[Music]
so I've been thinking this week about
doing this one from once a month on a
continuing basis so
so I think if I do that I think it'll be
here although it's harder to rent this
theater during the academic year but if
it isn't here it'll be somewhere else
and because I'd like to continue doing
this I'm learning a lot from doing it
and and once a month would really be
good because then I could really do the
background work and and I could probably
do that for a couple of years because
obviously this is going very quickly but
that's okay you know I mean it shouldn't
go any faster than it can go and that's
how it that's how it seems to me anyways
so this has been this has been a very
steep learning curve for me with regards
to these stories because I didn't
understand them very well and I got
better at using the resources on line to
help me do my background investigation I
have a lot of books and some of you may
have noticed that online I posted a
conversation I had with Jonathan Powell
and his and his brother Matthew
I hope it's Matthew ivory names escape
me so badly but I believe that's right
he just finished a book on them on the
Bible and so I've been doing a lot of
thinking and talking about these stories
trying to understand what they're about
and and then there's all these
commentaries there's a great site I
think it's called Bible hub that has
every single verse of the Bible is
listed there and then with each verse
there are like they've aggregated ten
commentaries from about ten commentaries
from over the last four hundred years
and so there's like a dense page on
every line and that's one of the things
that's really interesting about this
book too is that it's it's aggregated so
much commentary that it's that it's it's
much bigger than looks the book is much
bigger than it looks and so it's been
very interesting to become familiar with
those two and the fact that this site is
set up with all the commentaries split
up by verses means you can rapidly
compare the commentaries and get a sense
of you know how people have interpreted
this over while at least several hundred
years but of course much longer than
that because the people who wrote the
commentaries were of course reading
things that were older than that so
that's been very very interesting
so last week we talked about a couple of
things we talked about how you might
understand the idea of the divine
encounter and then we also paralleled
that with the idea that God disappears
in the Old Testament he he boughs out as
the stories progress and that seems to
be a an emergent property of the
sequencing of the stories right because
all the books were written by
independent people different people and
then they were aggregated by other
people and so the narrative continuity
is some kind of emergent property that's
it's a consequence of this interaction
between people readers and writers over
centuries and it's it's strange that
given that there are also multiple
coherent narratives that United you know
it's really it's really not that easy to
understand that but it does at least
seem to be the case and so and the third
thing we talked about was that as God
bows out so to speak the the the
individual personality seems of the
characters that are involved the human
characters that are involved seems to
become more and more developed and it
isn't exactly clear what that I mean
what it means is that God steps away and
man steps forward that's what it means
but why it's arranged like that or they
or they say ultimate significance of
that is by no means clear and so so
Abraham who we're going to concentrate
on today is quite a well-developed
character and I would say there are two
there multiple endings and beginnings in
the biblical stories the most important
ending I suppose is the ending of the
the garden of paradise and and the
disenchantment of the world and the
sending forth of Adam and Eve into
history right into the future into into
a mode of being that has a future as
part of it and that has history as part
of it and that has the necessity of
sacrifice and toil as part of it that's
obviously crucial and then that's that
is replayed with the story of Noah
because everything is destroyed and then
the world is created anew and then
sacrifices have to be made in order for
the world to begin and then you see the
same thing happen again after the Noah
story in the Tower of Babel because
history as we really
understand history seems to start with
Abraham because the stories of Abraham
sound like historical stories and no
scholars debate about the historical
accuracy of the Bible and I suppose
there's no way of ever determining once
and for all the degree to which you
might regard the accounts as equivalent
to modern empirical history but this is
a psychological interpretation of the
biblical stories not a historical
interpretation and it certainly does
seem to be the case that from a
psychological perspective we enter
something like the domain of the modern
conceptualization relatively modern
conceptualization of history with
Abraham beyond the accounts of divine
commands that Abraham carries out this
is from Freedman man I mentioned in the
last lecture
who wrote the disappearance of God a
variety of other books that are well
worth reading the narrative also
includes a variety of stories in which
Abraham acts on his own initiative he
divides land with his nephew lot he
battles Kings he takes concubines he
argues with his wife Sarah on two
occasion he tells Kings that Sarah is
his sister out of fear that they will
kill him to get his wife he arranges his
sons marriage in the place of the single
story of Noah's drunkenness there are in
the case of Abraham the stories of a
man's life and one of the things I was
really struck by reading this in depth
and read the commentary is how much like
a story about a person it is you know
Abraham isn't a divine figure in any in
any archetypal sense precisely when he
has archetypal elements because he's
also obviously the founder of a nation
but fundamentally he's a human being and
and he makes he has the adventures and
he makes the mistakes of a human being
and that's it's the mistake part that
really struck me you know because it did
I was talking with a friend of mine this
week Norman Doidge who's a very
remarkable person in many ways and he
was taking me to task he was reading my
book which I'm going to publish sure
which will be out in January and in in
the book I in one section I contrasted
the God of the Old Testament with the
god of the New Testament and made the
case sort of based on north of Freud's
ideas that the God of the Old Testament
was really harsh and judgmental you know
and that the god of the New Testament
was
more merciful and you know at least to
some degree more sweetness and light and
Norman took me to task about that saying
that that was a overly Christianized
interpretation which would make sense
because I derived it in part from
Northrop Frye and I really have come to
understand that more that he's right
because that he's right about that
because the God in the Old Testament is
actually far more merciful than he's
generally made out to be and you really
see this with it's good news
fundamentally if you regard the
representation of God as somehow key to
the description of being itself
I mean Abraham makes a lot of mistakes
you know serious mistakes and and yet he
has a life and he's and he's blessed by
God despite the fact that he's pretty
deeply flawed and engages in deceptive
practice I mean he's a good man but he's
not a perfect man by any stretch of the
imagination and and things work out
really well for him and he's the founder
of the nation and all of that and that's
good news for everyone because perfect
people are very very hard to find and if
the only pathway to having a rich and
meaningful life was through perfection
then we would all be in deep trouble and
so that that's very satisfying to read
that and the other the other thing that
I've been struck by is that you know
Abraham and I think this is actually
absolutely key to the interpretation of
the story Abraham goes out and does
things that's the thing and so one of
the things that I've noticed in my life
is that nothing I've ever done was
wasted and by done I mean put my heart
and soul into you know like like
attempted with with all of my effort
that always worked now it didn't always
work the way I expected it to work
that's a whole different issue but the
payoff from it was always positive I
always something always a something of
value always accrued to me when I made
the sacrifices necessary to do something
worthwhile and so I think part of the
message in in this in the story of a and
the Abrahamic stories is go do something
and and I thought about this in a
variety of ways outside of the
interpretation of this story because I
have this program some of you might be
familiar with which is called future
authoring program and it's it's designed
to help people
make a plan for three to five years into
the future you know and we so what you
do is you you answer some questions it's
a writing program you know answer some
questions about how you would like your
life to be what you would like your
character to be three to five years down
the road if you were taking care of
yourself like you were taking care of
someone that you actually cared about so
you kind of have to split yourself into
two people and treat yourself like you
like someone you have respect for and
that you want the best for now it's not
easy because people don't necessarily
have respect for themselves and they
don't necessarily want what's the best
for themselves because they have a lot
of self contempt and a lot of self
hatred a lot of guilt and a lot of
existential angst and and a lot of
self-consciousness and all of that and
and so people don't necessarily take
care of themselves very well and and I
think it's I think it's I think you have
an obligation it's one of the highest
moral obligations to treat yourself as
if you're a creature of value and and
that is in some sense it's in some sense
that's independent of your actions and
you might think about that
metaphorically as a recognition of your
divine worth in the biblical sense
regardless of your of your sins so to
speak and I think that's that's that's
powerful language as far as I'm
concerned once you understand it anyways
with the self authoring program the
future authoring program you you ask you
answer questions about what what how you
would like your friendships to be
conducted because it's useful to
surround yourself with people who are
trying to move forward and more
importantly who are happy when you move
forward and not happy when you move back
backwards not when you fall that isn't
what I mean but when you're doing
self-destructive things your friends
shouldn't be there to cheer you on and
because then they're really not acting
like friends obviously you know I know
it's obvious but it still happens all
the time and people allow it to happen
it's not a good idea and you know how
would you like to sort your family out
and I was thinking about this this week
too because I was thinking about Noah's
Ark and there was a phrase in that story
that I didn't understand which was that
Noah was perfect in his generations I
don't know what that means you know when
you're when you're going through a book
like the Bible if you don't understand
the phrase that actually means you've
missed something it doesn't mean that
that's just not you know that's not
germane to the story it means you're
stupid you didn't get it man
you didn't get it you didn't
standard and so the idea that Noah was
perfect in his generations and that's
why he could build an ark that would
sustain him and him and and humanity
itself through the flood it meant that
he not only did he walk with God which
is something that we talked about in the
context of the Sermon on the Mount but
he established proper relationships with
his family with his children and so what
that meant was that his not only was he
well integrated as a person but his
level of integration had reached the
point where it stretched out beyond him
and encompassed his family and so it was
Noah and the family that was in the ark
and I can tell you and I really
understood this this year because I had
a very tumultuous year you could think
about it from a personal perspective I
could think about it as a year that had
no shortage of floods and might and part
of the reason that I was able to get
through it I also had terrible health
problems and one of the reasons I was
able to get through it was because my
family really came together around me my
kids my wife my parents and my friends
as well and particularly a certain group
of friends and that's partly all of that
came together in my mind that's we can I
thought well that's what it means to be
perfect in his generations meant that he
hadn't just straightened himself out
he'd also straightened out his
relationships with his family and I can
tell you that when crisis strikes you
which it will it will the flood will
come right that's why the apocalypse is
always upon us the flood will definitely
come in your life and to the degree that
you've organized yourself
psychologically and also healed the
relationships between you and your
family that could be the critical
element that that determines whether you
live or die when a crisis comes or or
whether someone in your family lives or
dies and so the idea of the Ark
containing the man who's who walks with
God and who's generations are perfect
and that that's what sustains humanity
through the crisis it's like you
couldn't be more psychologically
accurate than that no the other thing I
was thinking about this weekend I was
thinking about another line in the New
Testament I think it's from the Sermon
on the Mount but I'm not absolutely sure
Christ compares the Kingdom of Heaven to
a mustard seed and so I was thinking
about a mustard seed as a very tiny seed
and it grows into
a spectacular complex plant and I was
thinking about how you should operate in
the world in order to make it a better
place assuming that that's what you
should be doing and that is what you
should be doing and there's lots in the
world to fix everything that bothers you
about the world and about yourself
should be fixed and you can do that and
my dawning realization I have a friend
he is in Montreal his name is James
Simon he's a great painter and he's
taught me a lot of things helped he's
helped me design my house and beautify
it and I bought some paintings from him
a couple of years ago and he did this
series of paintings where he went around
North America and and stood in different
places and then he painted the view from
here down and so it's his feet planted
in different places on roads in the
desert on the ocean I have one actually
hanging over my toilet which is him
standing at a urinal yeah well you know
he was trying to make a point and the
point was that wherever you are it's
worth paying attention and that's
because you know so all these places
that he visited he looked exactly where
he was from standing by the side of the
road in the desert sort of mundane in
some sense but then maybe he put 40
hours into that painting you know it's
very very realistic painting with really
good light and what he's telling you as
a painter is everything is worth paying
attention to an infinite amount but you
don't have enough time so the artist
does that for you right the artist looks
and looks and looks and looks and looks
and then gives you that vision and so
then you can look at the painting and it
reminds you that right where you are is
there's every everything that there is
is right where you are and that's a hard
thing to realize but it's actually true
and so I've been telling people online
in various ways and in lectures that
they should start fixing up the world by
cleaning up their room and I wanted to
just elaborate on that a little bit
before I get back to the lecture itself
so as it's becoming this internet weird
internet meme you know and and and it's
a joke and good it's a joke I'm really
happy about the fact that so much of
this has got like the leaving of humor
and it's really important because that's
what stops things from degenerate
getting into into conflict humor and I
was thinking about this idea of cleaning
up your room in relationship to the
mustard seed idea and you see the thing
about cleaning up your room this is also
something I learned from Carl Jung and
his study is on alchemy because for Jung
when the alchemist was attempting to
make the philosopher's stone he was not
only engaged in the transformation of
the material world but he was engaged in
the process of self transformation that
occurred at the same time as the
chemical Trent as the chemical
transformation so the psychological work
in some sense let's say you want to sort
out your room and beautify it because
the beauty is also important and let's
say that all you have is just a little
room like you're not rich you're poor
and you don't have any power that's
another thing but you've got your damn
room and you've got this space right in
front of you you know that that's a part
of the cosmos that you can come to grips
with and you might think well what's
there in front of you right in front of
you and the answer to that is it depends
on how open your eyes are that that's
the proper answer because you could say
and William Blake said this for example
Aldous Huxley made comments that were
very similar that in a transcendent
state you can see infinity in the finite
and you might say well you can say and
you can see infinity and what you have
within your grasp if you look and you
could say maybe that's the case with
your room and so you want to clean up
your room well okay
how do you do that exactly well a room
is a room is a place to sleep and so if
you say your room ups properly then you
figure out how to sleep and when you
should sleep and how you should sleep
and then you figure out when you should
wake up and then you figure out what
clothes you should wear because they
have to be arranged properly in your
dresser then you have to have some place
to put your clothes and you're going to
have some clothes you have to figure out
what you're going to wear those clothes
to do right and then that means you have
to figure out what you're going to do
and then your room has to serve that
purpose because otherwise it doesn't set
up properly and if it doesn't set up if
it doesn't serve your purposes you will
be unhappy and not happy in the room
because the way that we perceive the
world is as a place to move from point A
