Musing about a final Justice
August 21, 2011
In response to my class today at Koinonia in Young Harris, GA, I am in pursuit of justice on a grand scale, and I now conceive of my existence as a replay of my own life in heaven among all the humans (and angels) and I am sitting in the audience now and watching just like all the others, only I am in trance and take this replay as reality. This means that when the replay is finished then I will “come to†and realize now that all here, friends and foe, see me as I really am and as I know myself and how it is that I turned out as I did. Sort of like an avatar in reverse, taking the consciousness of the replay.
I will also see the replays of others, and perhaps this is simultaneous in time (in any case time being merely a human way of looking at things, according to Kant).
And then the judgments will start and we will all have perfect evidence of what has happened,* and we will know each other even as we are known, totally and in every respect. We will see ourselves in 3-D (in this my imagined projection of our lives) and we will be totally privy to the thoughts and the entire make up, and why it is that one sees a face in a cloud, and another does not. [Paul speaks in this tone.]
[* Perhaps in order that our souls might be communicated with others?]
We will not judge the former 8 year old brainwashed child who then also commits terrorist act 6 years later in the wholesale slaughter of some “pawns†of God (as I think the Muslim will consider humanity). We will have perfect knowledge and will make perfect judgments and they will be universal, even by the person being judged. [Paul speaks of Christians judging the angels.]
Then comes the judgment of God who will accept the judgement of man. According to Kant’s take on Jesus all the souls will all live in one of two different realms, both fully enriched by material for delight and enough for all, one of the communalist in heart (and not always obvious at sight and without subjective information of the subject), and one of the selfish bent where people would try to divvy up the material in order to lord it over others. Perhaps only one person would end up there where, once all information is known, the selfish go to fend for themselves (as Kant put it). Perhaps it will be only Don Giovanna. The good thing is that we will all take part in all knowledge and the judgments will be by universal acclimation, and so it will be our own doing. No one will be found perfectly innocent (except Jesus, I suppose, and even he falter in faith at the very end).
Perhaps then, wanting to think now as a Christian, that the special blessing that comes to those who followed Jesus as a member of his band would be a special joy surrounding the Lord Jesus as he goes here and there greeting people in the communal realm. And surely that joy is worth all the world and people who have not gleaned it cannot realize its value, for it is worth far more than fine gold. Pity those, despite their happiness (like truly happy puppy dogs, perhaps), for they do not have the joy of exaltation.
And even those who failed to live the honorable role of knight (and we need Christian knights and knightesses [to unnecessarily coin a word, and even then one of distinction, and thus a vanity]) might be rewarded for having at least outwardly promoted a Christian society (?). How shall we judge? Was it for gain? Was it for the sake of the world? And judge we must. That is our fate as a human. We must judge. Was it done sincerely, or only for show? All this will be clear and obvious to all as well as all the conditions that led up to the various choices made by all.
And so then we will all be satisfied and not person will doubt that justice has been done.
I guess to bring universalism into the picture, we would say that those in the selfish realm do not know, but those in the other realm know, that God will forgive them and accept them into his own realm of Jesus’ band, unless they simply refuse that. And so they are accepted at the universal banquet table and people are civil and polite, but maybe it will be impossible ever to have any communication because we will also see the actual character of the person we are talking with at a party, and that would in this case be unpleasant. It would like a spiritual nakedness. Maybe that’s the final justice. We are all at a party and there is a big elephant in the room with some people, and there is a natural tendency to separate and congregate with others of a like attitude of inclusion. We are all there at the same party, but some do not enjoy it while others do. Perhaps they are uncomfortable.
The evangelist message then becomes: the only way of avoiding hell (an isolated existence) is to be like Jesus, and while you might try to be like him on your own, the sure bet is to bet on Jesus himself and cooperate with others as a dedicated member of his band.They can proclaim that Jesus is a certitude and the only certitude available to man.
Hell then is isolation from human contact, and heaven is community (including therefore Jesus).
Being all alone at the party, but due to one’s own shame, and thus voluntarily leaving the party to sit outside alone, but with loads of cake and punch. For they cannot stand themselves when they are in the presence of the band of Jesus in their total nakedness. Everyone is at the party but some pull away to be alone at the edges. Kant, when thinking about moral justice, seems to think in terms of various degrees of happiness. All are happy, but in different degree. Some, perhaps, are happy when they are alone.
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