The Simple Explanation suggests that a "universal unit of consciousness" carries all of the information that manifests as our particular time/space continuum. This universal unit of consciousness is the primal algorithm of the set of laws that govern our universe. Some people call that God. Other people think it all can be boiled down to math and physics.
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On Friday, June 28, I was the guest of Miguel Conner on his Aeon Byte Gnostic Radio program. Aeon Byte can be heard on all popular podcast platforms as well as on youtube. This was my first interview regarding my new book, The Gnostic Gospel Illuminated. It's good to watch it on YouTube, because we run the illustrations during the program and I explain the visual symbology.
If you have any follow-up questions regarding The Gnostic Gospel Illuminated or The Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything, please feel free to leave me a comment here.
Now that I have completed writingThe Gnostic Gospel Illuminated, I am revisiting the standard teachings of my Christian faith. One of the central themes of the Christian faith is the death of Jesus on the cross. Christians the world over focus on the body of Jesus hanging on the cross. I have often pondered why this fixation of Jesus on the cross? Why is the crucifix the focal point of every church and altar? Why do people wear the cross as jewelry or hang a crucifix in their bedroom? The obvious answer Christians give is that without the cross, Jesus could not have saved humanity from sin, for he bore our sins into the grave with his death and they were washed away with his resurrection from the dead. Okay. Praise be to God. But why the cross? If Jesus had been stoned to death, or drowned, or beaten, or thrown from a high tower, would we feel such affinity for a stone, a lake, a club, or a roof? I don't think so. I think there is something very special about the shape of the cross itself. I ask this question because Jesus never said, "I am soon to pass on from this world, and I want you to focus on my body hanging on the cross as I take on the sins of the world." Yet, that's what people do, as if that were the point of the Gospel. As far as I can tell, Jesus did not ask for his death and resurrection to be the focal point of worship. What Jesus actually said was, "I and my Father are One," and "Whoever welcomes me welcomes the Father that sent me." In other words, Jesus acknowledged himself in reference to his Father, and he deflected glory to his Father. Yet, Jesus is worshiped by modern Christians to the extent that the Father almost goes unmentioned. Thank goodness for the Lord's Prayer which is directed to the Father, and not the Son. Jesus taught it to be said to the Father; he did not teach it to be recited to himself. No slight to the Son, of course; I am here simply emphasizing the Father. During the Last Supper, Jesus instructed his followers to think of his broken body as they break and eat bread, and to consider his blood as the fulfillment of a contract with humanity as they drink wine. This is what Jesus left the church as instruction regarding his death. He did not instruct them to erect images of crosses and to worship him hanging on the cross as if he were stuck up there forever. Yes, Protestants have allowed Jesus to come down off the cross and therefore their crosses are unoccupied to remind us that Jesus resurrected. But still, the focus is on the cross. Again, why the cross in particular? Last year I wrote "A Simple Explanation of the Sign of the Cross," wherein I explained my view of the symbolism of the cross. It is still a good explanation. In the meantime, I have developed a visual symbolism for the Gnostic Gospel, laid out inThe Gnostic Gospel Illuminated. Now I can apply the Simple Explanation to the Gnostic Gospel, or is it the Gnostic Gospel to the Simple Explanation? And here it is:
The cross draws down power from above to earth below, and bridges side-to-side the Powers engaged in Endless War.
If you read The Gnostic Gospel Illuminated book, you will fully understand the symbolism presented here. We who dwell on earth are engaged in endless warfare with the imitation that always seeks to lure us away from our Father in heaven. Oftentimes we do not realize we are engaged in warfare with the imitation because it can appear disguised as goodness. That is what is meant by the devil being a liar.
The Second Order of Powers are engaged in endless warfare with the deficiencies of the imitation. Although the Second Order of Powers comes from the good disposition of the Father and the Fullness, they have forgotten their heavenly nature and become deluded through rage and other passions and addictions.
The Christ came to earth in the form of a Son of Man to bring the Third Order of Powers to earth as the solution to overcoming the phantoms of the imitation that have mired the Second Order Powers in error. Those who have eyes to see the Christ are able to remember their Father in Heaven. Those who remember their Father in Heaven and repent from the imitation are redeemed. Jesus Christ was the fulfillment of the promise to redeem the fallen. Jesus, as the Son of God and the Son of Man, brought salvation to the deficiency and restored it to the Kingdom of Heaven.