to point B in and then if the place that
were in facilitates that movement then
we're happy to be there and it's the
place that we're in serves as an
obstacle to that movement then we run
happy to be there and so what it means
to set up your room is that you have to
have somewhere to go that's worthwhile
or you can't set up your room and then
your room has to be set up to facilitate
that and then the next thing is well
maybe you have to make it beautiful but
that's not easy right that means you
have to have some taste and that doesn't
mean you have to have money it doesn't
because you can be garish with money and
you can be tasteful with nothing all you
need is taste and taste beats money when
it comes to beautifying things you know
I mean not that money is trivial because
it's not the taste is crucial and people
who are very artistically oriented can
make beautiful things out of virtually
nothing and not only that the literature
suggests that if you're going to make
beautiful things putting real
constraints on on what you allow
yourself to do facilitates creativity
instead of interfering with it because
let's say you have to make something out
of nothing right which I suppose would
be a godly act right you have to make
something out of nothing it you have to
be creative in order to do that and so
then to beautify your room means that
you also have to develop your capacity
to be creative and so then you can make
your room shines but then what will
happen is that if your family isn't
together they will interfere with that
you'll interfere with that because you
won't have the discipline to do it
properly but then when you start
building this is this little microcosm
of perfection with what you have at hand
and Italy evoke all the pathologies of
everyone in your household they'll
wonder what the hell you're up to in
there and they won't necessarily be
happy because if you're if they're in a
lowly place let's say and so are you and
you're trying to move out of that then
the higher you move out of that the more
the place they're in looks bad and you
might say well what they should do is
celebrate your victory over chaos and
evil but that isn't what will happen
what will happen instead is that they
will attempt to pull you back down
they'll attempt to and I mean obviously
all families don't do that but but all
families do that to some degree and some
families do almost nothing but that and
so what that means is that if you're
going to organize your room then you're
going to have to confront the devil's in
your house and that's often that's often
a terrifying thing because some of those
Devils have have lineages that go back
many many many generations
and god only knows what you have to
struggle with in order to overcome that
and so and so to sort your self out and
to fix up your room is a non trivial
matter you know and you can do that
you'll learn by doing that and then
maybe you'll learn enough by doing that
so that you can fix up your family a
little bit and then having done that
you'll have enough character so that
when you try to operate in the world at
your job or maybe in the broader social
spheres that you'll be a force for good
instead of harm because you'll have
learned some humility by noting just how
difficult it was to put your damn room
together well and yourself for that
matter and so you'll proceed cautiously
with your eyes open
towards the good and so well those are
some of the things I've been thinking
about this week and they're Jermaine
they're like they're germane to what
we're going to discuss tonight because
what happens at the beginning of the
abrahamic stories is basically God comes
to Abraham and just says go get going
man do something do something get going
and you might think well where should I
go and God God is somewhat vague about
that and where he sends Abraham it's a
real fixer-upper man it's like there's
starvation there and there's tyranny and
there's and there's marital dissolution
and there's deceit like it's it's just
like where you live you know it's
exactly the same thing it's it's it's
tyranny and catastrophe so that's you
know the the great the tyrannical Great
Father because because Abraham ends up
having to sojourn in Egypt and and
there's a famine and so mother nature is
on the rampage and Abraham lies about
his wife as we'll see and so it's the
world it's the world it's tyranny and
and vulnerability and deceit and the
other God says Gold because if you do go
then you'll become a father of Nations
and you think well again that's pretty
good news although it's strange because
you'd expect that if God chose Abraham
then he'd send it immediately to the
land of honey land of milk and honey and
that isn't what happens at all it
doesn't happen at all and Abraham never
gets there but his mission is still
regarded as divine and thank God for
that because that's what your mission
will be because that's what you will
encounter in your life those are
archetypal things everyone encounters is
the tear
of the social structure and and the
rapaciousness of nature and the
deceitful the deceitful quality of the
human psyche it's like that's the world
now it's a negative that's a negative
view in some sense but it's positive in
this story because what it basically
says is something that's akin to the
Sermon on the Mount which is that if
you're aligned with God and you pay
attention to the divine injunction then
you can operate in the midst of chaos
and tyranny and deception and flourish
and you could hardly hope to have a
better piece of news than that given
that that's exactly where you are
so and I didn't see any of that me
Abrahamic stories to begin with so it's
been very interesting to have that sort
of reveal itself
Baberaham section nuff develops the
personality and characters of man to a
new degree in biblical narrative well
picturing him in a new degree of
responsibility in him a new degree of
responsibility so here's the other thing
that's really struck me and I think this
is absolutely crucial importance and I
don't know how much importance but it's
certainly important to me one of the
things that has just blown me away in
the last year because I've talked to
lots of people lots of people live you
know but also lots of people online but
it's more obvious live and it's obvious
in this theatre as well is that I've
gone around and spoken and a large
proportion of my audience is being young
man young you know under 30 something
like that and I've spoken to them a lot
about responsibility and what's so odd
about about this is that of all the
things that I've spoken about if I can
see the audience and I can feel how the
audience is reacting because I'm always
paying attention to all of you it's
insofar as I can manage that so I get
some sense of how what I'm saying is
landing you know what you have to do if
you're going to speak effectively to
people and what what happens is if I
talk about responsibilities everyone be
is silent just like they are now it's
silent and and not moving right focusing
attentive say pick up your
responsibilities pick up the heaviest
thing you can and carry it and the room
goes quiet and everybody's eyes open and
I think
whose makes me break up I was
[Applause]
I don't I don't know why I was speaking
to an English journalist today he was
going to write an article in Spectator
magazine I was talking about this and at
the same point in the discussion the
same I had the same emotional reaction I
don't really understand it I think it's
something something about it that's so
crucial because you know we've been fed
this unending diet of rights and
freedoms and there's something about
that especially there's something about
that that's so pathologically wrong and
people are starving for the antidote and
antidote is truth and responsibility
right and it isn't it isn't because
that's what you should do and some you
know and some some I know better or
someone knows better for you what you
should do sense it's that it's that it's
that it's that that's the secret to a
meaningful life and without the
meaningful life and all you have is
suffering and nihilism and despair and
all about and self contempt and and
that's not good and so the man it's
necessary for men to stand up and take
responsibility and they all know that
and and are starving for that message
and and the message is more that that's
also a good thing to stand up and take
responsibility because you're cursed so
much now from come from from when you're
young with this notion that you're
active engaged with with the world is
part of what is destroying and
undermining the planet and adding to the
tyranny of the social systems it's like
how about not so much of that Hey
because it's it is to soul deadening its
anti human right to the car and my sense
instead is that you know if you if you
were able to reveal the best of yourself
to you in the world that you would be an
overwhelming force for good and that
whatever errors might be made along the
way would wash out in the works and
that's the other thing that you see in
the Abrahamic stories because Abraham is
not a perfect person by any stretch of
the imagination he's a real person and
he makes mistakes but it doesn't matter
the overarching narrative is you know
maintain your covenant with God and
despite your inadequacies then not only
will you prevail but your descendants
will prevail it's like great
that's really good news you know so it's
been really something to see that in the
in the stories it's not that
so that's responsibility it's not just
that Abraham is kinder gentler more
intrepid ethical or a better debater
than his ancestor Noah rather both the
Noah and Abraham stories are pieces of a
development of an increasingly stronger
stance of humans relative to the deity
before the story is over humans will
become a good deal stronger and bolder
than Abraham oh that's really something
to say because Abraham is pretty bold
so we'll let's read the stories the
first one is about Abraham Sarah and lot
now these are the generations of Tara
Tara begat Abram so his name is Abram to
begin with and that actually turns out
to be important it's not Abraham Nahor
and Haran and Haran begat lot so Haran
is Abraham's brother and Haran died
before his father Terah in the land of
his Nativity in ur of the Chaldees and
Abram and Nahor took them wives the name
of Abraham's wife was Sarai
and the name of nahor his wife Milka the
daughter of Haran the father of Milcah
and the father visca but Sarai was
barren she had no child and Terah took
Abram his son
and lot the son of Haran his son son and
Sarai his daughter-in-law his son
Abraham's wife and they went forth with
them from the ur of Chaldees from ur of
the Chaldees to go into the land of
canaan that's exile and they came unto
Haran and dwelt there and the days of
Terah were 205 years and Terah died in
Haran and there's a reason that Sarah is
is introduced as barren and and it's to
set the stage I think it was anton
chekhov who when he was talking about
the stage setting for a play that if
there was a rifle hanging on the walls
and it had better been used before I
believe the second act or it shouldn't
be hanging there at all right and so
this is stage setting and I give part of
the reason that the biblical writers are
pointing out that Abraham's wife is
barren is because it's a real
catastrophe for Abraham oh and for Sarah
as well that she's barren and so it's
showing the trouble that Abraham's in at
the beginning of the story and it's also
it's also see what happens as the story
progresses is that Abraham Abraham and
Sarah are
eventually granted the Sun but it's way
late in the story and they're very very
old by the time it happens and of course
you're not going to be a father of
Nations without having a child and so
the writers are attempting to to make
the case that if you forthrightly pursue
that which God directs you to pursue
let's say that all things are possible
that's that's the idea in the narrative
you know you might say that's naive and
you know it's not it you think it when
you're naive right and then you dispense
with that idea and then when you stop
being the sort of person who dispenses
with ideas then you come to another
place and that's the place where you
think you have no idea what might be
possible for you with you if you've got
things together and pursued what you
should pursue you don't know how much
what's impossible to you right now would
become possible under those conditions
it's an unknown phenomena and like I've
watched people who put themselves
together across time you know
incrementally and continually and they
become capable of things that are taught
not only jaw-droppingly amazingly but
also sometimes metaphysically impossible
to understand and so we don't know the
limits of human endeavor we truly don't
and it's premature to put a cap on what
it is that we are what that what it is
that we're capable of and so you you
know you're already something and maybe
you're not so bad in your current
configuration but you might wonder if
you did nothing for the next thirty
years except put yourself together just
exactly what would you be able to do and
you might think well that's worth
finding out but of course that's that's
the adoption of responsibility and one
thing I've also learned over the years
because I've been curious about this
battle between meaning and nihilism to
know and I mean I mean I could see for a
long while the rationale in nihilism and
the power of the nihilistic argument but
it occurred to me across time that
despite that the power of the nihilistic
argument is more powerful than naive
optimism but it's not more powerful than
the optimism that is not naive
because the optimism that is not naive
says it's self-evident that the world is
place of suffering and that there are
things to be done about that and it's
self-evident that people are flawed and
that there's things to be done about
that and then the non naive optimist
says the suffering could be reduced and
the insufficient see could be overcome
if people oriented themselves properly
and did what they were capable of doing
and I do not believe that that's
deniable I do I do I think that human
potential is virtually limitless and
that there's nothing perhaps it's beyond
our grasp if we're careful as
individuals and as a society and so I
think that there's no reason for
nihilism that there's no reason for
hopelessness and and there's no reason
to bow down before evil because we're
capable of so much more and I think that
you can easily you know that first
because you're not happy with who you
are and you're ashamed and embarrassed
about it as you should be and you know
it because if you look out there you see
people who are capable of doing great
things and you know that we're not
giving it our all and still we're not
doing so badly you know and so you might
wonder if if if we devoted 90% of our
effort to putting things right instead
of fifty-five percent of our efforts or
maybe even less than that you might
wonder just how well could things be put
together and I think that you can figure
that out by starting with your room by
the way and the Lord said unto Abram and
this is this is the this is the opening
of the story
get thee out of thy country and from thy
kindred and from thy father's house unto
a land that I will show thee and this is
one of those phrases where every clause
is significant go somewhere you don't
understand that's the first thing get
the out of thy country you know back in
the 1920s there was a whole slew of
American writers who ended up as
expatriates in Paris Hemingway among
them and and who wrote the Great Gatsby
Fitzgerald yes and then a variety of
others it was very inexpensive in Paris
at the time and part of their
transformation into great literary
figures was the fact that they were out
of their country and now they could see
what their country was because you can't
see what your country is until you leave
it so you have to go into the unknown
that's that's God's first command go
into the unknown because you already
know what you know and so and that's not
enough unless you think you're enough
and if you're not enough and you don't
think you're enough then you have to go
where you haven't been and so that's the
first commandment to Abraham it's like
okay that that's a good one that makes
perfect sense go to where you don't know
yes and from my kindred well that what
does that mean means grow up right
that's what it means it means get away
from your family enough so that you can
establish your independence and that
isn't because there's something wrong
with your family although perhaps there
is you know as there is perhaps wrong
with you but it means get away you know
I talk to people very frequently whose
families have provided them with too
much protection and they know it
themselves and that means they're
deprived of necessity you know one of
the things that you see in the United
States for example is that the children
of first generation immigrants often do
better than the children they're
children and the reason for that is that
the children of first generation
immigrants have necessity driving them
and you don't know how much you need a
necessity to drive you because maybe
you're not very disciplined and if the
catastrophe doesn't immediately befall
you if you don't act forthrightly today
then maybe you never act forthrightly
right because the the gap between your
foolishness and the punishment is is
lengthened by your unearned wealth and
so you never grow up and learn and you
have to get yourself away from your
dependency in order to allow necessity
to drive you forward and that's to
become independent and to become mature
and I think part of what's happening in
our culture is that the the force that's
attacking the the fourth right movement
forward of young men in particular is
afraid of the power of men because it's
confused about the distinction between
power and authority and competence like
an a man who's who has Authority and
competence has power as a byproduct but
the authority and competence is
everything and and and people who can't
understand that failed to make the
distinction between power and authority
of competence
and they're afraid of power and so they
destroy authority and competence and
that's a terrible thing because we need
authority and competence what else is
going to
what else is going to allow us to
prevail in the long run and so you get
away from your country and you get away
from your kin and from your father's
house right and you go out there and you
establish yourself in the world it's a
call to adventure that's what this the
first lines in the Abrahamic story is a
