Philosophica Theologica

Philosophica Theologica (this paper) assumes the existence of God. We cannot prove the existence of ‘being’ and the ‘first causes of things’ without being able to explain and prove the ‘first cause.’  We definitely cannot prove metaphysical concepts without the existence of some “higher being.”  Because we cannot physically or intellectually explain the “first cause,” we will assume the “first cause” is God. There must be a “first cause” in any system.  Unfortunately for some, they must use God, otherwise they explain “first cause” away or call it some other name like the “One” or “Absolute.” If the “first cause” is not God in your system, then no one has ever remotely proven what this “first cause” is.  Metaphysics is a fallacy.  It is an attempt to define something that cannot be defined.  It is a contradiction.  A second assumption this paper follows is that we cannot prove the existence of God solely through reason or empirical evidence.  God can only be known through faith in an intellectual realm supported by reason. Unexplainable events like the universe, the appearance of humans and miracles tend to compel a belief in God but atheist could just as easily assume that the stars and humans evolved from some unexplainable big bang that has yet to be explained. A third and major assumption of this paper is that there are a set of truths (we can call them by any of a number of names- rules, laws, standards, norms, values, principles) that never change and have existed with and since this “first cause.” These truths are absolute, meaning that they represent ideas that are uniform, consistent and eternal. These truths existed before and with the ‘first cause’ and still exist today and will continue to exist infinitely into the future without change. These truths shall be called divine law and natural law. Divine law and natural law are truths, not knowledge. They were enacted by God. The combination and interplay of these truths are universal and transcend our existence. These truths explain and reveal “being” and the “first causes of things” such that humans can have a glimpse into perfected reality. Thus truth is the awareness of the synergy between the divine law and natural law whereby man discovers himself through rational thought.
Philosophy
Philosophy in this system is the study of the relationship of and between divine law and natural law among humans within nature. Christ was the epitome of this duality of laws.  He was both human and divine.  His life demonstrated to humanity that we live in a world that is governed by both natural (earthly) and divine laws. These laws were given to us by God. As stated earlier, any system cannot be formulated without the presence of an “unmoved mover.” Otherwise where does “being” and the “first causes of things” come? Can you imagine an ontological system without a theological base and without a God?  An atheist could accept the big bang and evolution and reject resurrection and immortality, but such a system would be based on pure matter alone. With no rhythm of life and necessity of destination, only basic natural instincts, survival of the fittest and individual selfish desires would form the basis of such a system. Such a system would require spontaneous generation of every single thing that exists including humans. Such a society would implode and collapse upon itself with total human destruction because of lack of innate guiding principles of “goodness.” Nothing would be good or bad. Everything would be sufficient to fulfill the relative necessities of the individual. Any system has to have a “first cause.”  And along with a “first cause,” there must exist some ever present laws that govern the explanation of “being” and the relationship that humans have among themselves and within their environment.  For these laws must accompany being and the first cause.   In other words these laws must exist because being and the first cause of things could not exist without some grand scheme of basic laws to control existence. There is no such thing as spontaneous generation.  One cannot produce something from nothing, unless, perhaps, one were God. Life happens with a regularity and predictability with sufficient consistency to support a conclusion of some guiding, organizing and constitutional principles.  Natural law and divine law establishes this underlying foundation.  Otherwise we would exist in chaos or we may not exist at all.
Metaphysics was the “science” that studied “being” or “the first causes of things” or “things that do not change.” Is it no longer possible to define metaphysics that way?  Metaphysics has become a catch-all category, a repository of philosophical problems that cannot be classified as epistemology, logic, ethics or other branches of philosophy. Epistemology is a theory of knowledge that investigates what distinguished justified belief from opinion. These terms were once based on theology.  Now they are more and more based on secular relativism as acknowledged by the definition of the following terms.
Phenomenology- the science of phenomena as distinct from that of the nature of being.   It is an approach that concentrates on the study of consciousness and the objects of direct experience.  Solipsism-the view or theory that the self is all that can be known to exist. Existentialism-a philosophical theory or approach that emphasizes the existence of the individual person as a free and responsible agent determining their own development through acts of the will. Linguistic analysis can be used to describe the unconscious rules and processes that speakers of a language use to create spoken or written language. Neo Positivism arises out of the analogy between physical and social phenomena.  Neo positivism takes phenomena from the physical world as models for social events and uses the laws of the former to explain the latter. It asserts that sociology should be a science and its methods should follow these of the natural especially physical sciences. Neo positivists consider sound scientific methodology to be the first principle of sociological analysis. For them sound scientific methodology involves mathematical and other formal models that incorporate formalization of variables. Computer techniques and language, experimental logics, laboratory experiments and computer simulation of human behavior become paramount.
These definitions demonstrate the replacement of ancient ethics with modern empiricism and morality. Truth, objectivity and certainty have been replaced with moral relativism. Any relevant philosophical system cannot be formulated without the presence of an “unmoved mover” and the associated laws and truths which come with the system. Even Plato had one.  Otherwise where does “being” and the “first causes of things” come? Can you imagine an ontological system without a theological base and without a God? A purely secular system would have no place to hang its hat, no concepts or ideas of good and bad with which to compare human responses. Such a sterilized society devoid of emotion in the spiritual sense creates a “what’s in it for me” culture devoid of love and affection.  If Humans did not act based on emotions and spiritual consciousness, every act would be neither good nor bad, just necessary to fill a desire of nature. Who would determine what is good? Is a set of divine laws required? Or is morality based on an encounter between two individuals with the hope that both seek the best or individual satisfaction or outcome between the encounter.  Such a system of morality becomes purely subjective. The same exact encounter between two sets of people could, in theory, produce two totally different outcomes or results with regard to morality. Happiness requires norms. People act contrary to ethical norms either because they are unaware of them or because compliance would be against their perceived self-interest. Divine law does provide the norms and theology must explain them.
 Is ancient philosophy the cause of the decline of theology, the study of God and our existence?  Plato, Socrates, Pythagoras, Plotinus, Aristotle and subsequent philosophers and their various schools attempted to explain our existence without the knowledge and certainty of a higher power. They developed extreme systems for the appearance of our solar system, humanity, plants, animals and humanity’s relationship with nature and each other.  When the Church Fathers appeared on the scene beginning with Origen, Athanasius, Cyril and the like, they felt a need and did in fact attempt to explain our existence using these ancient Greek, philosophical concepts. These concepts were science to them and became the reasons for our being, both to the Greeks, Romans and Christians. These concepts continued to be the reason for being with the Church Fathers although under a new concept, Christ. The Fathers thought that they had to work these two, sometimes opposing systems into one great creation story. The unfortunate consequence is that philosophical and theological concepts merged with the likes of very influential theologians like Augustine. The Church Fathers attempted a merger of philosophy and theology with a disastrous result. The Church Fathers tended to abandon God because of their need to explain their existence with philosophical concepts.  Hebrew history would have worked much better.  Truth, as expounded by the prophets, Christ and the apostles, got lost in the mix.  Divine and natural laws were put aside and truth became some fanciful concoction of ancient, Greek, philosophical thought and divine revelation.  Truth and reason were distorted with the resultant effect of 2000 years of confusion.
