numbers of textual interpretations. To prevent philosophy from becoming random speculation, it must create novel testable hypothesis. You also need a methodology, a thing which most philosophy lacks.
@@thoughtsuponatime847nope, that’s called science. Good luck trying to apply science standards to things that completely transcend it. The first point is just superficial
@@j8000 I think it will only fully happen in the end of time. This is a developing world, it is a journey, and it will culminate in the final judgment.
@@j8000 I really want to give a proper response to this, so bear with my wall of text. First, I think you'll probably agree that there are disciplines where noone has figured out a perfect strategy yet. Maybe there's a perfect strategy for Chess out there and we just haven't found it yet. In those cases, in the meantime, a 'good' Chessplayer is one who understands the game, who is learning and experiementing with new strategies, who can execute those skills when it counts. And 'good', here, is *relative* to other players, but it is not thereby relativistic - it is still true that Magnum Carlson is 'good in his generation'. Then secondly, you might ask yourself this: Are there disciplines where not only has the perfect strategy not been found 'yet', but we have good reason to think that a perfect strategy can never be found, doesn't even exist. I think painting is a good example of this - there's a rich tradition of people finding and mastering new techniques, exploring different possibilities of their art, and in a sense I would say that there is 'progress', but at the same time it would be a silly idea that there might be a 'perfect' work of art that encompasses everything art could or should ever be and which would conclude the history of art because afterward there'd be no point to painting anything anymore. Paintings, in reality, are always particular, concrete things, at the same time that they're aiming for an ideal, so no absolutely good painting exists or could exist. If ethics is like this, then it's simultaneously true that it's possible (and good) for one to aim at the good, and that the person who does this would be called 'a good person', while at the same time we acknowledge that no absolute definition of what it means to be a good person exists or could exist. Ohe alternative here would be if you think that morality *is* a solved problem and the only reason we're not living according to those principles is that people are flawed. But imo there are a lot of problems with that view - I got some strong objections to Kant, Rawls and all the popular variants of utilitarianism, at least.
A good discussion! Many of the other commenters don't seem to appreciate it much. The world view Jonathan advocates for is very alien to the modern mind but I find it very fruitful to contemplate.
The very first conversation was a foreshadow of the entire rest of the discussion. Johnathan was discussing the origin of saying "God bless you" after someone sneezed. He's so certain of his explanation that he goes on to explain how it informs other realizations. He talks about it being such a sticky idea and maintaining for so long so there must be something to it. But he was wrong. Or at least partially wrong. His explanation is one of the many contending explanations for the origin of the phrase. But him holding is explanation as the true one allowed him to use it as an analogy to come to other conclusions. This is exactly what he does for the rest of the interview. He interperates verses then uses his interpretation to inform himself on how to interpret the rest of the verses. But he has no evidence that his interpretation is correct. He interprets that death has a more broad definition due to God using "die in this day" to mean something like diverting from your purpose. Then without any demonstration that this interpretation is true, he just moves on to make more conclusions based on this assumption. Like it's definitely true and there's no way he's wrong. I wish it were that easy to interpret confusing texts. But it's not. If you get a basic interpretation wrong, then using it to interpret more will likely yield more wrong interpretations.
@010zach I wrote an article Sir, to explain why I disagree. See Below: If we just call what he is saying "his interpretation" and imply that because of the fact that humans see the world through a perspective lens, if that fact justifies abandoning discernment and requires calls for proving things that we know cannot be proven in the manner implied(empirically), then that is essentially abandoning the idea of objectivity. We test logic in the same way he references adjacent texts to explain the current text. We interpret languages being spoken to us in the exact same way he interprets the bible, by using the context to the left and the right of the word/text in focus. Chinese language has a word just for this to mean context, 上下文。 The characters literally break down to mean "Above上 -- Below下 -- Script文。Look to the text above and below to determine the meaning. They traditionally write top to bottom, which is why it is not Left vs. Right, but essentially all languages do this. It is our fundamental pattern of action for understanding anything. Some modes of thinking actively discourage our species prime moneymaker however. I'll explain. Johnathan's interpretation has a quality that other interpretations do not have. To arbitrarily stand back and avoid discerning it from others is something like reluctance to make value judgements. Test this to see if it is true. Read this line again, "If you get a basic interpretation wrong.....", now ask yourself, "What would an interpretation that is NOT wrong sound like?", and this one, "Can an interpretation be wrong?", lastly this, "Is there one correct interpretation, or many correct interpretations?". Your answers to these imply your epistemological framework, and this is informed by your true metaphysical worldview, and thus can be reverse analyzed to figure out what it is. I think that if you're a true subjectivist that refuses to make value judgements, because all perspectives are equally valid, or invalid none any better or worse than any other, then you would not like the idea of integration. It implies that all things are interconnected toward a single ultimate purpose, meaning there cannot exist multiple competing purposes all of which are equally valid. If you believe that there is an objective reality, one that is independent of our many perspectives and is as it is regardless of interpretation or opinion, then you would be the type to seek integration in all things. The quality that Jonathan's interpretation has is not that he disintegrates the stories, clouds them, complicates them, or removes purpose from them, but the quality is actually the understanding of the existence of an objective medium through which we can reference the truth to aid in integration of patterns. He doesn't start with an "interpretation", he starts with an objective fact. Death is the movement of a living form away from an integrated order toward a purpose, to a more disintegrated and purposeless form. This is a simple descriptive fact which the texts seem to validate. YadaYadaYada, basically the Bible figured out all the advanced science stuff 10,000 years ago, and scientists haven't the chops to understand it yet. Hence why they call themselves that. Anyways....having some fun there. His method is closer to what is meant to be conveyed by the Bible than many others, because it has this quality of integration. It begins to render understanding instantly and knowing the nature and origin of these stories and their form of information storage using allegory, metaphor, and symbolism, or "ultra-Memes" I call them, if ones interpretation can bring all of these stories a sense of unity and relatedness, then this is a sign of moving in the absolute correct direction, but only If you believe in absolute objective reality. If you're a subjectively prime type of person, then you'll sort of be annoyed at integration whenever noticed. I would advise against holding subjective experiences as primary, because you lose claim to science, reason, understanding, and thought itself. All of these nice tools can only be valid if there is an objective reality which can be used as an absolute reference point from which to integrate concepts. TLDR; He uses whole Bible to provide context for the specific text in focus at the moment, which makes his interpretation much more valid than most because some reasons mentioned above.
@@phillip3495Sorry but again all you have done is created a whole lot of sentences out of a whole load of paragraphs, from a whole lot of words.....but in the end does nothing to define the arguments in modern reality. Yes the guy maybe very intelligent, yes he may be a high thinker, yes he may understand absolute philosophy better than a lay person but I just want to ask.......was god dealing with well educated people, was philsophy something that was common and used by the majority of the people in the Levant, were their leaders able get across very complex cosmological concepts to these people. Was Jesus or Paul counted as one of the great philosophers and thinkers of our time. The answers are no......so why would god put together a book, a religion, a way of life and laws in such a way that it is not until 6000 years from its inception that some white guy is able to understand and define the real meaning of both the old and new testament. Sorry but if this guy is able to understand the 'true' meaning of the words of god, would that not make him the new 'Jesus' or at least a modern day prophet. Sorry but the guy jumps from one passage to another, to another, to another trying to make out these justifies his 'beliefs' of what the bible is really trying to say......rather than just saying that these high falluting ideas and concepts allow him to believe in the words of the bible.
Even from a materialistic point of view Scripture interpreting Scripture makes the most sense if your goal is honest inquiry into the truth because logically there must be a reason that this body of texts has stuck together for so long in so many different times, places, and cultures. The real kicker is when you realize that they stuck together because they point to Christ, in whom all things hold together.
@@aaronh8095 Which body of texts? Because you know the biblical cannon took centuries to form, and even today different denominations differ on what should or shouldn't be in it. But even if the cannon were more stable than it is, there's no way to get from "there must be a reason" to "that reason must be that it's all true." There are plenty of historical explanations for whatever degree of stability the biblical cannon has, most notably the massive, centralized institutions that have defined and maintained it for most of its existence.
I know I'm talking to a millennial, so allow me to explain it to you with Harry Potter. In order to understand why Harry's touch was deadly to Voldemort, you need to refer to the later text within the same series. That's the way you do it, you interpret one part of the text by using the other. It maybe novel to you, but that's in fact how pretty much all stories work.
@@BuddhaMonkey7it doesn't matter how many people wrote (or rather compiled) it. The canon is put together the way that it is because it made sense to people compiling it, the story follows within itself and is internally coherent. In that way it's no different than any other story. Your original remark was you putting your foot in your mouth. Now you're just suckling on it.
58:48 An example: Alex: "Yes, the world we live in is suffering, but why couldn't a perfect Garden of Eden just be and remain perfect?" Jon: "Because that's not the world we find ourselves in" Alex: "Why shouldn't it be possible otherwise" Jon: After much stammering "Things change and for things to change there has to be decay ... if you make food and it takes three hours then that's a problem, if there's an earthquake now I can't make any more food, that's the world Genesis describes: The reality of chaos to order. I can't imagine how it could be any different ... or in other words, you have Adam and Eve now, they don't eat the fruit and live happily ever after, and then what happens? Nobody can tell the story because nobody would be interested. Because it would be a lie. Alex: "What? If it had happened like that (which was the premise), then it wouldn't be a lie at all" And we continue with a related but different topic I want Jonathan's advocates to make some sense of this drivel. He jumps from one approach to another and doesn't find one argument why Eden couldn't be reality today. That's how he argues.
Because he doesnt argue at all honestly. Every time Alex pushes which in this podcast is usually very sparse already, Jon talks about something else or goes on a long enough tangent to derail the point Alex made/asked about. And then you have hundreds of "believers" comenting on how good he is at... What, exactly? Maybe not quite anyone but definetly a lot of people trained in creative thinking and writing can give more or less stuttery explanations of any random bullshit you ask them to justify. This conversation felt like a weird improv skit on Jons end tbh.
The guys entire world view is in the balance. If he starts critically analyzing it, I imagine he'll have no foundation to stand on. I was so shocked to see that Alex is the only noteworthy person to have had such an intimate conversation with him and yet with little to no pushback for his bizarre views.
Jonathan used a lot of words to basically say “you’re missing the point by making up hypotheticals.” Even more simply put, “that’s a stupid question.” Not that it’s a stupid question to ask in itself, but rather that it doesn’t really lead anywhere because it’s based on a false premise. It’s clear from the world that there is sin and evil and decay (as Jonathan points out), so to say “why couldn’t it be otherwise” misses the point when discussing a story describing reality. I will admit that Jonathan could do a better job of saying “we don’t know” to questions like this, because there are many things of God that are hidden from human knowledge in God’s transcendence and man’s finitude (see Job 38-42 or 1 Corinthians 1:18-25 for Biblical accounts of this).
Saints have imagined what would happen if Adam and Eve hadn't taken the apple. God would have given it to them and they would've ascended in glory and righteousness to the tree of life, becoming higher than the angels. Once the apple has been taken, death was introduced in the world. That's like saying if you shoot an arrow and miss the target, failure was brought into the world. Death is necessary to solve failure. Let's put it this way: if you learn math and try to apply it to some exercises but fail, it because your understanding of the math is wrong. That old understanding has to die and be replaced by a new understanding so that you can succeed. Orthodox Christianity asks us to die to the world (i.e. our wordly passions and desires) so we can live in Christ. That's what the saints do. If there is no death, then humanity would've been stuck in the same fallen state of Adam and Eve with no hope. There needs to be death so there can be resurrection. Maybe you'll think this is all drivel. I did my best to answer.
This conversation is absolutely COOKED! Over-analysis is certainly a thing, and scripture has been its primary victim, robbing it of its profound simplicity.
A .ore charitable reading might be "modern language has changed in such a way that the story no longer makes sense, here's how ancients might have perceived it". Johnathan's definitions make the story make sense.
@JacobSmaby no. There is nothing in the conversation about linguistic change over time, or reasons to say things about how ancient culture perceived life and stories. His position is entirely post hoc, making wild assumptions about symbolic meaning. The conversation is so confused he spends all his time explaining how his symbols work, that he doesn't get into methods to validate his claims. It's just claim after claim, with no way to fact check.
this is absolutely not the case --- when anything can mean anything you have no consistent meaning whatsoever, it's just noise I think this is something the atheist crowd has trouble with in general, meaning is not arbitrary, when you have patterns of meaning in the world, those are _patterns of meaning in the world_
@chrisc7265 "when you have patterns of meaning in the world, those are patterns of meaning in the world" aside from this being entirely circular, patterns and meaning are not in the world. They are in our perception of the world. The world simply is the way it is, it's our brain that connects the dots and identifies patterns. My point is that he's applying symbolic patterns of thought that aren't there. It's apophenia gone wild.
