08/4/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 24 of 27)

0296 What happened to American literature?

Does it transform into some disorienting house of mirrors.

Does propaganda constitute the new American written word, just like the moving pictures?

0297 Here is a diagram of how this new literary style might operate.

A new American literature_2bfserves as the embodiment_2bf of big government (il)liberalism_2bm.

0298 Chapter 47 discusses The Moynihan Report.

In 1965, the Catholic Assistant Secretary of Labor, Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927-2003), releases a report concerning why blacks (a category of the big(il)libs) are not as economically successful as whites (another category of the big(il)libs). The primary reason is broken families (which are the products of a separate big(il)lib agenda, called “sexual liberation”). Sexual liberation produces broken, fatherless, families, which then must be supported by federal programs with titles such as “welfare for families with dependent children” (a big(il)lib program). The result is a cycle where the children of welfare families end up as… um… welfare-seeking heads of families with dependent children.

0299 Jones has already written extensively on this topic.

But, does he realize that the public responses to this report constitute a new genre of American fiction?

0300 The Moynihan Report is immediately opposed by big(il)lib establishment figures such as Robert W. Spike (1923-1966), then executive director of the National Churches’ Commission on Religion and Race. Author of The Freedom Revolution and the Churches, he calls for a political solution. The “whites” need to expiate their guilt. Or, something like that.

0301 To me, if this doesn’t sound like a new American fiction, I don’t know what does.

Pity the reverend who has a control file at the disposal of someone with money and power.

Pity the fellow who speaks up, then is served a lawsuit about some… how shall I say it?.. episode of sexual liberation, whether true or not.

0302 This is the literary genre of manufacturing consent.

Stereotypes_2am are like esse_ce. They constitute a new (virtual) wilderness where human dispositions_1a are subject to literary and cinematic manipulation. Our attitudes_2af are like the essence that stands between human structure_3a and our evolved dispositions_1a.

The content-level category-based nested form with the normal context of making influence_3a is also like esse_ce. Making influence_3a is the normal context for a cognitive wilderness_2a arising from the potential of ‘selling a product or agenda’_1a. Both the normal context_3a and the potential_1a are sign-interpretants of a sign-vehicle, a perspective-level actuality_2c that stands behind the curtain_2b (so to speak) of stereotypes_2am, attitudes_2af, expert self-regard_2bm and the literature of… what?

What is the appropriate label for this new American genre?

0303 Chapter 48 concerns critical race theory and the destruction of American identity.

Can I locate the sought-after label within these concerns?

0304 Jones writes about the subversion of Catholic identity in the ethnic neighborhoods of Philadelphia.

The intelligensia_2bm – the literary classes – now refer to the people who used to live in those neighborhoods as “white”_2bf. The unspoken accusation is that these “whites_2am” are the reason why “blacks_2am” cannot make a living. It is their attitudes_2af. The unspoken accusation covers up the reality that the federal government’s welfare programs have subsidized broken families for generations.

0305 The only promoted remedy is for the federal government to step in and take affirmative action. This generates new expertise and constitutes the (il) of big(il)lib. Freedom of thought for modern expertise_3b is mirrored by an expertise that defines the system_3b through the fiction of legal decrees standing for enforcing morals_2b according to the dictates of ‘an opportunistic modern situational ethics’_1b.

0306 Here is a comparison of the Lost Generation’s and Affirmative Action’s situation level nested forms.

Each term seems to be a variant of the other.

What happens when both these situation-levels are reflections in the mirror of… what?…

0307 If Jones states that critical theory is the nemesis of American Identity, then is something else standing in the mirror of this nemesis?

08/3/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 25 of 27)

0308 The stereotypes of race are “black” and “white”.

The stereotypes of sex are “victim” and “aggressor”.

The stereotypes of gender are “legion” and “straight”.

0309 One stereotype cannot be labeled.

Why?

It is not a stereotype at all. It is as real as the people with money and power_3c, who can make influence_3a and impact_3a in order to sell a product_1a and an agenda_1a. These are the hidden ones, who hire the psychologists and sociologists, to survey the people… or rather, their internet usage… in order to know how their interventions_2c shape attitudes_2af and appear relevant_2af.

Surely, they_3c are looking for opportunities_1c.

0310 These hidden ones are as real as Reverend Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. They matter.

0311 They finance the types that come in “stereo”, as if there are two speakers, but one musical composition in the air.

Shall I play a game with metaphors?

Two speakers (Q and R) mirror one another.

The first speaker_3b (Q) constructs critical theory_2bf and occupies a position of academic renown, complete with a title such as Distinguished So-and-So Chair of the Institute for the Investigation of Whatever Stereotype Needs to Be Promoted. This expertise_3b virtually situates making influence_3a.

The second speaker_3b (R) sets the warp and woof of critical theory. Warp and woof? Let’s not get into the looming machinations in which the actions of academic employment are affirmed. These are the speakers_3b who, by their very presence in academic institutions, constitute a system of surveillance as formidable as any… well… “clerical” apparatus. This expertise_3b makes an impact_3a.

0312 Here is the diagram for the identity_3b and structure_3a of critical theory as nemesis of what it means to be an American (Q). This is the sensible construction of the first speaker_3b.