Revelation
So how do we know God exists?  Philosophers have manufactured hundreds of ways to explain the existence of God.  My way is simple. God revealed himself to a people, the Israelites.  All of mankind (Protestants, Catholics, Orthodox, Jews, and Muslims) accepts the history of the Israelites as true. We derive this history from the Old Testament. Further, God revealed himself through Christ, a human who performed Godlike behavior which we cannot explain through reason and empirical evidence.  Revelation is the explanation of the existence of God. Christians believe that the existence of Christ as God on this earth fully corroborates the creation story of humans and thus explains “being” and the “first cause of things.”  In a way, the existence of Christ proves a theological component of metaphysics.  Catholics hold that there must, of necessity, be certain revealed truths apart from those contained in the Bible; Tradition provides the foundation for this form of biblical metaphysics.
The first primary truth is that God created everything. God is the ‘first cause of things.”  God created “being” and “beings,” God created life, God created nature, God created the elements and God created the laws which govern His entire creation. The process of creation is a paramount natural law.  This system relies on two practical and universal groups of truths which God established to govern His creation: divine law and natural law. There exists countless laws in each group. Let us begin by looking at created, living things, nature. Natural law in this system is much more expansive than the traditional definition of the so called “Laws of Nature.” Natural law is defined as all of the laws in our environment which makes our universe function. Nature in this system is defined as the whole planet on which we live and the rest of the entire universe. Nature is a natural law. Humans live in nature except that a house or office building are merely shelters within nature just as foxes have dens and birds have nests. Natural law consists of all of the laws which are not divine law. For example, a natural law is that a star, like our sun, can warm a planet and provide light causing the planet to sustain life. The energy released from a star is natural law, the byproducts of which are heat and light.  Where did man come from, for example, is a question seeking an answer from the natural law and the divine law?  Some higher power had to have created all living organisms, plants, animals and humans, which, in this paper, we shall call “life.” Thus the term “life” represents all living things in the universe. “Living” means things which reproduce.  “Life” and “Living” are fundamental natural laws.  Life replicates itself in order to sustain the species. All living things require at least two basic needs for survival: water and nutrients. (Just imagine, most living things, except humans, spend a large part of their waking hours seeking water and food. [I was just wondering whether bacteria and trees sleep.]) This is a fundament natural law, living. All living things have five common characteristics: they are made of cells, they obtain and use energy, they grow, they reproduce and they adapt and respond to changes in environment. These five later characteristics are fundamental “laws of nature.” Thus we see that there exists several natural laws as a result of creation and they are general and basic.  The more detailed laws, those needed for the natural law to function correctly, are the “laws of nature.”(This paper rejects spontaneous generation and evolution.) 
This unmoved mover also created all of the matter which composes “living” and “non-living” things.   Examples of non-living things include rocks, heat, oxygen, our moon, the snow on the top of Mt. Everest and the elements that make up each cell in our body. These non-living things we shall call “elements.” Everything that exists in the entire universe which has a corporeal, physical body is either life or elements. Humans, plants and animals and microscopic organisms are “life,” but they are made of elements. This fact is a fundament natural law, the synergy between life and elements.  For example, almost 99% of the mass of the human body is made up of six elements: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus. Only about 0.85% is composed of another five elements: potassium, sulfur, sodium, chlorine, and magnesium. All 11 are necessary for life. These elements are in the form of blood, skin, bones, etc. Almost 98% (by weight) of a tree is made up of six elements: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur.
In addition to living things, elemental things are composed of elements but elemental things are not “living.”  “Elements” are not “life.”  This computer on which I am typing is composed of cobalt, nickel, iron, 7,7,8,8-tetracyanoquinodimethane, gallium, niobium, copper, lutetium, tantalum,  rutherfordium, zirconium, hafnium Gold, arsenic, ruthenium and neodymium among other trace elements. But the computer is not life. An automobile or a house are composed of hundreds of elements.  There are currently 118 known elements in the periodic table.  Some of the elements are gaseous, undetectable with the human eye. Elements are the key to living and nonliving things.  The combination of elements to produce things, including life, is a natural law.
The natural law of creation, which the unmoved mover instituted, causes a combination of elements to produce ‘life’ in this system. This creation event, the point in time when life and elements were created, occurred at some specific point in time in the past.   Life and the elements had a beginning. Creation, as a supreme natural law, continues to this day and will continue for the foreseeable future. Humans are born, planets are created and new elements produced (either here on earth or in the universe) every day.
Things, both life and elements, can be classified as Animate or inanimate. For animate things, they can move voluntarily.  Humans, animals and organisms can move voluntarily. A deer can walk from one side of the forest to the other, for example. A tree and a rock cannot move voluntarily. (Wind causes a tree to have movement but it is not voluntary on the part of the tree. A tree does not walk around. However, as it grows, the change in height is considered movement. Thus we may be able to conclude that all life has movement. All life is animated in that it moves voluntarily.) A second part of the definition of animate is to be “alive” or “possessing life.” Humans, animals, trees and organisms are animate in this second sense. Things called “life” are animate in this second sense also.  But the elements are inanimate, per say, when acting, or rather, existing alone.  A rock or an automobile are not animate in this second sense even though they both can be move through an outside source, thus they are not animate in the first sense either.  Elements cannot move voluntarily and they do not possess ‘life.’  From these definitions we discover that movement is a natural law (animation.)  Another natural law is that for things to gain existence (life or being), a combination of specific proportions of elements is required, another definition of creation. In this system, our unmoved mover created life and the elements simultaneously. (Note in Genesis, man was created on day six.) In other words, the elements were not created first and, then, by some system of spontaneous generation, life began to form. Humans did not evolve from the elements.
