salvation and exaltation

the following came about as part of a comment to (and then a bit of back and forth with) Bruce. it’s an attempt to put some of the ideas together into a more coherent whole in order to save it, instead of it being scattered in email replies (this is an important theme for the discussion, incidentally).

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starting with fundamental assumptions, this is one of mine: that life in heaven is a better, deeper, more enhanced version of life on earth. or, more succinctly, as above so below. this assumption is actually shared by most people who talk about these things, at least implicitly, because otherwise it would be very difficult to talk about it at all, or even impossible (though abstract theologians do get close to it, even they tend to use ‘light’, and many other similes). (of course a simile both compares and distinguishes, but we can’t keep going on semantic tangents, interesting though they are, we’ve only just started this).

a consequential assumption is this: that there is a potentially infinite number of worlds going forward (and potentially also quite a few going backward) who stand in the same type of relation as earth does to heaven. meaning that when we get to heaven, there will be another heaven to get to, so to speak.

infinities are unavoidable, conceptually. (we can try to ignore them of course, but it's not coherent, since we are avoiding the pursuit of a question until its limit). there are two options: either the infinity is static or it is procedural. i believe in the procedural because it is the only way to avoid 'pretending to understand’ the infinity. on the other hand, a metaphysical absolutist has necessarily to worry about the One Infinity, even though it is tautologically impossible to know it. whereas i only have to worry about who the relevant gods are for me and what they want from me, specifically. i can worry about those later questions when they become relevant. in other words, i’ll try to figure out the heaven after heaven once i get to heaven, but not before.

with endless regression, in other words, i don’t have to worry about the endless chain, the infinity as such, only about the links closest to us (in this case, pre-earthly life, and post-earthly life).

so when i say God, i am not talking about a nameless infinite abstraction. i am talking about Jesus, or his father, or else another specific being or, sometimes really a group of beings (like the heavenly family, or the heavenly council). but none of them nor all of them together is the super duper ultra mega god that was never anything else. because if ‘such’ a ‘thing’ ‘exists’ ‘it’ ‘is’ ‘unknowable’ (all this in quotes because language ceases to be of any precise use when talking about ‘it’), and i have better things to do.

more importantly, only a personal god that wasn’t always a god (and the super duper ultra mega god by definition always was what he is and always will be nothing else) could care, or work towards, both salvation or exaltation. (neither word makes any sense with this concept, in fact, but especially exaltation, since it is impossible to become that which was always so, and did not, itself, went through a process of becoming; also, with a super god that always was a super god, salvation can only be ultimately annihilation for the personal being).

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now, given ‘as above, so below’, it makes sense to look at the meanings of the words used. and the word translated as salvation in the new testament means etymologically ‘to heal, to make whole’, and from that more direct and basic meaning we get to saving, and thus to cosmic and even metaphysical saving. it appears a lot in Matthew, and Mark, and Luke. most of the time it’s not Jesus saying it, but people’s expectation of what he will do or explanation of what he already has done. in John it appears only six times, and by far the most interesting use is Jesus asking the Father to save him from the cross; which does not happen, but the fact that Jesus says it illuminates the concept very strikingly, in my opinion). Jesus also says in John that he is saving, not just people, but the world (the cosmos). now cosmos means order, so what he is saying is that he did not come to alter how things are ordered (to judge it), but to save the very workings of it. what else could saving mean in the case of the cosmos. a categorical modification hardly qualifies as saving anything. it’s rather destruction and building of something else.

now, these things (healing, making whole, saving) are clearly not things sought for their own sake. they are, if i recall correctly, what Carl Menger called ‘second order goods’, that is, goods we want because they enable us to do the things we actually want to do. in a general sense, healing, i suppose, can feel good, but often it also feels terrible. i mean the process. it hurts until it stops hurting, and until we’re healed. but either way, i think mostly we want healing in order to be able to live better, not just to be healed as such, or because it feels good.

similarly, the process of making something whole is laborious (for example, picking up a bunch of notes and turning them into a coherent and consequential bit of prose, as i am attempting to do here). but is that its own reward. in a way, yes. but it’s also obviously done for other reasons. if the reward was only to give coherence to our own thoughts, once it was done we could destroy it, and would not think to share it, and wouldn’t return to it later. other instances of making something whole follow the same pattern.

and more specifically saving (i don’t mean the cosmic or metaphysical version, i mean the more down to earth version from which we can then jump to the cosmic and metaphysical version): it’s exactly done in order to be used later. there is even a parable from Jesus about saving things and then doing nothing with them. he thinks it’s bad, because it’s fruitless. the point of saving, then, is to use whatever was saved later, when presumably it is more profitable to do so.

and so it would make sense that the cosmic version of salvation would follow the same basic rules, and the reason to save the cosmos must be that we can use it later in a better way. and that means saving is only the first step in a two step process. that is, salvation is supposed to lead, and has its reason in, later exaltation. much like life itself is supposed to lead, and have its reason in, the continuation of life (or, as Jesus poetically puts it, life abundant).