0313 To me, this big noumenon corresponds to experts_3b that propose valuations_2b that engender opportunities_1c for the Relativist One_3c, as discussed in a separate three-part e-book by Razie Mah, titled Original Sin and the Post-Truth Condition,

This examiner suggests that the literature_2bf of critical theory is a novel genre of American fiction.

Jones’s application of existence (the content level) and essence (the situation level) tells me that making influence_3a is like walking_3a, the actuality of {stereotypes [hidden grammar] our attitudes}_2a is like {the Bible [unifies] us}_2a, and the potential of ‘guiltlessly selling product’_1a is like the potential of ‘whatever carrying a gun intends to defend against’_1a.

0314 Imagine carrying a metaphysical gun_1a that would shoot Cupid before he could wound you with one of his self-annihilating arrows of desire_1a.

This would be the same metaphysical gun_1a that may be used against a critical theorist_2b.

0315 But, what about the people who are peirced_1b by the arrows of critical theories_2bf and then fall in love with the promulgated stereotypes_2am, whose hidden grammar makes the critical fictional forms so relevant_2af (R)?

It is as if they are trapped in the mirror of nemesis.

0316 Here is a picture of the sensible construction of the second speaker_3b (R).

0317 It is as if the believers_3b are like guns_1a.

They_3b are tools that the ones who work the system_3b use to promulgate their self-promoting_2bm literature_2bf.

Believers_3b spout the literature_2bf of the ones with self-regard_2am as if they are legal decrees_2bm, demanding sovereign enforcement_2bf. These legal decrees_2bm pretend that stereotypical fictional matter_2am is relevant_2af enough to make an impact_3a arising from the potential of ‘their adopted agenda’_1a.

0318 Believers vicariously share the working experts’ lack of guilt_1a.

They don’t need to carry guns_1a.

They carry a political agenda_1a.

That agenda_1a makes an impact_3a because operators_3c in the hidden perspective level are flush with money and power_2c and looking for opportunities_1c.

0319 The two diagrams portrayed above constitute America’s contemporary wilderness.

0320 The student should read chapters 50, 51, 52 and 53.

08/1/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 26 of 27)

0321 Welcome to the matrix.

Welcome to a simulated reality constituted by agents that work the system (Q) and minions that believe in the system (R).

The system is always changing, yet always the same, because it lives by cancellation of their opposition. The system replaces a suspect person’s identity_3b with a stereotype_2am that opposes the adopted agenda_1a. The stereotype-tagged guilty one_2af deserves social cancellation_1a (the gun_1a of critical theory).

0322 Jones tells the story of a person who… well… had an old-style American identity.

In the big noumenon, identity_3b virtually situates structure_3a.

In the big noumenon of the nemesis of the American Identity (Q), big(il)lib expertise works the system_3b and virtually situates manufacturing influence_3a.

In the big noumenon of those self-identifying within the mirror of nemesis (R), big(il)lib expertise believes in the system_3b and virtually situates making an impact_3a.

0323 For example, self-regarding racial theorists_2bm (Q) compose literature_2bf that isolates stereotypes_2af that – through an unspoken contiguity called “hidden grammar” – substantiate attitudes_2af within the normal context of making influence_3a and the potential of ‘selling a narrative (that veils the guilt of interventionalists on the perspective level)’_1a.

0324 Oh, did I say “narrative”?

I meant to say, “product”.

0325 For example, educational committees_2bm (R) distill what needs to be enforced_2bf from the fictions of critical theory_2bf. These experts_3b advocate policies_2b in light of what they perceive are political opportunities_1b. In this way, the propaganda_1b underlying the literature_2bf of higher-level authorities_2bm manifests as stereotypes_2af that are regarded as relevant_2bf in the normal context of making an impact_3a operating on the potential of ‘the adopted agenda’_1a.

0326 Allow me to compare critical theory (Q) and the mirroring identity of the big(il)lib believer (R).

Here is a comparison that starts with the situation-level normal context.

0327 On the side of nemesis (Q), the normal context of big(il)lib expertise_3b has the intellectual freedom to “work” the system. Unrestrained intellectual liberty_3b subverts the (old) targeted system (say, the institutional structures_3a of the American Identity of the 1900s), using apparently clever tactics (typical of the manipulation of words in propaganda_1b).

On the side of the mirroring identity (R), the normal context of big(il)lib expertise_3b internalizes the knowledge created by cutting-edge critical theorists_3b. Even though both nemesis and mirror are regarded as experts, there is a matter-of-fact distinction. For example, when a language professor teaches a course informed by the critical theories of Foucault_3b, she contextualizes the French theorist’s proclamations as if they are legal decrees_2bm, carrying the weight of authority_2bm. The students know that the professor will use the opportunities afforded by classwork_1b to enforce_2bf that authority_2bm.

0328 The comparison continues in the following figure.

0329 Here is a reminder. “Big(il)lib” is short for big government (il)liberalism. The bigger the government gets, the more illiberal the self-declared “liberal” will act.