call to adventure so great unto a land
that I will show you well you know what
does that mean you know one of the
things that I'd been struck very hard by
a number of writers Carl young obviously
among them I mean he he wrote things
like Nietzsche that if you understand
them they just break you into pieces you
know and and one of the things that Jung
understood in the psychoanalysts
understand it's one of the most
terrifying elements of psychoanalytic
thinking is very tightly allied with
religious thinking which is that you are
not the master of your own house there
are spirits that dwell in within you
meaning you have a will and you can
exercise a certain amount of conscious
control over your being but there are
all sorts of things that occur within
you that seem to be beyond your capacity
to control your dreams for example
that's a really good example or your
impulses for example you might you might
think of those as so foreign from you
that they're not even you don't even
want them to be part of you but but more
subtly even how about what you're
interested in what compels you like
where does that come from exactly
because you can't you can't conjure it
up of your own accord you know so if
you're a student and you're taking
difficult course you might say to
yourself well I need to sit down and
study for three hours but then you sit
down and that is what happens your
attention goes everywhere and you might
say well whose attention is it then if
it goes everywhere because you say it's
your attentions like well if it's your
attention maybe you would be able to
control it but you can't and so then you
might think well Jenin just exactly what
the hell is controlling it and you might
say well it's random it's the vall it's
better not be random I can tell you that
that's that happens to some degree in
schizophrenia there's an element of
randomness and
it's not random it's driven by the
action of phenomena that I think are
best considered as something like
subpersonalities although even that's
only a partial description you can't
make yourself interested in something
interest manifests itself and grips you
that's a whole different thing and so
what is it that's gripping you and how
do you conceptualize that is that a
divine power
well it's divine as far as you're
concerned because it grips you and you
can't do anything about it and so
there's a calling in you towards what
you're compelled by and what you're
interested in and sometimes that might
be very dark and sometimes not but
you're compelled forward by your
interest and so and so the idea that
what moves you away from your country
and your father's house and the comforts
of your child at home is it's something
that's beyond you and that you listen to
and hearken to that's exactly right and
you can say well I don't want to call
that God it's like doesn't matter what
you call it
exactly it doesn't matter to what it is
what it's called it still is and if you
don't listen to it that's the other
thing if you don't listen to it and I've
been a clinician and talked to enough
people now as old as I am to know this
absolutely if you do not listen to that
thing that beckons you forward you will
pay for it like you cannot possibly
imagine you'll have everything that's
terrible about life in your life and
nothing about it that's good and worse
you'll know that it was your fault and
that you squandered what you could have
had so this is not only a calling forth
but a warning unto a land that I will
show thee and that's it that I will show
thee that and you don't want to be too
concrete about this you know there's all
sorts of new territories that you can
inhabit if you there's this abstract and
conceptual territories of guilty
University and you study biology or you
study physics or or any discipline
you're in a territory right you're in
the territory that all the scholars have
established and then as you master the
discipline you move out beyond the
established territory into the unknown
and that's a new land right maybe it's
even the land of your
enemies for that matter but it's a new
land the frontier is always in front of
you and so you know when the earth was
less inhabited than it is now the
frontier was the psychological frontier
and the geographical frontier was the
same thing and now they've separated to
some degree because there's not so much
geographical volunteer but there's the
frontier is a place that never
disappears and the land that's beyond
the land that you know is always there
and it's always where you should go and
all of that packed into these what four
phrases so well so when I've been
thinking about narrative you look at the
world through a story you can't you
can't help it and the story is what
gives value to the world or or the story
is what you extract from the value of
the world you can look at it either way
you're somewhere and it's not good
enough right that's the eternal human
predicament wherever you are isn't good
enough and to some degree that's
actually a good thing because if it was
good enough well there's nothing for you
to do so it's actually maybe a good
thing that it's insufficient and that
might be why sometimes having lessons is
better than having more and I don't want
to be a Pollyanna about that I mean I
know that there's deprivation that can
reach to the point where it's no where
it's completely counterproductive but it
isn't always the case that starting with
little is you if you start with little
you start with more possibility it's
something like that so you moved from
always from what's unbearable about the
present to some better future right and
if you don't have that then you have no
you have nothing but threat and a
negative emotion you have no positive
emotion because the positive emotion is
generated in the conception of the
better future and then the evidence that
you generate yourself that you're moving
towards it that's where the positive and
fulfilling meaning of life comes so you
want to set up the structure properly
it's very very important and so what it
means is that you want to be going
somewhere that's good enough so that the
going is worth the while and you can ask
yourself that and that's partly what we
tried to build into the future authoring
program which is well we know what's
wrong with life it's rife with suffering
and insufficiency and deception and evil
it's all of that obviously okay what
would make the journey worthwhile
or you can ask yourself that it's like
alright in order to bear up under this
load what is it that I would need to be
striving to attain and if you ask
yourself that that's to knocking and the
door will open that's what that means if
you ask yourself that then you will find
an answer and you'll think you'll shrink
away from it you'll think well there's
no way I could do that it's like well
you don't know what you could do you
don't know what's possible and you're
not as much as you could be and so god
only knows what you could what you could
do and have and give if you sacrificed
everything to it and that's the reason
that Abraham is constantly making
sacrifices and it's archaic right he's
burning up like baby lambs but like well
they're alive you know that's something
and and they're valuable and that's
something it's you have to admit even if
you think about it as a modern person
but the act of sacrificing something
might have some dramatic compulsion to
it you know to go out into a flock and
to take something that's newborn and to
cut its throat and to bleed it and to
burn it might be a way of indicating to
yourself that you're actually serious
about something and it isn't so obvious
that we have rituals of seriousness like
that now and so it's not so obvious that
we're actually serious about anything
and so maybe that's not such a good
thing and so maybe we shouldn't be
thinking that these people were so
archaic and primitive and superstitious
it's possible that they knew something
that we don't it's certainly in the or
hammock stories one of the things that
maintains Abraham's covenant with God is
his continual willingness to sacrifice
it it's so that sacrificial issue is so
important because you are not committed
to something unless you're willing to
sacrifice for it
commitment and sacrifice are the same
thing and I think it's borders on
miraculous that those concepts are
embedded into this narrative at the
level of dramatic action you know
instead of abstract explanation people
are acting this out and then the
fundamental conception is so profound
that it's really quite it's quite
inspiring it's breathtaking really when
you understand what message is trying to
be conveyed you have to make sacrifices
and what you have to sacrifice you have
to sacrifice that which is most valuable
to you currently
that's stopping you and god only knows
what that is it's certainly the worst of
you it's certainly that and god only
knows to what degree you're in love with
the worst of you so well so you move
from the unbearable present to the ideal
future and and you can't help that you
have to live in the structure like that
that's your house that's another way of
thinking about it and if you want to get
your house in order and if it you want
it to be a place that you can live
properly then you have to plan the
future that is perfect and then I think
well what does that mean and it means
it's good for you right and one of the
things that I'm I do all the time with
my clinical and consulting clients is
trying to figure out what would be good
for them but we do more than that we try
to think okay well what how can we set
this up so it's really good for you and
that all the side consequences of that
are things that are good for other
people and so because people are often
also tended about trying to get
something that's good for themselves
because they feel that it's selfish or
that they don't deserve it so we set it
up so that well look we're going to set
it up so that it's plainly obvious that
this will not harm the structure of the
universe for you to have what you need
and to do it in a way that's of benefit
to other people there's no downside to
that and so it's okay it's okay if you
reach out and take that and one of the
things that's interesting about the
biblical stories Abrahamic stories as
well is that God doesn't really seem to
be opposed to the success of the people
that he's chosen you know what happens
to them is that they progress through
their journey as they they get larger
flocks and they they get more authority
and they they get they get more they get
life more abundant that's what happens
it's God isn't does it seem to be a
miser in the Old Testament it's like if
you put in the effort and you and you
accept the covenant and you make the
sacrifices then you get to be successful
and maybe successful beyond your wildest
dreams and that that's actually seems to
be okay with God and that's pretty cool
given that you know that the general
notion of Old Testament God is that all
he's doing is casting out curses and
death you know wherever he happens to
wander and
I mean there's certainly no shortage of
that but but again it seems to me that
that's very good news and that you also
don't have to be perfect in order for to
have that happen and then the other
thing this is the issue about going into
the unknown it's like well if you leave
your country and your kin and your
father's house and you go out into a
land that your intuition guides you to
you're going to undergo these radical
transformations this is the sacrificial
transformation too because you're you're
moving forthrightly and voluntarily into
chaos right and that's the same as the
dragon fight that's the hero story and
what will happen there is that you will
transform yourself and so the call to an
ideal is also the call to a sequence of
deaths and rebirths that move you closer
and closer to the ideal and that's what
that's what God is calling Abraham to do
in the first sentence of this story
you see these things echoed in the
strangest places and so these are stills
that I took from Pinocchio and this
little cricket so he's the still small
voice right that's the thing that calls
to you it's your conscious conscience
and part it's your intuition in part and
it's the thing that opens up the great
book of the world the great sacred book
of the world and that's what happens
here right and the animators are at
pains to show you that it's a
leather-bound book with gilt lettering
it's a valuable book and it's something
that's quiet that's showing it to you
right you have to meditate let's say you
have to be somewhere where the world
isn't drowning you out in order to
understand how to open this to listen to
that voice that tells you where you
should go with what you should do next
and then what happens is that something
beckons to you in the night it's a star
right it's something that transcends the
horizon it's it's glitters it's
brilliant it's it's not day to day it's
something that's beyond you it's
something that represents a transcendent
ideal and that makes it manifest to you
if you're quiet enough to listen and
that's what you wish upon so strangely
right and people do that they wish upon
a star they teach their children that
and they don't know why well what do you
mean you wish upon a star what the world
does that mean it means you lift your
eyes to the heavens and make a pact with
the transcendent and then you're and
then what your hearts desire will come
to you that's what it means and you
think well that's so that's not naive
it's the most sophisticated thing that
you can know and it's the birth of the
hero right because that's the that's the
nativity star obviously and this is
where it takes place it's just anywhere
and the person it is just a carpenter
and a toy maker but that's pretty good a
carpenter if you're a deceitful
carpenter then your house falls down and
if you're a toy maker then you love
children it's that's good start you know
so so Geppetto who lives in this little
it's it's a it's not a grand house it's
it's just in every day house but
everything that's happening and it is
good and so that means it's it's a
palace because everything in it is how
that's happening
good there's the saying and I don't
remember where it comes from then it's
better to have bread and water in peace
than a feast in conflict and that's not
a saying that's just the starkest
possible description of the truth
because there's nothing worse than
eating a grand meal with people you hate
and despise that are at each other's
throats it's much better to have bread
and water in peace it's it's not it it's
just clear-headed analysis of the
structure of the world to say things
like that
and so the magical transformation can
happen in the most mundane of places
because and the reason for that is that
the mundane nature of places is an
illusion because every place is the
potential birthplace of the kingdom of
God that's the case and so Geppetto he's
a good guy he has a kitten
you know the kitten likes him he makes
puppets and he's humble person and he
knows that compared to the ideal that
he's attempting to subscribe to that
he's he's not a based before it or
anything like that he's not despicable
in relationship to it but the reason
he's on his knees is because the thing
he's pointing at is above him you know
he he it wouldn't be the right aim if it
wasn't above him and so the fact that
he's on his knees so to speak is only an
indication that his aim is proper
because you should be on your knees to
something that you actually admire and
if you don't feel like being on your
knees in front of it then perhaps you
don't actually admire it and then that
means you haven't got the stage set
properly it could be it should be
something that fills you with awe your
aim should should be add something that
fills you with awe because whatever why
do something else well perhaps because
it's easy and perhaps because it's
malevolent and all of those things but
but those are no answer to the problems
that beset you they just make things
worse and that's clear and so then
Gepetto have is having made his pact his
covenant just like Abraham he falls into
a dream right he falls into a dream and
the rest of the movie actually takes
place in a dream and it's a dream it's
the dream within which transformation
takes place and that's laid out at least
in part time stops in
in the pinocchio story and everything
happens to Pinocchio in some sense in a
land it's outside of normal time and
that's that's the infinite archetypal
space and that's a real place that's a
real place the infinite and the finite
coexist and most of the time we're in
the place of the finite but that doesn't
mean that the place of this infinite
doesn't exist it just means that we
can't get access to it we just get
intimations of it from time to time you
know when things are going perfectly
well for you on those rare occasions
where everything comes together for the
brief moment you inhabit that divine
place and you have some sense of what
your life could be like if you organized
it from the smallest element to the
largest element and that's a place that
you can inhabit if not forever in a
manner that at least felt like forever
well because of Gepetto's decisioned the
transcendent manifests itself it takes
the form of the blue fairy here that's
the positive element of nature right so
we could say well nature it's not so
clear that she's on your side right
she's the Red Queen and Alice in
Wonderland who runs around screaming
when you go down the rabbit hole she
runs around screaming off with their
heads and who says in my kingdom you
have to run as fast as you can just to
stay in the same place that's mother
nature but then we might say well how do
we know that mother nature's attitude
towards you isn't negative because your
attitude towards things isn't proper and
that's what this film attempts to
indicate the idea is that if you aim
properly then nature aligns itself
behind you now it also arrays itself in
front of you perhaps even as an
antagonist but the power that it it it
provides you with from within might be
sufficient to overcome it from without
and i think that i think that the
clinical evidence is clear about that
because one of the things that we do
know is that if you take people who are
confronting terrible things and
shrinking from them and you teach them
how to structure their behavior so that
they can advance
with courage everything works better for
them their fears decrease and their
character grows and so there might be
enough of nature within us to help us
withstand the nature that's outside of
us and it depends at least to some
