what are we made of?
Take the time to think through this. You won’t regret it.
You are made of cells. I am made of cells. My cells are built on molecules. My molecules make use of atoms. My atoms are mostly space, but the bits that aren’t are called quarks…
Here is the moment of my amaze. The olive that I hold in my hand along with its friendly minced pimento, this olive that I now taste and eat, that former olive was, on some level, made out of something… not made from anything…
There is another word for not anything. The word is nothing. At some point, that is the answer to the question. What is it made of? What is it made of?
Nothing. And yet… it is…
Kick a stone. There are no tricks here. There are no props, no prefabbed white rabbits. The magic is real, and I stand blinking on the stage because of it. I’m real. I’m heavy. I’m matter. Cut me and I’ll bleed. But I’m not made out of anything, and if the Magician, the Poet, the Word, the Singer were to stop His voice, I would simply cease to be.
- re-ordered quotes from N.D. Wilson, Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl (from pages 21-24)
“…if the Magician, the Poet, the Word, the Singer were to stop His voice, I would simply cease to be.”
I must have this book.
I am completely missing his point here, I am more in the analytic school and this sounds like gibberish to me. If he is referring to our souls as the “nothing” he keeps alluding to I would disagree, the soul is made of something it’s just not like the things we measure in a material world. However, we do exist by the decree of God…is our existance completely dependant upon God’s continual thinking us into being or is that a one time event? This gets tricky because if I do get what he’s saying about the “Singer” it really does lean towards pantheism inadvertantly as I really don’t exist except in the mind of God.
Bob,
This quote is playing off the idea that God continually causes us to exist. Wilson here, seems to agree with Edwards in the belief that the universe is sustained by a continued act of creation ex-nihilo. As you probably know, while Edwards was far from a pantheist (universe = god), by his writings he seems to be a panentheist (universe exists within the mind of God). Edwards took Scriptures like Acts 17:28 quite literally: “In him we live and move and have our being.” In His essay, “God is Everywhere Present”, he uses this kind of thinking to expresses a vision of God’s saturating omnipresence in the universe.
I think the above quotes are beautiful, showing the magical nature of existence, but I appreciate you weighing in with your opinion. In this book, outside of Wilson’s Lewis-esque view of hell expressed in one of the final chapters, it feels like Wilson is incarnating Edwardsian thought in poetic language. The book was very helpful to me.
-Jeff
Yeah, I kinda get the point I am just not comfortable with the conclusions. It begs the question as to whether I exist or am I just a thought of God. I would agree that the universe is upheld by the decree of God in a dynamic fashion, and that there is nothing that properly exists outside of His rule and presence (That’s how I would interpret the passage you cited). However, I cringe at the notion that the universe is not a thing proper but rather a thought of God, philosophically it makes God the author of evil. This is where strict idealistic philosophy inevitably leads to. Put another way, how can you have free agents that are merely thoughts of God? (I say this as a supralapsarian strict 5 point calvinist mind you)
Furthermore, I am not so sure that the distinction between pantheism and panentheism is so easy to make, if “I” am but a thought of God do I really exist? Is there any distinction between myself an God then (Me being His thought)?
Simply put, is the universe a thing? Am I a person?
Great post though Jeff, extremely thought provoking. I am not so sure I have an answer that satisfies myself splitting the horns between deism (a universe that works just fine without God’s involvement) and what you are describing here. I would simply say we need more information as scripture doesn’t disclose the nature of the universe in this sense. Thus, I would tend toward calling it a mystery.
maybe this is a little simplistic, but what’s so bad about being merely the “thought” of God? doesn’t paul say (somewhere, maybe later in romans) who can know the mind of God? what would it really mean metaphysically to be his thought? i know this may be wading too deep, but it seems our words are simply inefficient…as bob said, this is a mystery indeed, but the best kind…one we can know, in the end, is undoubtedly good.
and jeff…i need this book.
Trev,
I agree with you. And, you would indeed enjoy this book.
-Jeff