"We are as gods and might as well get good at it. “ - Opening page of Whole Earth Catalog, Stewart Brand
THE DEIFICATION OF MAN
If the universe is following an arc from material to pneumaterial, what about the atomic and intimate building block: ourselves?
Simply put, do we, can we, should we see our lives moving in a direction? And towards what conclusion?
At the universe scale: there was creation of the material, there is Jesus ushering in the Kingdom, and there will be the end, when all is put under submission and in union with the Godhead. And this same path is the path God wants for us individually as well.
We are born into the material, we desire relationship with God, we want to become more like Him, He gives us His Spirit, and in the end we will be united with Him.
The same story that is playing out at cosmic scale, is playing out in our lives. We are on a journey of becoming.
What is the point of being a Christian? "Why am I here?" Is it getting saved? Or is it becoming like God?
Salvation is the key that unlocks the possibility of sanctification. God's acceptance of us, and our acceptance of that acceptance, creates the space for his Spirit and makes us new creatures. Salvation is not the end, it is the beginning. Salvation is not the arrow, it is the bow. Salvation is not the end of our commission to "make disciples", it is only the first step.
To "convert souls'' is an Eden-like protological impulse. It's not bad, but we can't stop there. We must push on to "make disciples", which is a New Jerusalem like eschatological impulse. God's hope for your life is not just to forgive your sins, His hope for your life is enabled through the forgiveness of sins. Getting saved is simply not the entire point of your life.
Our aim is Theosis, the process of attaining union with God; the deification of ourselves and others through the transformative power of God. The Gospel working out in our lives transforms us; we are born again. None of this is new; but all of this is rarely talked about, at least so clearly. How are we to spend our lives? Becoming more like God, and spreading the power of that into the world through action. These ideas are not new.
When we become believers we drink spiritual milk, and then we move on to more. Faith is a progression, as Paul says in Philippians 1:25, "Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith,".
In entering into faith, we become partakers in the divine nature. These are not my ideas - Peter says literally this.
"His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." - 2 Peter 3:1-11
We are called brothers, sisters, and heirs. Our aim is not to rival God, in a tower of Babel sense. The impulse of the builders of Babel were not wrong - they wanted to be in the presence of God. They wanted to share in the divine essence. But their method was blasphemous. They took it upon their own power, instead of asking God in humility. But we don't need to force our way or earn it; God is calling to us. We don’t need to go up, God wanted to come down.
Our calling is to co-reign with Christ by being filled with God. And these ideas have been known in Christianity from the earliest centuries. St Athanasius in the 3rd century said "He became man that we might be made gods."
Do you know all that God has called you to? We are:
"a chosen people, a royal priesthood" - 1 Peter 2:9
We are gods. As Jesus said:
"Is it not written in your Law, I said, 'you are gods'?" - John 10:34 quoting Psalm 82:6
And Paul says many times:
"you may be filled with all the fullness of God." - Ephesians 3:19
"In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit." - Ephesians 2:22
"we have the mind of Christ." - 1 Corinthians 2:16
We are sons and heirs.
"But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God." - Galatians 4:4-7
We are temples and therefore the dwelling place of God.
"Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?" - 1 Corinthians 3:16
God asks us to participate in the process of holiness; of our body and our spirit.
"Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God." - 2 Corinthians 7:1
He asks us to, in the course of our lives, become more renewed.
"So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day." - 2 Corinthians 4:16
"And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another " 2 Corinthians 3:18
"For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." - 1 Corinthians 1:18
"I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification." - Romans 6:19
We must practice the way of progress and becoming in ourselves. Salvation happens in a moment, but sanctification is a lifetime commitment to respond to the calling of God. We must continue along the journey that God has set out for us and called us to.
MAKING PEOPLE MORE LIKE THEY SHOULD BE
A key question then is: "how do we make ourselves more like we should be?" In this journey of becoming towards theosis and deification... how do we actually do it?
The simplest answer is that we should become who God wants us to uniquely be. An immediate observation is that God makes us uniquely: he made us to not compete with others for identity, yet we naturally do the opposite. While we should be imitating God, we instead imitate other people.
Imitating others is natural. Aristotle knew this: “inherent in man from his earliest days; he differs from other animals in that he is the most imitative of all creatures, and he learns his earliest lessons by imitation.”
Jesus, the image of the perfect human, in perfect unity with his Father, is deeply imitative. Jesus says:
"Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise." - John 5:19
Another world for imitation is mimesis. We "mime" others and through miming others we put on their desires and take them for ourselves. It starts from 2 toddlers happily playing with different toys inevitably wanting the same toy and fighting for it. It’s the grass is greener, and keeping up with the Joneses. Advertising is only valuable for this reason – humans seem to almost always inherit desire – whether from a friend, neighbor, or magazine. Jesus warns against this directly in Luke 12:15, "Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions."