(perhaps you prefer to use the greek term theosis, that is, literally, to be made like unto God, which of course, as explained above, is a nonsensical term when the concept of God is absolute; but i think Joseph Smith gave us a much better alternative in exaltation, since it means to be raised, underlining not only that it’s part of a process, instead of a static reality, which again would be nonsensical, but also that it’s an innate possibility, and through that, almost a moral obligation; also, when used together with salvation, it makes more sense because both it and exaltation are in the same language; and using foreign words usually get us further away from meaning, rather than approximate us to it).

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the right way to think of salvation, then, is as a prerequisite. it seems obvious that, much like you can’t invest later what you haven’t saved first (i assume there is no such thing as investment banking in heavenly matters), you can’t even start the process of exaltation before your soul is saved, that is, set aside for that purpose. and thus we can see their proper relation. but again, a prerequisite is never the real point of something. it’s just the stepping stone to something. like being accepted into college and actually learning something in college.

and further, exaltation itself must lead to further exaltation, like college must lead to practice, and practice to mastery, and on and on. (if of course we believe in an endless chain of possibilities, as seems necessary to me to admit all these concepts that involve becoming, rather than being).

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there quite a few implications of this for the meaning of earthly life. since exaltation is not a static reality, but a potentially endless process, it would make sense that our particular state after being saved, is not all the same, and thus the specifics of life matter a lot, are indeed central. we are saved as we are, much like we are accepted into college as we are. but every student is different, has lead different lives, has done different things, was able to do different things (because i don’t believe God can or would guarantee ideal situations, that by definition defeats the purpose; if he could do that, he could just make everything ideal right away). all this is surely taken into account by a highly intelligent being as God must be, and thus our specific curriculums in heavenly college will all be different. (i cannot tell you now how hilarious it is that i of all people have settled on this image; or maybe it’s fitting since my problem in college was really the idealistic notion i had of it going in; which i guess underlines the importance of not making the same mistake with regards to heaven, that is, have false expectations of its possibilities).

thus we reach the question of consciousness, and the demands it makes, morally speaking. if you believe, as i do, that salvation is a choice, then it requires consciousness. but different choices require different levels of consciousness. i can’t imagine choosing salvation with an eye to exaltation (because that is the actual point, remember) is the same as choosing what to have for dinner, in terms of consciousness (or even the same as doing all the necessary things to be accepted into college).

but again it would also seem very absurd to say that the prerequisites would be the same for everyone, and for every college. so the conclusion is that different consciousnesses make different moral demands. and so much like exaltation will mean different things for different people, so will salvation.

for each consciousness thus there must be a specific way of being (morally, intellectually, emotionally) that is possible and desirable. a child, an adolescent, an adult; as a primitive man, a medieval man or a modern man. each have their own parameters, and they really do not have much in common. an adult behaving like a good child is bad. a child behaving like a good adult is also bad. and so it must be with salvation, which is after all individual or it’s nothing.

or at least it is now, and for some. that is another complication. it seems to be the case that salvation was often thought of something collective, in the past. and probably still is in the case of more primitive forms of consciousness, or in babies who died in the womb, for example. simply because there is less individuality to save in such cases. but then again the question is unavoidable: if salvation is a choice, it must be individual. it makes no sense for it to be otherwise, because it has no value if it’s not a conscious choice. if you’re accepted into college because you’re part of a group it’s probably a bad idea for the person in question, and also for the college. (as we know from our current world).

so the conclusion is actually that after Jesus things are more rigorous. he made it possible to be saved as individuals, and by doing so he made it harder. and in that process he made it more valuable, because he allowed it to be for the possibility of continuation, not just achieving a permanent state. what he seems to have done is finally offered the possibility of salvation actually meaning something. that is, not saving for its own sake, but for some purpose beyond it. he brought heavenly saving in line with how saving works on earth.