0330 Potential on the situation level_1b situates the entire content-level nested form, particularly the actuality_2a.

0331 On the nemesis side (Q), the technical language of big(il)lib reason_1b yields propaganda_1b which situates the stereotypes_2am that guide our attitudes_2af by way of a hidden grammar. [Hidden grammar] is the contiguity between the matter of stereotypes_2am and the form of our attitudes_2af.

On the side of the mirroring identity (R), the action-oriented language of political opportunity_1b yields advocacy (calls to action)_1b that situate stereotypes as matter_2am and proclaims the importance of the attitudes that stereotypes call for_2af.

0332 The comparison is completed in the following figure.

0333 On the nemesis side (Q), making influence_3a is situated by the potential of propaganda_1b.

On the mirror side (R), making an impact_3a is situated by the potential of political opportunity_1b.

Anyone tagged with one of the old American identities is outside this system. Indeed, the two sides function to sap the resources of those outside their fiction.

0334 On the nemesis side (Q), liberated theorists_3b write the theoretical thought-pieces_2bfthat govern the stereotypes_2am that “speak to” our attitudes_2af.

On the mirror side (R), educated believers_3b derive the laws inherent in those thought pieces_2bf in order to enforce_2bf the realness (not fictionality) of the stereotypes_2am, thereby making them palpably real_2af or “relevant_2af“.

Is that not what good fiction is supposed to do?

0335 Finally, both the nemesis of American Identity and those who mirror the nemesis manifest the potential of having no guilt_1a, just like the Satan, at the opening of John Milton’s Paradise Lost. And, for Americans, that potential is precisely what carrying a gun aims to mitigate.

0336 The student should read the epilogue.

08/1/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 27 of 27)

0337 The colonies expanded into the wilderness of the frontier west.

The states expanded into the wilderness of nature.

The United States of America expanded into the wilderness of empire.

Now, we, the people, expand into the wilderness of a house of mirrors.

0338 The final three chapters and the epilogue convey a sense of resignation. Is the fiction that critical theorists write to be regarded as a comedy or a tragedy? Or is it a liberation or a trap? Nothing is as it appears to be. Not even the author remains undistorted.

0339 Even though Jones does not label the house of mirrors that constitutes Critical Theory “the new postmodern American fiction”. Jones’s treatment of Joe Ritchey tells of someone who was not only canceled, but ruined, because of his American Identity.

0340 Without explicitly asking the question, Jones poses the quandary, “Do the institutions that support critical theory as a way to turn their world into a fiction have historical precedent?”

Which of the following pairs of comparisons does it parallel?

0341 The student is left to formulate an answer to the question.

0342 My own epilogue begins with a cheer for E. Michael Jones for this thought-provoking exercise.

0343 My examination begins with the introduction of a model through which I (the reader in 2026) can appreciate contemporary meaning, presence and message within historic American literature. This is discussed in points 0027-0042.

As it turns out, a big picture of his original model of “existence precedes essence” may be diagrammed as a two-level interscope where identity_3b virtually situates structure_3a.

0344 Here is a picture.

This examination has been informed by a postmodern version of Jones’s Thomistic insight.

0345 What about Jones’s provocative writing style?

Readers from Catholic backgrounds might have a little difficulty accepting the text as written, because it (sort of) sounds like apologetics. My own difficulty? The model application, although consistent, does not shine, as it does in this examination. Jones applies the model. He does not articulate it. In this, my examination adds value to Jones’s text.

Readers from Protestant backgrounds may have serious difficulties with Jones’s text, in so far as the author does not respect Martin Luther, John Calvin, King Henry VIII and other founders. Plus, there is continuous mention of Satan as the hero of John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Plus, Jones seems to have no fondness for the situational import of sola fide, sola scriptura and sola gratia. This slogan situates the title of Jones’s book.

0346 Indeed, the first historical step to the American Identity contains the Protestant slogan as situation level and the title of Jones’s book as content level, as shown below.

0347 A meditation on this nested form tells me that Jones presents a gift to the Protestant and the American. Here is the first expression of the American Identity conforming to the scholastic ideation that existence precedes essence. Existence associates to the content level. Essence associates to the situation level.

At the same time, the esse_ce of scripture_2a is contiguous with the essence of us_2a, as Americans to be.

0348 And the gun?

Is it really a talisman for self-protection from those who pretend to be absolved of the doctrine of original sin, that is, from those who deny the fall of man?

Surely, this question will inspire future inquiry.

0349 Overall, Puritanism (Calvinism) ran its course for a century before the American Revolution. Then the romantic rehabilitation of nature ran its course for a century before the Civil War. Then, the nemesis and its mirror of abolitionist and northern aggressor, democratic theorist and voter-rights advocate, secular scholar and value-free administrator, aggrieved theorist and agenda-pushing educator, and (lest I forget) rabbi and jew, has run its course for a over a century.

What is a good title for the coming end of the current saeculum?

Here is my suggestion.

A Shattering of the House of Mirrors.

Or maybe, A Reconstitution of the American Identity, will do.

0350 My thanks to E. Michael Jones for this work. I hope that this examination adds value to his exposition and serves as a companion for the student interested in the topic.