I recognize a lot of people are having a hard time engaging in a certain style of thinking that Jonathan is proposing. I see Alex providing helpful push back to demonstrate the side literal thinking against Jonathan’s symbolic thinking. There is a bridge needed. And that a perspective of practical, experiential psychology. For example, the hottest buttons in this conversation are 1) what if the fall didn’t happen, 2) why are we (humanity) confined to experience the bad decisions of someone before us. The fall was a spiritual opportunity for Adam and Eve to exercise their free will; a free will that is required for us to have a harmonious and loving RELATIONSHIP with God. Relationship requires a two way interaction. On a practical level, I will not truly know if I can trust someone’s commitment to me until it is tested. Their response to the challenge or test says more about the person than their words or self-proclaimed belief system ever would. This is, how I see, the fall playing into the relationship establishment of God and Adam / Eve. It is less about it being the origin of all sin, and more of a demonstration on the opportunity WE ALL HAVE within our relationship with God. It happens in our lives, now. This idea also feeds into hot button #2 that I stated: why are we suffering because of someone else’s decision. Unfortunately we are carrying the weight of generational patterns and tendencies. You see this in family dynamics. Parenting styles pass down, communication styles pass down, belief systems pass down. Why? Influence of environment matters. So we can choose to break out of that in our own personal lives, but sometimes it takes some work to even see those patterns and how they consume us unconsciously…. This is also a spiritual opportunity. Do we rest in bitterness and resentment over what is, or do we allow ourselves to step through the doorway of opportunity that arises in the face of challenge? The Christian calling promises that the step through that doorway is actually a step into ultimate purpose. Pain is a great teacher, a wonderful propulsion forward. Arguably, unparalleled. Hope this brings insight to at least one person. I feel like these ideas needed to be addressed more deeply but the styles of thinking were like oil and water haha extremely enjoyable to traverse through with Alex and Jonathan 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼👏🏼
@@TheRealShrike that’s kind of the insane experience of applying the Christian meta-narrative. You actually experience a relationship with God. Pretty wild! Highly recommend!
@@SacredSight you can experience falling while lying in your bed half asleep. that doesn't mean you're actually falling. you can experience fake things. People do all the time.
At 41 minutes, Johnathan is explaining “God wanted them to have it eventually. If they had only waited till the Sabbath“. I do not recall that I have encountered this interpretation before. This is why listening to biblical interpretation feels so slippery to me.
Jonathan hasn’t done a great job at laying out the reasons here. You can find this idea in many church fathers, but if you want a more “in-text” explanation I can point to a few places. One is that we are taking the phrase “the knowledge of good and evil” a bit too literally. In other contexts where the phrase appears in the Bible, it’s associated with wisdom or maturity. An example is Solomon. We usually understand Solomon asking for wisdom, but in the Hebrew it’s clear he’s asking for the knowledge of good and evil. In the context of Genesis, this means Adam and Eve are taking in wisdom or maturity prematurely, and this results in their Fall. They eat before they were ready.
One site says this: “…Rabbi Isaac Luria [who lived in the 16th century], one of the most important figures in Jewish mysticism, tells us that if [Adam and Eve] would have waited three hours until Shabbat, they would have had permission to eat from the Tree of Knowledge because they would have first partaken of the Tree of Life.” Of course, Dr Maier Becker (in fact, an endocrinologist in Tel Aviv) makes the argument that the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life were, in fact, _one and the same_ and that, only after Adam and Eve “ate of” the Tree of Knowledge did it become the Tree of Life (in fact, the transformation occurred _because_ they at “ate of” the Tree of Knowledge) so biblical interpretation does seem infinitely flexible.
@occultislux if you hold this as a truth you shouldn't be here now but already expired by your own hand. Everyone who preaches meaninglessness but then shudders at practising what they preach is by definition a hypocrite. The very fact you are alive commenting that at all is a contradiction of your comment. For obviously, your life has enough meaning to engage in this type of conversation. Beliefs unlived are lies, and the belief that nothing matters can only be died in, not lived in. To hold death worshipping ideas and to be alive yourself is a hypocrtical contradiction. I literally cant give you the 3 letter acryonym that would be the TL;DR of this otherwise youtube autodeletes it. But you get the idea.
@@Reiman33 I'm not in the nihilist camp but I wouldn't say believing everything is meaningless is "death worship". Wouldn't someone who believes such think death is meaningless as well?
@@Mr_M1dnight you are correct in theory, but in practice there is no reason a real human individual would turn to nihilism other than the desire to tear down the high I mean I'm not gonna make claims, maybe there are some weirdos who don't follow that pattern, but it's certainly the main driver of nihilism
It sort of seems like Alex is dancing around the question “If God is good then why do we suffer” and Jonathan is refusing to answer the question directly because Alex isn’t asking it directly. The second half of the podcast is very repetitive in this way on both parts. For me personally, the answer is something like free will makes love more meaningful, or the world is more interesting that way, or there’s the cop out that we cannot know the will of God. Whatever the case I would have loved to hear Jonathan actually respond to the question instead of just dismissing it saying “well that’s not the world we live in so that’s not a useful question.” It’s frustrating but maybe I’m missing something. Otherwise great conversation!
@Alex O'Connor, just a helpful little tip: if you press your tounge strongly against your upper palate the urge to sneeze will go away very quickly. I use this whenever I have to speak publicly.
This was a great conversation, very interesting to hear and both were very respectful towards each other. It felt that it took time for Jonathan to get to the core of Alex's questions simply because both have fundamentally different views of reality and are trying to solve a fundamentally different problem: Jonathan see God, the nature of God, and the accounts of the Bible as factual pieces of the puzzle we call reality, and need to connect all of them to make sense of it. Because what if scenarios are not true in his world view, it doesn't fit in the puzzle so there's no point in wasting time on it, and that's why he call himself "more of a realist". Alex, however, see all of the above as simply hypothesis, including the very existence of God and their all good nature, and what if scenarios help with testing if those hypothesis are coherent, to find if there are maybe other hypothesis that have better explanatory power. But even if I disagree with his world view, being atheist, Jonathan's explanation were very clear and pretty insightful on the views of orthodox Christians, and presented some new interpretations of Bible symbolism that I didn't know or have thought about, being raised catholic. I'd definitely watch another episode with him as a guest.
58 mins in and This is deep 🔥. Jonathan really gracious in giving this info for free. I think part of the fundamental problem here is that Alex doesnt believe in free will, and so the idea of chaos and order being necessary for change or the great dance of life as Lewis might have described seems unnecessary.
Being a materialist, literalist, and fundamentalist hampers his ability to understand. I can see from his other videos, it literally blinds him from ascending to truth. He tries to grasp God in his head which is impossible. Since belief is based on faith and reason, there is also a supernatural component to which he does not believe.
Frustrated that Jonathan didn't get Alex's point. Jonathan keeps on pointing to the gap that is. Question should have been "Why did God not create the universe without the gap?"
Yeah, I'm from Jonathan's audience, but Alex's question was (which he also disappointedly didn't articulate clearly enough): 'why did God fuck up in this whole Creation thing though? And then why now trust this God that seemingly fucked up?' Of course Jonathan did give some of the right answer: 'you can live in Paradise right now, no one's stopping you.' (Of course that possibility was afforded by all the events of Jesus's life, but who really cares where it's from if it's available and usable.)
And then we can investigate whether and how it's possible to live in Paradise right now for us. (Btw I think Jonathan would argue that that's how the return will actually happen eschatologically, by individuals returning to this Paradisal state.)
I would like this part to be a sneeze world replies section ;) In Poland it is "na zdrowie" ( literary "for your health") no matter how many times one sneeze. In Zizek style when someone sneeze you can jokingly tell "sto lat ciężkich robót" ( "one hundread years of hard labour" :) ) One hundread years - this part suggest long life but it goes in a different direction in the second part as cheeky slav does ;):)
1:06:30 To answer Alex's question in a more clear way: Asking what if eve didn't eat the fruit is not like asking a historian what would've happened had historical events been diffrent. These are metaphysical truths not set events. A comparison with a mathematician is a clearer example. What if 2+2=5 is a more appropriate question. Here you can see why this question is so confusing and the answer Jonathan gives is so underwhelming. The only appropriate response would be, if I gave you two apples then gave you two more, you'd have 5. Obviously, that doesn't make any sense and is just incohesive all around.
@TheRealShrike This was the work or Carl Jung and the early depth psychologists. Through interpretation of mythological texts and searching for patterns and understanding that things necessarily exist in opposites he was able to "unlock" metaphysical truths hidden in the unconscious.
@TheRealShrike I urge you to look into it. Jung was honestly just a much smarter Richard Dawkins. They follow VERY similar paths and memes are just a shitty version or what Jung called archetypes. And the term "metaphysical truths" are as true as 2+2=4. Sure there is no true way to 100% know but they are very comparable.
Adam & Eve. Such a stupid fable; I don't know why we bother debating it. God is supposed to know everything. Therefore, he knew that Eve would eat the fruit, so how was it a test when he knew the outcome? Why would a god set somebody up for a test to see what they will do when he already knows the answer? It makes absolutely no sense at all. Same goes for the Abraham/Son thing. Well surely the god knew the outcome, so how was it a test of faith?
This shows why conversations are always better then debates
Not “always”
I used to be a Christian. I backslid once I became an adult by not going to church. I always had questions too that I never asked.. Somehow I stumbled onto a debate between a Rabbi named Tovia Singer vs some Christian professor in a debate. I watched Tovia dismantle the guy and Christianity. He showed the forgeries and corruption. The Rabbi made so much more sense. He spoke Hebrew.. I started watching all the debates..
The Rabbi me down the rabbit hole and I'm no longer Christian.
I listen to atheist debates vs Christians. The atheist always win but I can reconcile that you can't prove a faith based religion.
Watching a Rabbi dismantle Christian scholars was far more effective for me
@@NeonSlime-uu5kt considering Christianisty stemmed from Judaism I'd say neither won
@PaulB_864 ... what are you even trying to say?
@@ItsOnPaper When debate is better?
Johnathan Pageau and Jordan Peterson are having dinner together.
Johnathan asks “Did you enjoy the meal?”
Jordan replies “What do you mean by enjoy?”
Johnathan says “Enjoy as in the coming together of purposes to close the space that once filled the void. We both encircled the perpetual abyss with the substance of an emotion that makes us happy”
Jordan says “We’ll then why didn’t you just say that to begin with how is anybody supposed to understand what you mean?”
Jordan then asks Jonathan:
What is a meal ?
Jonathan:
Johnathan Pageau leaned forward, his eyes gleaming with the promise of a revelation so profound it seemed to teeter on the brink of the ineffable. "A meal, dear Jordan, transcends its mere culinary assemblage. It is a symphonic convergence of archetypal symbols, an alchemical transmutation wherein the prosaic acts of cooking and eating ascend to the hallowed status of sacrament, embodying the quintessence of communal identity and existential coherence. Each ingredient is not merely a component but a hieroglyph, an intricate sigil that encodes the primordial whispers of the archetypes, those deep structures that undergird and shape the labyrinthine expanse of our collective unconscious."
Dawkins: Eat it to survive or die.
"did you enjoy our dinner last night?"
"I'm still enjoying it"
The cool thing about communication is that I can take your entire comment as a communication that you don't get it. Which is fine.
You guys make it sound like they're being BS, but that's actually how Socrates would talk. That's how the entire field of philosophy was created.
That's how the entire field of philosophy was created. (1) Someone starts by saying certain things, and (2) then someone drills you down on the MEANING of the terms you've used by asking those very questions, until you both come to a clarification of the terms you've used, and (3) then see whether the certain things that the other person had said was true or not.
If you're going to say how philosophy is a BS field, you're also throwing the entire field of science away because that's where the scientific method is patterned upon-the Socratic Method:
(1) Hypothesis (a statement you've made about physical reality)
(2) Testing (asking those questions, by following through and poking holes to the hypothesis)
(3) Conclusion (see whether the certain thing you've assumed, aka your Hypothesis, is true or not).
And clarification of terms is very much important in almost all areas of discipline. e.g. If you're not clear with the meaning of legalistic terms, you're going to find yourself in a world of tyranny buddy.
@@Mobuku I don't think that's what bothers me. It's more that what Jonathan and Peterson et al. do eventually leads to a kind of equivocation. Meanings are swapped around and substituted for others. We're not digging down to a deeper meaning, we're completely changing it altogether. I don't think that is the same as the process you described.
I'm only 30 minutes in and my head hurts from this guy.
true
Good. That’s like saying “I’m 30 minutes into this workout and my muscles are burning”. Good. Just means you ought to keep lifting heavy concepts with your brain.
@@theonly764hero1there's a difference between physical stress and mental stress. This man has a hard time getting his point across.
@@theonly764hero1 He mean thee guys ideas are too absurd
@@theonly764hero1 You seem dumb
I think Pageau's connection of sin and death is mindblowing tbh. Describing death as the loss of unity of a multiplicity is actually the best description of death I've ever heard
When voldemort dies the eight Harry Potter movie you see him fall apart into many pieces of ash. The multiplicity no longer held together in unity.
It's undeniably in the category of descriptions of death that I've heard. And I say that with undiluted confidence.
Well it certainly sounds fancy.
@@lakingpaul what makes it sound fancy?
Check out Pageau's brother's book The Language of Creation
Both of you showed great patience, respect, and interest with regard to each other. Great chat.
Good conversation. Your conversation was about “the problem of evil”, though and that should have been named as the issue. Throw in some Augustine and Aquinas and riff off of it. Alex is a polite Luciferian intellect (thats a compliment) that puts believers like Pageau on their heels. Pageau understands things that he has difficulty articulating in the rational/materialist world. But he is growing in knowledge and wisdom and has had some brilliant insights when on biblical panels with Peterson. Keep at it guys,
In one direction, the respect was deserved. 😅
@@mfoley92
'Alex is a polite Luciferian intellect (thats a compliment)'
Why do you worship Lucifer...you gone mad, Bro?
' Pageau understands things that he has difficulty articulating in the rational/materialist world.'
Which is exactly why i love listening to the guy...
he's one of the few students who've successfully managed to circumvent the power of state indoctrination techniques and go with a more grass roots understanding of reality, and tb perfectly h that ain't an easy thing to achieve in this day & age, is it?
