This can only happen if the thoughts of each are in the mind of the other. No harm in expressing them too; but heard much more clearly than mere words, because it is the very thought of the other that one perceives in one’s own mind. Much clearer than the inadequate expression of that thought in words, when we all know that there is always a chasm between the imagination and the expression. Psychiatrists might condemn it as “Spirit possession”. Without wishing to appear contemptuous, it is something that lovers have always known about. Which is perhaps why Jesus told us to love our enemies.
So getting rid of the spirit of Plato is the first step, and being able to read each others thoughts is the last step; and in between we must strive to recover the spirit of the historical Jesus, who never in the Synoptic Gospels took refuge in theology. He always used parables. Only in John’s Gospel do you get the theorizing; in the Prelude in Chapter 1, and in the Last Discourses which begin substantially in Chapter 14. The language is sublime and incredibly beautiful, the sentiment lofty and full of compassion, and they represent an attempt dimly to understand what it is all about. For many years, together with the Johannine Epistles, they were the part of the Bible I loved most; but their fatal flaw is that they lack enthusiasm for life. And this is the fatal legacy of Plato; ever so slowly he has destroyed the vitality of the Church. It was Augustine who introduced him; and it is time he left. Augustine served his apprenticeship in tortuous paths; in shameless immorality, in manichaean belief which was not far removed from a hatred of life; and whose words in more mature life were used to justify the compulsion of conscience. Augustine wrote his best known book, The City of God, in an attempt to defend the Church after the sack of Rome by Alaric the Goth, for which the Christians were being blamed. And most of the earlier part of the book is concerned with denigrating Roman gods as evil spirits; it is only when he reaches Plato that he becomes eloquent. I prefer the attitude of Vice-Admiral Nelson, pondering whether to chase the French round the West Indies, or follow them back across the Atlantic; he said, “I’m not the Pope. I’m not infallible; but I make up my mind as best I can on the information available”. And he made the correct decision, which ended in the annihilating victory at Trafalgar.
Those with a zest for life, or even a zest for death, will always overwhelm those who haven’t either; Plato’s Olympian calm has had its day. Augustine, attractive in many ways, was not infallible either; and Plato should leave. In effect I am proposing there should be stripped out of Christian doctrine the entire body of Neo-Platonist thought for which Augustine was responsible. Then we can all go back to St.Paul’s letters; and start again this time using modern English, and studying what Jesus actually thought.