07/31/26

Semiotics and History: Gnosticism in Modern America (Part 1 of 1)

SaH0047 The following essay, originally written in 2016, comments on a book by a Lutheran Pastor about heretical influences in contemporary American society. The author is Peter Burfeind. The title of the work is Gnostic America: A Reading of Contemporary American Culture according to Christianity’s Oldest Heresy (Pax Domini Press, 2014). Please have this book at hand for the full story.

These comments are not a close reading. They situate Burfeind’s text with category-based models. These models were proposed and developed in How to Define the Word “Religion”, plus Primers 1 through 10. They were refined in the Course on Implicit and Explicit Abstraction. They portray relational and logical structures.

Also, my discussion presumes the first singularity. Gnosticism was cultivated in an early ancient civilization. As such, I expect its origin myth to be a fairy tale about the first singularity. The first singularity is discussed in the Crystallizations of the Fall series plus An Archaeology of the Fall, available at www.smashwords.com and other e-book venues.

In short, these comments apply a suite of postmodern scholastic hypotheses to Burfeind’s excellent text. They are different from, yet complementary to, Burfeind’s passionate argument.

SaH0048 This exposition constitutes a strand in the Razie Mah’s online course: Semiotics and History.

The various strands are listed in Razie Mah’s blog for February 3, 2026

‘Words that belong together’ are denoted by single quotes or italics.

Student instructions are colored in purple.

07/30/26

Looking at Peter Burfeind’s Book (2014) “Gnostic America” (Part 1 of 26)

0001 Peter Burfeind wrote Gnostic America: A Reading of Contemporary American Culture according to Christianity’s Oldest Heresy (Pax Domini Press, 2014).

This book is composed of four parts. The first part covers the fundamentals of Gnosticism as a Christian heresy. The second and third parts explore cultural manifestations. The fourth part applies these fundamentals and explorations to contemporary American Neo-Evangelical Christian churches.

0002 Burfeind argues that two Gnostic movements contend for sovereign power, progressives and Neo-Evangelical Christians.

To me, big government (il)liberals (BG(il)Ls) beat these Christians to the punch. The federal government has established a religion. It is not Christian. BG(il)Ls run Gnostic bureaucracies where authorities deny that they are religious at all. BG(il)Ls are the self-anointed angels (or more accurately, daemons) of a New Age dawning in America.

Christians who self-describe themselves as “spiritual, but not religious” accommodate BGL’s increasing sovereign power and aggression.

0003 Burfeind is not alone in this awareness. Over 60 years ago, Eric Voegelin expressed similar ideas in his short but significant book, The New Science of Politics.

This raises a question. What is the meaning, the presence and the message underlying the word “Gnosticism”?

With this question in mind, I turn my attention to Burfeind’s text.

Students should read chapter 1 of Burfeind’s text before proceeding.

0004 From Burfeind’s introduction, I know that Gnosticism is a very old heresy.

How old?

From chapter 1, I suspect that Gnosticism predated Christianity. Indeed, the death and the resurrection of Jesusrebuked Gnostic intuition. Why would Jesus retain the evil material shell of His body?

Jesus highlights all the ways that the Mosaic tradition offended Gnostic sensibilities. Both Christians and Jews are enamored of the material world. Gnostics, not so much.

0005 The Judeo-Christians believe in one God. So do the Gnostics. But, the one God of the Judeo-Christians is not the same as the Gnostic Source. The Source is a Monad, a complex singularity capable of putting everything into perspective. The Monad is the source of meaning.

0006 The Monad plays a key role in the Gnostic origin myth. The myth begins with the Source, beyond spoken language and in eternal time. From the Monad, male and female pairs emanated, each according to its aeon. The totality of the aeons is called the “pleroma”.

For the last era, our own, the female of the pair acted without her male consort. He was missing in action, so to speak. Sophia became pregnant with Yaltabaoth, half lion and half snake. She thought to herself, “This is not me.” So she took action, ripping the monster from her womb and hiding him in a cloud.

0007 Born yet aborted, living in a fog, Yaltabaoth decided to build his own world. He decided to create. What else was this demiurge supposed to do? He constructed his own world, which is our universe. He assigned archons (powers and governors) to rule his cosmos.

He was proud of his accomplishments.

Here I make an admission, there is more than one way to spell Yaltabaoth. That exercise is left to the reader.

Okay, back to the story.

0008 What else does this builder god do?

He manufactures our physical bodies. He steals a spark from the Monad (a soul) and pulls it into his world. As the soul descends, Yaltabaoth adds matter. At birth, each person is a spark wrapped in a mortal cloak. The spark is not material. The body is material. The two will war with one another.

0009 Therefore, Sophia pities us and offers this myth. The Self has a mission: Return to the Source. Sophia offers secret knowledge, gnosis, opening a path out of Yaltabaoth’s apparently all-encompassing cloud.

In fact, this myth, which joins cosmic and personal origins, contains a secret. It describes a location where you can find your Self.

0010 Clearly, this origin myth provides meaning. This meaning coincides with the model of social construction in Razie Mah’s How to Define the Word “Religion”. This model is further detailed in A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction.