Another distinction of ‘things’ is called corporeal and incorporeal. All “life” and the “elements” are corporeal. They have, consist of, or relate to a physical material body. Corporeal things are not spiritual, immaterial or intangible.  Corporeal things are things that are composed of elements and have a body, whether animate or inanimate, and can be experienced by one or more of the five senses. They exist in nature.  Incorporeal things are things that have no body, but are comprehended by the mind through reason, such as the rights of inheritance, right to freedom of speech, right of intellectual property and thoughts. Notice that incorporeal things belong to the individual and they center on humans.  (Humans attempt to give rights to animals, trees and the land.) An incorporeal thing is without physical existence in itself but belongs as a right to a material thing, property or human. Incorporeal things cannot be detected with the five senses. Corporeality is a natural law.  This paper shall be concerned with thoughts of humans, in particular, and not necessarily rights attached to material things and property. However we can be certain that animals have thoughts.  Fear and anger cannot be experienced by a dog unless he has thoughts about some outside source or stimuli.  (Animals, trees and the land do have the right not to be mistreated.  That is a divine law. It is based on a moral responsibility. God gave humans stewardship over the earth.) A second definition of incorporeal addresses a state of being outside of humans, that of spirits, angels and human souls. Most philosophers admit that humans are composed of body and soul. Someone on their deathbed in a coma caused by traumatic brain damage can be sustained by machines which provide oxygen and food, but, does that person, who does not have use of their five senses and cannot speak, think or move voluntarily, still have a soul? One question this paper will attempt to address is whether souls of animals exist independent of their physical bodies. Does all living things, including trees and organisms, have souls? Another question for this paper is whether thoughts, spirits and souls are composed of matter and, if not, how do they exist?
Cosmology
 What is the origin of our universe? The universe, the place where life and the elements currently reside, had a beginning also. Our universe is part of nature. Some claim the beginning was the big bang, an explosion. (Movement is a fundamental natural law.) They claim that a dense ball of material the size of a pea exploded, as if someone lite a fuse with fire and the pea went off like a firecracker. (Fire is a “law of nature.”  It requires a heat source, oxygen and a combustible material.) Our universe began to expand at this particular explosive event and it is still expanding today.  But no one can explain where the pea came from or describe what matter of which this pea was composed or why did it explode in the first place.   The elements, iron, hydrogen, oxygen, sulfur, etc., which compose stars, planets, galaxies and life, had to have been created also at this explosive event. Just look at a periodic table.  All known elements are listed but we can be sure that there are some elements created by God that are not yet known to mankind. Every living and nonliving thing in the universe, including the universe itself, is composed of an element or combination of elements.  Even life is composed of elements.  Humans have not figured out how the elements, which have no life, combined to form life. But that is what happens in creation. When did this crossover event occur, when nonliving elements coalesced to form living life?  Or did life and the elements appear at the same time? We already addressed this issue. They each appeared simultaneously and independently.
Atheist like to use Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution as an explanation for the creation of life. But his theory does not remotely explain the creation of life, much less the appearance of the elements. Did the elements go through a process of evolution too? Where did the elements come from, the pea? Life and the elements did not just spontaneously generate themselves. Someone had to create them. Even the most basic forms of life and the elements had to have had a beginning. You cannot get something out of nothing. There has to be a first of a thing to propagate.  There are plenty of missing links in the evolutionary chain that brings much doubt to the system. Archeology has not provided the transition from organisms to animals, much less the proof of the first animal divergences from sea creatures to horses, cows, birds and humans.
There was a time when life and the elements did not exist.  This period of nonexistence we shall call nothingness since God also created time. Only God existed in this period of nothingness. In other words there was a time when time did not exist either. At this explosive event, heat and light were created. The basic outcome of heat and light is fire. Light began to move at a speed of 299,792,458 meters per second/186,000 miles per second in a vacuum. This is a universal law of nature.   I am sure this explosion created sound which travels at 343 meters per second /1,125 feet per second when not impeded by oxygen or water. If water appeared, it froze at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, 0 degrees Celsius, 273.15 Kelvin, another universal law of nature.  Scientists and theologians all have at least one common point of agreement, and that is that life and the elements had a specific instance of birth, a beginning. We can conclude that all of being (matter), everything that exists within time and space and life and the elements as we know them today, at one point in nothingness, however many years in the past, did not exist. An irresistible force, an unmoved mover, caused life, the elements and time to spontaneously appear in space from nothingness.  What power could perform such a miracle accept an all-powerful, all-knowing and all-present entity we call God. 
God exists in a transcendent domicile beyond our current universe. Our current universe is expanding and scientists claim that we are getting closer and closer at seeing the edge of creation with the Hubble telescope and seeing creation as it is currently taking place. The universe is expanding as a shape of a three dimensional sphere. What is the universe expanding into?  Another fundamental law of nature is that when a substance or material increases in volume, the increase displaces another substance or material. Our universe, a chaos of conflict within the elements, is overtaking unity. Our universe is expanding into God’s domicile.  God’s domicile is perfected harmony. God’s domicile is God Himself in perfect harmony and unity.  Imagine God as a wide, invisible line, a space that is moving in both directions forever (infinitely).  Our universe in which we live and the time since its existence is a dot on that line. Existence can be compared to a heart monitor in a hospital that never, ever loses power.  God is the line that is produced by the heartbeat monitor.  Each heartbeat is represented by a variance in the line that forms a peak and returns to the original line.  Our universe in one peak from valley to valley on that line. Our universe was created, will live and die within a single heartbeat of God. God is so infinitely large that He could have very well created other, complete universes besides our own within His domicile that have come and gone, of which we are not even aware.      
This all powerful entity exists in a state of animation unconceivable by our irrational, human mind. His existence is similar to our soul on steroids, adrenaline and caffeine times 1000. But He is not soul however.  Our human soul, is spiritual and enlivens our body. A human body without soul would be dead.  Yes we can keep people alive with machines but they are only unconscious, living matter.  Angels and souls of humans and animals are not composed of matter.  A soul does not encompass elements, thus it is inanimate in one sense, yet it exists in a dimension which we cannot see with the eyes, so it is animate in the other sense.  Its existence is “form” without “matter.” It is the essence per Aquinas. Unlike humans and animals, God has neither matter nor form.  His existence is not in a spiritual nature as we would define a spirit as the Holy Ghost, or an apparition or ghostly entity.  It’s more of an electrified human soul that never sleeps and is fully conscious.  Yet it is not a soul. A peculiar thing about God is that His essence and existence operate in combination. He is both essence and existence at the same time.  This effect causes God to be all present.  God is all powerful because He is the creator of all things. He creates life, the elements and all thoughts, desires, emotions, intelligence, knowledge, wisdom and the souls that become part of any and all forms of life. The animated part of incorporeal things is in fact God. Therefore all “life” has souls, and these souls are part and parcel of God’s presence in nature.  Souls come from God at creation.  Thus God is all-present.  This infinite presence is a natural and divine law.
