persnickity

Did any of you read the "Serendipity" books by Stephen Cosgrove? They're short little kid books that all have a moral lesson - Nitter Pitter, Bangalee, Serendipity, Leo the Lop, Little Mouse on the Prarie, etc. There's tons of 'em. Anyways, the one - Persnickity - is about this perfectly neat and tidy dragon that leaves the messy dragons to live on his own. He throws a "house-warming party" and invites all the other dragons. They show up and destroy his roses, because Persnickity took the time to pick all the thorns off each rose - making them, in his eyes, more perfect. Until the dragons ate them because there were no thorns to stop them...

I thought of Persnickity as I was studying for a test tomorrow. Going over my notes, I came across some of the questions of change vs. continuity, is God a higher being, in the more tangible sense - separate from man - or is God all, and all is one, and that one is God? And I began to think (dangerous!)... we didn't get to discuss Heraclitus' take on God in class, but we were wondering what he might say, particularly in response to Parmenides and Zeno. Parmenides and Zeno say all is permanent - the philosophy of being, if you will. we are all part of one permanent, unchanging, perfect being. There it is - that operative word. Perfect.

Throughout history history, God, or that higher being, has been equated with perfect. At the same time, perfect has been associated with unchanging - why change the perfect? Therefore, is Perfect = unchanging, and God = Perfect, than God = unchanging.

Heraclitus believed in change. Rather than being, Heraclitus purports we are all in a state of becoming. Well, what about God, then? If he didn't believe in any constant, than God must also be "becoming" - God must be changing, too. But how can you have a perfect, unchanging God and a changing God simultaneously exist?

BUT - what is "perfect?" Who says Perfect = unchanging? Perhaps this state of becoming is, in fact, "perfect," rather than the state of being. Don't get me wrong - it's necessary for us all to partake in moments of being (as in being mindful - living in the present, not the past or future). However, as far as overarching concepts - the world as permanent vs. the world in constant flux - what is "perfect?"