0011 The model is an interscope, a nested form of category-based nested forms. The interscope offers nine slots. Features in the above myth associate with different slots.

Here is the open interscope, before any associations.

0012 My intent is to associate elements of the Gnostic origin myth with slots in the interscope of social construction.

0013 My first association concerns the Monad. The Source has the potential to put the situation into perspective, so it goes into slot 1c. The pleroma automatically becomes the normal context of the perspective level (slot 3c). The pleroma_3c brings the possibilities inherent in the Monad_1c into relation with the actuality of Sophia_2c.

0014 So what is the secret about Sophia?

Sophia is Personified Wisdom. It is not much of a secret. After all, philosophy is rooted in love (philos) and Wisdom (sophia).

0015 If Sophia_2c is the mother of the builder god, Yaltabaoth, then I should put the builder god into slot 2b. Yaltabaoth_2b situates our universe within the normal context of blind rationality (slot 3b).

Or should I say, “mindless rationality”?

The builder god lives in a cloud, isolated, without awareness of even his own mother. Sure, he snatches sparks from the Monad. He does this blindly. Who knows what spark goes into what body? Yaltabaoth operates in a fog. His archons are like bureaucrats, always following their rulebooks. His social norms? They constitute the Establishment.

The Establishment is the social arm of Yaltabaoth’s evil material world of blind chance and mindless necessity. For teenage Gnostics, that includes all parents. For big-government Gnostics, this includes everything associated with the American Founding.

0016 So, why does the builder god need a spark from the Source in order to animate the human body?

Yaltabaoth is so clueless. He does not realize that the spark comes from the Monad. It is just another thing at his disposal. Obviously, there is no better way to animate humans. He snatches an unwitting soul from its contemplation of Sophia and uses it to bring breath to a breathless body. Inspire. Hold it. Expire. I can feel it.

0017 Here, let me put my associations into the open interscope.

07/29/26

Looking at Peter Burfeind’s Book (2014) “Gnostic America” (Part 2 of 26)

0018 So far, this origin story portrays the production of the cosmos and the descent of the soul. Cosmic creation and personal destiny are thus linked through a spirit (formerly, the perspective) level virtually contextualizing an establishment (formerly, situation) level. Obviously, we humans go into the content… er, personal level.

0019 The mindless rationality of Yaltabaoth determines both the universe and my person. It stands in the way of my spark’s return to the Source. My material body is a hindrance. My body and its concerns are subject to being situated by the builder god’s natural laws as well as the establishment’s laws and decrees.

0020 Is this starting to sound vaguely modern?

Burfeind traces a path from ancient to modern times. So, it will probably come as no surprise that the best terminology for the ascent of the soul comes from the past two centuries.

Burfeind lists Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung as Gnostic thinkers. They founded modern Western psychoanalysis. They were trained in science and medicine, yet they produced terminology that associates to the personal level. They formulated their ideas at a time when Gnosticism was constellating in the West in the form of social movements.

0021 What term captures concerns with the body in the situation of the natural laws and social norms?

Freud’s ego does. The ego operates according to the reality principle. It defines my actuality. So, it goes into slot 2a.

The ego situates personal desires to accommodate to natural and social conditions. These desires belong to the realm of possibility. Freud called them “it”. English translators turned “it” into the technical term “id”.

0022 The reality principle may be labeled id^real. I can hear the reality principle in the phrases, “face it”, ‘that it’s”, “it’s too much”, “what about it” and so on. Substitute the word “id” for “it”. The reality principle is one current within the id. The id allows many currents. The logic of firstness is inclusive. It allows contradictions. So the id ought to go into slot 1a.

0023 The superego is the normal context in which the ego operates. The superego internalizes the natural laws and social norms. It goes into slot 3a.

0024 So far, the ego_2a constitutes one element of the personal level actuality. It works to satisfy the superego_3a. It fulfills the reality principle_1a. If that was all, then I would expect the person to be an easily trained animal. That is hardly the case.

Ah, this is where the spark must come into play.

0025 Freud’s Gnostic venture did not go far enough. Freudian psychoanalysis aimed to strengthen the ego_2a. To him, the ego was assaulted by other currents in the id besides id^real. The goal of the analytic dyad was to show that these other currents were mere fantasies, generated in response to some clinical cause.

The clinical cause was typically a trauma experienced during childhood. The symptom was an aberrant and insistent id^fantasy, making it difficult for the patient to maintain healthy ego function. The client exhibited a fixation.

The technical term is “repetition disorder”.

Okay, what about that spark?

0026 At first, Carl Jung was a promising student of Freud. Well, not quite. Actually, he was already an established practitioner in the fledgling field of the psychological sciences. He started following Freud’s ideas. Freud thought that he had found the person to inherit his intellectual legacy.

But then, Jung rebelled.

0027 The problem?

Freud insisted that id^fantasy was like a locomotive driven by the coal-burning engine of steamy sexuality. Yes, Freud was fixated, at least for a while. Other students proposed alternate engines, such as yearning for the mother’s breastand social status. Yes, id^fantasy is a broad current within the id. It is like the Euphrates compared to the Tigris of id^real.

