The Puzzle Palace

Image by Robert Dodd

I am going to talk about something rather unpleasant today. An unpleasant truth, in my opinion. Actually there are a couple of different ways you can take what I am about to say depending on your own personal beliefs, but any of those ways you could reasonably interpret this other than simple denial are unpleasant.

To explain it, I am going to tell you a little fictional tale about a paranoid prince. Once upon a time there was a very paranoid prince who was trying to protect a great treasure. It's not really his treasure to begin with, but lets not get into that part. To keep people from getting to the treasure, he created a vast series of stone walls, a labyrinth. A maze to keep the people away from the treasure. But people built siege engines to try to get over the labyrinth. So the prince built false siege engines all around the labyrinth, siege engines that didn't work right and led nowhere. The prince, being an evil magician, also created many illusions all around the labyrinth. Sometimes the illusion would seem to show the treasure right over the next wall, but in truth it was in the wrong direction and led to nothing.

The prince then recruited people from outside the labyrinth to praise the false siege engines and the false treasures, and these people had the illusion of great power and wisdom. They wore fine clothes and had fine hairdos and nice things, and they led people to false treasure rooms where for a time they might imagine they were swimming in golden coins, but really they were on a dung heap. The evil prince recruited kings from outside the labyrinth to punish those who made actual progress towards the treasure, and reward those who led others astray. This was quite a mess, and the prince thought the treasure quite secure.

Nevertheless, it was always possible to navigate the labyrinth by walking in one end, at a gap at one end, and by making all the correct turns to arrive at the other end where the treasure was. It was difficult, sure, but by remaining undistracted it could be done. And some did this, but few.

In the end, the prince could never own the treasure: the one thing he could and did do is to try his mightiest to keep anyone else from having it. He was never capable of enjoying the treasure, but only enjoyed defeating others.

I believe that you can take this as a parable of a real state of things. The treasure in the center is holiness, or you might say the way of being of true saints living in the world. The wicked prince is of course the evil one. And the path through the labyrinth is the path of mindfulness and attention that escapes the many traps laid by the prince. The true pilgrim seeking the true path through the maze may get waylaid along many false corridors, but because he is a true pilgrim who truly seeks the treasure and not anything else, he goes back to the point where he first started getting lost, and tries again. And the prince is constantly seeking, trying and trying, to achieve the downfall of the pilgrim.

Now, you could say that the prince is simply human failings and vices if you don't want to acknowledge the existence of any real demons, it probably works either way. However, one of the most widely acknowledged events in the 3 Synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) is Jesus casting out devils. In John, while there is no mention of Jesus casting out devils, Jesus mentions Satan directly, as he does in Luke. "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven," Luke 10:18. So if you want direct confirmation of devils in the New Testament, you have a whole lot to choose from.

"...because the prince of this world now stands condemned." - John 16:11.
Jesus said it, and I believe him. Indeed, I felt "pressure" to not write anything of this, which I won't go into except to say that I prayed to the Lord.

In comparison, there are no, none, zero, quotations about the Trinity in the New Testament but every denomination of the Christian faith believes it (falsely.) So yes, I believe that there are such things as demons and that there is such a thing as a prince of them. Whether you do so is up to you. What you should never do, is underestimate the subtlety of that prince, however you rationalize him.

Getting back to the parable, the part about the false siege engines and the false priests who praised them - well to be honest the evil one got into the Church business very early. You have the 4 Gospels in which Jesus is telling us to love our enemies, and as quickly as Acts (written by a disciple of Paul, probably in the late 1st Century) all of a sudden St. Peter is supposedly damning people to death (Ananias and Sapphira) for telling a lie about how much money they got for their own plot of land! My goodness, don't let that man anywhere near Washington D.C.! ;) If this version of Peter were to clone himself and start running around this world, the world would be depopulated very quickly. Not to mention the many other dubious tales of Acts, including an account of how the disciples first got the Holy Spirit that directly conflicts with John. And in Paul you have a man who I am sure had good intentions, but he couldn't control his own temper! He once wished his enemies would cut their own balls off, this is how poorly controlled he was.

How clearly I remember the words of our Savior: "cut your balls off!" No, that was not what he said. It's what Paul said though. And Paul confessed frequently he had problems controlling his own sin, which many people have, but clearly he had a large enough issue with it that it was worthy of mention.

So this means that false teaching set in virtually from the outset, and many if not most of these early leaders were led astray innocently. They did not know they were distorting the gospel, that is why I think the gospel accounts are mostly portrayed accurately. They did not distort what Jesus actually said, they revered what he said, but they distorted what it meant.

And it only got drastically worse from there. In 325 A.D. they had the Council of Nicea, an ecumenical council, a council of bishops, presided over by a ROMAN EMPEROR, Constantine. If that is not a fox in the chicken house, I am not sure what would be. And their first order of business was to suppress the truth, to suppress challengers to their views on Christ which would eventually evolve into the Trinitarian doctrine of today. There were several more councils along these same lines, suppressing dissent.