So, long may Pageau's lumb reek, as we uncivilised Scots like to say! :P
This is one of the few conversations that I can genuinely say is ahead of its time
Eve in hebew is described as: "Ezer ke-negdo".
Ezer is helping, "ke-negdo" is indeed "opposite" (the "ke" means "as", that is, helper as his opposite) , which usually can be understood as eve was made to be help for Adam.
But indeed, it could be understood with a deeper meaning, where the term can mean both it's positive and negative meaning, such that eve may "counter" help Adam.
Interesting, never saw it like that until now...
@@hatulflezet yet everyone else is claiming its just nonsense immediately. At least somebody (you) take seriously what you hear and check the original Hebrew
What's your source for negdo meaning opposite? I can't find anything saying that except for Christian websites that clearly have an aim in mind.
@@bluebitproductions2836 I am a native Hebrew speaker 😊.
"Neged" is that what opposes, on the other side, it can mean "against" but also simply like when you describe "the shore on the other, or opposing side".
Context is important when using the word, to give it the full meaning.
@@egonomics352yes! This is was a point made in the Exodus series where Jonathan was part of, but the point was not made by him.
@@egonomics352 Because it is nonsense. And what does it have to do with calling the serpent the woman?? It’s all just intellectualizing hatred of women. All these conversations are is people trying to defend how awful the Bible is.
Skeptics of Alex's caliber are very few and very precious. This thinking provides deep exploration of reality, origins, worldviews, philosophy, stories and symbols.... Thanks Alex and Johnathan for taking us to new and different awareness.
This is the single best analysis of the story I’ve ever heard. Where has this man been all my life?
haha welcome to The Symbolyc World.
Yeah holy shit this is absolutely mind blowing.
A lot of us been trying to get people to see this forever but it's usually 2 camps.
Atheist who just want to think the Bible is worthless and then fundamentalist that can't let go their personal images and relationships with the images.
And the 2 propagate each other. Atheist burrow deeper into wanting to hate and reject anything in the Bible because of how much fundamentalist cling to what they do.
The bible is a PROFOUND deeply spiritual book of spiritual truths that just ring true to your spirit.
Lot of people make fun of Jordan Peterson when he is asked questions and he says but what do you mean by that.. because he knows people cling to their own images of their personal relationship with meaning
Ikr alex is so very good at deconstructing and calling out the contradictions and major overwhelming issues with the Bible and a lot of other religions. It's crazy how people believe this nonsense for the sake of having a feeling of a higher purpose or fear of death....
@Mamba4.8 it's not that it's worthless it's that the religion has done far far far more harm than good. And is honestly causing more problems than not even now.... 99% of all wars are over this rediculous religious bull crap......
Thanks!
I think one thing you Alex should do, is to talk to someone about differences between mysticism and scholastism in Christianity. I think that might be one piece that is currently missing from this bigger picture you are trying to paint and communicate to us
@@LolSumor but I understand Christianity from a sola scriptura perspective...
Thank you for this comment.
But also mysticism is a unification with God, is personal. Is not the same as esoterism (inner path or understandig), which is a path of knowledge about these things.
The best comment. 🏆❤️
Alex could benefit from someone teaching him how non-scholastic/ mystic worldview works; and vice versa for Jonathan! 💪❤️
It's a difficult divide to broach. 😶
To be fair; Jonathan is repeatedly having remarkable success with it, considering how hard of a divide it is. 🏆❤️
Alex is also displaying remarkable flexibility & speed of adaptation. 🏆❤️
I think people who are very close to the bible often lose perspective about what the bible actually says in it's raw words. They fail to notice how they have constructed their own complex story around the words to make them sound more interesting, deeper, more sensical, less awful - take your pick! When JP is describing the "death" of Adam and Eve upon eating from the tree, he seems to have constructed an incredibly thoughtful, complex, meaningful and subtle sub-text that just isn't there in the original text. It's that "lean not on your own understanding" thing again: Anyone can talk around the words and create a new story from the bible, but it'll just be a set of assumptions, guesses, justifications. As someone who is NOT too close to the bible, who HAS read it but is NOT a believer yet is open to truth, it's just a crazy, fascinating old book with a messy history and an extremely dubious morality.
This is the kind of content that brings me to life. Huge thanks to both parties involved; hoping for many more.
Idk man... Johnathan couldn't back up a single thing he said
@@BenChaverin i have to say i enjoy these kinds of conversation as philosophical inquiries, but i fail to take diehards like him seriously when they claim this is certainly real
@y0landa543 even if he wasn't claiming it's "real", he isn't a compelling speaker. He does the JP thing where he can't stay on one topic. He's a poor communicator and thinks heaven is "where air is" whatever that means, when Satan is the "prince of air" and air is very obviously on earth lol. He just says things.
@@BenChaverinhe's being metaphoric. Ultimately we live in a physical world and have to bridge a gap to the spiritual because our language only exists to describe our experiential world which is primarily physical. The ancients had an experience of air but no idea what exactly it was but they knew they certainly couldn't go without it. It was mysterious, ineffable but life-giving hence the association with spirit.
If you want to be hard-nosed about these things and say that "we know that air is a gaseous solution of roughly 70% nitrogen... And we can't accept any other associations with it" then very quickly your options for communication become very limited. Take for example the word "inspiration". The ambiguity of "spirate" the substance being taken in is vitality important. Spirit being something that changes you, compels you to move towards a certain aim. Air being something external from yourself you take in. This gives a much better phenomenological account of the way inspiration is experienced than the modern idea that it's something produced by the working of our own minds.
There are many such examples of everyday metaphorical language that depend on such ambiguities. If you want to nail things down to a certainty based on scientifically measurable phenomena alone you'll quickly find your language is confounded and your unable to understand others speech. Just as it happened for the people of Babel when they worshipped the technological achievements of man over the mysterious power of God which has given rise to their harmonious society in the first place.
But of course the Bible is a load of old fairy stories. None of that could possibly happen in the real world ahahahaha
@BenChaverin that's not what he or his brother mean by heaven. If you read the language of creation then it's very easy to understand what Jonathan is saying. Heaven is simply the spiritual/immaterial world that informs Earth aka the material corporeal world. The problem here is many anglo atheists (especially americans) have the cards stacked against them when trying to ready the symbolic world of the scriptures.
11:26 Eve is called an עזר כנגדו a helper opposite him as in a person who helps him by being opposite him. A person who brings out his best by challenging him.
This guy has no idea about the Hebrew text
Alex I highly recommend you talk to a Chabad rabbi for understanding the Jewish Bible. If I could recommend one rabbi specifically it would probably be Rabbi Richie Moss from Nefesh Sydney
I've heard it referred to as a beneficial adversary by Dennis Prager, is he also off the mark?
That's the only thing that sucks about the podcast format, there was no chance to really drive this home outside of jonathan doing it, and I'm positive he knows this but it's hard sometimes I'm sure when the red light is on. I was wanting to chime in on this conversation at several points like that 😅
@@RollCorruption ying/yang
I love Alex's ability to break down and challenge other interpretations with proper understanding and context
But does he, I’m at a loss for words, a truly dumb individual. I think people don’t think, just want to hear presuppositions, it’s wild, what of any sense did the man say? Cause dumb literal man can’t think I should go with that, it’s so bonkers.
My take on Adam and Eve would be that it may be metaphor for reality as a lot of religious stories are. In the beginning in terms of reality if there was unity no forces split off yet. Then the strong and weak force emerged. After some time the weak force fell and caused what is manifest. So what we are living on, what is material is the weak force. Likely the strong force would still play a role and the neutral force mitigates the forces. So Adam: strong force; Eve: weak force. The weak force has also been personalized as Satan. There is the belief that God and Satan will be reconciled and a chant that posits that. The forces reconciled one day,what that would mean scientifically is not easy to determine.
He doesn’t have proper understanding and context what the fuck are you on about? Alex the idiot atheist has NO context no understanding no history no cultural knowledge at all of Christianity and the Bible. He doesn’t care to that’s the point. He’s logically dishonest.
@@ALavin-en1kr that is a very interesting interpretation and works well as a metaphor, although retrofitting it onto the fundamental forces of the universe (something the original authors would've known nothing about) is a bit of a stretch. It's a shame it's difficult to discuss the allegorical/metaphorical significance such pivotal writings without people either treating it as fact or trying to discard them wholesale because they aren't factual.
He's an expert flimflammer -- like Trump.
Such a great conversation. Thank you for actually engaging with and trying to understand Jonathon’s symbolic way of thinking and describing the world.
Thank you Alex and Jonathan for this amazing conversation.
It appears that to "understand" these texts, you must begin with the predetermined conclusion that everything originating from these gods, or themselves are inherently good. However, the moment you do this, you become oblivious to what these texts might truly be conveying.
You could do the same thing in reverse by assuming that the text has jack-shit to say, and just presuppose that the author is a moron because he lived a long time ago.
@@mentalwarfare2038 you still came with a predetermined conclusion which is exactly what I said
well the text itself says the thing is good and he based what "good" means off the texts and off what the "patterns" of good exists into most mythical stories.
He also entertained the idea of everything being evil (gnostic) and he think it doesn't work.
Not really. For example, there are plenty of scholars of scripture who have captured what these texts might be “truly conveying” while also acknowledging the theological aspect of it. Some examples are John Meier and Raymond Brown
But yeah you’re right, your metaphysics do play a role in how you read a text, just as they’d play a role in anything else you interpret in life. We’re fundamentally story telling creatures. Your insight isn’t that profound
I'd put it that you need to presuppose that there is a truth value to be found in the text.
Which itself presupposes the univocality of the texts, which is really where the whole thing falls apart. We know that these texts as we have them today are the result of centuries of redaction and that even their earliest material is the result of multiple authors writing in different contexts with different ideas about how things work and what things mean.
Fascinating. Alex you are that v v rare commodity in modern life of someone who genuinely listens and attempts to understand what the other person is saying even if you are skeptical. Its brilliant. I find Jonathans insights to be v interesting.
Alex, you truly are my most respected Secular thinker.
Thanks for sharpening my understanding through having meaningful conversations with religious thinkers 🙏🏻
Excellent conversation. Alex facilitates the elusive style of Pageau such that it becomes more grounded as the conversation goes on and the ideas begin to solidify
That's a charitable and diplomatic characterization of Pageau's "style".😅
@@MrPayne91 When did it ever solidify? I couldn't make it through
@@authenticallysuperficial9874 towards the end it becomes clear that he sees genesis as a condensed retelling of an event that happened "the fall" which explains the state we find ourselves in spiritually. He explains why gnostic interpretations fail at helping us to reconcile this and will leave us in a worse position.
I'm trying to understand how Pageau describes a hierarchy of being where the problem with the serpent tempting Eve was that it came from a being of lower station trying to reach above its place and disrespecting the divine order, and then on the other hand saying that NOT thinking this way leads to caste systems. Usually i can follow arguments and see where the intuition comes from, but to me this sounds like saying "if we don't respect the caste system, we'll be more likely to create a caste system, and we all agree that caste systems are bad"
I think you kinda missed Jonathan's point.
@@uchechukwuibeji5532ok? Where did I go wrong?
@@brbrofsvl I think he is attempting to explain that the potentiality for disorder in the nature of things is explained in the most coherent way in the genesis story, by the snake embodying that potential towards chaos.
Therefore, by him proclaming this vision of the fall of man to be the most coherent, he makes the argument that a return to proper order has to follow this same model.
Don’t hesitate to tell me if it answers your question.
Jonathan truly understands the deep wisdom that permeated intellectual thought prior to the Enlightenment. This was an astounding interview.
Jonathan is just contorting stories and parables to whatever he wants. It’s ridiculous and tantamount to just inventing his own language.
This is not deep wisdom. This is a bong hit of the bible. Big difference.
@@HeatherWP thats the best description I've heard in a while
This was one of the best theological discusses I've heard in a very long time. Thank you for the conversation.
29:05 he talks about defining terms but then looks at what he wants them to mean then defines them that way so his ideas work.
And once the ideas work, do you still have problems with them? Do they account for everything or is there still some problem?
@Augass 1+1 =4 if you define 1 as 2. But 1 is not two in this universe, so the ideas don't work. This is my point.
@@seand9805 Well I think he also prefaced this or may have said later that we have a disconnect between how we understand the word "evil" now and how it would have been understood back then, which is why it's easier for us to grasp what was really meant by it when we use the word "bad" instead. So he isn't choosing the word "bad" because it fits better in his worldview, that is just how it was originally intended to be understood.
Your analogy does loosely work, but in the reverse. And I say loosely because the meaning or definition of a number doesn't evolve the same way the meaning or definition of a word does over time. Especially through translations, words tend to get aberrated. So, we are looking at 1+1=4 and saying, no no, that doesn't align with reality. Maybe we've misunderstood what 1 means, and it was originally intended to be 2. A better analogy would be: say I am making a toolbox out of wood and the instructions say I need to build the box to be 8 wide, 5 tall and 15 deep. So I grab my metric ruler and start to mark out the pieces to fit that dimension and I realize this will be a tiny toolbox. I could barely even fit my hammer in a 15cm deep box. So then I go back to the instructions and see that it was an American company that made these instructions so I was meant to use imperial, which not only fits the worldview of a properly sized toolbox but also makes sense given its origin. So then I convert all the imperial measurements to metric and I carry making my toolbox.
Hopefully, this second analogy helps you understand that he is not (at least in the timestamp you showed) trying to change the definitions of words to fit his worldview, but instead hearkening back to their original intention and using our language to relay that comprehensively.