0028 Carl Jung completed Freud’s Gnostic formulation by proposing why humans are not easily trained animals. Jung said (more or less), “Yes, the ego works within the normal context of the superego. Yes, the ego operates according to the desires of the reality principle, id^real. But that is not all. The ego is also responsible for the other element of the dyad in actuality. The ego acts in the name of the other element in the dyad.”

What do I mean by “dyad in actuality”?

Actuality belongs to the category of secondness. Secondness always contains at least two elements. One affiliates to effect (in the broadest sense of the word). The other affiliates to cause. Ah, cause and effect? That sure sounds like actuality.

The ego is like a cause (in the broadest sense of the word).

What is the other element in the personal-level dyad of actuality?

0029 The Self is another element.

The ego is responsible for the Self. The ego acts in the Name of the Self.

However, the Self is watered by a different river within the id. That river is id^fantasy.

0030 What is the Self?

It is the actuality emerging from the possibilities inherent in id^fantasy. I know my Self through experiences that stimulate id^fantasy. Most of these experiences are personal feelings that occur in the moment, as the ego acts within particular circumstances and for particular reasons consistent with id^real.

0031 The Socratic formula, “know your Self”, may be framed as, “Pay attention to what you feel as you go about your duties in this world of natural laws and social norms.” In this way, you can train your fantasies to imagine virtuous situations, such as the situations depicted by Plato.

0032 Here is a diagram of how modern terms fit into the personal level.

0033 Jung discovered the element missing in Freud’s analysis. At the same time, he generated a host of troubling questions. For example, the Self is obviously outside of spoken language, since it does not operate according to the simple rule that ‘words refer to things and states of things’. It bootstraps itself from feelings encountered during the operations of the ego. It starts as a simple “I like this” and “I don’t like that”.

Then, the Self becomes sophisticated enough to know that this is a sign of that. Spoken utterances are not taken at face value. The ego does that. Instead, spoken utterances are incorporated as gestures that image or indicate something that I like or something that I don’t like. Or, even more evocatively, the gestures picture and point to something that may be fantasized about and something that may not be fantasized about. The Self is full of acquired tastes.

0034 The person flourishes when the ego takes responsibility for the Self and acts in the Name of the Self. The id^fantasythat Freud attributed to some originating trauma is really a current of desire that the Self experiences over and over again. Id^fantasy may express itself as desire or revulsion. Sometimes, desire is revulsion and revulsion, desire.

0035 If the ego treats the Self properly, then the Self may well be happy.

07/28/26

Looking at Peter Burfeind’s Book (2014) “Gnostic America” (Part 3 of 26)

0036 But, wait a minute. What about that spark?

Christians formulate the polarity within the unity of my person as active soul (animates) body. The modern formula is a little more Gnostic. The polarity within the unity of my person is ego [taking responsibility for and acting in the Name of the]) Self. In the virtual field produced by the actuality of Sophia, the Gnostic formulation takes one more step. My ego concerns the material aspect of my person. My Self constitutes the immaterial aspect of my person.

0037 Thus, the personal level sets the stage for the ascent of the Self to the Monad. Through Gnostic myth and rituals, Sophia provides the secret knowledge, the symbols and the experiences that awaken the Self and call it to journey to the Source.

0038 Thus, my working model of the Gnostic origin myth described in chapter 1 of Burfeind’s book looks like this:

0039 Sophia delivers her message to the Self, not the ego. The ego accounts for the Self. So, in the interest of survival, the ego suppresses the experience of the call.

Now, I will compare my working model to Suarez’s model of mind-dependent being.

0040 During the 1600s, the Baroque scholastics, such as Francisco Suarez, tried to figure out mind-dependent beings. Actually, they were features of mind-independent beings that could be taken by the mind to be mind-independent. Privations, negations, self-contradictions and relations were classic examples.

0041 For example, there is a hole in a wall. The hole actually is a place where the mind-independent wall does not exist, but everyone treats the hole as if it exists. I encounter a wall. The wall has a spot were it does not exist. I immediately conclude this hole is real. I am upset about it.

0042 What is going on?

Actuality belongs to secondness. Secondness is dyadic. There should be two elements in the slot for actuality, even though only one element is typically listed.

On the content level, the encountered being_2a is one element. It emerges from the potential of ‘something’ happening_1ain the normal context of ‘what is happening’_3a.

In the example, the wall_2a satisfies ‘something’ happening_1a. But then, so does that hole_2a. The missing section of the wall is where something is not happening.

The efficient intellect_2b projects a being that accounts for the encounter_2a. This being is completely mind dependent, even though I regard it as mind-independent. The accounting being_2a accounts for the encountered being_2a. The accounting being says, “There is a hole in the wall.”

0043 Suarez’s discussion on ens rationis can be modeled as an interscope, just like the Gnostic origin myth. The similarity is striking.

0044 The term “renvoi” is new. Renvoi is the contiguity between accounting and encountered beings. Look at that wall. I could call the hole a “privation”. But, that would not be enough. It’s not a privation of wall. It is a hole in the wall.

0045 So, let me dwell on the comparison between the interscopes of the Gnostic origin myth and Suarez’ model of mind-dependent being.

