The logical fallacy of monotheism is that a spiritual absolute would necessarily be the essence of sentience, from which we rise, rather than an ideal of wisdom and judgement, from which we fell.
It’s just that religion is more about culture and social cohesion, than spirituality, or logic. Especially logic, as it tends to ask why.
So this top down father figure lawgiver and his ten commandments is a useful narrative device, to get the constant churning of generations on the same page and respecting authority.
The problem is the absolute and the ideal are seriously different concepts. On the surface, they can be somewhat easy to confuse, as they are both reductionist. Yet the ideal is a distillation of one’s preference, while the absolute is where all form coalesces to equilibrium. The flatline between the ups and downs. The absolute zero of unmoving equilibrium. Thus the only truly universal state.
The effect, in a religious and cultural situation is a tendency towards fundamentalism of one preferences, as we assume them to be universal, rather than unique expressions and combinations of our circumstance.
Yet reality is more a yin and yang of polarities. The opposite of the absolute, for example, would be the infinite. The opposite of reductionism would be contextualization. The node and the network.
Think of reality as a dichotomy of energy and the forms it manifests. Galaxies are energy radiating towards the infinite, while form coalesces to the equilibrium of the absolute. Those black holes at the center.
Our bodies have the digestive, respiratory and circulatory systems processing the energy driving us on, along with a central nervous system to sort through the information precipitating out, as well as referee the emotions and impulses bubbling up.
As this energy must be acquired, we are driven by the desire of our appetite. The flame within, seeking to grow. Be it for pleasure, power, or knowledge, as it is appetite that gives this banquet of life meaning.
Societies are the dichotomy of organic energies pushing up, as civil and cultural forms coalesce in. Youth and age, liberal and conservative.
Desire versus judgement. The heart/gut versus the head.
While our cultural models are more about instilling particular and often useful distinctions of good and bad, right and wrong, the fact is that good and bad are not some cosmic dual between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary of beneficial and detrimental. The 1/0 of life.
So we are drawn towards the objects of our desire, but they are many and so judgement has to chose, say between immediate desires, or longer term goals.
As this tension is never going away and is what motivates and defines life, there will be no perfect, ideal morality, just a fluctuation between the absolute and the infinite.
My spiritual model.