degree and how it is that we orient
ourselves in the world to some into some
unknowable degree now Geppetto wants an
autonomous individual as a son and
that's also something that makes him a
great person because autonomous
individuals have their own will and if
you're a tyrant it's the last thing that
you're going to want and if you're the
tyrant who's jealous of his son it's
even more so the last thing you're ever
going to want and so to aim high and to
want the development of the autonomous
individual are the same thing and I
would say that's the core story in some
sense of Western culture is that to aim
high and to develop the autonomous
individual are the same thing and that's
what happens in Pinocchio that's what
happens in the story of Abraham and the
transformation takes place
the magical transformation and in the
Pinocchio story one of the things that's
so interesting about it and this is part
of its mythological substructure from
the scientific perspective there's only
two determining forces with regards to
the destiny of the individual there's
nature deterministic and culture
deterministic and then scholars wrangle
about which of those is the greater
force but in mythological stories
there's always a third element and that
third element is something like
autonomous consciousness and there's no
place for autonomous consciousness in
the deterministic story of nature and
culture but we all act as if autonomous
consciousness is the primary reality and
the biblical stories are predicated on
the idea that autonomous consciousness
is what gives rise to the world and I
don't think that we're in a position to
presume that that is necessarily in
error and so what that means is to aim
high and to develop the autonomous
individualist
is simultaneously the decision to
formulate an allegiance with the
the conscious power that brings being
into existence and that all takes place
inside this little puppet and then he
has his adventures right he's he's he's
still half jackass and half deceptive
but he still despite that and despite
all the errors he has the capacity to
move forward and to transform it into
something to transform himself into
something that can be properly
considered described as a true son of
God and that's the Rite Aid and it works
like this as far as I can tell you know
when I talk to people about doing the
Future authoring program they often put
it off and it's not surprising because
it's hard and and be it but it's more
than that they think well I don't know
how to write I'm going to do a bad job I
don't really like assignments I'm going
to have to do it perfectly I need to
wait till I have enough time and like
one of those is enough to stop you cold
and all five of them you're just done
and so I tell people do it haphazardly a
tiny bit at a time and badly because you
can do that I tell my students when
they're doing their thesis master's
thesis write a really bad first draft
and then we have a little conversation
about that because they don't think I
mean that because it sounds like a
cliche in some sense it's not a cliche
it's not a cliche at all it means you're
a terrible writer but but if someone put
a gun to your head and said you have to
have your hundred page pieces done by
next Monday or I'll shoot you but I
don't care how terrible it is you would
sit down and write it and the thing is
then you have it right then then you
have something and then you can fix it
you could iterate and fix it that bad
first draft that's the most valuable
thing and so that's what you need you
need a bad first draft of yourself and
there's there's an idea that young
developed about the trickster and the
Jester the comedian right that the
trickster is the precursor to the Savior
that's one of the things I learned from
young it was just it's so unlikely you
never think that it's so amazing that
that my
be the case but the the the satirical in
the Iran Akande and the troublemaker
that the comedian the fool the fool is
the precursor to the savior why because
you're a fool when you start something
new and so if you're not willing to be a
fool then you'll never start anything
new and if you never start anything new
then you won't develop and so the
willingness to be a fool is the
precursor to transformation and that's
the same as humility and so if you're
going to write your destiny you can do a
bad first job you're going to get
smarter as you move forward that's the
thing is that so something beckons to
you that's what happens here maybe the
star that Geppetto wished on was the
wrong damn star but at least it was a
star right at least it was in the sky at
least it moved him forward and so you
say in your life well something grips
you and it fills you with interest and
you think well should I do that an
answer is if not that then something
what if it's a mistake it's a mistake
rest assured what do you know you're
going to stumble around right and what's
going to happen is this you're going to
move to you're going to not stay in
stasis you're not going to wander around
in circles and I see people like that
they said well I never knew what to do
and now I'm 40 it's like that's not so
good that's not so good and you might
say well and there is a literature too
that suggests that people are a lot more
unhappy when they look back in their
lives about the things they didn't do
than they are about the mistakes they
made while they were doing things and so
that's really worth thinking about too
because there's redemptive mistakes and
a redemptive mistake would be a mistake
that you make when you go out and try to
do something you know you actually you
think okay I'm going to try to do this
when you're not good at it you make a
bunch of mistakes it's like what's the
consequence if you pay attention is
you're not quite so stupid anymore
that's the thing is you've been informed
by your by the results of your errors
and so what happens is you follow the
beacon you follow the light and and
you're blind so you don't know where the
light is it's dimly apprehended only and
you're afraid to follow it but you
decide to take some stumbling steps
towards it and as you take stumbling
steps towards it
you become illuminated and enlightened
and informed because of the nature of
your experience because you're pushing
yourself beyond where you are and you're
going into the country that you have not
yet been in and you learn something and
so what happens then is the star moves
you move 10 feet towards it you think no
that's not right I didn't get it right
it isn't there it's actually there
and so then you you see it somewhere
else and you shift yourself slightly and
you move forward and that's what happens
is that you continue as you change the
thing that guides you forward moves
right it's like God in the in the in the
desert in Egypt the pillar of light that
you're following it's moving it's not a
permanent thing you move towards it it
moves away it guides you forward and so
you say well is what I'm aiming at
paradise itself and the answer to that
is no because what do you know you you
couldn't see paradise if it was right in
front of you but you might get a glimmer
of it and so you move towards it and you
grow and then the next time you open
your eyes you see a little bit more
clearly and that's what happens is that
just happens over and over right it
keeps moving and so you move like this
but the thing that's so cool is that
although zigs and zags you say in each
of those zags is it and zigs is a
catastrophe I hit a wall my god and then
I had to die a little bit and I barely
got back up it's a Phoenix
transformation at each at each turn and
it's painful but the thing is is that
even though you've you've traveled 20
miles let's say on that road and you've
only moved 3 miles forward you've moved
three miles forward instead of falling
backwards because that's the thing too
is that if you stand still you fall
backwards you cannot stand still because
the world moves away from you if you
stand still and there's no stasis
there's only backwards and so if you're
not moving backward back forwards then
you're moving backwards and that's more
more of the underlying truth of the
Matthieu principle to those who have
everything more will be given from those
who have nothing everything
we'll be taken it's a warning do not
stay in one place well as you dig and
zag maybes and maybe the Cataclysm of
each transformation starts to lessen
there's not so much of you that has to
die with every mistake and maybe you end
up oriented at least reasonably properly
if you were sensible that would have
been your trip but it wasn't right it's
that and perhaps it's a lot worse than
that perhaps there's no shortage of
backtracking but it doesn't matter
because as you stumble forward you
illuminate and inform yourself and
perhaps that's partly because the world
is made of information and if you
encounter it and tangle with it then it
informs you and then you become informed
and then your information and then
you're ready and so God says to Abraham
I will make of thee a great nation and I
will bless thee and make thy name great
and thou shalt be a blessing that's
that's a good offer
fundamentally I mean it means what does
it mean to to be made a great nation of
well perhaps it has something to do
directly with your descendants but I
don't think it's just that you know is
if you're a force for good in the world
then that radiates out from you and if
you're good enough it's difficult to say
how much of an impact on things you
could have you know Dostoyevsky who is a
very crazy person partly because of his
epilepsy he said a man is not only
responsible for everything he does but
for everything that everyone else does
and you think well no no no and yes
sometimes no sometimes that's what you
think if you're cataclysmic
cataclysmically depressed right is that
your sins are so egregious that that
they're unforgivable and that in some
manner you're at you're at fault for
everything that's terrible with
world but there's actually truth than
that and there's actually redemptive
truth in that is that things wouldn't be
so bad if you weren't so if you weren't
so far from what you could be and that's
terribly pessimistic because it's all on
you man but it's terribly optimistic
because God there's a lot of things that
you could do and if you're crying out
for something to do then that's the best
news you could possibly have it's like
things aren't so good but you know are
you so if you stop doing the things that
you knew to be destructive which is the
right place to start you know if you're
going to clean up your room what do you
do first well you just get rid of the
mess you know and you know what
now no one has to come in and tell you
hopefully what's the worst mess it's
just it announces itself to you and you
can certainly know yourself and this is
a very easy meditative exercise to sit
down and think okay I'm doing one thing
really stupidly that I should stop doing
it's like how long is it going to take
you to figure out what that is it's
about two seconds right you've known it
forever but you could even make it less
demanding you could say there are some
stupid things that I'm doing that I know
are stupid and wrong that I could stop
doing that I would stop doing and then
you can just start with that and you can
just do that and maybe it's just a
little thing although it's not because
it's it's a it's a step forward on the
proper voyage it's not a small thing and
you think well what would happen you
could say let's do this for a year even
a month just try not to do things you
know to be stupid and wrong for a month
and that means not to say things you
know to be stupid and wrong as well
maybe that's the most important thing
just do it as an experiment see what
happens and so fun because I have people
writing to me from all over the world
who are saying they're doing that
they're saying well you know I cleaned
up my room and and then I stopped saying
stupid things and my god it's like
things are way better it's like who
would have guessed it you know and so
it's low-hanging fruits man because
they're saying that's the other thing if
there's a lot of things wrong with you
then it's it's really easy to start
fixing it you know you got so much
there's so much territory that you can
inhabit
I will make of thee a great nation I
will bless thee that's good I mean the
whole nation thing that's positive but
to have God on your side that's you know
you might want that when things get
rough that would be good and make that
name great and now it shall be a
blessing wonderful that's a good deal
then I will bless them that bless thee
that's good too
and curse him that curseth thee and in
thee shall all families of the earth be
blessed that's something that's
something that wouldn't it be something
if you could wake up and your day was
composed in part of people thanking you
for all the good things you've done in
the world would that be good it's not
impossible for that to happen so Abram
departed yes as the Lord had spoken unto
him and Lord went with and the neighbor
him was seventy in five years when he
departed out of her and that's all now
Abraham lives a long time but this is
also part of the story so he has a wife
who can't have children he has nothing
obviously he's been hanging around dad's
Shack for a little too long given that
he's 75 right it's kind of time to get a
fire lit underneath him a bit and so it
is not got much going for him but he
still decides to to move forward and
I've seen this too you know like if you
don't have your destiny in hand by your
time you're thirty it's it's rough you
start hurting and if you don't have your
destiny in hand by the time you're 40
then you really start hurting and 40 is
a real fork in the road the fork in the
road that's always where you meet the
devil by the way and that's because
every time you have to make a decision
the possibility of evil beckons that's
why that is
I had a friend I told you a little about
him and he killed himself just after 40
you know he had had a book published and
with a very small press he was quite a
good writer but he could not get himself
together and it hit him too hard at 40
and I'm not saying that it's hopeless at
40 I'm not saying that and I'm not
saying that partly because of these
verses but also partly because of
in my clinical practice I've had people
come to me who have had very chaotic and
ill-spent lives let's say who were in
that neighborhood of age and and it's
true for people who are older as well
who then decided to make a real effort
and to try to make where they were
better you know instead of being bitter
about where they weren't because that's
better nasteria lee does you in it's
really not good it's the opposite of
gratitude it's it's it's the
manifestation of resentment it makes you
malevolent it's very very bad to be
better it's not it's not it's hell to be
bitter and if you're 40 and you're not
successful then you have to accept your
lot and you have to start to improve
what's right in front of you and if you
do that it doesn't take very long it's
quite interesting to watch people things
can be a lot better in six months and
they can be way better in two years like
it's a struggle uphill struggle but it's
by no means impossible and and I don't
know again what the limit of that is I
suppose it depends to degree to some
degree on the degree of your commitment
but anyway so abran other indication of
the real validity of this story God
isn't setting this up to be easy right
Abraham's old and his and his wife is
old too and more than that she's barren
how is he going to be the father of
Nations how is he going to be successful
well the initial departure point is
insufficient radically insufficient and
and that's very inspiring because it
means that you can start from where you
are so Abram departed as the Lord had
spoken unto him and lot went with him
and Abram was 75 years old when he
departed out of Haran and Abram took
Sarai his wife and lot his brother's son
and all their substance that they had
gathered and they know he has a
relationship with law right he doesn't
have his own son but he his brother died
and so he takes his nephew as his son
that's grateful you know he could be
very angry and have nothing to do with
him because he didn't get his own son
but that isn't that isn't what happens
is he's offered a substitute let's say
and he accepts it and so good for him
you know and and that's an
it's also something that I've seen that
characterizes people who can make the
best of a bad lot is they don't get
exactly what they want but something
comes along that offers possibilities
that are sufficient perhaps if exploited
properly and they open their heart and
welcome them in instead of rejecting
them in bitterness and so that's a good
thing and that's part of Abraham's
character and Abram took Sarai his wife
and law his brothers son and all their
substance that they had gathered and all
the souls that they had gotten in her on
and they went for us to go into the land
of Canaan into exile let's say and into
the land of Canaan they came and that's
another repetition of the transformation
story right you have to go to a land
where you're not welcome an abram passed
through the land unto the place of CGM
unto the plain of mora and the Canaanite
was then in the land and the Lord
appeared unto Abram and said unto thy
seed I will give you this land and there
he builded an altar to the Lord who
appeared unto him and he removed from
thence unto a mountain on the east of
the cell and pitched his tent having the
fell on the west and high on the east
and there he built an altar unto the
Lord and called upon the name of the
Lord now we don't understand
these rituals precisely you know I don't
know if the people who did this engaged
in a meditative ritual without the idea
that you take something of value you do
this
youyou undertake this dramatic
transformation a life and death
transformation and is that an aid to
meditation and what you do do you sit
down and thank you you pray pray being
to ask you know - what do I do next
how do I orient myself in the world as a
useful exercise to do that - I think
it's something that people could do
every morning I think it's useful to sit
down and think okay what's the most
important thing I should do today
what I have an array of things that call
to me to be done some of which I will do
with joy and some of which I will bear
as responsibilities but I raised em
selves in front of me and with what
should I attend to first
well do you ask or do you decide and it
seems to me when I do it because I do it
all the time I do it every morning I try