0046 The Self is like the hole in the wall. The wall is the seamless operation of the ego, within the framework of the superego, fulfilling the reality-principle desires of id^real.

My Self says, “None of this is ego-activity is about me. Or is it?”

All sorts of feelings come bubbling up from id^fantasy. Many of them are weird. I label the actuality that encounters these feelings “my Self”.

0047 For the content-level, the comparison looks like this:

0048 What does this imply?

My ego is comparable to my efficient intellect projecting a being that accounts for my Self within the normal context of ‘what is happening’.

0049 This is exactly the opposite of what I would expect for the actuality emerging from id^real.

I expect that my ego would encounter the world. Instead, my Self encounters the world. My ego is responsible for and freely acts upon that encounter. My efficient intellect projects my ego in order to account for my Self.

0050 Even more striking is that the ego brings to bear all the materiality of natural laws and social norms in its account of the Self’s encounter. It’s like the ego starts by yelling, “Get that id^fantasy out of here. Id^real will tell me what to do.”

Recall, the ego acts in the Name of the Self, but the ego does not necessarily take the Self into consideration.

0051 Hmmm. Would that explain repetition disorders?

If my ego does not take responsibility for my Self, then he can ignore my id^fantasy. So my Self, in response, will simply serve up the same encounter over and over again.

She says, “Deal with this, reality principle. Take responsibility for what I like and what I don’t like. Acknowledge my feelings.”

0052 Imagine a world where I only encounter real beings. Or maybe, imagine a world without accounting beings. I cannot notice a hole in the wall, because I cannot account for the wall itself.

I suppose my day would go like this: Hunger. I look for an encounter with real edible being. I strive to avoid being eaten. Oh, what’s that? Ah. Got it. Yum. Sleepy.

In a world filled with social norms, none of this flies. I must cook food and share that food with others. Sometimes I don’t enjoy what they like. But, I have to eat. Then, when I want to sleep, no one will permit it. I have tasks to do.

The Self learns to enjoy these troubles. Id^fantasy can adapt to almost anything. I may not like my routine, but I can learn the art of enduring it. It can learn to pray. I can find joy in my routine.

0053 So, my Self compares to the encountered being. Perhaps, my Self is better expressed as me encountering ‘my encounter with a real being’.

The Self is all about experience. It is not about responsibility and freedom. That goes with the ego.

07/27/26

Looking at Peter Burfeind’s Book (2014) “Gnostic America” (Part 4 of 26)

0054 Next, allow me to compare the virtual nested forms in the realm of actuality. Suarez’s model of mind-dependent being is on the left. The Gnostic origin myth is on the right.

0055 Even though these two virtual nested forms look very similar, there is one key difference.

0056 In Suarez’s discussion of mind-dependent being, the end point is alignment among all the elements in actuality. The formal intellect reflectively judges the reckoning of the efficient intellect. The accounting being projected by the efficient intellect ought to explain the encountered being. Plus, the explanation should conform to a reality principle.

0056 The Gnostic formula is different. The virtual nested form in the realm of actuality never aligns.

0057 Why?

Yaltabaoth and the Establishment are monsters. The ego is only concerned about the person’s material conditions. The ego is slave to natural laws and social norms. The ego is at the service of a corrupt material body that encases the pure immaterial spark of the Self. There is no possibility of alignment.

0058 What is the Self to do?

The Self can admit defeat and just get used to it. The Stoic says, “Live a life of quiet desperation.”

The Self can rebel and become the target of the wrath of Yaltabaoth and the Establishment. That is the way of Icarus, who rebelled against his father Daedalus’ instructions.

The Self can submit to the ego’s demands and bow before the laws over and over again, finding joy in its own humiliation.

Or, the Self can escape and return to the Source. Through secret knowledge, practices, rituals and incantations, the Self can experience Sophia. It can find a way past ego and Establishment. It can slip by Yaltabaoth. It can get around the efficient intellect with its accounting being. It can return to the Source.

0059 Here is a story.

A friend of mine lied to me in order to gain advantage. Because I need to get along in my social circle, I cannot retaliate.

On a later occasion, my so-called friend shows me a photograph from before the lie.

“Who is that?” he asks.

“That is me.” I reply, trying to hide my disgust. I would like to be the carefree and trusting person that I once was. I am no longer that person.

My so-called friend smiles. He confirms that I am the same person, as far as he is concerned. He did not apologize. He re-iterated the lie. He re-enacted his advantage over me.

I think to myself, “So, this is what I get instead of an apology.”

0060 What happened in this story?

0061 In Suarez’s model, my efficient intellect projects an accounting being (my ego-response) into the second slot of the content-level actuality. My ego-response accounts for the real encountered being (of my so-called friend’s actions).

My ego-response also reflects the situation, which emerges from ‘what is happening’.

I am too vulnerable to fight what he did. I am too slow to respond. Plus, he would gain even further by turning the group against me.

My ego-accounting being takes care of material me.

0062 If there was a possibility of us coming together, of honestly becoming friends again, he would have apologized. Hey, I just thought of it. I should demand an apology.

It’s too late.

His act with the photograph shows that ‘he wants his cake and to eat it too’. He wants me to be a friend as before as well as a chump that he lies to. There is nothing I can do to stop that from happening.