@ClimbingtoFreedom sure that may work, but you are missing the point. He starts with defining death and says it is when you stop moving toward your purpose. But then glosses over how this fits the ideas of "dying on that day" that he is trying to get around in the first place. Humans' purpose was to multiply then, and it still is now. Or if you believe it is a god. It was to worship God then, and it still is now. So, his weird definition of death does not even work on his terms regardless of the purpose.
He then goes on to say that it is good and bad, not good and evil, as you said. This is also odd, given he can not site anywhere the validity of that claim, but only that his brother came up with the idea. But worse is he says that a table would make a bad car or something like using a parrot for a spoon. So is he saying that Adam and Eve were so dumb that they would try to eat rocks before they ate of the tree of knowledge? Next, how is being naked bad? That is the tip off to god in the story. Naked is not bad but shameful. Adam was not protecting his naughty bits from the elements. His good/bad idea is silly and does not work in his own little world, but Alex is too gracious of a host to tear him apart. There is far more wrong with this guys reasoning, but it is not worth my time. There is enough here to damn his position. If you want to walk down his crooked road of nonsense, be my guest, but don't pretend to others that it actually works in context or even logically, for that matter. Thanks for the conversion.
@@seand9805 But what's more important is THAT NONE OF THIS MATTERS. That's exactly why neither Matthieu (Pageau) nor Jonathan are citing bible translators for you. Matthieu gives you a coherent system of interpretation which you can check yourself. If it's completely coherent and never fails who cares about citations?
When Alex asked, “Could Eve have done differently?”, I was sorry that Jonathan didn’t make more of the opportunity to discuss the significance of free will in the story. It’s a point that I think demands our attention.
I had the same feeling that You.
It's precisely in that point Free will and Conscience and consequences of good or bad usage of them is what separating Us from rest of Creation.
God made Adam and Eve by His image. He gave them purpose and direction how They should use their power to stay in union with Him.
Adam should make order from chaos just like God by naming creatures and call the purpose on them.
And second part of their purpose was to not eat from the fruit of knowledge of Good and Bad.
God tell them that They are Created and not Creator what They should and shouldn't do in order to stay in union with Him.
And then Eve met serpent who tried to inflict opposite of what God wanted.
He wanted direct Eve look out of him.
Serpent was below her but fruit was above both of them.
Then Eve was charmed by fruit and that desire was in conflict with Conscience.
She should delay gratification and control her impulses.
Serpent should be getting his purpose and order from Adam because he was above serpent . But when he distract Eve by prohibited fruit he put his desire on her.
In that time She should put her will to obey God first and desire to get fruit on second, step back and go for Adam for help and Adam should use power from God to put serpent in his hierarchy place and order.
And when Eve come to Adam with fruit for him to eat, She was separated from Adam and God.
But Adam wasn't separated from God yet.
He shouldn't be deseived by Eve, but put God will first and call God for help and repent with Eve because He wasn't with Her when she met serpent.
It's story about not putting Our desire first because we are creatures created in the image of God above what God is desired for Us.
God bless Us.
Have a great Life.
@@KamilWieczorek-ns4en Thanks for fleshing the point out. Yes! I think the “vertical” dimension of sin (our will against God’s) is absolutely central.
Yeah this too. But perhaps this may be the difference between Orthodox and Catholic theology that we're seeing from Jonathan Pageau. Catholics heavily emphasizes Free Will, but I'm not sure about the Orthodox position.
@@Mobuku It's just admiting that We have agency in that World, We are not a puppet. God creating Us with a tools and to make relationship.
Making relationship is not a puppet property.
We can see that as God created that Us in a way that is good trajectory for Us to mature and use Our tools to rule the whole world to the Glory of God.
Like We Us people are invited to table for big Boys, God is a Boos ofcourse but it's the best Boss and Leader to have and it's realm of spirit, Angels and Demons and Us. All of Us are invited to the table.
It's one of Meaning of the name of Israel is to wrestle with God man.
God loves Us to be taught opponent but with kindness and grace.
It's like on every One of Use individual and the power of relationship between Us and between Us and a God is
Whole fck ing Universe is settled.
I was had some really profoundly realization. Big Big. It's soo Damm scaremy but soo DAMM massive too.
If u want then listen.
We are called to first to rules Our self in this Earth. Like everyone in this planet it's called to be united under One God to the sake of his Glory. It's to summun resurrection not to the inviduals. But to whole planet.
Jesus will come in the End of a Time in this universe will be still glimpse of hope to make anything in the name of Glory this Universe have future We are still welcome in the table for a Big Boys.
But all living beings and God itself is betting to Us go mature as fast and in the so much Big scale like We can .
Every living beings on this planet have One purpose.
To spread the Glory of Our Father in every corner of the Universe.
It's like We need to assume that We are not enchanter to this day Life from outside of Here and There.
It's like one candle of Glory of God Father, Jesus Christ and Holy Spirit in the vast vast universe.
Maybe They are waiting for Us to join, Or We are the only One that survived. Only becouse of Grace of Jesus Christ.
Every day every Ants, Beea Cow,s Pigs, Doliński, Orks and Wheals, Bird bacterias and Viruses ars counting on Us, They are cheering o Us and aploud to Us.
Becouse only We Us a human Can take Glory of God from this Earth and spread his Love to the Moon, to The Mars and to Every fcking corner of this and maybe beyound that Realm.
Every One of Us need to build in Our Heart Temple / Tabernacle for the Glory of God and Jesus and Holy Spirit and in every relationship with each others We need doing for the Glory Life.
And after everything od this Im staying in me room for years and I'm scared to death to pray for Life.
I'm sorry My Lord Jesus Christ that I'm so sinful. Everything Hope I have in You. With out You that's no worthy. Everything in You and nothing without You.
Please Help.
God Bless You Jesus
@@KamilWieczorek-ns4enWhere did you get the idea that the created must obey the Creator Carte Blanche? Wrong answer. By that position you think if you create clones you can enslave them. Neither does a Creator have authority just because it created. If you want to contend so, that’s merely an argument for ‘might makes right.’ Otherwise, indeed even Creators have to obey a greater justice, and therefore should be disobeyed if they issue bad orders. For example, here’s the correct maxim for all mortals: “Always disobey orders to stay ignorant of ethics.” For otherwise you can’t even discern injustice or abuse. Gaining knowledge of good and evil is a higher purpose than dogmatism. Dogmatism is dangerous and irresponsible.
'A tree is an image of order, an image of structure. It's a fractal structure. Then you have a snake. It's an image of change. It changes its skin, it can be in two places at the same time, it's shifty, it's shrewd, its an image of chaos. The idea that a snake is an image of chaos, I hope you can see that this is pretty universal. Like in every culture this giant sea serpent, this Leviathan, slithering thing, that kind of moves and shifts and coils itself and is an image of chaos or strangeness of being.
I do not see this reasoning. Snakes shed and change their skin, but trees also lose and change their leaves. A fractal is a repeating pattern, but so is a coil. Why would slithering and moving be chaos? Earlier, Jonathan says that the sky represents order because the stars don't move, but he meant that they don't move relative to each other in the sky (on a human time scale). They do move over the hours. The moon moves. If feels arbitrary to classify these things this way, yet these classifications are load bearing to the entire argument.
If this is how the author intended the passages to be interpreted by their readers, do we see this understanding in ancient Hebrew texts? Perhaps I am ignorant, but I have not read that anywhere.
This type of classification seems unfalsifiable and, because of that, I feel it is very weak to base so much reasoning on.
Yeah, so many times I felt he was just running away with the metaphors that could easily be applied either way, or interpreted entirely differently - then he says "This is the world we live in, I don't see how it could be any other way"... I found that a bit arrogant, perhaps it's not his intent to seem as if he's presenting this indisputable portrayal of reality - but it comes across like that at times.
Yep. He’s not a disciplined thinker.
Dunno if this will help, but the difference between the tree vs the snake = difference between the house vs. The whirlpool. One is sturdy, lasting, a place you can count on - the other is mobile, quick, and destructive. Hope this helps discern between the two.
@@JacobSmaby you can belabour a metaphor to mean practically anything: the tree represents change and impermanence as it transforms during the seasons whereas the snake represents patience and solidity as it defends the eggs in its nest etc. Ultimately this symbolic world can be mapped on to absolutely anything in any which way you want to frame it, and then it becomes a rather blunt instrument.
@Vrailly There are myths of trees that hold up / structure the world in many, many cultural myths. There are sneaky / deceptive / chaotic snakes in many many cultures. These were not pulled out of John's butt, these are symbols that have been used for millenia untold to describe the word.
Have been watching these discussions for a while, and this is by far and way one of the best ones, if not THE BEST. Interesting top and a good/honest conversation. Should 100% have Jonathan back.
If God wants to enter into a relationship with us, why would we even need somebody like Jonathan to help educate us about the true meaning of the text? Why can’t we just take the words at face value? If everything Jonathan says is true, we must accept that God intended on sending a confusing message that everybody will misunderstand, and for some they’ll pay the price in eternity because they misunderstood the true meaning of the text and dismissed the book as mythology.
Jonathans worldview is common knowledge and taken for granted in Orthodox communities and is in many ways just explaining what people intuit about the text naturally. Now unfortunately for those of us who have to step into a foreign worldview to understand these ancient texts, it takes effort to do so, but is nonetheless worth the effort in the end. I strongly encourage you give a complete effort to understand his position and the lens that he sees it through.
@@immortalityprjct Jonathan himself said it is like a puzzle. So God sent a Puzzling message? So much so that the one's who wrote Genisis belonged to a different religion and Judasim still doesn't get it? How many Christian denominations are there who take a different reading? Too many to name. What is Johnathons heavily symbolic reading good for? Any sophist can spin a meaning out of a story. To claim that spin as *Truth* is jumping the shark.
Fair enough if that's his view but he seems to speak as if his view is the case.
@@jhunt5578The easiest conclusion to draw for a holistic interpretation of Christianity is that God views suffering as a good that creates meaning in behaving without sin. If that’s accepted, everything slots together. The moment you try to argue suffering is bad, the whole thing falls apart. That’s an indictment of the religion, but at least it would be cohesive.
@@UltimateKyuubiFox So bite the bullet on the problem of evil?
if nature is so self evident, then why we need science and scientist's perspective to describe the world for us? why do we need things such as microscopes, rules, logical systems, etc? why isn't everything just engraven in your brains when we born? why can we move your fingers when we want to, but don't know how exactly how our bodies do it? why can't we just take everything at face value?
You need someone like Joanthan to explain the Scriptures for you for the same reason you need Einstein to explain Physics to you. Those things are not self evident, there is no such thing as "pure empirical experience", you don't experience gravity, you only experience objects falling to the ground. You also don't see all 4 cube's facets at the same time, you can only see 3, and you will have to spin it to see the other one, nor you know the exact size and quantity of atoms there is.
Both nature and human knowlage is contingent. Its simply how everything that is phyisical is, there is no reason for the metaphysical/spiritual to be different. And it is like this because its good, you cannot argue otherwise.
This has been my favorite episode so far, and I think you guys are properly discussing an issue that is at the heart of the atheist / Christian divide. I'd love to see another episode. Thank you for this one!
Yeah all the 4 points Alex made in the beginning could be their own episode 😅
Christian makes up anything he damn well pleases to interpret it to make sense to himself. Alex reads and interprets what the words are actually saying.
@@ryanfristik5683 I understand the frustration, but I truly think you are missing where the conversation went
This kind of babytalk philosophy, way below the level that Alex O.Connoer can operate at, is your idea of a great direction? Babytalk Christianist moralizing and Bible torture.
@@ryanfristik5683How do you know what words in an ancient, half-forgotten and then artificially resurrected, not widely known language mean? Out of a wider context of the body of scriptures and ancient Hebrew culture you have little exposure to. 😂Is maybe that you rely on the interpretations of others who/ which may or may not be trustworthy? Your whole idea that you understand the words is all based on faith, buddy. Oh, the irony😂
Im glad you two are talking! Jonathan and his brother is the reason I'm christian today, seeing the world as symbol really made it a magical place
@@Alexander_Isen If the kind of "reasoning" Jonathon uses were valid, I could use it to prove literally any claim.
@@authenticallysuperficial9874 No, you couldn't.
@@Alexander_Isen yes he could, I can tell you right now that Jonathan does not know the story of genesis that well (and he doesnt care about it) because he would say stuff that were not written in the bible in order to make sense of it. I have done intense research thru all the genesis translations and i can tell you that for a person who claims he knows the symbolism of genesis he doesnt know KEY info about the story. He has not done proper research. I simply cannot trust a person like this. The same way Jonathan created symbolisms for the story of genesis i can create similar symbolism about everything and anything..I could argue that the devil is actually the good guy in the story and God the bad guy. This is how people end up with theories like the earth is flat. Because without proper research, evidence and logic you can create any world view you want, but it will have nothing to do with reality. Jonathan is living in his own imaginations, his own world because he is afraid of reality.
@@asas14444 One day you'll wake up
@@Alexander_Isen yeah, you too little bro
Alex, thank you very much for being such honest and such genuine sceptic! I found your channel shortly after I converted to Christianity. Your witty questions and your opennes to have discussions with people like Jonathan, JBP or Ben Shapiro help me so much in understanding faith. I had doubting Christianity for the same reasons you usually raise, but you formulate them so much better than I ever did.
Thank you Jonathan for your energetic and inspiring answers! The way you see the the world seems truer than I ever saw it, thank you for sharing this.