The reason the cross looks as it does and occupies such a central role in worship is that the cross represents human beings. The cross is shaped like a human, a Son of Man. It is no accident that Jesus was crucified on a cross, because Jesus is a Son of Man, the Son of Man. If, hypothetically, humans looked like dogs, then the Son of Man would have come in the form of a dog and the cross would look like that, too.
The human form is shaped like a cross. Small wonder we are drawn to the crucifix.
The cross should remind us that humankind has been redeemed by the body and blood of Christ in an even more profound way than acknowledging the indignity and suffering of Jesus on the cross; it should remind us that the Son of God, the Christ, bridged with the form of his human body, Spirit to Matter, Top to Bottom (Spirit to Earth) and Neighbor-to-Neighbor (side-to-side). In the Gnostic Gospel, redemption comes to all of creation through the incarnation of the Son of God into the body of the Son of Man. The manner of the Savior's birth, death, and resurrection will come to every soul as they realize their Father is in Heaven and to Heaven they will return. For every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. It just takes time.
The First, Second, and Third Powers follow Christ the King, while the Phantoms of the Imitation cling to the darkness below.
We aren't there yet, because of the common delusion of presumptuous thought, which causes people to behave selfishly. Ego must first make way for the love of Christ to take over the throne of the Self. Only then may you rise above the egoic imitation, for then you will have a Champion and King.
The Christ entered history about two million years ago to bring an end to the "economy" that sustains life on our material earth. About that time, Christ raised human beings above their fellow eukarya by endowing us with the ability to reason, remember, and glorify our Father and the ALL. Humans were designed to be truly existent living images of the Fullness.
The aeons of the Fullness dream of Paradise
"So they came, they too being far superior in their carnal emission compared to the ones who had been brought forth from deficiency. For in this way they too were emitted bodily together with the Savior by being manifested in union with him. These are such as belong to the single substance, and that is the spiritual one. The economy, however, is variable, this being one thing, that another [Tripartite Tractate, v. 115, 116]. The Gnostic Gospel claims that we humans are all children of the spiritual realm of the Fullness, Redeemed by the body and blood of Christ in the form of "a drop" of remembrance, "a seed of the promise" that "now enabled instruction and a return to that which they had been from the beginning" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 117].
DNA carries the "remembrance" of organisms
Humans were endowed with reason so they could remember their true inheritance and repent of their tenacious claim to material life. This Redemption comes easier to some than to others: "Now, humanity came to exist as three kinds with regard to essence--spiritual, psychical, and material--reproducing the pattern of the three kinds of disposition of the Word, from which sprung material, psychical, and spiritual beings" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 118].
Eukarya, which include all animals, plants, and fungi, are an Order above the prokarya, who lack cellular walls, nucleii, and double-helix DNA. This Simple Gnostic Gospel classifies prokaryotes as soulless material beings and the 2nd Order of Powers as psychical beings with souls. Humans are eukaryotes whose DNA has been augmented with advanced capabilities that enable them to "remember" their spiritual home. Because Christ's code is inscribed into our DNA, all humans are able to remember and glorify the Father.
"The spiritual kind [of human] is like light from light and like spirit from spirit... It received knowledge straightaway from the revelation... When he remembered that which is superior and prayed for salvation, [he has] salvation without any uncertainty" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 118, 119]These are the prophets, evangelists, and teachers of the Word, whose job it is to help their brothers and sisters to remember the Father above. "The psychical kind, however, being light from fire, tarried before recognizing the one who had appeared to it, and still more before rushing to him in faith... it was content that it was not far from the hope given by the promise, having received... a pledge of the assurance of things to come... Those who rid themselves of the lust for domination that was given to them temporarily and for short periods, who give glory to the Lord of glory and who abandon their rage, will be recompensed for their humility by being allowed to endure indefinitely" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 118, 120].
These are folks who feel they are doing just fine, leading a mostly moral and comparatively upright life--good family people, good citizens. They realize nobody is perfect, and they try to be helpful to their neighbors. "The material kind, however, is alien in every respect: it is like darkness that avoids the shining light because it is dissolved by its manifestation. For it did not accept his coming, and is even filled with hatred against the Lord because he revealed himself...