God’s omnipresence is fully conscious.  His consciousness produces effect.  Conscious effects stem from thoughts but God has no thoughts.  If He had thoughts they would immediately take effect. Per Aristotle, God has active intellect, nous. This intellect is the force behind the cosmos, everything that is known to exist.  God’s potency creates actuality. Normally one must put in motion an act to achieve potential to change or create. God’s potential is unlimited.  But God is the First act. Yet God Himself was never created. God is a combination of potentiality and actuality. This state of being makes God all present and all powerful.  He has no beginning or end. God was not created yet He resides in everything He has created.  God is not matter yet resides in all matter.  This is the reason God is both essence and existence so that He is all-present.  He is everywhere in the universe at all times, even before time was created.  He is in the creation and destruction of stars and planets.  He is the substance that fills the universe, black matter.  God is all present on earth.  He is present in human souls and bodies.  He is present in plants and animals (life) and water, fire, air and earth (elements).He is present in the air we breathe. God is present in the sunlight, the water and oxygen and carbon monoxide.  He allows things to grow and die. God is all present because He is all-powerful. God’s presence in life and the elements is a basic natural law and is also a divine law.
God also created the “laws of nature.” God is, in nature, the law that governs our natural world. He, as the law of nature, administers and regulates all creation, birth and death of universes, city states, planets and stars, humans and animals, plants and microscopic organisms, all of the elements and the relationships, rules, and interactions that are needed for the carrying out His natural law of creation. There are another set of universal and fundamental rules, the “laws of nature,” that govern the creation, existence and death of all created things, both life and the elements.  These fundamental laws of nature are just like God, they never change, are omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. But these individual “laws of nature” are not Natural laws. Creation is a natural law.  Sexual drive of animals is a law of nature.  Other examples of the laws of nature are the boiling and freezing points of water. All of the laws of nature combined is a natural law.
God’s omnipresence causes Him to be all-knowing.  All knowing God is a fully conscious entity, aware of everything at all times.  God’s existence can be compared to a super computer that can make billions and billions of computations a second.  But God is that super computer times a billion. The individual intellects of each human from the beginning of time composes a fraction of God’s knowledge. His knowledge is the foundation of time.  We shall call this basic unit providence. God provides protection and spiritual care for His creation. The providence of God is the accumulation of effects of all natural and divine laws.  Providence is the supreme divine law. Everything that happens on earth and in the universe is a result of God’s providence.  God’s power and presence places everything in effect, therefore He knows all.  God knows all because He is all-present and all-powerful.
 
Divine and Natural Law
Humans live and react as in an ant colony surrounded by glass walls in an enclosed container with the human owner looking in.  God looks into our lives here on earth in the same way.  But the human owner has no spiritual or rational connection with the ants in the colony.  God, on the other hand, has extended Himself in spirit to be with us at all times.  Unlike the owner of the ant colony, who may look in when food is given to the colony, God provides sustenance to his creation constantly.  Likewise, His spirit is always present on earth for putting into effect His natural and divine laws, like spiritual food. God is omnipresent. His spirit operates and controls nature, and when humans let Him, He operates and controls human minds in rational thinking and activity. The divine law truly becomes manifest in the elemental world. This materialization is a natural law. Many humans participate in blind activity just like ants, never noticing the presence of the owner, in our case God. They work, fight, eat and reproduce, but they are oblivious of any transcendent world, just as the ants. God’s spirit allows us to transcend our everyday work-a-day world and see beyond our immediate environs. He calls all but few are seeking and finding. God as part of His character, is composed of the natural and divine laws.
If you believe in God, as this system proclaims, then theology must be part and parcel of the philosophical system.  Faith exposes truth through reason and knowledge. The definition of truth, as nothing more than rules of conduct, is refuted and rejected.  Truth goes way beyond moral conduct.  Truth explains “being” itself and the working of the natural, providential world and the spiritual, divine world.  Truth explains everything.  Humans become aware of their current reason for existence, where they came from, where they are headed and how they must participate in this material, elemental world to eventually arrive at their ultimate destination.  Truth truly sets you free, free to enjoy a peace in this dangerous world and a hope to live joyfully in a future existence. Truth is full knowledge of the natural law and divine law.
Divine law is derived from the eternal laws of God as they have appeared historically to humans throughout revelation. Divine law are the laws necessary for God to dispense justice within His creation. Justice is a premier divine law.  There are thousands of divine laws in the Old and New Testaments. The Ten Commandments are one example. Love of neighbor as yourself, and treatment of others as you would be treated are examples from the New Testament; love is the premier and most powerful divine law.   Divine law governs the relationship between humans among themselves and the relationship between humans and society and the relationship between humans and God. Notice the common denominator in all of these relationships are humans. Divine law has an effect on the soul of humans.  It causes us to reason and become rational creatures. Divine law bridges the gap between lower laws of nature and the higher natural laws.  Divine law governs and explains our thoughts, emotions and interpretation of perceptions of sensible objects, corporeal objects like cars or other humans. Divine law defines the proper reaction by humans to the laws of nature. Divine law governs our concupiscence.  Divine law is only applicable to humans. Divine law does not have an effect on organisms, plants, the lower animals or the elements. These are governed by the natural law. (It may have an effect, but only as a byproduct.) The judicial restraint formulated and applied by divine law is promulgated by God and are not effectuated within humans until accepted as Grace. Grace is a divine law. Temperance, prudence, fortitude and justice rationalizes and differentiates the divine law for humans.   Humans cannot reason and effectuate these distinctions until grace is provided by God and accepted by humans.  Only then can humans begin to understand the mitigating effects of the higher natural law and begin implementing the divine law.   Divine law does not function like natural law. Natural law functions without the aid and assistance of humans.  Natural law just happens.  Divine law happens to the extent that justice is dispensed by God to humans. But divine law requires acceptance and participation by humans. This participation is a natural law. Humans, who make attempts to enjoy the full possibilities of natural law, must enforce their self-perceived concepts of divine law to administer justice among humans. Humans make attempts through their political States, governments and court systems. Humans fail at every level in their attempts at implementing divine law.  At least humans still recognize the usefulness of divine law.  Many criminal statutes are derived from God’s divine law. Divine law acts as a guide to humans who first must understand and distinguish the laws of nature and the higher natural law.  Only then can humans possess the yearning to implement the divine law in their relationship with God and among each other.  
Natural Law, is tough to summarize succinctly. Natural law is the processes which God has instituted for the correct functioning of the universe. Natural law exists independently from life and the elements. Natural law is the fundamental rules that govern corporeality and animation in the grand scheme of things. Natural law has no basis in morality.  It is neither good nor bad.  Natural law is neutral with regard to morality and ethics. That duty belongs to divine law. Natural law governs the relationships between the elements and life but it also governs the basic, sustainable and reproductive components of the interaction between the elements and life and life and humans in particular. Natural law, like divine law, is universal and eternal.  Natural law has an effect on the elements, life and humans, in particular, but in different modes of execution.  Life and elements exist in nature.  Natural law governs nature, nature being defined as the great outdoors and beyond into outer space.  Natural law governs the existence of life in nature.  Natural law governs the existence of elements in nature. To narrow our focus of discussion, natural law governs the relationships between humans and their existence within a community and society.  But it also has effect on the physical body and a secondary effect on the soul. For example, naturally I can go outside on a cold winter day and feel the ice cold wind blowing against my face.  The laws of nature can explain the cold weather and can explain the cold wind.  The natural law can explain the effects of this coldness on the human body.  It may stimulate an animal of the lower nature, like a deer, to seek shelter and likewise with a human.  But the natural law can have a secondary or indirect influence on the mind.  It can create recollections of similar circumstances experienced in a duck blind and bring back fond memories of sleigh rides in the snow.  Natural law can generate or produce happiness within the soul. But natural law is indifferent to emotions, joy, happiness and thoughts altogether. Natural law just exists and humans cannot change it or be changed by it. On the other hand divine law controls the regulation of thoughts and emotions produced by the effects of nature generated by natural law. In other words divine law provides the moral basis and justification of natural law. 