If any of you would make a podcast happen with N. T. Wright, it would be amazing!
Idk if it's becsuse I'm getting a kind of "distant uncle repeating something he read on Whatsapp" energy from the origin of "Bless You" explanation, but I'm having a hard time believing it.
Yeah his obvious BS really set this convo off on the wrong foot.
Copy/paste that for me for the entire conversation.
This just shows how little you understand Pageau's work on Symbolism. This is like Page 1 of his brother's book
Not to mention, he literally uses it as a conversational cudgel...he knows Alex doesn't appreciate it, and continues regardless. It's condescending browbeating.
@MystiqWisdom www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2429626/pdf/postmedj00163-0054.pdf
What are these comments? Thanks for the great conversation, Alex and Jonathan. Very different backgrounds and forms of thought, but I thought it was super stimulating.
You'd love hanging out with stoners lol. Very strong similarities between them and John.
@@Philitron128 I think you'll be able to name one similarity: you don't like the way they talk.
@@martinallen6411kind of like a wealthy intellectual saying all poor people are stupid because of they way their off putting “ghetto” accent, right? And the intellectual would have a very hard time surviving as a poor person in a ghetto.
@@andreys1793 I'll tell you what these comments are. Jonathan has a communication problem where everybody including Alex is having trouble understanding him. And he's answering questions Jordan Peterson style.
@@andreys1793 the comments are because Jonathan was just asserting asserting. We have a method to differentiate imagination and reality. Do you? If so, how does anything jonathan said pass that test?
Soo ...will we ever get to the bottom of why the serpent was in the garden in the first place?
Its necessary to have temptation, you can't grow without being able to resist it. It's a test I think.
Well the snake is the agent of change in the story - to write a story where nothing changes, where there is no interesting turn of events say, is to not write a story at all.
@@pup11074You may be correct but did Pageau answer what the purpose of the serpent was. I think that was the point of the original comment.
@johnwheeler3071 I don't think he did explicitly answered it
@@giv123buckle up boys, this is a long one:
This is actually quite funny in an ironic way. The snake represents the part of the garden you can't account for. Or perhaps you haven't yet accounted for. Or you did account for but then it shifted, it shed its skin. Hense the mystery in a way.
So alex asked why did God put a snake in the garden if it's just going to trick Eve and cause the fall. As though this was a description of an almost arbitrary series of event that could have happened differently. "Couldnt God have avoided this?"
Jonathan was perplexed by this as he views the story as a description of reality, not some sort of recorded series of events. He thinks its obvious why the snake is in the garden, for several reasons:
- Adam sometimes misnames the animals, he misses certain facts in his theory. And those details he misses are like snakes in a walled garden. Those mistakes may form the grounds for a better name later, if the snake is handled properly. Or perhaps Adam has encountered something that cant be named, becasue its always changing. or, its to complex to be fully encapsulate by order...
- when God separated the dry land (order) from the deep waters (choas), he doesn't get rid of the waters, he leaves it around the edge of the land. Snakes and chaotic waters are associated by their waving behaviour. Hence leviathan and other sea snake mythology. You don't get rid of the snakes/choas, you put it in its proper place - outside or at the border. Also, you need the water to fertilise the land, to renew it when it becomes baron, not too much though, or the land becomes flooded and unliveable.
- snakes are associated with circles and time (the auroboris) - because we experience time as cycles and time brings change, and change is a source of chaos and so are snakes. Why circles? Circles are irrational, if you try to divide a circle Into segments based on its radius you get 6 equal segments and a 7th slither of a segment that contains the irrational remainder. That remainder is the snake in the walled garden (again). we live in a universe created with irrationality and remainders, it's baked into maths and physics.
What do you do with the remainder/chaos/snakes? You put them in their proper place and use them for your benefit. To renew yourself. And that's why the ancient Hebrews invented the 7 day week. 6 days of orderly work, keeping the garden clear of snakes and 1 day of chaotic rest where you allow the snakes to come back in slightly. Thus restoring balance to the cosmos, and giving your sons something to wrestle with. You dont want them to become Dodo's after all.
What happens when you kill all the wolves In Yellowstone national Park? The deer populatiom grows out of control and messes up the whole ecosystem. Put the wolves back in, the park is renewed.
This is biblical cosmology.
The purpose of the snake is to be difficult to understand. Why did God make a universe that changes and is difficult to understand? Becasue thats what makes life interesting. He created a universe even he cant fully predict and control (at least from the hebrew perspective).
The snake is the thing you know you dont know. You know? And when you're theorising about the cosmic order of the universe, you need to leave a space for what you dont fully understand, whilst understanding the effect that it can have on you when you encounter it.
Alex looked up the word עֵזֶר (ēzer), which means helper. However, the next word is what describes Eve as Adam’s opposite or adversary which כְּנֶגְדּוֹ [cənegdo], often translated “a suitable helper” but is better rendered “a helper as his opposite.”
That's pretty progressive. I wonder if it meant that what happened was meant to happen and that all those punishments were a challenge and not actual punishments. That their real purpose was destined to perish only to be reborn with a new purpose (not talking about converting to Christianity but becoming curious and inquisitive beings). It would be such a waste to have such an interesting story to only be about punishing disobedience. After Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden they go on to learn how to survive in a brutal world outside and produce offspring. It sounds too much like an analogy of children growing up and going out into the world. They start out innocent and obedient and grow into adulthood by challenging their guardian and creator. They are tested to strengthen their resolve and to finally leave. It sounds like a story of learning to think independently and enduring suffering to test whether we succumb to the pain and return to the garden or learn to plant and grow our own garden.
The way he presents quite lofty ideas with such assurance rubs me the wrong way. He presents points in a way where it seems like they should be so obvious but they are some of the wildest interpretations I've heard.
Because he's thinking more like a ancient, rather than modern reductionist materialist. Of course it's going to seem wild, it's a totally different framework. Most people in the West aren't going to get it, at least not immediately. Can't read the bible as a set of forensic historical physical facts.
Read Lucifer by Vertigo comics. Way more interesting and consistent.
Spend more time in this space. These interpretations are pretty normal.
So true. My BS meter was flying off the deep end within 5 min and I had to come to the comments to ensure I wasn't the only one.
They are obvious within the Christian worldview. Your incredulity is not an argument against it.
I'm gonna start saying bless you whenever someone farts
Jonathan was talking about the stickiness of superstitions and phrases like bless you and presenting their “stickiness” as something mysterious when in fact there is nothing mysterious or divine about why they happen to persist.
They are also not always universally applicable and they do not contain some divinely ordained Truth or meaning within them. Just social facts. Which of course, is where religions come from.
Read: “Denial of Death” by Ernest Becker.
No religion has a monopoly on a basic biological function like sneezing, breathing, life or death.
Etiquette rules surrounding bodily functions, appearances and other social, economic and physical markers have routinely been used throughout history as a way to differentiate upper classes from lower social classes. In many cultures, displays of “unrefined” bodily functions were seen as uncivilized, and thus associated with the lower classes.
The rich, powerful and snobby (and those that aspire to be like them) use this as a way to demonstrate their superior status and create a distinction between classes thereby reinforcing class hierarchies.
It’s not a cosmic mystery. So why try to present it as one?
They persist because of the stigmas around not following them. Not for some spiritual, or cosmic reason.
@@Ungrievablelol it’s not arbitrary, what’s the reason those upper class ppl would pick those things in particular?
@@jacobschmidt Once you stop and think about it, it’s not that hard to see that sneezing, burping or farting would all be leveraged in similar ways to set the wealthy classes apart from the lower classes over the course of history-through ridicule and the enforcement of certain social norms.
Over history, the wealthy upper classes (or those aspiring to be like them) have used various social, economic and physical markers to distinguish themselves from lower classes, in order to build and then reinforce their status and privilege while shaming, ridiculing and stigmatizing lower classes.
Other examples of social, economic and physical markers:
- Hygiene: Cleanliness (access to soap, clean water and clean clothes, access to toiletries) which the poor could not afford. This has been (and still is) associated with wealth and status. You can add any “undesirable or so-called embarrassing bodily functions” like sneezing, burping or farting, to that list.
- Posture and body language: “Shoulders back!, head up!”, nose in the air!. “Good posture” was established as a sign of refinement. See how much good posture you can maintain, when you’re going through some serious heartbreak and hardship. Jolly good!
- Table manners: Talking with food in your mouth. Loud noises while eating. I say!
- Body size: in many cultures over history, being overweight has been seen as a sign of wealth and status. Goodness gracious!
- Smells: Perfumes and colognes to cover up their body odor. Something poor people could not afford nor be privileged enough to care about. These days we still have people looking down on homeless people for some of these reasons, without realizing that they simply don’t have access to showers or even to clean running water. Good heavens!
- Hair: Trimmed hair, regular fresh haircuts. The poor cannot afford that but are looked down at for not maintaining. “Bally well done!”
- Skin color: Throughout Asia, even to this day, dark skinned people are looked down upon and seen as belonging to lower castes and as undesirable. Skin lightening products are popular there. You ought to already know about the horrors of skin based segregation, slavery and Jim Crow. “Beastly weather isn’t it?”
Let’s see. What other social, cultural or economic markers could the rich upper classes leverage as a distinguishing marker of status?
- Well, going to the Opera, of course: In the past, only the rich and privileged could afford to do indulge in Opera culture all dressed up like the monopoly guy from Ace Ventura. Lol. I do declare!
- “Refined” Language: In England, certain regional English accents and mannerisms are still seen as less proper and less refined and used to distinguish the refined “posh” upper classes from the lower classes. Hence the veneration of the “Queen’s English” in England. “One mustn’t grumble dear.”!
This made me literally laugh out loud. Thank you.
@@Ungrievableyou can always rely on a post-modernist to give the worst feasible take
Imagine clicking on a interview asking an Orthodox Christian about the fall of Adam and Eve and being upset when he gives an Orthodox Christian account of the fall of Adam and Eve
Lol
@@marincusman9303 Shocked Orthodox Pichachu face!
@@marincusman9303 nah, one can be curious what the view is and then get disappointed that the view is dumb.
@@realGBx64 have you ever heard anything of Jonathan Pageau’s before?
@@marincusman9303 no, and after this, I'm not interested at all.
Jonathan made perfect sense. Thank you so much Mr. Pageau. If you know you know.
Fr man its bullseye after bullseye. The skeptic types in the comments just dont have context for engaging with the stuff he talks about, not to mention the bias towards reductionism being a real blinder
love seeing Jonathan Pageau on your channel 👍
I tried, I swear I tried to make it to the end, but I don't think my spirit is strong enough to endure so many arbitrary statements
My brain is melting through my ears
Likeeee. 😅don’t I know the meaning of opponent? 🤣
I swear I don't understand a single word of what he's saying 😂
So. Many. Words.
Lol, I’ve never heard that one before, but I get it because I’m realllllllllly lost myself. I understand what Alex is saying, and everything after that I’m either dumb or just plain stupid…..
i think if eve didn't eat the fruit, then genesis would describe a state of equilibrium. the story would end, there would be no time. so maybe the answer is: if you hypothesize that there is no serpent, then you get a static universe
Great guest Alex, bless you
The problem I think it's that both Alex and Jonathan are approaching the Fall narrative at an allegorical level but forget about it when tacking Alex's question "But why God did it that way an not the other way?"
Alex's question would be to answer something like what it would mean if the universe didn't have gravity in it. The answer is always "you wouldn't be here to ask the question". If God did it differently we'd not be here to wonder about "what if". And that is the same answer on both allegorical and literal levels.
So the scientific narrative as well as the biblical narratives are maps of the place not the place, a way to understand the world around from perspectives that apply to different domains: the literal scientific narrative is about how things are, while the biblical narrative is about how to be. Hence these narrative are orthogonal not parallel competing with each other.
Then the question just becomes "Why did God make my being here conditional on contrasts like the presence of evil against good?" and "How can we trust that God didn't do it differently because this was the best way?"
@@KonoGufo your question is also moving away from allegory. It's like asking why did the universe made you conditional on the existence of oxygen, which is a literal understanding. On top of that you may think of God too literally as a flesh and blood being rather than the more appropriate definition which is the ineffable (just beyond the ability of the mind to capture into comprehension).
Doesn't the bible teach that there is an alternative i.e. heaven? What stoped God from creating that world instead of this?
@@DaFunkLab I think this might be a framing problem because I don't understand how Heaven can be thought of as an alternative. The coherent way I understand Heaven is that it is a goal, a different state of existence, not a retreat or an escape.
@@Adaerus maybe it's better to refer to it as an afterlife. If there is an afterlife is it possible to sin and "fall" there? If not, why didn't God create that world and we live there? Is there something about this world that makes the next possible?
Logical Inconsistencies and the Infinite Regress of Sin
One of the primary criticisms, as articulated by Alex O'Connor, is the logical inconsistency inherent in the narrative. The story posits that Adam and Eve, prior to eating from the Tree of Knowledge, lacked the knowledge of good and evil. This raises the question of how Eve could be tempted by the serpent if she did not understand the concept of evil. Alex points out that this implies an inherent potential for sin within Eve, suggesting that the capacity for sin was present even before the fateful act, leading to an infinite regress. If Eve's ability to sin was preordained, the origin of sin cannot be solely attributed to the act of eating the fruit, but must lie within the divine design itself, thus complicating the narrative's internal logic.
Knowledge of good and evil is the experiential knowledge of good and evil. Before Adam and Eve sinned, they had no experience of evil. They only had experience of good. Sinning gave them an experience of evil. After, sinning, they now have knowledge of good and evil. So eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil conveys the idea of committing a sin which leads to death.
