[Before his conversion, Paul was not so different from other members of the Jewish elite. He yearned for recognition, not for material goods.
What type of recognition?
Paul wanted to be recognized as more righteous than his peers.
He was not covetous, like those other grasping elites.
Oh yes, he was better.
He enforced the Law.]
Summary of text [comment] page 83
The New Testament develops this theme.
The Son of God invites us to the service of his Father.
The Son of God challenges our bondage to elites whose demands can never be satisfied.
Instead, our service to YHWH is presented as an exercise of freedom.
[In the graciousness of a Persian king, a remnant returned.
They built the second temple in Jerusalem.
Could this devotion be described as ‘bondage’?
No and yes.
No, the individual is ruled by YHWH.
Yes, the individual is ruled by an elite who claims to speak for God.]
[In Babylon, the exiles lost everything, except their values and their desires for YHWH.
In America, the exiles gained everything and lost their values and desires for YHWH.
What will happen now, once again, depends on Persia.]
[A recommended electronic text in regards to the Progressive word-based mind:
James Ostrowski, Progressivism: A Primer on the Idea Destroying America, 2014, Buffalo, New York: Cazenovia Books, first edition, ISBN 978-0974253-87]
Summary of text [comment] page 83
[Schoonenberg moved to another facet of virtue and sin.]
According to Paul, sin rules in “man” and over “man” through concupiscence.
Schoonenberg quoted Paul’s Letter to the Romans 7:17. His sinful deeds “are not done by I, but by the sin that dwells in me.”
Paul is in bondage to a sinful attitude that renders him powerlessness.]
[So the question becomes: How do I redeem the spiritual spark that makes up my true self?
Redemption is promised through secret knowledge (gnosis) that guides the ascent of the soul.]
[Today, in the third and fourth generation after Schoonenberg wrote, ‘the symbolic order of big government liberalism’ is … unzipping.
Schoonenberg aimed to show that another Scriptural contrast, ‘the whole person against God’s law’, could support the actuality of the term ‘concupiscence’.
Today, his work stands in testimony to fully zipped Modernism.]
[These scenarios dramatically increase the weirdness of New Testament.
God’s Incarnation occurred precisely at the juncture when oppositions within the Jewish and Roman societies were … um … unzipping.
Their languages were coming undone.
Their political systems were fundamentally transforming.
Jesus preached to third generation.
His resurrection was preached to the fourth.]
[In the early 7760s, Schoonenberg wrote on the cusp.
During and after the second battle of the enlightenment gods (The Hot Battle of the Fraternalist Ideologies: 7738-7745 U0’). A Progressive religion attained sovereign power in the USA. It had not consolidated power. It was the first generation of a new idolatry.
Schoonenberg was unaware that a change in the symbolic order constitutes an opening of the mythos.
In the USA, big government liberalism changed the meaning of the words of classical liberalism. Big government liberalism won the third battle of the enlightenment gods (The Cold Battle of the Materialist Ideologies 7745-7789 U0’). The American people lost that battle. Classical liberalism was eclipsed.
It does not matter what causes the change of a symbolic order, whether a discrepancy between lawdenial and lawacceptance, bureaucratic veiling of original meanings, apparent contradictions within the symbolic order itself, God punishing the iniquity of the parents in later generations, two civilizations making contact, the trauma of plague or war, migrations, and so on. The change in the symbolic order is mythic.
The system of differences changes.
Language changes.
Confusion deepens.
Novel meanings, presences and messages are revealed.]