Natural law often takes place right in front of you without your knowledge.  Take a tree as an example.  The leaves are absorbing carbon dioxide and expelling oxygen.  The process of photosynthesis is causing the tree to grow with the help of sunlight.  The roots are absorbing moisture and nutrients in the growth process, another basic rule under the laws of nature.  We can see from this example that the laws of nature are taking place right in front of us and we are not aware of their operation at all.  The same ideas hold for changes in weather.  Weather patterns are influenced by the small tilt of the earth closer or farther from the sun.  Winter brings less sunlight and these cold weather patterns.  These are all laws of nature.  Our trees, for example, begin to lose their leaves.  Like grass, they go into a state of hibernation (I am thinking of bears here) and are fueled by the sap in their roots.  Laws of nature exist independent of human activity.  They just exist and humans have discovered many of them. But there are probably thousands of laws of nature which we have not yet discovered through the sciences. And there are natural laws which we have not yet conceptualized.
 
The discovery, conceptualization and implementation of natural law and divine law leads to truth. Truth is perfected knowledge and based on morality, wisdom, and virtue in a synergy of divine and natural law.  Truth is the rule of divine law with regard to the individual.  And the truth in natural law is empirically determinate.  Truth in the laws of nature is the final discovery of a certain condition or existence in nature, like the fact that a chromosome is a strand of DNA that is encoded with genes. In most cells, humans have 22 pairs of these chromosomes plus the two sex chromosomes (XX in females and XY in males) for a total of 46.  Another truth is that heat is measured by temperature and water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. A molecule composed of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom is a molecule of water. These are all laws of nature and govern the birth and maturity of nature.  We, as humans, are nature. Humanity along with the plant and animal kingdom is a natural law. Divine law determines and regulates how humans react to and live within nature. Nature is a natural law.
Epistemology
Knowledge is not truth.  Knowledge is the progression of accumulated ideas, mathematical formulas, and empirical evidence that form a basic elemental scientific fact.  New ideas are added onto these elemental facts until a crisis or paradigm change occurs and new knowledge is promulgated.  When this process ends, or, in other words, comes to fruition, one has a truth which eventually becomes revealed truth.  Knowledge is changeable and cumulative.   Truth is finite, definite and unchangeable. Knowledge is empirical and scientific.  These terms imply change. Change is a natural law.  Truth is constant and given, in other words, truth has been with us since the beginning and will remain with us until the end. Truth is not singular.  It is definitely a plural concept.   Humans seek knowledge to gain truth.  All reality becomes understood when truth is exposed.  The circle become complete. When theologians and philosophers, and now, secular scientists, come to that realization, their cooperation will reveal marvelous results. They must learn to separate knowledge and truth.  Knowledge is gained from looking forward.  Truth is gained from looking to the past.  Science seeks knowledge.  Theology reveals truth.  Philosophy explains the convergence. 
Truth existed before Christians appeared on the scene.  The Israelites definitely had a brush with truth and discovered much before Christ revealed a large sum of the whole. Jewish theology is the first conveyor of truth. In other words, Christian theology is the understanding of being with a triune God and philosophy is the search for being usually without a God. Finally, why would an atheist ever search for a reason to life and being in the first place?  That concept is an oxymoron. A search for being requires life and a creator.  Therefore philosophy is a misguided attempt to explain humanity without a God.  Or if we must extol its benefits, philosophy is the dividing line between those seeking and those who have already found. The origins of truth and revelation are identical. Both are from God.  Human reason, another fundamental natural law, allows us to combine knowledge and revelation to reach truth. (In fact, the terms, truth and revelation, could be synonymous with the terms Natural law and divine law in a theologically philosophical system.  Knowledge is an accumulation of answers to natural law and divine law questions. Science is the accumulation of answers to the “laws of nature” questions. Truth, the revelation of answers, is the theological basis which ties these two concepts together.)
Secular and theological scientists and philosophers must come to realize that natural law can be explained by divine law.  In truth, the existence of creation can be explained by the synergy between the two. Scientists will realize that natural law is governed by and is in fact divine law. Before natural law was conceived by God, Divine law already existed.  Rightly so. God must be separated from modern science but both sides must be promoted, studied, relished and projected as independent modes of existence, the later to seek knowledge and the former to seek and obtain truth.
 
The origins of reason and revelation are identical.  Judaism and Christianity has always been and must be an intellectual revelation. Revelation is the process by which humans become familiar with divine law.  Revelation is the preeminent divine law while reason is a natural law. Rebellion against religious tradition (revelation) has been at the core of Western Philosophy.  Yet Plato confesses that the wisdom of the ancients is of divine origin.  That indicates a very distant and holy past. Revelation began at the same point in time as creation. Therefore, theology is always prior to philosophy.  Humans gain knowledge of being through revelation.  God provides an insight into the book of divine law. Divine law explains the workings of the human mind and the human’s quest to “know” the theological, philosophical and scientific meaning of the words “existence,” “being” and “reality.”
Philosophy is ultimately based on a prior interpretation of reality and that implies a first cause.  Reality has to have a starting point from which one initially interpreted this reality.  The theologian guards and interprets tradition which is past action.  The philosopher attempts to rationalize current perception to predict future reality. The philosopher’s attempt to explain the reality of this world is at a disadvantage.  He has only corporeal things of this world.  That is, he must use ideas which he cannot see with his eyes to explain tangible things.  He is required to use images of his mind and transcendental things, spiritual things, and things not of this world.  Because of his disadvantage, he seeks out a creator.  If a creator created these intangible things, there must exist a law or method by which these things operate and exist in harmony. Plato had no conception of our triune God nor was he exposed to the truth and wisdom that the Spirit of God offers. He sought but he never found.  He developed fanciful tales about the creation of man and the universe and our being within it.  Humans have been tethered to these ideas of Plato and Aristotle ever since.  Philosophy attempts to explain ontology and metaphysics by varied degrees of growing complexity based on irrational and fanciful musings of two pagan intellectuals.  What a pitiful mess mankind has put himself.  Man reasons because God created us that way.  Animals reason but just not rationally as humans.  Human intellect has a transcendent connection to a superior power which we can recognize.  Those, who recognize this absolute power given by God, discovers that the truths proffered by natural and divine law really exist and they have no need for theories on how humans perceive reality and gain knowledge. 