0063 Here is Suarez’s model of the story.

0063 A momentary flash of reflective reason_2c opens a possibility_1a.

I could demand an apology. But, that would start a fight. What would I say?

0064 Maybe, I would say, “What type of friend are you, lying to me for advantage?”

But, then, he would say, “Well, what type of friend are you, for even mentioning this.”

Ah, the cruelty. He obeys the rules, even as he defies their spirit. I cannot. He can bend the rules. I cannot. He can break the rules. I cannot. What am I to do?

07/25/26

Looking at Peter Burfeind’s Book (2014) “Gnostic America” (Part 5 of 26)

0065 I hear a voice, “This is all the work of Yaltabaoth and the evil Establishment. There is a way to get to a world where friends apologize for lying. I will send secret knowledge for you to fly to the Source.”

0066 Who is Sophia gesturing to?

She addresses my Self, my immaterial me, not in words, but in fantasy.

0067 This is very different than what Christianity offers. But, that is not my path at the moment.

Instead, for now, this claim is left to the student.

0068 I would like to examine the contiguity between the two elements of the content-level dyad in actuality. The technical term for this contiguity is a French word: renvoi.

What is the contiguity between accounting and encountered beings?

What is the contiguity between material (ego) and immaterial (Self) me?

0069 Of course, I cannot fully put these contiguities into words. The Real defies spoken language. Spoken language has to translate the Real into a system of differences. Spoken language cannot grasp the whole.

0070 Nevertheless, let me try.

0071 For Suarez’s model of ens rationis, the accounting being explains the encountered being. I can write the dyad as accounting being [explains] encountered being.

Of course, anyone can ask, “What do I mean by the word ‘explain’?”

I reply, “Look at the example. The accounting being of this is a lie explains the encountered being of my so-called friend’s behavior.”

The accounting being offers a form to what is happening.

0072 For the working model of the meaning underlying the word “Gnosticism”, material me takes responsibility for immaterial me. Obviously, my ego is free to act in the Name of my Self, because he dismisses my fantasy-induced feeling that I should get an apology.

My ego insists, “Oh no, forget that. It is too dangerous.”

I can write that as ego [takes responsibility for and is free to act in Name of] Self.

0073 Yet, no Gnostic will ask, “What do I mean by responsibility and freedom?”

Why?

The Gnostic already knows. Responsibility and freedom are projections of the evil and malignant Yaltabaoth and the Establishment.

The ego is in conflict with the Self. My ego represses, suppresses, manipulates, takes advantage of, denies, repudiates (and the list goes on and on) my Self. My ego is worried about this material world, not immaterial me.

Maybe, I can write this as ego [dominates and represses] Self.

0074 Now, let me compare the two renvoi.

0075 In Suarez’s model, renvoi ultimately makes sense of ‘what is happening’. Renvoi supports the situational-level idea_1b that my friend is establishing that he can take advantage of me.

Renvoi is sensical. The idea that situates renvoi is perfectly sensible in a world where there is no human perfection. After all, Suarez wrote in a tradition holding the concept of Original Sin.

0076 In the working model of Gnosticism, renvoi frames concerns of material me over immaterial me. Renvoi supports the situation-level idea_1b that my friend ruthlessly participates in the evil inherent in all material concerns.

0077 My Self wails, “All he wants to do is get ahead.”

0078 Renvoi is sensical. In addition, renvoi includes the trampled feelings that constitute my Self. Renvoi includes the practical fears of my ego. The idea that situates renvoi is sensible, not to Suarez’s formal (Christian) intellect_2c, but to Sophia’s (Gnostic) call_2c.

0079 The next question that goes with the story is: What if I lost it?

What if I yelled at my friend, “Why did you lie to me, you evil monster?”

That would be a mistake, because it would turn the situation against me.

My ego would not allow that possibility.

0080 This answer brings me to a comparison between Suarez’s model and the model of the Gnostic origin myth in the realm of possibility.

0081 These two virtual nested forms put the previous discussion into a nutshell.

0082 The senses are engaged in order to fulfill the potential of ‘something happening’_1a. However, they are also tuned to the possibility of desire in the ‘something’ that happens_1a.

0083 A contiguity between accounting and encountered beings (renvoi) informs an idea that underlies the efficient intellect’s projection of an accounting being_1b

To complete the loop, the accounting being_2a triggers and fills in the content-level nested form_3a(2a(1a)).

0084 If the normal context is defined by my superego_3a, then the content-level nested form determines my social predicament. My accounting being (my ego) explains my encounters in terms of who the world thinks I am supposed to be_1b(3a).

The problem is: My Self_2a is not who the world thinks I am supposed to be_1b.

0085 For Suarez, the terminus is the potential of coming together_1c in the normal context of reflective reason_3c.

For Gnosticism, the terminus is the Source_1c in the normal context of the inadequacy of this passing age_3c.

0086 The potential for coming together_1c says, “Pray for your friend’s conversion and forgive him.”

The Source_1c says, “Utopia is a world where friends do not lie to one another. Ignore the material concerns of the world. Fly to me.”