to sit down and think okay I've got
things that I would like to do and
things that call to me out of necessity
what do i do first and it's not so much
a decision as it is a question and I
don't know what I'm calling on it's I'm
calling on my capacity to think I
suppose but that's not my capacity
exactly I'm there I can I can commune
with whatever provides answers and I can
think that that's me thinking but and I
didn't that I believe that I can't think
I do believe that I can consciously
think but that's not the same as calling
for inspiration it's not the same
process just like a dream is not
conscious thinking it's something that
happens to you and that kind of
inspiration is also something that
happens to you because I ask myself well
what's the most important thing I could
do next and then I have an answer to
that but it isn't because I decided
exactly I've decided that I'll do it
whatever it is and that I want to know
what it is those are the decisions but
but there's an involuntary aspect to the
sorting that occurs and and that's the
psychological equivalent I suppose to
this and I guess the sacrifice is when I
feel that I will do whatever it is that
calls to be done then I don't do the
other things that I might want to do and
that's a sacrifice it's to me it's the
proper sacrifice because my sense is
that things don't go properly unless you
do what's most important and if I want
things to go properly and I do because
I've had my taste of things not going
properly I want things to go properly
and so then it's not so difficult to do
what's necessary to to do what makes
things go properly under those
circumstances and it's partly see this
is partly why the story of Sodom and
Gomorrah is embedded in the Abrahamic
stories I think because that's an
apocalyptic story right if things go
badly enough the whole city is destroyed
and then and the reason it goes badly is
because the people in the city do not
behave properly and the people in the
city might
bu and so if you're not behaving
properly then you go and so does the
city and maybe you don't want maybe you
do want that but maybe you don't want
that and if you don't want that then
maybe and you know that if you don't do
things property then it's you and the
city if you actually know that then
maybe that terrifies you badly enough so
that you're willing to make the
sacrifice to do the right things instead
of the impulsive things that you might
otherwise want to do you know I learned
from Viktor Frankl and from Karl yoga
and from Alexander Solzhenitsyn and for
many of the people whose works on the
Holocaust that I read and on the
catastrophes in the Soviet Union and the
people who studied it most deeply always
came to the same conclusion the state
became corrupted because each individual
allowed themselves to be corrupted or
perhaps participated joyfully in the
process of being corrupted and the
consequence of that was the end of the
world and so what that means is that if
you don't behave properly then you bring
about the end of the world and maybe you
think well that's only the end of your
world
fair enough or maybe it's the only the
end of your family's world you know
which I suppose might give you some
pause but there's more to it than that
because you're connected to everyone
else
and what you do that isn't good
distributes itself and all the things
you don't do that could be good take
away from the whole and so if you know
that and I do think you know that if you
take it seriously because if you look at
if you look at historical events the
cataclysmic events of the 20th century
seriously I do not think that you can
fail to come to that conclusion and
Abraham journeyed going on still towards
the south that's interesting because to
go south means to go downhill too it's
not good to go south it's colloquial for
going to where you shouldn't go and
this is what happens to Abram you know
he his a cent is preceded by a descent
and that's very common in life I would
say and so it's a little the redemptive
element of this narrative is that if the
Covenant is constructed properly so it's
an arc which is your decision to align
yourself with God for all intents and
purposes then even the journey south can
be part of a broader journey upward and
there was a famine in the land that's
Mother Nature failing to cooperate I
mean that's going to be pretty
disheartening for Abraham don't you
think is he finally gets it together
when he's 75 to leave and then you know
because God says well do you not get
going and and so the first place he goes
everyone's starving to death it's like
you know you might think about that as a
test of faith
wouldn't you say but he keeps going and
then what happens well he has to go to
Egypt so great he goes where he's
starving where everyone's starving and
then to get away from where everyone's
starving he goes to a tyranny so the
whole beginning of the story is not
particularly auspicious and Abram went
down into Egypt to sojourn there for the
famine was Grievous in the land
it's a repetition of the same idea again
there's downhill voyage out into chaos
right it's repeated over and over that
the beginning of Abraham's journey is
basically a sequence of of experiences
of Exile chaos tyranny and catastrophe
well you should be able to relate to
that you know how hard it is to get
things together you know you go out to
do what you're supposed to do say and
there's you're beset by the
intransigence of the world and failure
well so what are you supposed to do
about that well maintain your faith in
the good and continue to move forward
that's the idea and part of that even if
even if you don't buy the metaphor it's
like what are you going to do instead
that won't make it worse so even if
there it isn't enough that you're
pursuing your at least for stalling the
transfer may
of the chaos into your of your life into
sheer hell and that can certainly happen
you know you see people who are having a
terrible time and then you see people
who are having a terrible time who are
also in hell and it's a lot better to
just have a terrible time than to have a
terrible time and be in hell at the same
time and it came to pass when he was
come too near to enter into Egypt that
he said unto Sarai his wife behold now I
know that thou art a fair woman to look
upon therefore it shall come to pass
when the Egyptians shall see thee
that they shall say this is his wife and
they will kill me that they will save
thee alive so look I mean Abraham is
Abram is really having a rough time he's
a failure right I mean he's wandering
around through the land of starvation
now he's going to go be a quasi slave in
Egypt he has this incredibly attractive
wife and all he can look forward to is
the fact that the most successful man in
Egypt the Pharaoh will take her from him
so he's got the whole embitterment thing
pretty much nailed down as far as I can
tell and this is when he makes one of
his errors let's say and one of the
errors that humanizes him say I pray
thee that thou art my sister that may be
well for me for thy sake and my soul
shall live because of thee and it came
to pass that when Abram was coming to
Egypt the Egyptians beheld the woman
that was she was very fair the Prince is
also a pharaoh saw her and commended her
before Pharaoh and the woman was taken
into Pharaoh's house and he entreated
Abram well for her sake and he had sheep
and oxen and he houses and menservants
and maidservants as she houses and
camels so actually things work out
pretty well for for Abram despite his
deceit right which is quite interesting
and I guess it's because if the
overarching structure is solid something
like that it's something like that then
then errors can still be forgiven to
speak about it from a metaphorical
perspective and the Lord plagued Pharaoh
and his house with great plagues because
of Sarai Abrams wife well it doesn't
seem very fair but because the Pharaoh
didn't know but but it's not the right
way to look at it
the right way to look at it see there's
a story later in the in the Bible about
David and David David could be a pretty
bad guy you know so one of the things he
does is when he becomes king he's in his
castle and he's looking over the city
and he sees a woman nude bathing nude
sunbathing nude on a roof out on the
city and he's smitten by her floored by
her and he has inquiries made about who
she is her name is Beth Sheba and and he
finds out who her husband is and her
husband actually happens to be a general
in his army and he arranges for that
general to be put at the thick of the
battle and killed and then he takes
Bathsheba so and and and the Lord is not
pleased by that let's put it that way
and that's interesting is only did it's
an interesting story because you might
say well why can't the King do whatever
the hell he wants like seriously
he's the king he's not just he's not
like the Prime Minister the president
right he's the king and so you might say
well why is the King subject to any
rules whatsoever what's the rationale
for the king being subject to rules
well the rationale emerges in these
stories if there are social strictures
that are such that even if the ruler of
the land transgresses against them there
will be hell to pay
and that's continually presented over
and over in the biblical stories and
it's a natural law sort of idea that
there are there are intrinsic rules to
the game of social human being and if
you and maybe intrinsic rules to this to
the natural state of human being you
break those rules consciously or
unconsciously at your absolute peril and
not only at your peril but at the peril
of the state and it doesn't matter who
you are and so I would say this is
actually an indication of God being fair
rather than being unfair because the
rule here is Pharaoh or not
you don't get to take someone else's
wife and the ignorance is no excuse now
you might say that's a little bit harsh
and perhaps it is a little bit harsh but
it's not without merit the idea is not
without merit and of course Abram is
implicit in this despite that he is
successful and Pharaoh called Abram and
said what is this that thou has done
unto me why did so now tell me that she
was thy wife why said Stowe you she is
my sister I might have taken her to me
to wife now therefore behold thy wife
take her and go thy way and Pharaoh
commanded his men concerning him and
they sent him away and his wife and all
that he had and Abram went out of Egypt
he and his wife and all that he had in
lot with him into the south and Abram
was very rich in cattle in silver and in
gold and that's it so what's interesting
you know big Abraham he he goes to the
place of famine and then he goes to the
to the place of charity and then he he
lies and then he almost loses his wife
but because he goes things work out for
him and so hooray for that and he went
on his journeys from the south even to
Bethel unto the place where his tent had
been at the beginning between Bethel and
high unto the place of the altar so he
makes another sacrifice which he had
made there at the first and there Abram
called on the name of the Lord well so
he's had an adventure right he's he's
he's finished his journey and and so
there's a culminating point in this
narrative and now I just know what to do
he's left the place he said he doesn't
know what to do so it's time to build an
altar and make a sacrifice and figure
out and to ask for divine guidance once
again to figure out okay well I've done
that been there done that what's next
and I'm the question is asked seriously
and this is something to consider if you
want to know what to do ask seriously
and say I'm willing to see Abraham
sacrifices a life to his vow well so
what do you do well you don't sacrifice
an animal you don't you don't make a
blood sacrifice you do it
psychologically you say I'm going to
sacrifice my life to the same
that's what you do if you're serious
what do I do next well I'm going to
sacrifice my life to this aim what is it
that I should do that's worth
sacrificing my life to that's a serious
question well then maybe that's the sort
of question that people don't ask
because they're afraid of the
seriousness of the question and and what
the magnitude of the potential answer do
you really want to know what you should
do that would be worth sacrificing your
life to well the answer is yes because
it's worth it but the answer is also no
because what really it's your life you
know what if you're wrong and you're
probably wrong but maybe that doesn't
matter maybe it doesn't matter because
maybe the rightness is in the process
and not in the and not in the decision
right because it's not it's the
beginning of a sequence of decisions as
we've already pointed out to the place
of the altar which he had made there at
the first and there Abram called on the
name of the Lord and Lord also and Lord
also which went with Abraham Abram had
flocks and herds and tents and the land
was not able to bear them that they
might dwell together for their substance
was great so that they could not dwell
together and there was a strife between
the herdsmen of Abrams cattle the
Cowboys and the herdmen of lost cattle
and the Canaanite and the perizzite
dwelled then in the land well that's
interesting too because you know
Abraham's having a pretty good time of
it now right he's out of starvation hey
that's good he's out of the tyranny now
he's kind of wealthy and then the story
flips on him he's wealthy and now a bad
thing happens to him right it's that
he's got all this wealth and so does his
nephew now they can't get along because
they have too much stuff so that's quite
comical as well that I think that's a
comic interlude here now they handle it
properly and Abram said unto Lord let
there be no strife I pray they between
me and thee and between my herdmen and I
heard them because we're brothers it's
not the whole land before they separate
thyself I pray thee from me if you'll
take the left then all take the right or
if you depart to the right then I'll go
to the left so basically they sit down
and say well you know one of us has got
to get out of town and it can be one or
the other it doesn't really matter we
can flip a coin or but we have to we
have to separate and so they do it
amicably and Lord lifted up his eyes and
looked at all of the plain of Jordan
that it was well watered everywhere so
that's an intimation of Eden right
because you remember he even means well
watered place before the Lord destroyed
Sodom and Gomorrah even as the Garden of
the Lord like the land of Egypt as thou
comest unto Zoar so interesting you get
foreshadowing here again right so Lawton
Abram are making the decision about
where to go and and law it looks out and
and sees a reasonable place but then
this warning comes up that there's a
city out there there's a place out there
where things are not going to go well
things are being done badly and things
are not going to go well then Lord shows
him all the plain of Jordan and law
journeyed East and they separated
themselves the one from the other Abram
dwelt in the land of Canaan and lot
dwelled in the cities of the plain and
pitched his tent towards Sodom but the
men of Sodom were wicked and sinners
before the Lord exceedingly now the word
sin I've mentioned this to you before I
think it's an interesting word it's it's
the derivation of an archery term in my
understanding of its derivation and it
the Greek word was hamartia and Hammar
he is an archery term which means to to
miss the bullseye and you think it's
worth thinking about that metaphorically
because you've got to think about all
the ways that you could miss the
bullseye right you can close your eyes
that's very common you could just not
lift up the damned bow and arrow to
begin with you could face the wrong way
you could be unskilled in your aim but
I'm and I also like the the archery
metaphor because human beings are built
on a hunting platform right and we
always aim at things were things that
were ballistic creatures on a trajectory
always and we're always aiming at
something we're always aiming at the
mark and which is of course what you do
when you hunt right because you have to
hit the mark precisely and that's what
we're like and so what we're like that
psychologically we have to aim at
something and then move towards it and
and so to sin is to miss the mark is to
is to miss the bullseye to to fail to
take aim to aim badly gain carelessly or
to not aim at all and that says well
that's that's like a sin of omission
that's to not do and then to be wicked
is to aim at what you know you shouldn't
aim at and
again I don't I don't think of that as
an external morality precisely I think
that you can read the entire biblical
narrative again from a psychological
perspective and say we're not talking
about external codes of conduct here
although we could we're not the
wickedness that's being described is the
act of you doing something that you know
to be wrong
period you know and you may do something
you don't know if it's wrong or not that
isn't a sort of thing that we're talking
about and we're not talking about the
things that you do that are right there
that other people think are wrong we're
not talking about those either we're
talking about those things that you
consciously do although you know them to
be wrong yourself and that's the things
that seem to get people into the most
trouble in these stories and I believe
that to be the case I think that's very
accurate psychologically it's amazing
because I see this all the time if you
do something wrong it's because you're
Stig nur n't you don't know better it
doesn't go well for you that's the case
but if you do something wrong and you
know it's wrong the punishment is is
manifold and I think the reason for that
I think the reason for that is because
that makes you Cain it means you betray
your own ideal right if you just don't
know well you haven't betrayed your
ideal you're just not together maybe
you're even willfully blind but if you
do something you know to be wrong then
you've betrayed your own ideal and that
lands you Cain says to God once Cain
destroys Abel he says I cannot bear my
punishment and the Lord said unto Abram
after that lot was separated from lift
up now thine eyes look upward and look
from the place where thou art northward
and southward and eastward and westward
for all the land which thou seest to
thee I will give it and to thy seed
forever and I will make thy seed as the
dust of the earth so that if a man can
number the dust of the earth then shall
all the I seed be numbered arise walk
through the land in the length of it and
the breadth of it for I will give it
unto thee
in the cathedral at shark I can't say
