This is the heart of the argument in this webpage.
An example of a rule are the legal moves of the knight in chess. We know that physically the knight can make any move, so the rule limits these possibilities. If we don’t obey this rule it has no real effect, it simply dissolves that game. We could use the new move and so have a new game. Rules create games, and games require the adherence and obedience to rules. It is up to people in authority to enforce and maintain rules. This is all in the mind however, it is not real.
A Law is different. If we let go of an egg the result is not an option, it will fall. Whether it breaks or not depends upon other factors but it will fall. Falling obeys very precisely rules which have been expressed in physics and indeed on paper. These arbitrary equations could be otherwise F=ma might have been a=Fm and the school master will enforce the correct rule. However in reality no one has to enforce the egg’s behaviour: it is always the same, it cannot be otherwise, it always falls. This is a Law for it cannot be otherwise. When people speak of God they envision an absolute unwavering enforcer of this cosmic game, the one who keeps the universe obeying these rules: the one who puts the authority behind the Laws.
If we disobey the rules we have only the wrath of imaginary human authority. If however we disobey the Laws we run into God. If we drive too fast it will upset the authorities but it does no real harm. But if we hit someone then we run into God and into Reality where real rules come into force. Laws that cannot be changed or undone.
This distinction between Illusion which is just man made custom and authority is to be seen as distinct from Reality which is factual and indisputable.
There is very much confusion on this subject because liberating ourselves from custom and authority is essentially anti-social. It demands that we see human authority and culture as non-essential. We exist in society and such a move is understandably frightening; it challenges us to our very core.
It is sad however to see this very move toward God become embodied in further customs and society as it has in the worlds religions and cultures. Our forefathers in every society retreated to the hills and the deserts and the forests to enact this transformation to God: they did not wear clothings or join in customs and cults – these entrapments are the opposite movement toward Man. The religious wars are between societies of men who have lost sight of the Laws and God and replaced them with man made customs which need enforcement. If you need to guard and enforce a Law then by definition it is not a Law.
There is an advert at the time of writing in the UK for army recruitment. It paints the compelling image of the comradeship and society that one experiences as a member of the army. What it doesn’t show is the equal comradeship experienced by the society of people that we will fight. Wars create strong social bonds and inclusion, it feels good to a fundamentally social organism like Man. But for every bit of belonging there are people who do not belong: all societies include and exclude at the same time: all societies unite and divide at the same time: all societies bring peace and war at the same time: all societies embody rules enforced by man, they do not embody Laws given by God.
Lawful society is already here we are all already members of it. There are no Lawfully righteous and no Lawfully heathen, there is nothing to Lawfully fight for, no Lawful kingdom to create; it is already here.
Disharmony exists because we humans cannot bear to accept the authority of God. We have insights but like my very writings here we chose to embody them in arbitrary rules. These words I use here can be written in myriad ways, they can say anything: some things that are Lawful (like F=ma) and some things that are Unlawful (like a=Fm); things that we call true and false. Lawful rules mimic God at first but soon come to replace Him.
Scientists once thought they were uncovered the Laws of God, but today some seem to think that they are responsible for the Laws. Unified Field Theory will be great detective work when it is complete, but the crime of creation happened all by itself billions of years before life had even arisen! Whatever rules we find to express the Laws of the universe it always remains to be explained why the universe obeys these rules as Law rather than others. That Law-giver is the ancient Logos: in various other languages called God (English), Allah (Arabic), Yahweh (Jewish), Dao/Tao (Chinese), Dharma/Dhamma (Indian). (To confuse us in some systems the Law has a personality as a god, in others like Buddhism it is just a Law).
To have a discussion things have to be one way or another. We can discuss rules, discuss what people have thought, written and said. By contrast the Law can only be one way. That is why it is a called Law not rule. On Law there can be no discussion. This is how the universe is, at the beginning there is always just Law. All men have always known this.
We are born as instinctive players into a million games and spend our lives learning the rules.
We know God not in the trip to the supermarket, but in the realisation that if we do not eat we will starve. Feel hungry once in a while just to remember the way things really are. We know God not in the money we give to charity, but in the realisation that if we didn’t someone really would find life more difficult. Spend the money on yourself one day and look at the difference it makes. We know God not in being pious and good (there is no such thing), but in realising that if we are bad it leads to confusion, frustration and suffering.
By contrast we know there is little God in TV because if we don’t watch it is makes no difference at all. We know there is little God in a shampoo brand because any soap will do. We know there is little God in a political party because it makes little difference who is in power - wheat grows as well under communism as it does liberalism. We know there is increasingly little God in the work we do because as the current downturn illustrates it makes no difference whether we are in work or not. But that is subject for another page.
It is obviously a subtle point as evidenced by the confusion that surrounds it: but rules and laws do seem distinct. Rules can be otherwise and are therefore zealously enforced by the games players, especially when their desire for society draws them deeply into a particular game. Whenever we feel that we need to enforce something: it is because it can be otherwise and it is therefore manmade and a rule. By contrast Laws are the foundations of all existence. They can never be otherwise. We notice them because they enforce some rules (F=ma) and not others (a=Fm), some statement and not others. In themselves they are beyond discussion and compromise: they just are. There is nothing to enforce: God enforces his own rules. We need only look and learn – that is the Way of Mankind.
Total Nature is a name for this underlying existence of Laws. Mankind is creative in making a buzzing and busy world full of stories and fantasy: but the test comes not from human authority and judgement but from the Laws that truly govern. Get it wrong and we all suffer.
http://totalnature.atspace.com/
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