From my reading it doesn’t say she was tempted. It says she was deceived. And it was after her “eyes were opened”. Like did she know at the time she was being deceived? Probably not. That’s the whole thing about deception. ..
She didn’t have to have knowledge to listen to someone other than God. God told them not to do something (whether they know it’s good or bad), they do it (whether they know is good or bad) it’s separates them from God (sin). They realize in that moment it’s bad (their eyes are opened). Therefore concluding that God is good and anything that separates is bad. Then maybe also rationalized it later that she was deceived
Man always has had choice by design. When Samael fell he brought the temptation of sin aka Evil to Eve and she had a choice. She didn’t understand the consequence of this choice because previously man had not experienced evil but it was the nature of free will and choice that allowed man to experience both.
@@wesleymoening8525 good explanation
@@philosophicalinquirer312 AI generated mush
This was an excellent conversation. I really enjoyed hearing pageau’s perspective
He's not "theologizing", Alex. He's "symbologizing". That's his thing to do to everything, including burps. Good catch.
Except he is just pulling these symbolizations out of thin air.
@@TacoTuesday4 I just read your sentence by pure chance. Pulled it out of thin air.
What if everything means something other than what any person with any perspective for or against, believing or doubting, ever thought the thing meant? But that's what it was always about! Because it's way cooler and solves some issues with the standard framing! @@TacoTuesday4
A Joseph Campbell turd with chunks of Jung and Freud.
@@brianbrennan5600 a good way to challenge his ideas is to have many people try to find their own honest interpretation of a particular symbol he talks about. Ideally we should pick one that he is strongly confident about. And if too much of these interpretation does not connect to his own then that is a good argument to challenge him, his brother, and jordan peterson.
So glad you guys got to talk again! I was hoping you would!
What was gained?
Lol, this is like being excited Rogan is having Terrance Howard on again 😂
@@HIIIBEAR While I don't think Pageau is always very articulate and has a hard time getting his feet in conversations like this, I'm just glad to see someone from the Eastern Orthodox perspective talking with Alex. That said, Pageau brings a pretty heavy mystical presentation and it might be better for him to talk to someone like Stephen de Young or Nathan Jacobs who are Orthodox scholars.
Alex has talked to a lot of Thomists and stuff in the past but Id be interested to see him discuss Palamite theology with someone. In any case, it's just nice to see someone with an Eastern Christian perspective instead of more apologetics stuff.
@@davidbolt9566 if someone doesnt have a clear way to differentiate imagination and reality then alex will never be on the same page.
I might be one of the few, but i really like how Jonathan layed out the possible Inspirations of the Fall of Adam & Eve, the underlying structure of our World & the rules that are in the chaos of earth, and simple humans trying to make sense of it, passing on their theories in a story like this. I recently studied a lot of darwinistic Theories, you can definitly tell that many of these stories try to make sense of darwinistic principles, how they apply to humans, to our families, societies, civilsations, nations & us as a whole. I think the whole picture is beyond any human understanding, but we can learn enough, like its obvious that sin constitutes a moral degeneracy, that applies to greater society over time. At the end of this road lays distruction, like the annhilation of Sodom & Gomorah. We like to think we are above all those earthly rules, the chaos etc. But it is sins that bind us to this chaos, the very thing that seperates us from God. Sins that dont really exist in them, until they eat the fruit of knowledge. I will need to study further the relationship of darwinism & religion, but this helps tremendously. Christianity does something very different then the other Religions, its like it understood something that later Religions like Islam cleary missed. I also think you are spot on with your Interpretation of God, god often doesnt really punish, altough i until now perceived it as such, he even warns you before and just tells you what happens when you act a certain way. He is merciful in a way, as you often can turn around, repent & avoid the destruction & survive & create, change or turn around communities into thriving ones by acting good & moral. But for that you need to know the difference between whats good & whats bad. Thank you, Jonathan Pageau, your interpretations certainly brought me more understanding in some ways, like seeing those stories like a puzzle, that abstracts a bigger picture.
Jonathan is amazing. What I love about him is that he takes the Bible as a whole and doesn't dissect it like the literalists and fundamentalists. It is true the Bible is a library and has different genres, but everything starts to click when you read it contextually -- in light of the whole. The Biblical story is different from other creation stories where gods are competing with other gods and also with humans. The God of Abraham is a noncompetitive God. To be omnipotent, all knowing, and eternal means to always live in the present now. Thus, God knew about the fall for all of eternity. To be just, merciful, and allow free-will, it had to be that way. To allow free-will means God will never force anyone to love him, so with free-will, there are choses. To choose good, then there must be a flip side to that.
This is the most interesting and mind opening discussion on Genesis I've heard. Fantastic listen!
Johnathan delivered a masterclass in theological structure
I'd love to read a single negative comment toward Jonathan here that actually brings up the things he says instead of just spamming 'word salad' which just reveals you don't understand what he's saying. You guys should be more like Alex himself, who at least is able to repeat back to Jonathan what he is saying before he attempts to argue against it. (p.s, just because another language uses a phrase that doesn't say the word 'bless' in it, doesn't mean you aren't 'blessing' a person when you respond to a sneeze. That is just the word-concept fallacy.)
I posted a couple. Although I focus on epistemology.
I was rolling after Alex pulled out the metaphor of the smoking alcoholic parent god. Just the expression on Jonathan's face lmao.
This was incredible, I learned so much! Love what you’re doing Alex, I follow Jonathan closely and this helped me a lot to understand my faith a little deeper. Great discussion!
I like Jonathan as a person, but it's just and endless list of pieces that never come together in synthesis. Vague references of possible intrest. Any ball you throw at him perfectly fits in with what he's already juggling. I think he's been a horrible influence on Jordan who is prone to mysticism and depth without a bottom.
Nothing mystical about coming back to the primary human experience. He's just treating reality at the most fundamental phenomenological level. For example, if you don't understand that people drink water, but not H2O and that water can be warm and refreshing but H2O can't, then you've got a problem. An unimaginably large amount of H2O molecules makes water, but I don't have any experience of those molecules, only the higher identity.
The approach Jonathan is taking is a mixture of tradionalisme, symbolism, metaphysical and platonic thinking. It is not a scientifically approach strictly speaking although science is a way of determining patterns. He says this again and again. You have to see these stories as puzzles. Christianity is not by all means a homogen religion. He has his way of looking at the world. It is more phenomenological. How are we experiencing the world and how to make sense of it all. Stories are tools to comprehend the world that surrounds us. That is also basically what symbolism is. I ones heard from a professor that metaphysics is not something that is grasp right a way at times but it needs great pondering and reflection. For some it is the reductionistic way of looking at the world that are making meaning in their lives.
People like Jonathan, JP and Carl Jung back in the day critique is that this world view is not enough to make a meaningful life but rather to explore and see Logos in all things roughly speaking . It is very platonic in that what we are striving for is the good, the beautiful and the truth.
Sorry for my English ✌️🙇♂️ hope that you guys understand it better now 😄
I really enjoyed the talk, but it took an odd turn when Alex asked Jonathan why God placed the snake in the Garden of Eden in the first place. It was unclear whether Jonathan misunderstood Alex's intention or if he deliberately avoided the topic, but his response felt evasive. At its core, Alex was asking: Why did God create an imperfect universe? Why did He make humanity flawed, requiring us to overcome our imperfections to become like Him? Why didn't God create a perfectly harmonious existence for all eternity?
This is a profound question for those who believe in a loving God, and an easy one for those who don't. I've pondered this question many times throughout my life, especially during periods of suffering. Each time I overcame a challenge and grew from it, I still wondered: "Why was this suffering necessary in the first place?"
There's a yogic idea suggesting that suffering is a blessing, pushing the unconscious to grow and expand by creating a necessity to escape the unpleasantness. Fully conscious beings, like angels, do not suffer because they no longer need it for their development. As Pageau mentioned, in this worldview, the purpose of life is to expand until we achieve absolute unity with God. Since God is all-encompassing, everything in existence must reach this full expansion and unity together to become God itself.
One can conceptualize this process as a big breath in and out. Initially, there was God as a singularity. God "exploded" into all creation, maintaining perfect unity since God is in everything. To the individual parts, however, it appears as if they are just that-separate parts. This is the difference between absolute reality, where God exists with full consciousness of everything, and relative reality, our perception where everything seems separated. This is the "breathing out" phase, where God bursts forth in endless creativity. As parts move further apart, they become less conscious of themselves and the universe.
Eventually, there's a turning point marking the beginning of the "breathing in" phase, where everything evolves and is naturally drawn to reunite. Everything strives to expand and encapsulate everything else, folding back together until it becomes one again. What comes after that? Perhaps another cycle of breathing out. It remains unknown.
Yet, the original question persists: Why? I suppose we won't know until we are reunited with everything else. Ironically, at that point, it will be us making the decision, for we will be God. There's an intriguing thought hidden in that: Why did we do this to ourselves the last time we were united as God?
The entire _interview_ felt evasive to me; the man is so bent on his overly-complex, sometimes senseless "explanations" he just avoids the questions he has no answer to with a lot of... well, it's not _word_ salad, but ... _philosophical_ salad.
I like your reasoning and Christian’s would call this new age theology, everything is god and all is separate yet one like the waves of the ocean being individual yet one with the ocean. God experiencing itself thru everything.
Mormons believe something similar to this, although they believe that once you become like God you will not be the same as him
@@MrFireman164 What a lot of useless pap that is. I'm sure it would feel good to pretend life was some kind of neo-hippie, transcendental journey into "energy realms" and "wave conjugations," but it's not actually explaining anything or making any useful differences to actual lives.
First world white people philosophical masturbation.
Brilliant. Best comment and I’ve read 100s! 🙏🏼
Awesome interview. These two gentleman have some great conversations. Thanks, Alex.
1:49:16 This question that Alex has is pretty much the exact theme in Job.
“There is a way that world is that I would prefer that it was not.” - that’s it right there, a perfect example of a good starting point.
And, like in the Job story, the “friends” never can give a satisfactory answer. It is a question that has to be posed to the divine itself, and the satisfactory state at the end of Job is not in the form of an answer, but in something else, which is well documented by many, including Blasé Pascal, who Alex was speaking about earlier, as some kind of an encounter with the ground of all being.
Look how it happens in all of these different stories:
In Abraham it takes the form of a negotiation
In Jacob it is pictured in a wrestling match that goes on all night
The Hebrew phrase עֵזֶר כְּנֶגְדּוֹ (ezer kenegdo), if translated more literally, carries an intriguing meaning. Eve is described in oppositional terms, as “a helper who is against him”.
Like an opposable thumb?
Also….why do animals have pain in childbirth……???
Alex: Could Eve have turned down the fruit?
Guest: Sorry man I'm just more of a realist and we live in a world where she factually did not turn it down.
For me this sums up this entire stupid conversation up to this point. 1:03:10
I don't think she could have done.
I have no idea why god would want to create this universe and i'm assuming we wouldn't be able to know that anyway. But if she had the capacity to not take the fruit then she's effectively Jesus (god) levels. If she/ we are essentially divine/ ordered/ united then this universe doesn't even exist...which I think means Eden doesn't even exist either. That is assuming Eden is somewhere between heaven and earth.
Or in other words. If god had created humans as perfect then we could never have been a separate entity from both god and heaven in the first place. We effectively skip back to the beginning without ever having time/ reality play out.
I think the answer to Alex's question of "why did god force this upon us?" is:
- we have no possible way of understanding why god decided to create the universe...
- we were designed to eat the fruit because the eating of the fruit is fundamentally reality as we understand it.
- god forced creation and we are just a part of that system.
There could very well exist a corner of the universe or a different universe God made that the balance between unity and multiplicity (as Jonathan would put it) was never broken. But what of it? It is irrelevant to our reality. Our planet we clearly consumed the fruit, and continue to listen to the same lies and fall into the same traps now. The serpent still tells us lies and we still listen. Science will save us. Technology will make us like God. Let us worship the data and transcend together. It's all lies. It is better to rediscover the meaning and purpose that we've traded in for a sort of material comfort.
He makes such a dishonest answer when he says this. They're discussing hypotheticals and potentials all throughout this conversation and then when pressed with a direct question he didn't want to answer, he just dances around it. What a quack! So much respect for Alex pushing on it while he tried to get out of responding.
She could have in theory, but in actual practice, NO, not taking it was impossible...the system was set up to have them fail. Obviously.
Sadly, you got nothing out of the first hour...even the first few minutes about sneezing was illuminating a bit, as was the Old Testament thing about shaking hands. Not everything has to be revelatory and life-changing to have some value.
@@BadgerUKvideoyes, that’s kind of the answer. The reason why the story is the way it is is because otherwise there would be no story and there would be no reality.
I *sort* of see your objection - Genesis, from its internal logic, could have happened differently, and so it seems not so much like a metaphysical system that 'proves' that the world has to be the way it is, but merely a description of the world as it is.
And if we're thinking about god as a 'creator' who is to be held responsible for the way reality is, we arrive at the standard theological problems with the existence of evil and all that.
But isn't that a sort of strange objection for an atheist to make? I'm saying this as a basically atheistic philosophy student myself. Imo the way we have to think about this is that 'god' is a horizon of the possibility of good, conceived of in a particular way (we exist in a *relationship* to it that is simultaneously individual and transpersonal, it is not the kind of thing that one can attain through force or deceit, it's transcendent in a way and we can never 'capture' it fully, so it can not be totally systematized).