But gaining knowledge is a basic “law of nature” for humans.  Note that seeking knowledge it is not a natural law.  Rather it is just the growing pains from creation. How does humans gain knowledge?  Knowledge can only be gained through the senses. The senses are a natural law: Touch, sight, hearing, smell and taste.  The senses are not peculiar to humans.  Animals, plants and even organisms have senses. That all life has senses is a natural law.  Smell and taste are the least powerful of the senses for accumulation of knowledge in humans.  Sight dominates and hearing cooperates with sight yet they all work like an orchestra in concert. Humans are most conscious of things seen and heard.  If one were placed in an absolutely dark filled room with absolutely no sound, your mind can easily come to rest. You could become completely self-aware.  Yet you would still produce thoughts.  So thoughts must come from another source in addition to the senses.  The senses tend to measure the immediate environment. When one enters the room described above, the senses will immediately detect the lack of light and sound.  If the room were absolutely sterile, no sensory experience of smell or taste would materialize. The only sense would be touch until the body is at rest, unless, of course, one is conscious of sitting on the floor.   Therefore any additional thoughts, except those that the floor may be hard and uncomfortable, must come from memory of past sensual experiences and anticipated future ones based on the past experiences. Past sensual experiences may include the process leading up to placement into the room or the reason for being placed in the room.  Future experiences can be anticipated.  One may think of things to do when released, for example, like eating a Big Mac or riding home in a car. But one cannot fully participate in a future experience by thought alone, especially one that has not already been experienced in the past. One can only approximate the future experience even if one has had similar past experiences.  The future experience does not become reality until the senses formally perceive the event. Anticipation is only fiction. Therefore reality and sensual perception are natural laws. An accumulation of sensual experiences through reality becomes knowledge. Reality can be defined as a physical state of lucid and present, sensual perception. But where do thoughts come from that are not derived from present sense perception when the mind is at rest.  All unperceived thought comes from remembering past experiences.  Memory is a natural law. Therefore, thoughts are incorporeal yet animated.  Thoughts are therefore movement of the soul. Thoughts and the soul exist on the same plane.  They are synonymous.  In fact they may be identical.
Our waking hours are spent in a conscience and reality driven world. Yet we spend one third of our life in sleep.  During sleep, our five senses are not at work.  Thus any thoughts during sleep must come from memory, but memory which is not conscious (unconscious).  This repository of memories is called our subconscious.  This memory bank can be accessed during sleep and wakefulness, however. We know that our brains are very active during sleep.  A definition of sleep might look something like this:
 “a naturally-occurring, reversible, periodic and recurring state in which consciousness and muscular activity is temporarily suspended or diminished, and responsiveness to outside stimuli is reduced; an endogenous (i.e. naturally produced by the body itself) sleep-regulating substance, or substances, builds up in the body’s cerebrospinal fluid during our waking hours, which has the effect of increasing the pressure to sleep the more it accumulates. This pressure is only released by the act of sleeping itself, during which the levels of the sleep-regulating substance in the body rapidly declines. Neurons (nerve cells) in the brain and brainstem produce a variety of nerve-signaling chemicals called neurotransmitters in different parts of the brain. These neurotransmitters in turn act on different groups of neurons in various parts of the brain, which control whether we are asleep or awake. A whole cocktail of neurotransmitters are involved in driving wakefulness and sleep, including histamine, dopamine, norepinephrine, serotonin, glutamate, orexin and acetylcholine, among others. While none of these neurotransmission processes is individually necessary, they all appear to contribute in some way.”
This information about sleep is acquired knowledge, through science, and explains one of the many laws of nature, sleep. All living things must sleep.  The mental activity during sleep is not rational, however.  Have you ever woke from a good night’s sleep and remembered dreams?  Aren’t they almost always weird events?  The brain is active during sleep and sometimes creates thoughts, yet these thoughts are not rational thoughts.  Thus we can presume that rational thought based on reason can only occur during waking hours and comes from the active senses. The senses, the natural connection to the soul, are not active during sleep.
 We now have research institutions who seek new knowledge based on empirical evidence in a secular environment. Secular sciences have no room for theology. I propose that such a separation is a very good outcome. Some say that universities fail to combine all new knowledge into a database of truths which would demonstrate knowledge’s interrelationships. Theologians do not like the idea that knowledge has become secularized and segregated. But that outcome is good. What philosophers and theologians fail to realize is that knowledge is different from truth. In classical logic, 'everything must either be or not be."  The ancients were not aware of the interconnectedness of the natural world, salvation history and human history.  Knowledge was imbedded in a theological ethic that had a supernatural end but was explained philosophically. Early universities, upon the rediscovery of the ancients, taught medicine, law and theology under this philosophical bent toward theology. Finally, attempts were made to separate theology and philosophy.  The scholastics made the pursuit of knowledge an end in itself devoid of religious necessities. Nominalism rejected universals or abstract objects. Humanists wrote about antiquity and a renewed confidence in the ability of human beings to determine for themselves truth and falsehood. The Reformation secularized knowledge and rulers championed rival doctrines in their universities. The Protestants fell into interdoctrinal disputes and theology became muddled with scientific knowledge.  Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism, as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical. Luckily there appeared great minds like Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, and Newton. A shift occurred to the natural sciences. Knowledge was secularized. Secularization was complete with empiricism. The Popes unwittingly cooperated in the secularization of Catholic universities by allowing natural sciences to be confused with creation science.
Finally, we can see that truth is a completely different pursuit than the knowledge acquired from science, which is gained from empiricism.  One does not need science to explain creation if one believes in God. We can seek and learn the processes of creation, but we do not need to explain the moment of creation itself. We must accept “creation” as a natural law.  An accumulation of truths equals wisdom.  Truth is found in the Old and New Testaments. One knows when he has discovered the truth when he reads and understands the wisdom literature of the Old and New Testaments.  Paul’s writings in the New Testament are filled with truths, not so many of the natural law but mostly divine law.  Truths are actually synonymous with the natural and divine laws.  But truths transcend the natural and divine laws.  Truth is a synergistic reaction through a combination of these laws to form a state of peace where no doubt exists. Truth leads to harmony.  Every personal situation, which life exposes, reveals a rational response.  This is truth.  The response must be gained in peaceful solitude centered in wisdom.  In this solitude, all anger, desires, adverse judgment, discriminations, emotion, are controlled and conveniently packaged and put away.  This unimpeded clarity of vision results in truth. Truth really is an encounter with God. “The gift of wisdom enables judgement according to divine truth.” Summa Theologica, I, 1, 8 ad 2.