A hallmark of this mimetic rivalry is that the object of their desire becomes secondary to winning. The toddler doesn’t want the toy – the toddler wants to win. Solomon used precisely this axiom when he proposed to divide the child in half. The false mother did not care if the child was cut in two – she just wanted to win. People become insane when they are locked in-step in mimetic desire. They are obsessed with their competitor and they start to look more and more alike. Of course this “alikeness” only escalates the conflict until the only solution is “this town is not big enough for the two of us.” Violence. Death.
"What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel" - James 4:1-2
The imitation of man, homo-mimesis, and the imitation of God, theo-mimesis are antithetical. "You can not love God and money." - Matthew 6:24. Imitation is unavoidable, you must be a slave to someone.
We all believe that we want what God wants for our lives, but when we examine our desires we find them mostly inherited from our family, friends, or heroes.
This battle between horizontal mimetic desire and vertical mimetic desire is something we all experience. The apostle Paul calls it 'flesh and spirit.' Author Seth Godin calls it 'the daemon and the resistance.' Oscar Wilde says 'be yourself, everyone else is already taken.' Abraham Lincoln says, 'Every man is born an original, but sadly most men die copies.' Both myth and history share the same story and often the same conclusions. We must escape horizontal mimesis.
Parents know that what starts at miming desire, quickly leads to tears and hitting. Imitation of humans leads to rivalrous violence.
We see clear evidence of this in the mimetic mob. Ideas that spread like wildfire have things in common. They have a frenetic and deranged quality. Dissidents are cast out. Wearing the same thing, talking the same way are supremely important. Life it seems is a playing out of "middle school never ends."
The modern attempt at escaping mimesis is "being true to yourself." Which is an attempt at self-referential mimesis. This is the belief popularized by Ayn Rand and her philosophy of Objectivism. This is either impossible (as a prime-mover act of zero to one) or a strange mystical paradox. The goal is the same however - to escape horizontal mimesis, which is the essence of conflict and violence. And we should escape not only the circumstances where mimetic rivalry plays out, but also the mindset from where it begins. The self-help section will tell you to be true to yourself, but their conclusion is to copy how they became true to themselves.
The imitation of God is different. We imitate God through getting to know him, by loving him. And when we know him we are able to see what he wants for the world. God is not interested in pitting us against others - he does not give competitive missions. We become like God through loving him. And through loving him, we find our true potential.
The Christian solution to humans copying each other and that leading to conflict is humans imitating God by being Christians, "little-Christs" or the imitation of the Saints (who are imitating Christ). As Paul says:
Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. - 1 Corinthians 11:1
While the imitation of man leads to violence, the imitation of God leads to love. God won't compete with us - his love is sacrificial and unconditional. When we strive toward becoming like God, we inherit his eyes for the world and his eyes for ourselves. The gospel does not come into the world through a military campaign, it comes through martyrdom. The greatest love is this - that one should give us his life for his friend.
"But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness." - Ephesians 4:20-24
How do we make ourselves more like we should be? We imitate God. Or for those that remember Sunday School, "Love Jesus and be like Him"
Consider the 10 commandments. Every commandment is focused around centering people on theomimesis, the imitation of God, and breaking them of homomimesis, the imitation of man, and it’s damaging consequences. The 10 commandments opens with “Love the Lord God” and ends with “Do not covet”. These truths are not new, but they have been hidden for a long time.
What does it mean to be like God? We have unlimited capacity for action: free-will, we have unlimited capacity for wisdom. This is the direction of our growth. To grow in free-will and to grow in wisdom about how to use it.
What is the key to making others more like they should be? Love. "And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near." - Hebrews 10:24
Beyond cliche, unconditional love gives another a safe mimetic model. Imitation is unavoidable, but in the strange loop of imitating a person who loves us perfectly, we find the ability to see ourselves as we truly are and love ourselves as we truly are. It is through love that we release the potential in others and give them free will.
THE ONE WHO THRIVES
If you've met her, you know her.
Her eyes are so clear and vivid.
Her brow is not furrowed in sorrow.
Her posture leans in to you. Her spirit is patient and kind.
She makes you feel at ease and loved. She speaks wisdom.
Her laugh is pure and joyous.
She has escaped violence and rivalry, and has joined those who wonder, love, and explore.
Her chains of fear have been broken, she plays through life.
Safety and comfort are no longer her gods, God stands alone.
God is in control, nothing is that dire or serious.
So she smiles without ceasing, not always a toothy grin, but always in her eyes.
She is free.
Her career is nothing close to mine - yet I want to be like her.
And I think that's because I want to be like Jesus.
Her spirit screams love. Maybe you know her.
I wrote this about a friend of mine.
"There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love" - 1 John 4:18 (KJV)
THE CASE FOR FREE WILL
We are called to imitate God and in that way share in the divine energy.
If homomimesis is mainly characterized by the imitation of others, then a most notable aspect is its slavery to the desires of others. What then can we say about theomimesis? It breaks those chains.
Theomimesis releases us from the imitation of others by giving us the ability to imitate God. And in that way it delivers us from the chains of slavery of the world, and give us the freedom that is found in God. For this reason, freedom and free will is core to the Christian vision of humanity.
Freedom is a Christian virtue. More than that, it is the direction of our calling.