A short aside, what is Trinitarianism? It is the belief that 1=3, that 3=1, and that simultaneously that both 3 and 1 are equally and fully the case. Readers of George Orwell may recall a similar episode in the novel 1984 in which the protagonist's torturer held up 4 fingers and said it was 5, and tortured him until the protagonist indeed agreed it was 5 and not 4 fingers he was seeing. If they can get you to say 1=3 they can squelch all dissent, because you have given up thinking for yourself and will accept anything they say. You would be surprised how vociferously clerics defend this doctrine even today. The Gospels are clear: yes, Jesus is pre-existing, yes Jesus is the Son of God, yes Jesus is the living Word of God. They are equally clear that Jesus is not the same as God. The fact that he is called the "begotten" Son of God, and that he is called "Son," and that he could genuinely die at all, should make all that adamantly clear to anyone actually paying any attention. Of course for someone for whom 3=1, anything is true.

Okay, back to the main thrust here. About in the same period, Constantine decreed the death penalty to anyone possessing the writings of Arius (one of their main opponents in the Council of Nicea) and refusing to turn them over. This response to people with dissenting opinions, to burn them alive or otherwise murder them, only became more popular in the following centuries. Because Jesus clearly said to do that... not. No, he said love your enemies, not burn your enemies. But the Church, in full possession by the prince of this world, much preferred to roast them alive. While this no doubt started happening in the 4th Century or earlier, and it is believed that many of the Church's enemies were murdered in various ways long before this, it hit full swing by 1300 A.D.

Lets just let this sink in a minute. The same Church that quoted Matthew 5:44 out of one side of its mouth, gave the order to burn people alive out the other side. Sure, maybe it was the civil authorities who actually lit the match, but with the judgement and approval of the Church. The Church told them to do it.

And of course in the 20th Century we had the lovely phenomenon of the televangelists and the Prosperity Gospel people and so on - may God have mercy on their wretched money-loving souls.

Now though, thankfully, the evil one doesn't need to drag a false image of Jesus around anymore. The Church is passe, it is on its way out. There is a new Gospel much more to Satan's liking: CONSUMERISM. Now, finally, the evil one can express himself frankly. Consume, buy, revel in your wealth, revel in your SELF, because that is all there is. In the 18th Century Enlightenment, Satan said there is no God. Now he doesn't even have to bother, people have found a new and "better" God. All hail your one true god of these latter days - Mammon. See how powerful he is, see how shiny. You know you want him. Golden calf my backside, this is the god that gives you what you really want. Things.

Truly, no deity has ever been so shiny. And what small thing does he ask in return, for all these pretty things?

So, getting back to that labyrinth. First hurdle is even seeking God, the real God, at all. Most don't. It seems apparently contrary to self-interest to do so.

The second hurdle is getting past all the lies, all the wolves in sheep's clothing, that the evil one throws up in front of you. When I first came to Christ a long time ago now, of course I naively assumed that the Church knew how I could get to know God better. I joined a Pentacostal church, people speaking in tongues, the whole bit. When it did not turn out to be true that they helped me know God more, I rejected the God they were supposed to be believing in, thinking that they were accurately representing Him. When I came back to God the second time, I did much the same thing, but I was getting wise. I left to follow another path, a path of my own, one I learned much from. This third time I returned, and I wasn't taking anyone's word for anything but seeking for myself. I might have many illusions to overcome, but at least they will be my own.

The third hurdle is overcoming a limited sense of oneself, as I mentioned in the first part. It seems contrary to self-interest to follow Jesus. Most people think of themselves as like an enclosed box sitting on their shoulders, and everything outside that box is alien and hostile. You have to overcome that false self to find your true self. When I first came to Christ, I looked at what was being called for in the gospels in terms of self-sacrifice and I honestly said to myself, I can't do that. I was being very honest with myself. That is like asking a stone to become a bird. There is no path from the one place, my selfish self, to the other, the child of God and follower of Jesus. They are as alien as alien could be. Like a stone wanting to become a bird.

Well there is a path, but I can't explain what it is. God does it. Just keep pushing towards God.

The fourth hurdle? I guess putting into practice, putting the life of a follower of Jesus into practice, but I am not sure I am at that stage yet. There may be other hurdles I know nothing of.

But the purpose of this post is, you have to take that labyrinth seriously. You have to take the enemy seriously. The latter part of the Gospel of John is full of Jesus describing this world as belonging to the evil one, of the masses of the people belonging to him. Take that seriously.

The Lord bless you and keep you;

the Lord make his face to shine upon you

and be gracious to you;

the Lord turn his countenance upon you

and give you His peace.