The idea that he's a 'great big beard in the sky' who made decisions at the beginning of time about the order of existence, is more like an artefact of primitive mythological ways of thinking - they didn't actually have the kinds of abstract philosophical terms that we can operate with now, so instead they had to try and think in stories.
So the answer to the 'riddle' Jonathan is trying to point to here is simply that god isn't all-powerful in the sense that there's some guy out there who could have created existence differently and we could blame him for our woes, it's that there precisely *isn't* anything like that from the start. God is like something that's still only now coming into existence. He's 'the most quiet voice' that is bringing itself into existence in the dialectic of matter and its self-transcendence (spirit, if you want to call it that).
I wonder how far Pageau would be okay that interpretation.
Two points.
1) The Bible is just a story written by men. It is not that deep or complex.
2) there are infinite numbers of textual interpretations. To prevent philosophy from becoming random speculation, it must create novel testable hypothesis. You also need a methodology, a thing which most philosophy lacks.
@@thoughtsuponatime847nope, that’s called science. Good luck trying to apply science standards to things that completely transcend it.
The first point is just superficial
How can the "horizon of the possibility of good" be something that is currently "coming into existence"?
Surely some good things already exist
@@j8000 I think it will only fully happen in the end of time. This is a developing world, it is a journey, and it will culminate in the final judgment.
@@j8000 I really want to give a proper response to this, so bear with my wall of text.
First, I think you'll probably agree that there are disciplines where noone has figured out a perfect strategy yet. Maybe there's a perfect strategy for Chess out there and we just haven't found it yet. In those cases, in the meantime, a 'good' Chessplayer is one who understands the game, who is learning and experiementing with new strategies, who can execute those skills when it counts. And 'good', here, is *relative* to other players, but it is not thereby relativistic - it is still true that Magnum Carlson is 'good in his generation'.
Then secondly, you might ask yourself this: Are there disciplines where not only has the perfect strategy not been found 'yet', but we have good reason to think that a perfect strategy can never be found, doesn't even exist.
I think painting is a good example of this - there's a rich tradition of people finding and mastering new techniques, exploring different possibilities of their art, and in a sense I would say that there is 'progress', but at the same time it would be a silly idea that there might be a 'perfect' work of art that encompasses everything art could or should ever be and which would conclude the history of art because afterward there'd be no point to painting anything anymore. Paintings, in reality, are always particular, concrete things, at the same time that they're aiming for an ideal, so no absolutely good painting exists or could exist.
If ethics is like this, then it's simultaneously true that it's possible (and good) for one to aim at the good, and that the person who does this would be called 'a good person', while at the same time we acknowledge that no absolute definition of what it means to be a good person exists or could exist.
Ohe alternative here would be if you think that morality *is* a solved problem and the only reason we're not living according to those principles is that people are flawed. But imo there are a lot of problems with that view - I got some strong objections to Kant, Rawls and all the popular variants of utilitarianism, at least.
A good discussion! Many of the other commenters don't seem to appreciate it much. The world view Jonathan advocates for is very alien to the modern mind but I find it very fruitful to contemplate.
It’s interesting, I think the point Alex is at is Romans 8:20-21. And Pageau isn’t addressing what Alex is really trying to get at. 1:44:19
The very first conversation was a foreshadow of the entire rest of the discussion. Johnathan was discussing the origin of saying "God bless you" after someone sneezed. He's so certain of his explanation that he goes on to explain how it informs other realizations. He talks about it being such a sticky idea and maintaining for so long so there must be something to it.
But he was wrong. Or at least partially wrong. His explanation is one of the many contending explanations for the origin of the phrase.
But him holding is explanation as the true one allowed him to use it as an analogy to come to other conclusions.
This is exactly what he does for the rest of the interview. He interperates verses then uses his interpretation to inform himself on how to interpret the rest of the verses. But he has no evidence that his interpretation is correct.
He interprets that death has a more broad definition due to God using "die in this day" to mean something like diverting from your purpose. Then without any demonstration that this interpretation is true, he just moves on to make more conclusions based on this assumption. Like it's definitely true and there's no way he's wrong.
I wish it were that easy to interpret confusing texts. But it's not. If you get a basic interpretation wrong, then using it to interpret more will likely yield more wrong interpretations.
@010zach
I wrote an article Sir, to explain why I disagree. See Below:
If we just call what he is saying "his interpretation" and imply that because of the fact that humans see the world through a perspective lens, if that fact justifies abandoning discernment and requires calls for proving things that we know cannot be proven in the manner implied(empirically), then that is essentially abandoning the idea of objectivity.
We test logic in the same way he references adjacent texts to explain the current text. We interpret languages being spoken to us in the exact same way he interprets the bible, by using the context to the left and the right of the word/text in focus. Chinese language has a word just for this to mean context, 上下文。 The characters literally break down to mean "Above上 -- Below下 -- Script文。Look to the text above and below to determine the meaning. They traditionally write top to bottom, which is why it is not Left vs. Right, but essentially all languages do this. It is our fundamental pattern of action for understanding anything. Some modes of thinking actively discourage our species prime moneymaker however.
I'll explain. Johnathan's interpretation has a quality that other interpretations do not have. To arbitrarily stand back and avoid discerning it from others is something like reluctance to make value judgements. Test this to see if it is true. Read this line again, "If you get a basic interpretation wrong.....", now ask yourself, "What would an interpretation that is NOT wrong sound like?", and this one, "Can an interpretation be wrong?", lastly this, "Is there one correct interpretation, or many correct interpretations?". Your answers to these imply your epistemological framework, and this is informed by your true metaphysical worldview, and thus can be reverse analyzed to figure out what it is.
I think that if you're a true subjectivist that refuses to make value judgements, because all perspectives are equally valid, or invalid none any better or worse than any other, then you would not like the idea of integration. It implies that all things are interconnected toward a single ultimate purpose, meaning there cannot exist multiple competing purposes all of which are equally valid.
If you believe that there is an objective reality, one that is independent of our many perspectives and is as it is regardless of interpretation or opinion, then you would be the type to seek integration in all things.
The quality that Jonathan's interpretation has is not that he disintegrates the stories, clouds them, complicates them, or removes purpose from them, but the quality is actually the understanding of the existence of an objective medium through which we can reference the truth to aid in integration of patterns.
He doesn't start with an "interpretation", he starts with an objective fact. Death is the movement of a living form away from an integrated order toward a purpose, to a more disintegrated and purposeless form. This is a simple descriptive fact which the texts seem to validate. YadaYadaYada, basically the Bible figured out all the advanced science stuff 10,000 years ago, and scientists haven't the chops to understand it yet. Hence why they call themselves that. Anyways....having some fun there.
His method is closer to what is meant to be conveyed by the Bible than many others, because it has this quality of integration. It begins to render understanding instantly and knowing the nature and origin of these stories and their form of information storage using allegory, metaphor, and symbolism, or "ultra-Memes" I call them, if ones interpretation can bring all of these stories a sense of unity and relatedness, then this is a sign of moving in the absolute correct direction, but only If you believe in absolute objective reality.
If you're a subjectively prime type of person, then you'll sort of be annoyed at integration whenever noticed. I would advise against holding subjective experiences as primary, because you lose claim to science, reason, understanding, and thought itself. All of these nice tools can only be valid if there is an objective reality which can be used as an absolute reference point from which to integrate concepts.
TLDR;
He uses whole Bible to provide context for the specific text in focus at the moment, which makes his interpretation much more valid than most because some reasons mentioned above.
@@phillip3495so what if he knows his book of stories better than most? that means he’s got Bible quiz knowledge not insights into human nature.
@@phillip3495Sorry but again all you have done is created a whole lot of sentences out of a whole load of paragraphs, from a whole lot of words.....but in the end does nothing to define the arguments in modern reality.
Yes the guy maybe very intelligent, yes he may be a high thinker, yes he may understand absolute philosophy better than a lay person but I just want to ask.......was god dealing with well educated people, was philsophy something that was common and used by the majority of the people in the Levant, were their leaders able get across very complex cosmological concepts to these people. Was Jesus or Paul counted as one of the great philosophers and thinkers of our time.
The answers are no......so why would god put together a book, a religion, a way of life and laws in such a way that it is not until 6000 years from its inception that some white guy is able to understand and define the real meaning of both the old and new testament. Sorry but if this guy is able to understand the 'true' meaning of the words of god, would that not make him the new 'Jesus' or at least a modern day prophet.
Sorry but the guy jumps from one passage to another, to another, to another trying to make out these justifies his 'beliefs' of what the bible is really trying to say......rather than just saying that these high falluting ideas and concepts allow him to believe in the words of the bible.
Exactly! This is an effort to hide contradictory claims in the bible with as many words as possible.
Fantastic discussion! I absolutely loved this and found it so insightful. Thanks for sharing Alex and Jonathan!
"That's the best way to do it, is to use the text to interpret the text."
Somebody page Dan McClellan, stat.
Even from a materialistic point of view Scripture interpreting Scripture makes the most sense if your goal is honest inquiry into the truth because logically there must be a reason that this body of texts has stuck together for so long in so many different times, places, and cultures.
The real kicker is when you realize that they stuck together because they point to Christ, in whom all things hold together.
@@aaronh8095 Which body of texts? Because you know the biblical cannon took centuries to form, and even today different denominations differ on what should or shouldn't be in it.
But even if the cannon were more stable than it is, there's no way to get from "there must be a reason" to "that reason must be that it's all true." There are plenty of historical explanations for whatever degree of stability the biblical cannon has, most notably the massive, centralized institutions that have defined and maintained it for most of its existence.
I know I'm talking to a millennial, so allow me to explain it to you with Harry Potter. In order to understand why Harry's touch was deadly to Voldemort, you need to refer to the later text within the same series. That's the way you do it, you interpret one part of the text by using the other. It maybe novel to you, but that's in fact how pretty much all stories work.
@@n0vitski How many people wrote Harry Potter, over how many hundreds of years? I've never read it so I'm not sure.
@@BuddhaMonkey7it doesn't matter how many people wrote (or rather compiled) it. The canon is put together the way that it is because it made sense to people compiling it, the story follows within itself and is internally coherent. In that way it's no different than any other story. Your original remark was you putting your foot in your mouth. Now you're just suckling on it.
That was fantasitc - thank you both! Seeing this podcast made me more excited than any podcast this year
58:48 An example: Alex: "Yes, the world we live in is suffering, but why couldn't a perfect Garden of Eden just be and remain perfect?"
Jon: "Because that's not the world we find ourselves in"
Alex: "Why shouldn't it be possible otherwise"
Jon: After much stammering "Things change and for things to change there has to be decay ... if you make food and it takes three hours then that's a problem, if there's an earthquake now I can't make any more food, that's the world Genesis describes: The reality of chaos to order. I can't imagine how it could be any different ... or in other words, you have Adam and Eve now, they don't eat the fruit and live happily ever after, and then what happens? Nobody can tell the story because nobody would be interested. Because it would be a lie.
Alex: "What? If it had happened like that (which was the premise), then it wouldn't be a lie at all"
And we continue with a related but different topic
I want Jonathan's advocates to make some sense of this drivel. He jumps from one approach to another and doesn't find one argument why Eden couldn't be reality today. That's how he argues.
Because he doesnt argue at all honestly.
Every time Alex pushes which in this podcast is usually very sparse already, Jon talks about something else or goes on a long enough tangent to derail the point Alex made/asked about.
And then you have hundreds of "believers" comenting on how good he is at... What, exactly? Maybe not quite anyone but definetly a lot of people trained in creative thinking and writing can give more or less stuttery explanations of any random bullshit you ask them to justify.
This conversation felt like a weird improv skit on Jons end tbh.
The guys entire world view is in the balance. If he starts critically analyzing it, I imagine he'll have no foundation to stand on. I was so shocked to see that Alex is the only noteworthy person to have had such an intimate conversation with him and yet with little to no pushback for his bizarre views.
Jonathan used a lot of words to basically say “you’re missing the point by making up hypotheticals.” Even more simply put, “that’s a stupid question.” Not that it’s a stupid question to ask in itself, but rather that it doesn’t really lead anywhere because it’s based on a false premise. It’s clear from the world that there is sin and evil and decay (as Jonathan points out), so to say “why couldn’t it be otherwise” misses the point when discussing a story describing reality.
I will admit that Jonathan could do a better job of saying “we don’t know” to questions like this, because there are many things of God that are hidden from human knowledge in God’s transcendence and man’s finitude (see Job 38-42 or 1 Corinthians 1:18-25 for Biblical accounts of this).
Saints have imagined what would happen if Adam and Eve hadn't taken the apple. God would have given it to them and they would've ascended in glory and righteousness to the tree of life, becoming higher than the angels.
Once the apple has been taken, death was introduced in the world. That's like saying if you shoot an arrow and miss the target, failure was brought into the world. Death is necessary to solve failure. Let's put it this way: if you learn math and try to apply it to some exercises but fail, it because your understanding of the math is wrong. That old understanding has to die and be replaced by a new understanding so that you can succeed.
Orthodox Christianity asks us to die to the world (i.e. our wordly passions and desires) so we can live in Christ. That's what the saints do. If there is no death, then humanity would've been stuck in the same fallen state of Adam and Eve with no hope. There needs to be death so there can be resurrection.
Maybe you'll think this is all drivel. I did my best to answer.
The way i understand it is: for multiplicity to exist, for change to exist, the fall needed to have happened. Alternatovely there would be stasis.
I have been waiting for this for a long time, hope it’s good.
I thoroughly enjoy every conversation you have with Jonathan. Please have him on again.
