The purpose of beliefs and ideology is to create a weltanschauung that is able to answer any question or challenge posed to it. Ideology is a system which we are to conform to. When faced with questions one’s weltanschauung is unable to answer, the individual is either forced to admit that their ideology (or their understanding or praxis) is incomplete, or they invent a new answer to justify their beliefs, irregardless if their answer is found in their belief system. Either way, their individual weltanschauung has been falsified, even if their actually ideology remains unchallenged. An ideology, belief system, or philosophy only has value if it has explanatory power. A system which is able to interface with more fields and answer more questions is truer than one that cannot. As Truth is objective and a being, ultimately certain ideologies are truer than others, with ultimately there being only one single True ideology and belief system. I say this not to espouse exceptionalism or supremacy, but as a necessity of my own weltanschauung which attempts to place God above all in all regards. I know there are many people who do not share my particular beliefs, and on an objective level I believe them to be wrong, but this does not mean they are my enemy. There are many people whom I could say are close to sharing my weltanschauung, but regarding the points in which we differ I presume my correctitude. Now admittedly, this statement sounds exceedingly arrogant. However, I will be the first to admit that I have made innumerable errors over the years and have believed many falsehoods. Yet, regarding the inerrancy of belief, it is essential we all believe that what we maintain as truth is True. If you do not believe what you espouse to be True, then I will not waste my time engaging with you. If your belief, your faith is so weak that you feel the need to apologize or discredit your own views with doubt so as to make them palatable to me, then they have no merit. Every belief should be a thesis, one in which we can defend, not feelings of fluidity which one does not truly believe or internalize. If you do not sincerely believe what you espouse, then why should I even consider your points? Give me your best and if your weltanschauung has more explanatory power than my own, I shall be won over.
If one’s beliefs are True, then you should have enough self-respect to want to see them enacted universally. This again comes to the objectivity of Truth. How this universality is achieved can vary. I do not believe the Truth needs to be forced upon people, as I understand Truth to be irresistible once it is known. Of course there are those who war against Truth, the Logos, but I believe such elements only end up justifying Truth in their opposition and war against it. Furthermore, in such a war of all against all, they are ultimately impotent and will find themselves utterly destroyed, having cut themselves off from that which sustains their very existence. What form the consequences that their separation from the Divine in this life takes is particularized. Personal sin is a possible example, but also is state persecution and annihilation. This is not to say that God normatively directs His people to destroy others (although this has happened in the Old Testament), but that when a collective or individual actively and deliberately separates themselves from God, they cease to be co-energized and sustained by Him, thus engaging in actions which result in their persecution by secular forces. If one hates God, he will also hate man and thus commit actions against men, which the state has been empowered to prosecute.
Everything we believe should have at its source the divine. God is the source and creator of all things, and the Father is the source of the Trinity. Thus everything we do should be related to the Father through Christ the Son, as has been ordained by the cosmic mystery of the Incarnation. But what does this actually mean? To answer this, I look to the philosophies of René Guénon and Julius Evola. Not that the philosophies these men espoused are correct or the Truth, but rather their metaphysical instincts and commitment to an authentically transcendental praxis is something which we should emulate. For example, both Guénon and Evola rejected science upon metaphysical grounds. Evola (regarding the theory of evolution in particular) rejected science because it presupposes the existence and value of progress, of things moving from simplicity to complexity, inferiority to complexity. In Evola’s metaphysics, the universe is in decline as a result of entropy, and what moderns call progress is the divorcing of the human soul from the divine creator and sustainer. I am less versed in Guénon’s beliefs, but from what I read, Guénon saw science as an endeavour to understand the universe by breaking it down to its constituent components, to attempt to learn about the whole from studying the particular. Guénon believed the reverse; to know the whole we must study the whole itself, and through that the particular will come to be understood. Thus, with God as the creator of natural laws and forces, to understand nature and creation we are to not only study God academically and come to a knowledge of and about Him exclusively (which was the error of the Catholic scholastic theologians of the Middle Ages), but to know Him personally and be united to Him through his divinizing energies. Thus, to understand the universe and its order we are to enter into an intimate relationship with God, to walk with Him in the cool of the evening through the garden.
Thus, I metaphysically reject science and scientific knowledge. Sure, science may be able to get some things correct, and it may tell fascinating stories. I for example love Darwin and evolutionary theory. I even think natural selection is true to some degree. But when evolutionary biologists claim that a butterfly’s markings came about to emulate eyes so as to scare off predators, they essentially falsify their atheistic weltanschauung. There is no purpose, meaning, or intention to evolution. A butterfly’s markings may happen to look like eyes to us, but to claim intentionality or purpose is to imply the existence of a sentient force directing evolution. Humans are pattern seeking, so just as we see eyes on butterflies, we see animals in cloud formations. Some butterflies happen to have spots which look like eyes to us. That is what the evolutionist should say, instead they wax eloquently on about the infallibility of natural forces and the creativity of evolution. Again, evolution is great, even compelling story, but to me that is all it is. Not that evolution and science being stories is a bad thing. I have learned much from fiction, but it is ill advised to base one’s life choices and identity around fictional stories. My enjoyment of science is similar to my enjoyment of a C.S. Lewis or Tolkien novel. Regarding an actually study of natural laws and forces, I prefer the term natural philosophy, as philosophy implies logical order and the existence of a logical mind from which it stems. Creation has been redeemed through the blood of Christ on the cross. Christ’s blood fell from His body and was absorbed by the earth. Creation likewise has been baptized twice: first in water during the Great Flood, to purify it from sin and corruption, and second in Spirit through the blood of Christ so that it may be sanctified, made holy, and united to the Logos by whom it was created. Thus, to know God is to understand His creation, and to appreciate and understand creation is to be directed to him.