"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery" - Galatians 5:1
and further on we read,
"You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh ; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other. So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law." - Galatians 5:13-18
"where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom" - 2 Corinthians 3:17
The mechanism here is fascinating and I don't claim to have all the answers.
If homomimesis leads to violence, theomimesis leads to freedom. The mechanism by which homomimesis leads to violence is well explored. When you imitate another person, you end up having competing desires, and that leads to a rivalry that goes far beyond the original shared desire. The mechanism of theomimesis is far less explored. If homomimesis is defined by imitating another's selfish desires, then theomimesis could be defined as imitating another's selfless, perfect love, desires. If homomimesis leads to competition, then theomimesis leads to sacrifice.
Through imitating the selfless God, we have for the first time the ability to imitate someone who actually loves us selflessly and so in that way are able to selflessly love ourselves for the first time as well.
This is a strange loop: by imitating God we are able to love ourselves and others more, which enables us to imitate God better. Douglas Hofstaeder, a cybernetician made famous by his book Gödel, Escher, Bach, calls these strange loops the very basis of consciousness and intelligence. Through the strange loop of theomimesis, we actually become alive. We wake up. We are born again.
What if that loop were perfected? Could there be something to being made in the image of God that hints at this?
If we define the exercising of free will as action, we find a clue in Jonathan Edwards theory of the trinity. God is perfect and Jesus is God’s perfect self-reference. We find the key axiom of consciousness, a strange loop, in the definition of God as Trinity. The relationship between God and Jesus is so perfectly referential that it achieves an escape velocity in the outpouring that love – which is the word, the pneuma, the Holy Spirit. Similarly when we imitate Jesus, as Christians / little Christs, we achieve an escape velocity outpouring of the pneuma in and through our lives. Perhaps what it means for man to be “made in the image of God” is that we are made mimetically.
Imitation is unavoidable, but in the strange loop of imitating a person who loves us perfectly, we find the ability to see ourselves as we truly are and love ourselves as we truly are. Free will then is never a result of isolation, but always loving community. Free will is activated in you through another’s unconditional love for you and your acceptance of that through imitation. So freedom is found in slavery. Paradox. I think if we look at life – this seems true. People going through a hard time do not need to go deeper into their minds, or need some dollars to escape it. They need another person to love them unconditionally.
Free will is core to man. Free will is unlocked by escaping rivalrous mimesis and is enabled by accepting the unconditional love of another. The true object of free will is love - because love can never be rivalrous. This is the secret to life that is embedded in every great story and told by every great leader.
Free will is not enough, we must also have the tools to multiply it, and the wisdom to wield it. Furthermore, we must have the culture and systems to encourage and nurture it.
THE ETHIC OF MAXIMIZING FREE WILL
"He came because he is at heart a listener and a searcher for some transcendent realm beyond himself." - Loren Eiseley
The imitation of other humans is bad. It is bad primarily because it removes free will. Instead of making a decision from first principles - we blindly copy another. Free will, whether evolved or divinely breathed, is that which makes us human. It is what makes us, as Francis Schaeffer would say, dignified as a species and individuals.
Things which increase free will are good, and things which decrease free will are bad. The output of homomimesis is competition and it is obsessed with removing the free will of others (and oneself). The output of theomimesis is love and is obsessed with increasing the free will of others (and oneself). While all humans have the capacity for free will - do most of us actually use it?
When put into practice, this seems obvious. Democracy is better than fascism because you have more options, not just one. We all agree it's better when someone can choose their career or spouse instead of being assigned one. Murder may increase your free will, but it significantly decreases the free will of your victim - in fact - it is the ultimate crime in that it removes all possibility of future free will. We as humans have two goals: to increase the free will of ourselves and others, and to help teach people how to use their free will well.
The dream that self-help sells is the life that theomimesis is. It is a life free from rules, and constraints. It is pura vida. It is full of light burdens, open handed dreams and adventure. Freedom.
This also gives us a clue about free will. We asked at the beginning “does it exist” and if so “what is it” and “do all humans have it implicitly”. Assuming we can trust our most basic experiences, we all experience free will. We feel like we have free will. If we have a good God – then this is a trustworthy thing. So if we feel we have it – then we do. But I think that exercising free will is very different from having it. If free will is like a muscle, then if you don’t use it - you lose it! How does one use it?
"that freedom is not defined as the lack of restraints, the “don’t tread on me” liberty that is so congenial to Americans… and this freedom is not defined as the license to do and create whatever we wish, the freedom of Prometheus for example. Rather, this freedom is defined by imagination, the capacity to imagine what is not actual and to take that imagination seriously" - Philip Hefner
What is the purpose of life? To extend the free will of others. How do you do that? Love them unconditionally and show how God does too. That is the ultimate gift; bringing them out of the cave and into the light. Knowledge itself can not achieve this - it is mimesis and the knowledge that flows out of the mimesis of loving relationship.
Our responsibility in the world is to express our free will through loving action in order to increase the free will of others.
Postscript
This post is dedicated to René Girard who is now with Christ.