that properly because my French is
non-existent
so a cathedral is across and the
transformation takes place at the crux
of the cross which is exactly right
because the transformation takes place
at the point of maximal suffering and
the cathedral is designed to indicate
that right symbolically now what happens
in the religious ceremony is also a
journey and it's a journey in some sense
to the holy city and then that's also
played out in the idea of pilgrimage
right because you go to the holy city
actually you go to Jerusalem or wherever
it is that you think the holy city is
you go there and that takes you out of
your country and away from your kin and
away from your family into the strange
land and as you make the journey you
transform and when you come back you're
not the same that's the Hobbit right
that's the story of the Hobbit but let's
say you can't afford to go on a
pilgrimage so you go to the cathedral at
Chartres and there's a huge maze on the
ground and it's the world north west
south and east just as God describes
here so it's laid out and you enter the
maze at one side and in the middle is a
stone pattern that looks like a flower
and it's it's the place where being
wells forth and it's at the center of
the Cathedral and what that means is
that if you accept your suffering then
you move to the place where the spirit
of being wells forth that's what that
means and so you enter the maze and you
walk and it's divided into quadrants and
you walk one quadrant completely and
then the mains pathway takes you into
the next quadrant and you walk that
completely and then it takes you to the
third one and the fourth one and then
when you walk the maze completely
everywhere when you've gone everywhere
in the world north south east and west
where you when you traverse the
territory completely then you come to
the center and then it's yours and
that's what this is so I've noticed when
I've been renovating houses I like to do
that I paid a lot of attention to
the psychological process of a house
renovation because I learned from young
that young said this this is something
man he said if he was he was talking
about the stages of integration
psychological integration and he looked
beyond Piaget I would say although
Piaget looked very far he said here's a
conjunction you have to get your
rationality on your emotion together
that's a male/female conjunction
symbolically speaking male rationality
female emotionality you want to bring
those together so that they're oriented
in the same direction your emotions in
your rationality served the same purpose
so then you're unified in mind and
spirit let's say that's are good enough
once you've got that together then
there's a boat you have a body and then
that's a male/female conjunction again a
divine conjunction the recreation of
Adam before his division into female and
male and the reconstruction of the
androgynous Christ that all that all
those ideas are linked together so now
you have your emotion and your
rationality moving in the same direction
but you're not acting it out so now you
have to unite that abstract part of you
with your body and start acting out what
you think and feel and that's the next
conjunction but it's not the last one
the last conjunction is when you realize
that there is no distinction between you
and your experience they're the same
thing and so then when you put together
your house you're putting together
yourself so I've noticed in when I've
lived in places rented or owned didn't
matter and if there were part of the
place if there was a part of the place
that I hadn't attended to whatever that
might mean it might meant cleaned it
might have meant fix but it certainly
meant at least thoroughly investigated
then that was chaos it was like it was
it was like the desert that part that's
that's a way of thinking about it it
wasn't mine even if I owned it wasn't
mine
I had to interact with it before it
became mine and I had to interact with
it and I had to put it in order and then
it became mine and then and then to the
degree that it became mine and was in
order then I was also put in order now
you know that because you go into places
that make you uncomfortable
and maybe it's your own house it's
highly probable it's highly probable I
you know I walk into well Chinese
doctors do this traditional Chinese
doctors they go into place people's
place and they they diagnose their
health conditions on the on the balance
of yin and yang chaos an order they
walked into a house that this is easy to
do you walk into a house there's too
much chaos hey you can detect that in no
time flat
everything is out of order and chaotic
you don't even want to be there you
certainly don't want to open the
refrigerator that's for sure and there
are things that should have been done
years ago everywhere and every one of
those things is a fight that hasn't
happened and something that's being
avoided and you can't even walk in there
and maintain your health this is you
walk in there you're sicker than you
were when you were outside and that's
one sort of place and then another sort
of place is you go and look at the
living room and the person has vacuumed
the living room rug and the lines that
were vacuumed are parallel to one
another
and the and the furniture is covered
with plastic and you get a glass of
water and then just as you're going to
set it down on the coffee table the
person rushes over and puts a coaster
underneath it and everything in that
house says to you that it would be a lot
more perfect in that house if you were
either not there or dead and that's
there and that's the message that the
whole house is blasting at you and if
you happen to live there then you're
going to be sick and what you're going
to be sick from is too much order and in
the other house you're going to be sick
from too much chaos and so when you
interact with a house the unexplored
parts are the chaos that have that parts
that you have not yet contended with are
the chaos that has not yet been
transformed by your embodied logos
action into habitable territory and it
does not belong to you arise walk
through the land in the length of it and
the breadth of it for I will give it
unto thee the neighbor him removed his
tent and came and dwelt in the plain of
Mamre which is in Hebron and built there
an altar unto the Lord and it came to
pass in the days of amraphel king of
shinar arioch king of ellasar chair de
L'Amour
there's a lot of kings we won't talk
about them he's made war with barrett
king of sodom and with Persia king of
gomorrah she and ab king of admah and
the king of bela wishes or and these
were joined together in the Vale of
Siddim which is the salt sea hmm now
this is actually very much relevant
because you see the Vale of Siddim which
is the salt sea is the farthest south
you can go if South is down because it's
the Dead Sea and the Dead Sea is the
lowest place that there is so what's
happened is that there's chaos in the
lowest place that there is that's what
this story says and what happens to lawd
is he gets tangled up in the chaos of
the lowest place that there is and in
the fourteenth year came Chidori l'amour
and the kings that were with him and
smote the ref Eames and Ashtaroth
her name and the Susan's and ham and the
Emmons and shava Korea Korea Thames and
the horites in their mount sire unto
Alperin which is by the wilderness and
they returned and came to end mishpat
which is Kadesh and smote all the
country the Amalekites Amalekites and
the amorite that dwelt in has a cup
houses Zonta my hey hey hazards on
tomorrow there we go perhaps and there
went out the king of sodom and the king
of gomorrah and the king of admah and
the king of the bulla and the king of
bela the same is zoar and they joined
battle with them in the Vale of Siddim
so this is absolute chaos and mayhem in
the lowest place it's hell
essentially with cheddar loam or the
king of the lamb and with tidal king of
nations and amraphel king of shinar
arioch king of ellasar four kings with
five and the Vale of Siddim was full of
slime pits
low in hell like with war isn't enough
they had to throw the slime pits in
there apparently around the Dead Sea
there are pits of bitumen like the like
the tar pits in near LA and so that this
seems to actually be historically
accurate and the kings of Sodom and
Gomorrah fled and fell there and then
that remain fled to the mountain and
they took their Goods and they took all
the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah and all
their victuals and went their way and
they took lot Abrams brothers son who
dwelt and sought him and his Goods and
departed so Abram has a family member
who falls into the lowest place and
there came one that had escaped and told
Abram the Hebrew for he dwelt in the
plain of Mamre the Amorite brother of
his skull and brother of a nur and these
were confederate with abram and the
neighbor him heard that his brother was
taken captive he armed his trained
servants born in his own house 318 and
pursued them unto down well so now we
also know that Abraham's a pretty brave
guy right he gets word that this
horrible war has broken out in the worst
of all possible places and that his
nephew is involved and the first thing
he does is you know mount up his posse
and get the hell in there and rescue his
nephew so Abraham's oh whatever
goodness is from the Old Testament
perspective it isn't harmlessness right
it isn't emasculation and castration
it's not that it's not weakness it's not
the inability to fight none of that is
associated with virtue it's a sort of
strength that enables someone to mount
an armed team of 300 people when he
finds out that his nephew is being
kidnapped in a terrible war and to get
the hell out there and take them back
and so that's it that's a that's a
that's a call to - it's a call to power
that not know
a kind of peaceful meekness that's funny
too because you know there's a line in
the New Testament the meek shall inherit
the earth I got a look at my phone for a
sec here I don't know what time it is
there's a line in the New Testament that
says and send the Sermon on the Mount
says the meek shall inherit the earth
and that I read that line always
bothered me I thought no way that's not
that that's not right meat can't be the
right word so when I was doing this
story of Noah and talking about the
Sermon on the Mount
I spent a bunch of time looking at
commentaries on that line looking at the
roots you know the Greek roots and the
Hebrew roots and trying to figure out
what that meant and in meat does not
mean meat that's wrong here's what it
means those who have weapons and know
how to use them but still keep the
machine will inherit the earth Jesus
that's a lot different man it's a lot
better right because the way it's
normally it's normally interpreted is if
you're so weak that you're harmless then
things will go well for you it's like no
that's not right that's and that's not
that can't be right it doesn't fit with
the narrative it certainly doesn't fit
with this narrative and he divided
himself against them he and his servants
by night and smote them and pursued them
unto Hoba which is on the left side of
Damascus and he brought back all the
goods and his brother lot and his Goods
and the women also and the people did
work Abraham and the kings of Sodom went
out to meet him after his return at the
slaughter of charrid Aloma and of the
kings that there were there with him at
the valley of shaveh which is the Kings
Dale and Melchizedek king of Salem
brought forth bread and wine and he was
the priest of the Most High God and He
blessed him and said blessed be Abram of
the Most High God possessor of heaven
and earth and blessed be the Most High
God which had delivered thine enemies
into thine hand and gave him tithes of
all and the king of Sodom said to Abram
give me the persons and take thy goods
to thyself this is that that were the
goods that Abram that they'd been
rescued of the Kings and Abram said to
the king of Sodom I have lift up mine
hand unto the Lord what does that mean
it means I've made a vow that's what it
means
that that's what that phrase means I've
made a vow to God the possessor of
heaven and earth that I will not take
anything from a thread even to a
shoelace I won't take anything that's
yours lest you should say I've made
abram rich I'll take only that which my
young men Avedon and the portion of men
that went with me and inner s : ma'am
let them take their portion and so
Abraham decides here he's made this
immense sacrifice and done this
incredibly brave act and rescued his
nephew and rescued the king's goods and
and they offer him a reward and he says
I'm not going to take the reward and the
reason for that is that he doesn't want
to contaminate the ethical purity of his
actions he doesn't want to be paid he
doesn't want it he doesn't want to
benefit from doing he doesn't want to
avoid some what is it exactly he doesn't
want to benefit inappropriately from
doing the right thing it's something
like that and so it's another testament
to his character in a very complex
Testament right because he's not a sin
he's not a good man in any simple sense
I mean look what's just happened he's
he's mounted and armed
he's mounted and armed he's he's led an
army into battle and parked in and
participated in the slaughter he refuses
to benefit from it except to get back
what was his
that's it he refuses to benefit from it
except to get back what was rightfully
his and in that way he maintains his
covenant with God even to a shul a chit
I anything though never so smaller mean
less thou should claim a share with God
in the honor due to him
this is from Matthew pool who was an
English nonconformist theologian
commenting on that line even to a shoe
latchet ie anything though never so
meaner small lest thou should claim a
share with God in the honor due to him
to his blessing alone I do and I will
all my riches or lest thou should say
Abram is enriched with my spoils and
however he pretended kindness and
charity yet indeed it was his
covetousness that put him upon this work
after these things the word of the Lord
came unto Abram in a vision saying fear
not
Abram I'm nice shield and I exceedingly
and I exceeding great reward a vision
issue again
[Music]
well we went through that last week fear
not Abram I am thy shield and my
exceeding great reward and Abram said
Lord God what can you give me seeing as
I'm childless toddlers and that's the
only thing that matters to a broom at
this point and the steward of my house
is this an easier of dem Damascus no kin
and Abraham said Abram said Behold to me
thou has given no seed and lo one born
in my house is mine heir and behold the
word of the Lord came unto him saying
this shall not be thine heir but he that
shall come forth out of thine own bowels
should be nine hair
so he gets promised the impossible once
again and he brought him forth abroad
and said now look towards the heaven
until the stars if thou be able to
number them and he said unto him so
shall thy seed be and he believed in the
Lord and counted to him for
righteousness
seeing that this is a covenant idea this
belief because here's the belief it's
the willingness to act as if the world
is constructed so that if you do the
right thing the best possible outcome
will occur it's a decision that's the
Covenant right it's a decision about how
to live in the world because the
evidence can't be there before you make
the decision right and so you might
hedge your best you know when when
Christ comes back in the book of
Revelation to judge people because it
comes back as a judge and virtually
everyone gets cast out with the chaff
and not saved with the wheat huh he says
something very interesting he appears in
a vision with a sword coming out of his
mouth it's a horrifying vision and he
divides the the he divides humanity into
the Damned and the save or the dead yes
the Damned and the saved he says
something very interesting he says to
those who were neither hot nor cold I
will spew you out of my mouth and and
it's a it's a disgust metaphor right and
what it says is that the word
punishment isn't waiting for those who
committed to something and did wrong the
worst punishment is reserved for those
who committed to nothing and stayed on
the fence and that's really something
too that's really something to think
about and it's also something I believe
to be true because I see that stasis is
utterly destructive because there's no
progress all there is is movement
backwards there's aging and suffering
and no progress and so did not commit to
anything is the worst of all
transgressions to commit means to put
your body and soul into something to
offer your life as a sacrifice means
that you're willing to make a bargain
with fate and the bargain is I'm going
to act as if I give it my all then the
best possible thing will happen because
of that and to to not see the analogy
between that and the the active faith in
God is to misunderstand the story
completely and it has to be an act of
faith because how are you going to know
you can look at other people but that
isn't going to do it it's at Kierkegaard
was very clear about this sort of thing
there's certain sorts of truths that you
can only learn for yourself through
experience and that's of course why
Abram also has to go out alone right he
has to leave this kenneth's it's an
individual it's the individuation
process like dying it's something that
you do alone there's no way you can tell
what is within your grasp let's say
unless you make the ultimate sacrifice
and there's no way of finding out
without actually making it and so that's
the sacrificial act right that's that's
really active Abram being called upon to
sacrifice Isaac and think about that is
Abram he's been doing he's been like
breaking himself into pieces trying to
progress forward through starvation and
tyranny and war and deceit and the
potential loss of his wife and child
lessness and like everything that can
really befall you in some sense and
finally God grants him Isaac when he's
old it's impossible he gets Isaac his
son and then what has got to do next is
say well you know that son that you've
been waiting for so for so long it's
like I'd like to see just exactly what
you're made of
I think you should offer him up as a
sacrifice and I mean it's a very
barbaric story in a sense and maybe in
more than just a sense but Abraham does
maintain his covenant he's willing to
make the sacrifice he's made willing to
make this is the thing he's willing to
make whatever sacrifice is necessary to
keep his covenant with God intact and
that's that and that's the decision
well maybe it's no surprise that people