Likewise regarding human organization our starting premise should be that of God. Democracy is the politics of dust and matter whereas Monarchy is the politics of God. Monarchy is derived from the monarchy of the Father, even in non-Christian monarchies. This is because monarchy is patterned on the family, which is patterned on the relationship of the persons of the Trinity. Thus, intuitively mankind is drawn to create monarchies or systems like it to enact that which they ontologically know is right and ordered. Power is hierarchical and flows in only one direction. God is the source of all power, and thus earthly powered is bestowed upon leaders by God Himself. Democracy is a denial of God because it presupposes a petite power of divinity innate in all people, separate and detached from God. I am “god” therefore I have freedoms and rights. Some Christians will skirt around this by claiming that rights and freedoms are given to all by God, and thus democracy is Christian. The fallacy here is that freedom and rights are a faculty, not a human trait. We have “freedom” not because we are free, but because we do that which is right. Freedom is an attribute of God not man, because only God is able to act in complete righteousness. Thus, freedom is a faculty bestowed on individuals of quality, not on the masses, the quantity (taken from Guénon’s thought). Therefore, an authentic politics must reflect quality and hierarchy and not the masses, which despite beliefs to the contrary, do not possess freedom or a unified will. The masses may practice or strive for freedom in regard to their personal lives and choices. However, they are not innately free beings, and thus their elevation to political prominence through democracy represents a degradation from transcendence and divinity to that of the contemporary and mundane. A democratic people is one which has been politically separated from God, even as they may be faithful Orthodox Christians. Likewise, fascism and Nationalism Socialism, which claim to rule because of a national will, still rule based upon democratic ideals and principles even if no election is ever held. The monarch is unique because he is not only chosen by God to rule (as all leaders are on some level chosen by God, Romans 13:1-6), but because he has been set aside, spiritually sanctified and sacramentally united to God and His power through the Holy Mystery of coronation. Thus, the power of the king is equal to that of the bishop as both receive direct authority and power from God, with the former receiving God’s secular power and authority and the latter, spiritual. However, in this life where the secular existence is more present, the power of the king takes precedence over the bishop’s, but as the secular power of the king is spiritual in origin, the king’s spiritual power is still divinely justified and is divine. Thus, through the king spiritual and secular power are united, just as in Christ humanity and the Divine are united.
To conclude, atheists, but particularly Muslims, like to employ Matthew 21:18-22 as a prooftext against the divinity of Christ. The passage reads:
Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered. And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away. And when the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, How soon is the fig tree withered away! Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.
Essentially their claim is that the killing of the tree was immoral and that such an act demonstrates that Christ possessed blameworthy passions and was unable to control them. Of course this interpretation is incorrect. The Logos is that which sustains all creation, and creation reflects the Logos in itself through the logoi. The logoi are principles which govern and reveal the purpose and order of creation, which relate to the Creator. Humans likewise reflect the divine presence. The more one knows and is united to God, the more God is reflected and visible in them. Creation recognizes this fact, which is why our Church has saints who were able to tame and befriend wild animals. Holy men like St. Seraphim of Sarov were able to draw creation to themselves because animals such as bears where able to recognize in him the presence of their creator, and in St. Seraphim’s presence they reverted back to the continence they knew in the Garden of Eden before the fall. Nature is co-energized with man, as we co-energize with God. Thus, God through man is able to restore the original state of creation and have it be offered to Him through mankind, who serve as God’s royal priesthood: royal, in regard to dominion, and priest in regard to us offering to God that which is His. Thus, creation comes to mirror the state of humanity. If we are close to God, creation is good and fulfills its function according to the will of the Logos. If we are distant from God or even war against Him, nature will become our enemy. I do not believe in the “science” of anthropogenic climate change, however I do believe that sin will cause the land to war against us, and as Scripture states “that the land spue not you out also, when ye defile it, as it spued out the nations that were before you,” (Leviticus 18:28 KJV). I do believe that creation will reflect back towards us what our present state of spiritual being is. Creation is thus saved and brought into communion to God through and by us. The fig tree that Christ encountered had been in an environment of such sin that its logoi had degenerated because of the sin of the people who inhabited that locality. It was a living symbol of their sin. So damaged was this fig tree that even in the presence of the Logos Himself, it was unable to fulfill its ordained function. However, as the Logos is that which sustains all, what Christ did was not “kill the tree” but rather cut it off from the energies which sustained it. The tree may have been well physically, and it may have even produced fruit at a later day, but its “sin” was that it could not recognize the Logos even as He was before it, thus it was already dead spiritually and Christ simply acknowledged the reality which humanity had established and which the tree embodied. Humanity had cut the tree off from God, and thus God stopped sustaining the existence of the tree. Therefore, this passage is warning and a promise to us. The warning is evident, but Christ’s promise is that united to Him, all that He wills shall be possible for us. Mountains will not move because we will them to alone, but because Christ with us wills them to and because Christ wills to have us be His instrument for that purpose.
My books are available here: https://www.amazon.com/s?i=stripbooks&rh=p_27%3AElwin+Ransom&s=relevancerank&text=Elwin+Ransom&ref=dp_byline_sr_book_1
If you are able to donate I would welcome your support on Patreon or via the crypto wallets below: https://www.patreon.com/godkingandnation
Bitcoin: bc1q3q8qaff3d2zllj3yx7jtszrs349xv4av2r8mg3
Ethererum: 0x072E4EE9268AfAA436A8f4BBdAF775b28007eCD4