The whole sneeze thread, Milhouse explained it best: "When you sneeze that's your soul trying to escape. Saying God bless you crams it back in."
This conversation is absolutely COOKED! Over-analysis is certainly a thing, and scripture has been its primary victim, robbing it of its profound simplicity.
Kept expecting him to say "accidental discharge."
"I just sneezed and then I shidded and farted and camed in my pants."
😅
This is horrendous....
I thoroughly enjoyed it
@@immortalityprjctI enjoy listening intellectual train wrecks as well.
I appreciate the discussions that demonstrate mutual respect on these matters.
Up is down, back is right, left is wet, black is sharp. If a thing can mean anything, than anything can make sense of what i need it to.
A .ore charitable reading might be "modern language has changed in such a way that the story no longer makes sense, here's how ancients might have perceived it". Johnathan's definitions make the story make sense.
@JacobSmaby no. There is nothing in the conversation about linguistic change over time, or reasons to say things about how ancient culture perceived life and stories.
His position is entirely post hoc, making wild assumptions about symbolic meaning. The conversation is so confused he spends all his time explaining how his symbols work, that he doesn't get into methods to validate his claims. It's just claim after claim, with no way to fact check.
this is absolutely not the case --- when anything can mean anything you have no consistent meaning whatsoever, it's just noise
I think this is something the atheist crowd has trouble with in general, meaning is not arbitrary, when you have patterns of meaning in the world, those are _patterns of meaning in the world_
@chrisc7265 "when you have patterns of meaning in the world, those are patterns of meaning in the world" aside from this being entirely circular, patterns and meaning are not in the world. They are in our perception of the world. The world simply is the way it is, it's our brain that connects the dots and identifies patterns.
My point is that he's applying symbolic patterns of thought that aren't there. It's apophenia gone wild.
@@uninspired3583 this is a very odd thing to believe, that there are patterns in our experience of the world, but they aren't really there
I recognize a lot of people are having a hard time engaging in a certain style of thinking that Jonathan is proposing. I see Alex providing helpful push back to demonstrate the side literal thinking against Jonathan’s symbolic thinking. There is a bridge needed. And that a perspective of practical, experiential psychology. For example, the hottest buttons in this conversation are 1) what if the fall didn’t happen, 2) why are we (humanity) confined to experience the bad decisions of someone before us. The fall was a spiritual opportunity for Adam and Eve to exercise their free will; a free will that is required for us to have a harmonious and loving RELATIONSHIP with God. Relationship requires a two way interaction. On a practical level, I will not truly know if I can trust someone’s commitment to me until it is tested. Their response to the challenge or test says more about the person than their words or self-proclaimed belief system ever would. This is, how I see, the fall playing into the relationship establishment of God and Adam / Eve. It is less about it being the origin of all sin, and more of a demonstration on the opportunity WE ALL HAVE within our relationship with God. It happens in our lives, now. This idea also feeds into hot button #2 that I stated: why are we suffering because of someone else’s decision. Unfortunately we are carrying the weight of generational patterns and tendencies. You see this in family dynamics. Parenting styles pass down, communication styles pass down, belief systems pass down. Why? Influence of environment matters. So we can choose to break out of that in our own personal lives, but sometimes it takes some work to even see those patterns and how they consume us unconsciously…. This is also a spiritual opportunity. Do we rest in bitterness and resentment over what is, or do we allow ourselves to step through the doorway of opportunity that arises in the face of challenge? The Christian calling promises that the step through that doorway is actually a step into ultimate purpose. Pain is a great teacher, a wonderful propulsion forward. Arguably, unparalleled.
Hope this brings insight to at least one person. I feel like these ideas needed to be addressed more deeply but the styles of thinking were like oil and water haha extremely enjoyable to traverse through with Alex and Jonathan 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼👏🏼
Well, for starters, relationships only exist and work if you know the other person is really there.
@@TheRealShrike that’s kind of the insane experience of applying the Christian meta-narrative. You actually experience a relationship with God. Pretty wild! Highly recommend!
@@SacredSight you can experience falling while lying in your bed half asleep. that doesn't mean you're actually falling. you can experience fake things. People do all the time.
At 41 minutes, Johnathan is explaining “God wanted them to have it eventually. If they had only waited till the Sabbath“. I do not recall that I have encountered this interpretation before. This is why listening to biblical interpretation feels so slippery to me.
Jonathan hasn’t done a great job at laying out the reasons here. You can find this idea in many church fathers, but if you want a more “in-text” explanation I can point to a few places. One is that we are taking the phrase “the knowledge of good and evil” a bit too literally. In other contexts where the phrase appears in the Bible, it’s associated with wisdom or maturity. An example is Solomon. We usually understand Solomon asking for wisdom, but in the Hebrew it’s clear he’s asking for the knowledge of good and evil.
In the context of Genesis, this means Adam and Eve are taking in wisdom or maturity prematurely, and this results in their Fall. They eat before they were ready.
@@Joefrenomics I appreciate your input and offering of a direction to look. Thanks 👍
One site says this:
“…Rabbi Isaac Luria [who lived in the 16th century], one of the most important figures in Jewish mysticism, tells us that if [Adam and Eve] would have waited three hours until Shabbat, they would have had permission to eat from the Tree of Knowledge because they would have first partaken of the Tree of Life.”
Of course, Dr Maier Becker (in fact, an endocrinologist in Tel Aviv) makes the argument that the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life were, in fact, _one and the same_ and that, only after Adam and Eve “ate of” the Tree of Knowledge did it become the Tree of Life (in fact, the transformation occurred _because_ they at “ate of” the Tree of Knowledge) so biblical interpretation does seem infinitely flexible.
This was great. I very much enjoyed hearing both of you and couldn’t wait to hear the other person respond to each point
Amazing how much depth Pageau went into from being asked "if God than why bad thing happen?" over and over again.
@teamcoalhapcharcoal you're right, I forgot to mention he occasionally said "plz say it's not real"
"The sleep of reason produces monsters." Endlessly.
But isn’t everything meaningless anyway? Why is that a problem?
@occultislux if you hold this as a truth you shouldn't be here now but already expired by your own hand. Everyone who preaches meaninglessness but then shudders at practising what they preach is by definition a hypocrite.
The very fact you are alive commenting that at all is a contradiction of your comment. For obviously, your life has enough meaning to engage in this type of conversation. Beliefs unlived are lies, and the belief that nothing matters can only be died in, not lived in. To hold death worshipping ideas and to be alive yourself is a hypocrtical contradiction.
I literally cant give you the 3 letter acryonym that would be the TL;DR of this otherwise youtube autodeletes it. But you get the idea.
@@Reiman33 I was just being sarcastic to his claim. I'm not a nihilist / atheist.
@@Reiman33 I'm not in the nihilist camp but I wouldn't say believing everything is meaningless is "death worship". Wouldn't someone who believes such think death is meaningless as well?
@@Mr_M1dnight you are correct in theory, but in practice there is no reason a real human individual would turn to nihilism other than the desire to tear down the high
I mean I'm not gonna make claims, maybe there are some weirdos who don't follow that pattern, but it's certainly the main driver of nihilism
It sort of seems like Alex is dancing around the question “If God is good then why do we suffer” and Jonathan is refusing to answer the question directly because Alex isn’t asking it directly. The second half of the podcast is very repetitive in this way on both parts. For me personally, the answer is something like free will makes love more meaningful, or the world is more interesting that way, or there’s the cop out that we cannot know the will of God. Whatever the case I would have loved to hear Jonathan actually respond to the question instead of just dismissing it saying “well that’s not the world we live in so that’s not a useful question.” It’s frustrating but maybe I’m missing something. Otherwise great conversation!
Yeshua bless us all ❤😊✝️
“A helper for you”: it isn’t helper but FOR that could be an opponent. It could be rendered against. A helper against you
Exactly
Is a “helper” against you a helper?
Anti-helper… got it.
@@bobbydobalina best kind. Beneficial adversary
@@bobbydobalina that’s how the hemispheres of our brain work. “The Master and his Emissary”
Alex is Iain McGilchrists emissary (left-hemisphere) and Pageau is the master (right-hemisphere)
As are many of the detractors in the comments (but much, much more intensely).
My thoughts exactly.
@Alex O'Connor, just a helpful little tip: if you press your tounge strongly against your upper palate the urge to sneeze will go away very quickly. I use this whenever I have to speak publicly.
This was a great conversation, very interesting to hear and both were very respectful towards each other.
It felt that it took time for Jonathan to get to the core of Alex's questions simply because both have fundamentally different views of reality and are trying to solve a fundamentally different problem: Jonathan see God, the nature of God, and the accounts of the Bible as factual pieces of the puzzle we call reality, and need to connect all of them to make sense of it. Because what if scenarios are not true in his world view, it doesn't fit in the puzzle so there's no point in wasting time on it, and that's why he call himself "more of a realist". Alex, however, see all of the above as simply hypothesis, including the very existence of God and their all good nature, and what if scenarios help with testing if those hypothesis are coherent, to find if there are maybe other hypothesis that have better explanatory power.
But even if I disagree with his world view, being atheist, Jonathan's explanation were very clear and pretty insightful on the views of orthodox Christians, and presented some new interpretations of Bible symbolism that I didn't know or have thought about, being raised catholic. I'd definitely watch another episode with him as a guest.
58 mins in and This is deep 🔥. Jonathan really gracious in giving this info for free. I think part of the fundamental problem here is that Alex doesnt believe in free will, and so the idea of chaos and order being necessary for change or the great dance of life as Lewis might have described seems unnecessary.
Being a materialist, literalist, and fundamentalist hampers his ability to understand. I can see from his other videos, it literally blinds him from ascending to truth. He tries to grasp God in his head which is impossible. Since belief is based on faith and reason, there is also a supernatural component to which he does not believe.
giving out worthless platitudes for free is not being gracious, it is being annoying.
@@realGBx64noted brother.
Frustrated that Jonathan didn't get Alex's point. Jonathan keeps on pointing to the gap that is. Question should have been "Why did God not create the universe without the gap?"
Yeah, I'm from Jonathan's audience, but Alex's question was (which he also disappointedly didn't articulate clearly enough): 'why did God fuck up in this whole Creation thing though? And then why now trust this God that seemingly fucked up?' Of course Jonathan did give some of the right answer: 'you can live in Paradise right now, no one's stopping you.' (Of course that possibility was afforded by all the events of Jesus's life, but who really cares where it's from if it's available and usable.)
And then we can investigate whether and how it's possible to live in Paradise right now for us. (Btw I think Jonathan would argue that that's how the return will actually happen eschatologically, by individuals returning to this Paradisal state.)
"Why did God not create a square circle?"
@@emilem4338 If a squared circle didn't bring evil into his creation, then why not?
@@Kazeshini25663 the point is there is no Creation without evil
In French, it's "à tes souhaits" ("for your wishes") after your first sneeze, and "à tes amours" ("for your loves") after a second.
Usually after a third sneeze people say "à ta mort" (for/to your death) lol
@@eternalbattle1438 à tes aïeux !
@@eternalbattle1438 🤣
never heard the second one lol
I would like this part to be a sneeze world replies section ;) In Poland it is "na zdrowie" ( literary "for your health") no matter how many times one sneeze. In Zizek style when someone sneeze you can jokingly tell "sto lat ciężkich robót" ( "one hundread years of hard labour" :) ) One hundread years - this part suggest long life but it goes in a different direction in the second part as cheeky slav does ;):)
That was gentlemanly conversation. Yet such an unsatisfactory ending.
1:06:30
To answer Alex's question in a more clear way:
Asking what if eve didn't eat the fruit is not like asking a historian what would've happened had historical events been diffrent. These are metaphysical truths not set events.
A comparison with a mathematician is a clearer example. What if 2+2=5 is a more appropriate question. Here you can see why this question is so confusing and the answer Jonathan gives is so underwhelming. The only appropriate response would be, if I gave you two apples then gave you two more, you'd have 5. Obviously, that doesn't make any sense and is just incohesive all around.
How do you know they are metaphysical truths? Seriously... the only answer you can give is that somebody told you. Can't that somebody be wrong?
@TheRealShrike This was the work or Carl Jung and the early depth psychologists. Through interpretation of mythological texts and searching for patterns and understanding that things necessarily exist in opposites he was able to "unlock" metaphysical truths hidden in the unconscious.
Metaphysical truths is far too strong a word. Maybe they found things useful in therapy. Jung's work is controversial.
@TheRealShrike I urge you to look into it. Jung was honestly just a much smarter Richard Dawkins. They follow VERY similar paths and memes are just a shitty version or what Jung called archetypes. And the term "metaphysical truths" are as true as 2+2=4. Sure there is no true way to 100% know but they are very comparable.
@@TheRealShrikeDo you mean there's no way for us to recognise metaphysical truths, we just have to take someone else's word for it?
Adam & Eve. Such a stupid fable; I don't know why we bother debating it. God is supposed to know everything. Therefore, he knew that Eve would eat the fruit, so how was it a test when he knew the outcome? Why would a god set somebody up for a test to see what they will do when he already knows the answer? It makes absolutely no sense at all. Same goes for the Abraham/Son thing. Well surely the god knew the outcome, so how was it a test of faith?
Jonathan Pageau needs to let Alex finish what he's trying to say...
I detest Pegeau.... and his r*tarded brain. I wish Alex would have confronted him on all his subjective garbage interpretations.
Fascinating subject Alex, would be great to hear other discussions on this topic
I would have loved to hear the question "what did God intend to happen".