don't do that and he believed in the
Lord and he counted it to him for
righteousness and he said unto him I am
the Lord that brought thee out of ur of
the Chaldees to give this land to you to
inherit it and he said Lord God whereby
shall I know that I shall inherit it and
he said to him this is a sacrificial
story again taking a heifer of three
years and a goat of three years in RAM
of three years in a Turtledove and a
young pigeon it's fairly specific
actually and he took all these and
divided them and laid each piece one
against another but the birds divided he
not now there's a reason for that and I
don't know the reason for it and when
the fowls came down upon the carcasses
Abram drove them away and when the Sun
was going down a deep sleep fell upon
Abram and lo a horror of great darkness
fell upon him how did it mean he was
afraid of the dark which is what I
thought it meant when I first read it it
isn't what it means it means that he
fell into a trance or something like
that
and then he was enveloped by absolute
horror so that's how this story begins
and here's the commentary from Joseph
Benson who was an English Methodist
minister who lived in 1749 it was born
in 1749 and when the Sun was going down
about the time of the evening evening
oblation the washing for he abode by
them praying and waiting till toward
evening a deep sleep fell upon Abram
this was not a common sleep through
weariness or carelessness and what a
sloop is that's supposed to be sleep not
a common sleep through weariness or
carelessness but a divine ecstasy that
being wholly taken off from things
sensible he might be wholly taken up
with the contemplation of
things spiritual well it really makes
you wonder what Abraham was up to in his
campsite so he was participating in
something that enabled this experience
and Lola or a horror of great darkness
fell upon him this was designed to
strike upon the spirit of Abram and to
possess him with the holy reverence holy
fear prepares the soul for holy joy God
humbles first and then lifts up echoes
of psychedelic experience and he said
unto Abram know of a surety that thy
seed shall be a stranger in a land that
is not theirs and shall serve them and
they shall afflict them for hundred
years and also that nation whom they
shall serve I will judge and afterwards
shall they come out with great substance
and thou shalt go to thy fathers in
peace thou shalt be buried in a good old
age but in the fourth generation they
shall come hither again to the iniquity
of the amorite is not yet full
commentaries of Joseph Benson once again
they shall come hither again hither to
the land of Canaan wherein thou not art
thou art the reason why they must not
have the land of promise in possession
until the fourth generation is because
the iniquity of the ammonites was not
yet full the righteous God has desert
determined that the amorite shall not be
cut off till they arrived at such a
pitch of wickedness and therefore till
it come to that the seed of Abraham must
be kept out of possession so the
interpretation of the story essentially
is that Abraham's descendants will end
up enslaved in Egypt for a long lengthy
period of time and eventually come back
to the land of Canaan and it's
interesting to because this is part of
Abraham's bargain with God and in this
divine vision I mean he's been promised
everything but it's a pretty tough
bargain because you know when God is
pushed or reveals himself let's say he
says look you're going to get your
damned descendants you know but it's not
going to be it's it's it's going to be a
tough journey they're going to be slain
slaved for a very long time and
eventually come back and you won't see
it you'll be dead long before then and
so it's a realistic promise in a sense
and you might say well Abram is so
desperate to keep the faith that he's
willing to read good into what isn't
good but I think
I think I don't think that's the right
way to look at it I think the right way
to look at it is the people who wrote
these stories were very realistic and
they knew that even if things turned out
well for you I mean we're still going to
be real you know we're going to be some
fantasy it's like let's say you have a
family that flourishes is people are
still going to die they're still going
to get sick they're they're still going
to have they're still going to be alive
you know with all of its suffering but
it'll be the but it'll be a life that's
rich enough and complete enough so that
it'll justify its its nature essentially
and so and it came to pass that when the
Sun went down and it was dark behold a
smoking furnace and a burning lamp that
passed between the pieces Albert Barnes
American theologian commented on this
the oven of smoke and lamp of flame
symbolized the smoke of destruction in
the light of salvation they're passing
passing through the pieces of the
sacrificial victims and probably
consuming them as an accepted sacrifice
or the ratification of the Covenant on
the part of God as the dividing and
presenting of them were on the part of
Abram in the same day the Lord made a
covenant with Abram saying unto thy seed
I haven't given this land from the river
of Egypt unto the great river the river
Euphrates the key nights and the Kehna
sites and the Cadman nights etc now
Sarai Abrams wife bear him no children
and she had a handmaid wait a second I
think we'll stop there I'm tiring out
and it's just at its 929 so that's a
very good place to stop so yes
[Applause]
so so I should I should close properly
and just sum up so what happens here is
that that Abram enters into a covenant
with God to act in the world and the
action is an adventure story essentially
and the adventures repeat and they're
and they're punctuated by success and
sacrifice and re contemplation right and
so it's this it's this journey it's the
it's the hero's journey uphill I'm here
there's a crisis I collapse i
reconstruct myself to a higher place and
life is like that continually and that's
the story of Abram and that's all
contained though it's all contained and
this is the thing that's so cool because
that is what your life is going to be
like whether you plan out your life or
not it's going to be punctuated like
that maybe it won't go up maybe it'll go
down the question is what sort of
container of you need to be in in order
to tolerate movement up and down and
that's what the story of Abraham
provides it provides a it provides a
description of the Covenant that's like
the Ark the Covenant in the Ark are the
same thing right except the Covenant is
the psychological equivalent of the ark
and the Covenant is have faith in the
structure of existence and go forth
that's the Covenant and that and the
story is that's the best possible
solution that you have at hand all right
so I'm going to make a request with
regards to the questions which may mean
you have to reorient yourself in the
line I would like the first two
questions on each side if possible to
relate specifically to tonight's lecture
and then I can and then I can address
more general issues if that's if that's
okay
so and I again I would like you to
carefully speak into the mic so that the
people who are watching can hear can you
hear me yeah I can I the story about
Abraham
as saying his wife was his sister you
referred to that as him making a mistake
I'm not quite sure I understand how
you're reading that as a mistake seeing
as it was a very deliberate decision and
it had a pretty good outcome for him and
he does the same thing a few chapters
later yes this is true
you see I don't I don't I don't feel
that I have cracked that part of that
story properly now the reason I said it
was a mistake is because it's clearly an
act of deceit and in it and it does put
the Pharaoh in a very awkward position
not to mention sir I by the way are sir
how do you say that I don't know how to
say that sir i sir i it's awry to begin
with yes is that right sir I yes okay
and then it's Sarah and that so Abram
means High King something like that and
Abraham means father of the people and
Sarai means princess and Sarah means
mother of the people it's something I
have it exactly right I'll tell you next
week but that's part of the name
transformation the the it seems to me
that at least in part it's an indication
of Abraham's willingness to use a
suboptimal solution when driven to it by
necessity I don't think it's a heroic
act to pretend that your wife is your
sister now you know and and and maybe
you might say well under the
circumstances there was nothing else he
could have done but it does seem it I
can't see how you can interpret it other
than as a departure from the truth
but I know that that's not all there is
to it and it does seem to work out well
for him and my interpretation is that
well if you're oriented properly in the
world the grace of God allows you a few
necessary mistake something like that
you have an alternative idea
well why not what what is it about that
that because it's Abraham and it isn't
reasonable to attribute mistakes to him
or what is it because at least I think
it says in the text that he's looking to
get out of a bad situation and he does
whatever is the best thing that's
available to him and not to mention as I
said he does the same trick a few
chapters later yeah well maybe maybe it
is the case that you know it's like a
white lie issue you know you say well
it's a white lie acceptable I would say
well the best that you can come up with
is acceptable that that doesn't mean
it's it's optimal though right like I
I'll give you a foolish example because
it's the best that I could do at the
moment but you know if you if you have a
loved one who says does this dress make
me look fat the answer to that question
is I don't answer questions like that
that's the answer right
because the other answer is the white
lie I mean at least in this context and
that means that on the one hand you're
maintaining the positive contract
between you and the person who's asking
the question but then you're still
sacrificing the truth within that so
your your you're maintaining your
relationship with the higher order truth
but sacrificing a lower order truth and
that would be better than the reverse
but it's not as good as not sacrificing
the truth at all and I would say that if
you're maybe fortunate because sometimes
it's a matter because you can be in a
situation where all your choices are bad
I've seen people in situations like that
I've probably been in situations like
that and maybe that is what's happening
in that stories every choice Abraham is
in front of him is bad but I can't help
but think that it's more than that it
means that if you're doing the best you
can and it's not perfect it can still be
good enough that's how it looks to me
thank you
hello dr. Peterson you mentioned earlier
there's been a pervasive problem of
nihilism and moral relativism and that
that kind of be cured with a nice naive
optimism that's grounded in fact and
what can actually be done to improve
situations is there a way to communicate
that message to a younger audience say
teenagers in a high school environment
which is nowadays a hotbed for this kind
of nihilistic morally relativist
thinking great I'm glad you asked that
so I'm going to tell you I was thinking
about saying this at the beginning but I
decided not to but now I get to say it
because I got this question so that's so
cool um I I have plans and so his plan
number one I have worked with some
people to design a website that will
enable high university students to enter
their course descriptions their
professors name the sub discipline and
the university and an artificial
intelligence agent will tell them if the
course is postmodern neo-marxist
indoctrination not not only and I have
made tentative arrangements with someone
to finance a advertising campaign for
that site and so the goal is well to
inform the consumer do you want to be
educated or do you want to be
indoctrinated and happily you'll be able
to use the site equally for both
purposes right because if you want to if
you want to take the the the courses
that I would regard as into oxidation
then this will give you a way of
ensuring that nothing that you get
exposed to won't be of that sort so and
then I'm going to make a video to
introduce that to university students
and their parents and I'm going to
outline what I think the universities
are doing wrong is about 20 things
they're doing wrong and and there's
seriously wrong things and I'm going to
start by describing the utility of a
university education in humanities
education because the humanities
education
makes you into the kind of autonomous
individual that can go away from that
can be independent and can communicate
and think and that has immense economic
value not not just spiritual value and
cultural value but economic value and so
there's I don't want to tell people not
to go to university I want to tell them
to go to university and grow the hell up
and and learn to communicate and think
and I want them to avoid the people who
will take the spirit away from them and
so that's what that website is going to
do I hope and the goal is to drop the
enrollment in the indoctrination courses
across the english-speaking world by 75%
within five years that's the goal so and
then you ask that you ask more
specifically about high school students
well we have this future authoring
program that has been used for
university students and it produces
about a 30% improvement in retention and
we've tested several thousand University
students anyone can use it by the way
it's not for university students but it
was easy for us to test it's beneficial
impact even if people only spend under
90 minutes on it it still has
approximately that effect especially on
young men especially if they're ethnic
minorities especially if they're not
oriented towards a career and didn't do
very well in school and so that's really
cool because it's really hard to design
a psychological intervention that helps
the people who are doing the worst most
psychological interventions so imagine
there are people who are doing not so
well and people who are doing well and
you produce a psychological intervention
what usually happens is the people who
are doing well benefit even more right
but this seems to work for the
disenfranchised so we're thrilled about
that
really and so we produced a version for
high school students yes and so but we
don't have them look three to five years
out into the future because they can't
and they don't know enough you know it's
hard for fully mature adults to look
that far into the future high school
kids can probably manage three to six
months and so we're going to have them
concentrate on character development and
and what they want for their from their
friendships and
how they would like to orient themselves
in school and to start thinking about
the sorts of person that they would like
to be and that never happens in schools
weirdly enough there's a guy named John
Gatto who won the Teacher of the Year
award in New York City and then in New
York State and then stopped being a
teacher by the way he wrote a series of
books about the education system that
explained why students in pre-university
education aren't taught to be autonomous
individuals it's very interesting what
he's discovered historically but anyways
we're going to market that probably to
parents and to university students
themselves rather than to the schools
because our experience has been that
producing this sort of material directly
for individuals works much better it's
much more efficient and so then students
will be able to or their parents will be
able to purchase the program and the
students will be able to use it to
design their own personality in a manner
that would make them thrilled to be
alive let's say that would be the goal
right yes
[Applause]
I'm gonna get you to turn it to put it
down a little more heed excellent
perfect yes yes yeah and I think I
specially the literature in
developmental psychology I think bears
this out but I think a huge part of
learning is interaction and discourse
and that seems very difficult in an
online setting even if it's through text
I don't I don't quite see it it's the
same thing and additionally I think
there's a huge motivational factor
that's difficult to arm it's difficult
to keep motivated when you're isolated
and nobody else around you is pursuing
the same goal so how would you dress
though you're absolutely right on both
counts um I would say that the idea of
an online humanities university is
grandiose and it may not be possible and
the reason for that is that and as
you're alluding to we actually don't
understand what the university is we
think it's lectures and exams but it's
probably not it's certainly being
together with people of your own age as
you start your life it's moving away
from your household it's establishing
yourself as a credible intellect right
it's it's picking a new group of peers
it's all of those things and it isn't
clear how that can be replicated online
now the people that I'm talking to are
sophisticated enough to understand
Marshall McLuhan's dictum that the
medium is the message and so I think it
would be a mistake to attempt to
duplicate the University online because
you can't but so what we're
concentrating on right now is not so
much content but infrastructure the
question is we want to set up an
educated education online that will be
autonomously self-governing and
self-improving and the content in some
sense were not so much interested in the
Khan
and as we are interested in the process
by which people who generate good
content might be optimally rewarded and
that's what we want to get right and
that's probably a discussion that'll
take a year or two years to to flesh out
we started to conceptualize what the
system might look like but but to your
point
it isn't we're not taking lectures and
putting them online although obviously
that's what I'm doing that that isn't
going to make an online humanities
University and we know that I think
everything you said is exactly is it's
very accurate and also indicative of the
high probability that something like
this would sail so but well you know
where we're going to try to be aware of
the pitfalls we're also going to I read
this great book I would recommend this
book it's a very funny book by a guy
named John gall it's called system
antics and it's a cult classic
systematics and it's about how systems
really work and how they fail and it's a
work of ironic comedy but it's quite
brilliant and one of the things when one
line he needs it's made of a bunch of
axioms and here's one axiom I just love