Space and Time
What is time?  Does time have a beginning?  Will it have an end?  Time has been described by philosophers in many different ways.  Plato’s conception of time was primitive. The heavenly bodies are divine and move in their various orbits to serve as markers of time: the fixed stars to mark a day/night, the moon to mark the (lunar) month and the sun to mark the year. Time itself came into being with these celestial movements as an “image of eternity.” Plato argued not only for a beginning of the universe in time, but a beginning of time itself. When the Demiurge created the universe, he also created time. But what is Plato’s definition of time? Plato's text in the Timaeus at 37d reads:
 “[the Demiurge] began to think of making a moving image of eternity: at the same time as he brought order to the universe, he would make an eternal image, moving according to number, of eternity remaining in unity. This, of course, is what we call “time.” 
What does that mean? Other passages in the Timaeus make it clear that Plato thought of time as a kind of celestial clockwork, that is, a certain kind of motion, rather than a measure of motion. Is time motion or a measure of motion? Aristotle claimed that “time is the measure of change” (Physics, chapter 12). Aristotle emphasized “that time is not change [itself]” because a change “may be faster or slower, but not time…” (Physics, chapter 10). For example, a leaf can fall faster or slower, but time itself cannot be faster or slower. In developing his views about time, Aristotle advocated what is now referred to as the relational theory when he said, “there is no time apart from change….” (Physics, chapter 11). In addition, Aristotle said time is not discrete or atomistic but “is continuous…. In respect of size there is no minimum; for every line is divided ad infinitum. Hence it is so with time” (Physics, chapter 11). There are problems with Aristotle’s definition.  Change occurs in time, or rather, along a continuum of time but time measures nothing especially changes in things. Time continues even when there is no change. (If the only thing that exited in the entire universe were a rock such that no weather or erosion could cause it to change, and no human or earthquake could move it, time would continue to exist.) Time cannot measure change because that would require an implication of some method of measurement to time itself.  In other words, time would have to be a combination of seconds and inches or some other form of measurement.  Aristotle’s definition of change may be examined by looking at the life of a tree.  As a sapling, it exists as a point in time.  When it reaches 6 feet tall, its existence is at another point in time and when it is 20 years old and 100 feet tall its existence is at a much later point in time.  Then it is finally cut down or it dies. This does not describe time but confirms that a tree has a life for a certain duration and changes as it grows. Everyone agrees time cannot be measured without there being changes in life or elements, because we measure time by observing changes in life or elements, but the issue becomes whether time exists without change.  Of course it does. If our tree did not exist, time would still exist. There is motion within time but time does not measure motion or change. At the instant of first creation, say God’s creation of the universe or the appearance of the items causing the big bang, time was also created because something set things into motion. (In this system, that would be God.)Time and motion exists side by side and are distinct natural laws. Time is a natural law. The question really becomes whether time always existed or whether it had a beginning.  Once begun time does not stop whether their exist things to change or not.   Creation is a continuous process and so time exists along with creation but completely independent of creation or change. Change is a natural law. Change, like time, is neither good nor bad. Everything changes, but it is our own self perception of the changes in things that are good or bad. Time may end when all life and the elements no longer exists, if such a period emerges, since time was created out of nothingness. Its demise does not mean that there are no longer things which exist to change. Time, as a natural law, would have no reason for existing.
 In ancient Greece, Plato and Aristotle agreed that the past is eternal. Aristotle offered two reasons. Time had no beginning because, for any time, we always can imagine an earlier time. In addition, time had no beginning because, for any present situation, we always can ask for its prior cause.  In the fifth century, Augustine said the universe was made with time and not in time, implying that time began with God's creation a finite time ago. In Medieval times, Aquinas' contemporary, St. Bonaventure, agreed and said there was a first motion and thus a first time, which implies Plato and Aristotle were mistaken in saying the past is eternal. The Past implies events occurring.  For events to occur, some change or motion must take place.  In our system, God is the creator of our time out of nothingness.  The past is eternal but time is not. If everything in the universe, and the universe itself, ceased to exist, would time cease to exist?  Time is just like God in that it is infinite.  But there are two types of time, natural time and divine time. Time, described as a period of existence, started when creation started and that is the natural part of time.  Before our creation event, time existed but was divine time, a time when only God existed.  We are currently living within natural and divine time. There will come a period in the future when natural time will disappear and only divine time will exist again.
Time is a natural law like gravity or the heat generated from a fire are laws of nature. You cannot see time. It is not composed of matter.  It is not spirit either.  It has no cognitive abilities, rational thought nor does it create or destroy things.  It has no life of its own except it may have a beginning and an end. We cannot stop it or start it. Time cannot be measured, just as light and sound, in my theory, cannot be measured, two other natural laws. Here’s why. Humans create artificial units of measure for time only for our subjective needs.  One day is one complete revolution of the earth on its axis. Yet if I were on Saturn, that day would be completely different as compared to our earthly time. We say light travels at a certain speed per second. However a second on earth would be a completely different period of “time” on Saturn.  One sees that humans create a fiction for time based on our earthly environment.  All existence lives within time except time is not space.  Time, like change, is neither good nor bad. Time is our own self perception of the changes in things but time does not cause or measure the change.  Time is a natural law and divine law.  Natural time had a beginning and will end.  Divine time is infinite with no beginning and no end.
Space is a part of nature just as the outdoors on the back porch.  Nature begins where the human body ends. ‘Elements’ and ‘life’ exist within space. Space implies a chamber or finite capacity in which things exist.  Space is a place. Space exists within time. Space can be measured, for example, in either capacity, length or distance.   Oxygen and carbine dioxide and no telling what other elements fill space on earth between animate and corporeal things.  Outer space is not completely empty, but consists of a “hard vacuum containing a low density of particles, predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, neutrinos, dust and cosmic rays.  90% of the mass is in an unknown form, called dark matter, which interacts with other matter through gravitational but not electromagnetic forces. It does not emit or interact with electromagnetic radiation, such as light, and is thus invisible to the entire electromagnetic spectrum. Although dark matter has not been directly observed, its existence and properties are inferred from its gravitational effects such as the motions of visible matter.”  String theory and the general theory of relativity make attempts at explaining space and time. Humans live within time.  All elements and life exists in time.  We attempt to measure time but only for human consumption and use. For example, it takes 365 days for the earth to make one revolution around the sun.  That definition does not describe time.  Time is much more expansive than that.  Another peculiar element of time is that past and future events happen within time.  For example if a court of law set a firm and fixed trial date, the opposing parties must prepare and be ready to have a hearing at that specific moment in time for which the hearing is set.  Time moves events.  The trial with all court personnel and the parties and witness will appear and event will take place whether the parties want it or not.  Time forces action and repercussions.  It forces the future yet exists in the past.  Time is the measuring stick of God for the duration of His ‘elements’ and ‘life’ within a particular space, our universe. Space is like time in that there exist natural space and divine space.  Our currently, existing universe is natural space.  The space into which our universe is expanding is divine space. Our natural space allows change, life, the elements and all of the natural laws to exist.  Natural space had a beginning and will end.  Divine space is infinite.