(isn’t it interesting that no one ever thought to ask Jesus the question that appears in Acts: what must i do to be saved. also the answer is believing in Jesus, that is, that he can do this for us; but Paul says specifically that the person asking will be saved, and also his household; that doesn’t work for us now: i can’t decide that my wife will also be saved; she has to decide for herself; i prefer it that way, since i don’t regard her as my property; and that’s what it is, less than conscious saving renders the saved a property of the savior; of course many people believe that, but it just doesn’t feel like something Jesus would like, since he keeps insisting that his followers regard him as a friend, rather than a master).

we can see the difference between the Old Testament and the New. a more advanced consciousness requires fewer commandments, but they are harder to follow. Jesus reduced them to two that are very abstract and, at least consistently, here on earth, impossible. but are they not superior. do they not unlock and make possible something greater than what the hebrew law (or any other variation of the old world) did. the hebrews could only get to sheol. they couldn’t be trusted with handling enhanced flesh (and our alienated self consciousness as individuals in a physical body is already, unlike collective belonging, a form of enhanced flesh handling).

so after Jesus we can go further, better. and if it has nothing to do with stages of consciousness, why would Jesus wait so long. why not come right away. it makes more sense that he came, not exactly when everyone was ready, but when there were conditions for people to be ready.

thus, i am very convinced that increasing consciousness is an inherent part of God’s desire for us. not as a sort of resignation and afterthought to salvation, but actual specific intention and purpose. God wants us to be more like him. and that includes, if not fundamentally concerns, advancing in consciousness to his level. that is, not only be saved, but be exalted.

if increasing consciousness was not central, then one would have to conclude that God would be satisfied with everything staying at the lowest stage. since incarnation seems to be a playground for further enhancement, just like (as i see it) heaven will be an even more advanced playground, now with the added bonus (as well as challenge) of a larger consciousness in an incarnate life but continuous with a previous one (not the farce of reincarnation). and if it was not central, then there would be no reason for earth at all in fact, or for heaven to have anything to do with the earth and life as we know it, which then contradicts pretty much everything Jesus ever said about it (he loved using similes; was he only using them to be understood by simple people. if so, he chose very poorly, because most people didn’t get it).

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Jesus said it is necessary to be childlike to enter into heaven, but being childlike is not the same as being a child. dying is necessary to be resurrected, that’s a given. but if being childlike is necessary also, then is it better to die as children, and enter heaven as children. it would seem to be easier, but it feels wrong. a dead child is the worst thing in the world.

but if it is the case, despite it feeling wrong and horrible, i see no reason why we should stop there. why not just fetuses. they are embodied, and certainly have souls. they can die. and if the only real thing of importance in this world is dying, then it’s certainly better to die early. we need to pass through here, and that’s it. and while individually the case may differ (that is, it might be profitable for me personally to live beyond infancy), structurally, it really doesn’t matter if a person lives a month in a womb or a hundred years on the earth, just as long as we make that one right choice after death. and much less do the specifics matter (who i loved, what i’ve seen, what i’ve done). again this feels very wrong.

i don’t think it’s stated strongly enough the importance of consciousness, the blessing and moral beauty of consciousness. because while this development is an intrinsic possibility of every being, it is not the buried talent that matters, but the one that’s put to use. that we have it is only the first step. then we have to choose to save it, set it aside for later use. and then make use of it when the time is right.

so what does it mean that we have to be childlike in order to enter heaven. i think it just means that we will enter heaven as children enter this earth: with eyes and ears and hearts fully open, ready and willing and desperate to learn at every opportunity.

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Jesus says all he’s doing is something he saw the Father do. but we also naturally regard Jesus as important on his own, and necessary. since i don’t believe in the static infinity, the two things can be stated in harmony, and work well together.

the key is precisely to add that Jesus is important 'for us'. that is, the endless chain of beings in different stages of development. that God the Father has a father and god of his own must be admitted given the other pieces of the puzzle we have (and the implications of the opposite, that is, monism, render Jesus useless with absolute certainty anyway). but such a remote God is not important for us to concern ourselves with, not before we concern ourselves with Jesus and his father.

so in a way, the two things are indeed quite intertwined. the relevance of Jesus is not abstract and a matter of totality (as in classical theology) but understood within a context of plurality and flux, which he himself provided (a Son and a Father, and thus an endless chain of sons and fathers). and what could be easier to understand, that every father was once a son, and that every son may become a father as well. i believe it’s precisely the first thing we tell children when they ask where they come from.

for me, the answer to the question where do gods come from, is the same.

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using this image again of course