this is the system does not do what its
name says it does and so one guy worked
in Alberta Social Services when I was a
kid about eighteen or so and I worked as
a consultant and I one of the and I got
involved in projects that were above my
pay grade I would say and I learned a
lot about how how large bureaucracies
functioned and I was asked at one point
to update a report that had been made
the year before about what percentage of
the spending of the Social Services
Department actually went to the
recipients of welfare and and social aid
in general and the answer was the system
did not know and could not find out and
they had hired a very expensive
consulting firm to answer that question
the year before and I was asked to
update it which was quite odd to begin
with but then I did I went and looked at
the consulting report and I went into
the data and what I found was that none
of it was real but even more importantly
there was no way of knowing whether it
was true or false because the system had
never been set up to calculate what
percentage of its total spending
actually went to the recipients of
social aid it just blew me away and then
I thought and I was reading this book at
the same time and I thought oh the
purpose of the social services
department is to employ people in the
social services department and I mean I
wasn't being cynical about that it's
like charity most charities you know
it's like 90% overhead so what is the
charity do it runs itself now you don't
want to be cynical about that because
big businesses are the same most like
even if they're running at a profit the
profit is like five percent so the
business spends 95% of its time
maintaining itself you know and it makes
a bit of product and it makes a bit of
profit but most of what it does is
maintain itself so anyways
one of the axioms in that book that was
one of them is the system does not do
what it says it does so that's then you
can face the system with a clear head
and say okay well this thing isn't doing
what it says it's doing but it's
probably doing something and the thing
it's doing might be useful but we should
figure out what that thing is so that's
been really useful to me as a guide to
thinking the other thing he said was if
you want to build a big system that
works start with by building a small
system that works and scale it and we've
done that for example with the self
authoring programs you know has built
small scale systems that are very robust
with the hope that they'll scale and
that's the same we'll do the same thing
here is start with a small amount of
content see if we can reward see what I
would like to have happen is you know
there's a lot of people out there who
are pretty intensely educated and some
of them are really creative and so
imagine that there's a timeline imagine
you could do a humanity since you
imagine there's a timeline say of a
thousand years but scalable then imagine
that that there would be lectures
associated with the timeline at
different levels of resolution so we
might call for a lecture on the 3rd
century AD what happened in the 3rd
century ad you've got half an hour to
explain it you can explain it any way
you want you can use animation you can
use lecture you can use text you can
make a movie we don't care what you have
to do is that's the topic that's the
timespan that's the amount of time and
then you can post it and so we could
generate content that way and let people
experiment and then we can have people
review the content as part of their
generate questions about the content as
part of their assignments rate the
questions as part of their assignments
and rate the content and then if we
charge people imagine you had to pay $50
a month to enroll something like that
maybe we would allow you when you first
enroll maybe you get to use five dollars
of it as disposable income you can
reward that to any creator you want but
as you progress through the courses your
right to determine where your money goes
would increase as you became more and
more educated hopefully that way we
would get some quality control built
into it so those are some of the ideas
that were that we're starting to play
around with so the only one I'm consider
about is the motivation yeah what's that
the motivation issue for individuals
well then I'm not going to go into that
because it would take too long but but
rest assured that we are thinking about
that very hard as well we're going to
build competition into it we're going to
build cooperation into it we hope to
build peer into relationships into it I
think all that's possible but but
complex right because it's we don't know
how to build an online education system
really and but it would be fun to
experiment and see if we can figure out
how to do it so thank you hi so I I
couldn't really zero in on any
particular question so it's more of a
family questions that I have about the
nature and cultivation of conscience
which was in a sense what this story
exemplified about Abraham why do you say
that why do you think that the story
exemplified the development of
conscience of conscience
specifically well going back to the
zigzag yeah right and the star how you
have to keep okay so that's what you
were referring to
okay orienting yourself completely
autonomously yeah on your own terms
right yeah okay okay so you we hit on
some great there I think you know and
this is something weirdly enough that I
learned most particularly from the
Pinocchio movie which I spent a lot of
time studying is because in in the
Pinocchio movie Jiminy Cricket is an
avatar of Christ essentially but it's
very
because he's a bug that's the first
thing that's kind of weird and because
Jiminy Cricket is southern US slang for
Jesus Christ among other things but and
these things get aggregated in in great
mythic dramas like that and that's a
great mythic drama but you know one of
the things that really makes Jiminy
Cricket different from Christ apart from
the fact that Christ wasn't a cricket is
that Craig the cricket learns as he
progresses right even though he's the
conscience and so you'd think that he
would be the infallible guide that isn't
how the moviemakers set it up but not so
cool is that he is just as muddle-headed
as Pinocchio at the beginning and he's a
bit arrogant and puffed up too and so it
took me a long time to think that
through and then I realized that well
you you have the voice of you have the
voice of culture in you you have the
voice of culture within you but it's old
and dead and out-of-date and it's not
fully articulated and updated and then
what happens is that if you enter into a
dialogue with it and you hammer yourself
against the world then you get hammered
into shape and so does your conscience
and so you both become elevated and so
well so anyways I think that's that's
ridiculously cool because it means that
your conscience you don't have an
infallible guide but you have something
within you that you could build into an
infallible guide if you cooperated with
it and and said it so well so I think
that's very interesting so that being
said yes the picture that I have in my
mind of the cultivation of virtue in
general it's kind of like taking a block
of wood and trying to carve out a sphere
out of it it'll never be perfectly round
but the more you carve right the rounder
and rounder right that's successive
approximation yeah well one of it's also
like what do you call that compound
interest this is one of the things
that's also and I think this puts you on
the to those who more shall be given
part of the curve it's like you know you
don't have to improve yourself very much
each week to really improve yourself on
the ridiculous amount in a year you know
so you could make you could you could
you could Wow make your day 1/100 of a
percent better than the day before
not would do the trick if you were if
you were constant about that that would
do the trick so that that's this
successive approximation is you don't
want to underestimate the utility of
incremental progress man it's really
kids deadly powerful so so let's say you
get to the you know the higher ends of
the curve right you're like a pretty
virtuous person let's say you even
become a sage or something of the sort
and I mean one should you doubt your
conscience like what are things that we
should watch out for even when we got
great
well that's yep okay um just just to get
it out of the way right yeah I don't
know how much this relates well it does
relate but Psychopaths for example the
entire idea that they lack a conscience
and that's why right that's what
psychopathy is whether or not you agree
with that definition right but there's
an issue of conscience again a play with
psychopathy how can we the first
question doubt ourselves in a way that's
warranted right regardless of how
virtuous we've become and can you treat
a psychopath could they call fate a
conscience okay so let we'll start with
the first one part of the reason that
that I believe that freedom of speech is
the canonical right let's end obligation
right more importantly even obligation
is that that's how you figure out if
you're wrong you know because so I said
home and I think and I think and I think
let's say but I'm like who am I to think
there's so many things I don't know that
it's it's just there's the what I know
compared to what I don't know is so
miniscule that it's a preposterous act
just to say something okay so so no
matter how much I sit at home and think
I'm not going to fix that I'm going to
be flat and then I have biases but my
temperament and I have biases because of
my malevolence and I have biases because
of my my gender my sex let's say since
we're not so fond of that word
so Eva no matter how much I said home
and think I'm still going to be wrong
and malevolent so then what do I have to
do is I have to talk to some other
people and I have to say this is what I
think and it's going to be ugly you know
because what the hell do I know but then
if I listen people will tell me why I'm
wrong and lots of people have been
telling me why I'm wrong like a lot and
it's hard you know it's hard but it's
but I've learned something from it like
I had this revelation let's say about
being yelled at by your father now I
know that you can be yelled at too much
by your father but it's like you're
wrong man and so someone's yelling at
you and maybe they're only ten percent
right but if you shut the hell up and
listen then you can figure out where
you're wrong and then maybe you can be
thankful for that and then maybe if you
shut up and listen your father would
quit yelling at you you know because
he's wrong - what the hell does he know
he knows how to yell at you and tell you
how you're wrong and he's throwing
things out you add you that are probably
not true but some of its true and you
know if someone can tell you why you're
wrong they've given you a great gift
because then you don't have to be wrong
anymore and you might think well who
cares if you're wrong but you know
there's a line in the New Testament - is
if the blind lead the blind won't they
fall in won't they fall into a ditch the
answer to that question by the way is
yes they will and so the reason that you
want to think is because thinking is how
you like when you think you creative the
fictional world that's an analog of the
world and then you make an avatar of
yourself to act in that world and then
if the Avatar dies you don't act out
those actions right well so if you think
properly then you don't have to suffer
and die and so if you can say what you
think and people can tell you why you're
wrong and you know to say what you think
under extreme circumstances means that
you're going to say things that no one
wants to hear because those are the
things you don't know about those are
the things that are conflictual and
differ
called it are going to be hard
conversations man and you're going to be
wrong about them a lot if you don't get
to stumble forward with your stupidity
then you can't be corrected and so so
there's no distinction between free
speech and thinking and there's no
distinction between thinking and
thriving and so those who want to
inhibit free speech do not wish for
people to thrive and I believe that so
thinking does not happen inside your
head that's only the beginnings of
thinking and it's this that we're doing
here that's thinking you know so we have
to protect that psychopath I don't I say
this I hope non naively also having
dealt with Psychopaths in my clinical
practice and I would say now and then in
my life I don't believe in Psychopaths I
don't believe that we know enough to say
there are people born without conscience
um I don't think the psychometric
measurement of psychopathy is everything
that it should be I've been trying to
model it bei in the Big Five domain I
think now it's complicated because so I
would say a psychopath the classic
psychopath is likely extroverted
especially assertive disagreeable and
unconscious and maybe extremely low in
neuroticism so you can't frighten them
but so that's a rare combination because
it's extreme on many traits right but
that I don't believe that that means
that someone with that personality
configuration is doomed from birth to a
pathological existence because there's
things about psychopathy that that the
that the classifiers those who claim
like correctly that the psychopath is
born in some sense can't explain it's
like well what about the cruelty there
seems to be a motive they're you know
they're passionless and they lack no
they lack emotion well why are they
cruel then for entertainment well but
then you have to explain the
entertainment motivation like there's a
failure in some sense with the classic
psychopathy theorist to come to grips
with the problem
malevolence it skirted over and you
can't do that if you're talking about
psychopathy it's like malevolence is the
bloody issue here and so the other issue
with the psychopaths is that he's
irredeemable right that's the idea I
don't think we know enough to make such
claims now and that doesn't I know the
psych office a literature quite well and
I have great respect for their primary
research is in the field I want to make
that perfectly clear but we're talking
at a different we're talking we're
approaching the problem from a different
level of analysis here something like a
spiritual level of analysis and I don't
think that there's an easy easy
translation from the descriptive
psychometric psychiatric approach to the
spiritual level they don't match and I'm
more likely to say let's not assume the
soul is doomed from birth right and I'm
loathe to think that there are people
born irredeemable although I do think
there are irredeemable people know the
death penalty issues interesting in that
regard you know because I've read a lot
about really terrible people and I've
also read a lot about what really
terrible people said about themselves
and many of them wished for the death
penalty and so it's absolutely clear
that there are things that you can do
that deserve the death penalty but that
doesn't mean that the state should have
the right to impose it that's a
different question so yep
in the previous lecture you mentioned
the 2008 economic crisis and one of the
very interesting themes that's emerged
at many levels be at universities or
economic policies this perceived culture
war specifically the idea of Marx versus
milk and you've criticized postmodern
the neo-marxist thought very frequently
one interesting critic of the policies
of the EU specifically EC ECB and IMF
during the Greek debt crisis was Yanis
varoufakis the former greek Finance
Minister and his criticism of MIL was
deal was Mills alleged contempt for the
population and verify his comments on
the type of capitalism that results in
too big to fail
he describes themselves as an erratic
Marxist to me personally is an example
of someone whose position on the
philosophical mooring of policy is
interesting to compare and contrast with
yours
he certainly not your typical Marxist or
post modernist even though not really
sure what that means but if you look at
his work during the Greek debt crisis
and his current work with diem25
he seems to be well reasoned
well-positioned and and articulate now I
wanted to know if you had an opinion on
that type of criticism of MIL or his
taking of a position as a neurotic
Marxist okay I would say I would say no
to the specifics of the question I don't
think that I have that detailed
expertise in order to answer the
question at the level of analysis that
you where you formulated it but I have
something to say that's more general
about the set of phenomena that you
described there's no doubt that
distribution is a major problem that
capitalism contends with imperfectly at
best and the distribution problem is the
pre de distribution problem right and
it's something that Marx commented on
which mostly in the monetary sphere is
that money tends to accumulate in the
hands of very few people it's like
there's no doubt about that now as we've
discussed before the people in whom
hands the money accumulates do turnover
more than people say think especially in
in countries that are functioning me
reasonably well and it's really
important that that happens yes yes yes
but that doesn't that doesn't solve the
problem of the fact
that produced goods gravitate towards an
extreme minority now they're also
produced often by extreme minority which
is also a problem I would say then that
the idea that capitalism is more prone
to that distribution problem than any
other system I don't believe that to
have been demonstrated at all and I
think that capitalism is actually pretty
good at self-destruction
except when that's interfered with and I
think that's particularly the case in
the United States where generally the
policy has been if you're an idle with
feet of clay no matter how big you are
you get to fail now that's being
compromised severely in the last 20
years and we're probably going to pay
for that I think they really paid for
that in Japan right where there is every
attempt to prop out that the gods that
should have died so so fair enough for
the critique of capitalism that's not
the issue the issue is do you have a
better idea and if the idea is well we
could kind of do it marks suggested then
you don't get to have that position and
claim what should I say I haven't seen
any evidence that systems predicated on
that set of actions have done anything
but more harm than good thank you yeah
and when will you be announcing the
monthly extension to the circuses as
soon as I find out whether or not I can
rent this theater in the fall yeah thank
you we'll see you next week
you
[Applause]