"Those who arrogantly pride themselves in their vainglorious lust, who love temporary glory, who are oblivious to the fact that the power they have has been entrusted to them only for a limited time and period, and for that reason have not acknowledged that the Son of God is the Lord of the ALL and the Savior, and who have failed to rid themselves either of their fury or their way of imitating those who are evil--they will receive judgment for their ignorance and their senselessness, namely suffering" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 120, 121].
These people proudly call themselves atheists and they have no fear of God because their meme bundle rejects sober contemplation of God. Others may proudly call themselves scientists; still others, academics. Some may be industrialists, tech giants, entertainers, pandering politicians, or philandering priests. They are successful materialists who have no inclination to replace their ego with God. They mock believers, believing themselves superior to those poor, deluded fools. The Gnostic Gospel names Jesus of Nazareth as the incarnation of the Christ, who walked the earth 2,000 years ago. Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God and instructed his followers in the ways of virtue. Jesus did not ask to be worshiped or glorified, rather, he redirected praise to the Father.
Jesus was both "fully human," with human DNA inherited from his earthly mother, and "fully God," entwined at conception with DNA inherited from his spiritual Father. Within the body and blood of Jesus flowed the perfected genomic instantiation of the Paradise dreamed by the Fullness. In this manner, Restoration came to the Deficiency below. Christ's incarnation in the body of Jesus, and the spilling of his blood onto the earth, brought the ALL and the aeons of the Fullness face to face with the material agony of life, suffering, and death.
We may now infer that with the coming of the King, the final Kingdom is at hand. For not only did the Christ incarnate in that body, but so too did the angels and the powers of the Fullness who worked tirelessly within the cradle of each cell, protecting and expressing Christ Jesus. "The final restoration, however, will take place after the ALL is manifested in him who is the Son--the one who is the redemption, who is the road toward the incomprehensible Father, who is the return to the preexistent--and after the members of the ALL have been manifested in him who is truly the inconceivable, ineffable, invisible, and ungraspable one, so that the ALL obtains its redemption" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 123, 124]. "For the redemption began to be given among the humans who were in the flesh, with his firstborn and his love, the Son, coming in the flesh, and the angels who were in heaven having been found worthy of forming a community, a community in him on earth" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 125]. The most accurate interpretation of these verses is that the angels were literally inside of the body of Jesus, forming a "community" in him, living and dying with him. Indeed, our karyotic cells work as an integrated community inside each of us, devoted to taking care of the needs of our bodies. "As for the true baptism, into which the members of the ALL descend and where they come into being, there is no other baptism except the one--and that is the redemption--which takes place in God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, after confession of faith has been made in those names--and after one has believed that the things one has been told are real" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 127, 128]. The end goal of Redemption is return to the Father's abode--that Paradise dreamed by the Fullness, where there is no death, no disease, no disappointment, and no deficiencies. That Paradise where Christ is King and peace reigns supreme, and there is only cooperation, fellowship, and true love. In Paradise there is naught but life; so all the grass is green, and flowers blossom endlessly, and every soul that has ever lived, lives happily with their friends and families.
"The Prologue and the Promise" by Robert McCall was a popular image of Paradise that once graced the walls of Disney's Florida EPCOT Center.
What happens on Judgment Day? The spiritual ones who already serve the King take their places in Paradise as the "Elect" of the Church, and they join with the aeons in the "concord and the inseparability of the ones whom he has known and who have known him" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 128]. Those who are of the "Calling," that is, those of the Remembrance who were caught in the endless war with the Imitation, have within themselves "good dispositions and... a sentiment that derives from that which is" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 130]. "They greeted the light" like a bolt of lightening, "and they bore withness that it had appeared for their salvation" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 131]. Thus the Called will condemn evil and will turn away from the rage that has consumed them, and they will be healed as they "acknowledge that they have an origin of their existence, and they desire to know what that is that exists before them" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 132]. "And even those who were brought forth from the desire of lust for domination, having inside them the seed that is lust for domination, will receive the recompense of good things if they have worked together with those who are predisposed toward good things, and provided they decide to do so deliberately, and are willing to abandon their vain love of temporary glory so as to do the command of the Lord of glory, and instead of that small temporary honor they will inherit the eternal kingdom" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 131, 132]. As for Those of the Imitation who embrace the darkness and deny the light, well, "even they will obtain direct vision, so that they will no longer have to believe only on account of a small word produced by a voice that this is how things are. For the restoration back to that which was is a single one. Even if some are exalted because of the economy, having been set up as causes for the things that happened, unfolding numerous physical forces and taking pleasure in them, they--angels as well as humans--will obtain the kingdom, the confirmation, and the salvation" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 133]. These, too, will be provided "with dwelling places where they will dwell eternally after they have renounced the downward attraction of deficiency, and the power of the Fullness has pulled them upward, on account of the great generosity and the sweetness of the preexistent aeon" [Tripartite Tractate, v. 136].
