Author’s Notes
Source Material – The Ego And It’s Own
Pages Covered – 17
Already on Part II, so far so good. From here on out I’m going to have to actually develop my responses at the same time I’m posting. Part I and Part II involve responses that were written out on Discord. The formatting unfortunately poorly translates from discord to WordPress. Thus I’m better off just writing my reflections on WordPress itself! Without further ado, let us begin.
The Excerpt
Now, what is his cause? Has he, as is demanded of us, made an alien cause, the cause of truth or love, his own? You are shocked by this misunderstanding, and you instruct us that God’s cause is indeed the cause of truth and love, but that this cause cannot be called alien to him, because God is himself truth and love; you are shocked by the assumption that God
could be like us poor worms in furthering an alien cause as his own.“Should God take up the cause of truth if he were not himself truth?” He cares only for his cause, but, because he is all in all, therefore all is his cause! But we, we are not all in all, and our cause is altogether little and contemptible; therefore we must “serve a higher cause.” – Now it is clear, God cares only for what is his, busies himself only with himself, thinks only of himself, and has only himself before his eyes; woe to all that is not well-pleasing to him. He serves no higher person, and satisfies only himself. His cause is – a purely egoistic cause.
The Ego And Its Own, Page 17
The Reflection
Simply, and purely amazing. This is akin to what Heraclitus has said, “To God, all things are good & just.” After all, all things can be “Good” just as all things can be “Evil.”
All things are simultaneously both Good & Evil and neither Good nor Evil. I speak, of course, “of the thing in itself.” “The thing as a concept.” Neither the intentions put behind those things nor the interpretations put ahead of those things, are to be considered.
For instance, the thing or concept of “life-taking.” Murder is the unlawful, or better put, perversion, of “life-taking.” Murder is life-taking with a perceived negative intention and perceived negative interpretation.
As for a positive intention and positive interpretation, I suppose it would be attempting to divert a “universally bad and unpleasant” outcome from occuring (at least in your perspective) by killing whatever it is that is attempting or helping to cause that outcome.
The Reflection Part II
Neutral intentions and neutral interpretations would likely be how we simply kill a lot of microscopic things around us by merely existing, or perhaps killing for food.
The “act of reproduction.” Non-consensual reproduction (Rape) is negative, consensual reproduction is positive. Sex just for pleasure is more neutral. Of course though, these definitions and examples I’ve provided are oversimplified and grossly immature.
These examples merely attempt to introduce the idea that, to God, all things are indeed Good in and of themselves. As humans however, we tend to corrupt these things, whether for “good” or “evil” intentions & interpretations. Ultimately though, it is all too Human…
The Reflection Part III
Other than all that however… I agree, all causes, no matter how small, no matter how large, are God’s causes. No matter how significant and no matter how insignificant the causes may be, they are still ultimately all of God’s causes.
Existence is God. God is Existence. For Existence to perpetuate itself (Existence) it is thereby serving itself, its own cause, which is the highest cause and therefore most egoistic cause. Simply by existing & living, we are serving Existence. And as we are fragments of Existence we are thereby serving ourselves.
Everyone is serving himself, whether he realizes it or not. His “noble and higher” causes are ultimately his causes. For he feels that there is something noble in preferring to serve the cause of another aspect of Existence rather than his own cause of his own aspect of Existence.
Outro
This is definitely a lot to take in and process. Please feel free to create topics in our forums or comment on this post! We can extend the discussion then. Otherwise carry on, I’m linking the last post through my pseudonym.
Regards From Your Fellow Wonderer,