The only forms banished to the outer darkness are those attributes of the Deficiency that "did not exist from the beginning"--the shadows and phantoms of the Imitation that bring nothing but death and destruction.
Slime molds are not bacteria, but single-celled organisms called "eukaryotes" who have been on the planet for a couple of billion years, long before the emergence of multi-cellular life forms. They are the "first life" progenitors of all of the plants, animals, and fungi on the planet. Eukaryotes possess a true cell nucleus and DNA with the double-helix structure, and all of the complicated cellular mechanisms that go along with that, still used in our bodies today.
From wikipedia: When a slime mold mass or mound is physically separated, the cells find their way back to re-unite. Studies on Physarum polycephalum have even shown an ability to learn and predict periodic unfavorable conditions in laboratory experiments.[10]John Tyler Bonner, a professor of ecology known for his studies of slime molds, argues that they are "no more than a bag of amoebae encased in a thin slime sheath, yet they manage to have various behaviours that are equal to those of animals who possess muscles and nerves with ganglia – that is, simple brains."[11]MacPherson, Kitta (January 21, 2010). Princeton University. One cool thing about slime molds is that they are individual, single-celled organisms, yet when conditions call for it, they come together and form one fully coordinated body. Once in that aggregated body, the mold acts with one mind, one will, and one goal. When an assembly is pulled apart, the individuals and fragmentary clumps will crawl toward one another and pull themselves back together. When it comes time to reproduce, the mold body individuals will form themselves into stalks and reach upward to the sky, holding their spore sacs into the surrounding water or air to be carried away. While the withered stalk drops back down in self-sacrificial death, the memory of the stalk's form swims away in the wake of the new single cell, propelled by the long, trailing flagella that emerges from the remains of the umbilicus.
Watch this short video that shows slime mold aggregations acting as a single, multi-cellular animal.
Now, if you think this behavior is surprisingly complicated, take a look inside a cell and see a whole 'nother world of complications. Here are two articles from the Simple Explanation blog that take you inside the machinery of the cell: "ATP Production Machine" and "Inner Life of a Cell."
Humans like to arrange themselves into pyramids and stalks, too.
According to the Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything, consciousness is not dependent upon size, nor is operational complexity. Every single thing in our universe, no matter how big or how small, carries within itself the blueprints and consciousness needed to get its job done, whatever that job may be. The Simple Explanation calls these blueprint-carriers "Units of Consciousness."
This simple torus diagram represents the basic blueprint for every material instantiation in our universe.
Here is the Simple Explanation hierarchy as manifested by the human body. This hierarchy is formed by Units of Consciousness "holding hands" with their neighbors to level up to the next, more complex, form. At each level, new Units of Consciousness emerge to inform and coordinate the tasks.
The lowly slime molds are a beautiful example of the Simple Explanation's Golden Rule--reaching out to others like themselves with love, information, assistance, and the willingness to work together for the common good.
These single-celled organisms-who-work-as-one are living proof of the Simple Explanation's model of aggregated consciousness and collective will.
The Simple Gnostic explanation is that these slime molds are emanations of the Fullness, as are we all. These single-celled primitives are part of the Second Order of Powers, put on earth to rectify the Deficiency. There is no need to puzzle over the level of sophistication demonstrated inside the cells and amongst the single-celled Eukaryotes because they reflect the intent of the Fullness to redeem the Deficiency that began with Logos, the Demiurge. The Eukayotes, and their use of the DNA double-helix, bring the will of the Son and the Hierarchy of the Fullness, to the earth.
This illustration represents the Fullness of the ALL as a hierarchy where every aeon knows its place, power, function, and name. The rays behind the pyramid represents the ALL, and the white cloud behind is the Son. The Fullness and the ALL dream of a plan to correct the lifeless condition of the Deficiency.