Metaphysics
Metaphysical investigation includes existence, objects and their properties, space and time, cause and effect, and possibility. A central branch of metaphysics is ontology, the investigation into the basic categories of being and how they relate to one other. So the question becomes how does “life” relate to the “elements” and how does “life” relate to “life?”  They relate to one another through the cooperation and interaction of the natural laws and divine laws and the reaction of the elements and life to the consequences of the laws effects.  The elements are exclusively controlled by the natural law.  On the other hand, life is governed by both natural and divine law.  Only humans have a unique relationship with divine law.  The lower beings, like plants and animals, do not operate under nor have a direct relationship with divine law for the simple fact that they lack rational reasoning.  A pecan tree or a mule deer does not wonder whether God exists or whether they were created by God or by spontaneous generation or evolution.  Neither has a love or even hate of its neighbor nor do they worry about virtue or happiness.  Both are only worried about one thing, survival. And further the tree has no brain thus no mind to worry. And they really don’t worry, because worry only belongs to rational beings, humans.  They exist to survive. But the mule deer does make decisions, though they may be made without reason (i.e. reflective thought).  He decides to go one way in the forest versus another and he decides to run when confronted with danger.  He decides to eat when hungry and mate when his innate sexual drive kicks in.  These reactions are all basic components of natural law, and more particularly the laws of nature. Does a tree think?  It has no brain but it does react to nature’s stimuli just as the mule deer but at a lower level of existence.  It responds to sunlight.  It seeks nutrition and water from the soil. Humans function with the same natural law inclinations as mule deer but on higher plane.  This higher plane is rational thought and reason.    What is it, rational though? This list of definitional words for the word rational are not much help:  agreeable to reason; having or exercising reason, sound judgment, or good sense; reasonable; sensible; being in or characterized by full possession of one's reason; sane; lucid; proceeding or derived from reason or based on reasoning. The definition is closely related to the definition of the word reason. Reason is defined as the power of the mind to think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic.  Another definition is (1)   the power of comprehending, inferring, or thinking especially in orderly rational ways:  intelligence (2)   proper exercise of the mind (3) sanity; the sum of the intellectual powers. So a good definition of rational thought and reason in this system is the process by which the mind and soul reaches knowledge and eventually truth through use of the sum of intellectual powers. These definitions imply chance and logic and subjectivity.  What may be reasonable and rational for one person may be something completely different for another.  Just like our measure of time, it is based on our personal assessment of our current environment.  Reasoned rationality requires more certainty to become truth.  Reason must be based on and grounded by natural law and divine law to be rational. But reasoned rationality requires the melding of the intellectual product of the mind and soul, the product of which becomes objective truth across socio and economic human existence. This objectivity is not the product of individual thought processes within individual humans but the insight gained within individual humans of exterior objective truths.   One plus one equals two is reasoned rationality, that is, it is based on a mathematical certainty (truth). Mathematics is a natural law. We can with certainty now conclude that natural law is based on reasoned rationality. In other words, natural law is the same as mathematical certainty. It is reasoned, objectified reality. Natural law expresses the truth behind nature.   Is divine law just as certain?
When a human views an image which appeals to his/her basic natural instinct, that image is imprinted, usually permanently, in the brain.  Take for example, pornographic videos.  When viewed, these images form a lasting impression in the mind.  These mental pictures are easily brought to the present through memory and can be projected to the future through the sex drive.  These appeals to nature’s instinct can become addictive and lead to abnormal behavior.  In our example, a man may become addicted to pornography on the internet and such addiction may contribute to current abnormal behavior, delusional activity projected into the future and possible future misbehavior.  This appeal of the basic laws of nature can be associated with any of a litany of natural human desires, some harmful and some helpful.  For example a desire for nutrition in excess may lead to gluttony, but with temperance, a healthy sustainable life.  Divine law assist in the mental process of distinguishing between “good” and “bad” when faced with decisions under the natural law.  Divine law, unlike natural law, must be mastered.  Of course divine law must be revealed, studied, learned and practiced before it can become beneficial. The constraints and compliance with divine law does produce certain effects, joy for compliance, and justice for non-compliance.  Participation in the divine law results in certain outcomes. Unlike natural law, divine law is based on reasoned rationality.  It is reasoned, objectified reality of the “good” of God and distinguishes the bad effects of human misinterpretations of natural law.  These laws promulgated by God must be imputed to humans by a process of osmosis, though. The divine law must penetrate the mind and must be used to filter the sense perceptions humans experience very day. Divine law then forms a basis for reasoned rationality. It guides the soul. Of course in our system, reasoned rationality is a strict compliance with divine law in order to reach truth.
If the brain is considered a central processing unit of some form that receives sensory data from the surroundings and gives (corresponding) some form of output, so as to help the living organism move/sense/survive in his surroundings, then shouldn't every living organism need one? The answer is no. The non-bilaterian animals don't have brains (jellyfish, coral).  Almost all bilaterians (humans) have a brain, with the exception of the echinoderms (sea stars, sea urchins, sea lillies, sea cucumbers, brittlestars), who have a nerve net with no centralized brain. A brain is merely a centralized concentration of nerve cells at the front end of an animal. It is not a prerequisite for sensing or interpreting the environment, however.  Bacteria can do both those things just fine using simple chemical triggers. Even sponges react dynamically to environmental conditions without even a nervous system. A brain just makes more elaborate calculations and complicated reactions possible. The point behind this diatribe is that life requires some mechanism to perform sensory perception of its environment, within life and the elements. The more complex the decisions to sensory perception, the greater need for a brain.  Reasoned rationality in humans is the epic need.
How does sensory perception work? Life is composed of elements.  Elements are composed of atoms, ions or molecules and light’s interaction with the elements gives rise to the various phenomena (reality) which can help us understand the nature of life and the elements. “Light is part of the electromagnetic spectrum, which ranges from radio waves to gamma rays. Electromagnetic radiation waves, as their names suggest are fluctuations of electric and magnetic fields, which can transport energy from one location to another. Visible light is not inherently different from the other parts of the electromagnetic spectrum with the exception that the human eye can detect visible waves. Electromagnetic radiation can also be described in terms of a stream of photons which are massless particles each travelling with wavelike properties at the speed of light. A photon is the smallest quantity (quantum) of energy which can be transported and it was the realization that light travelled in discrete quanta.” Light is a natural law.
Sound is a natural law. “In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as a typically audible mechanical wave of pressure and displacement, through a medium such as air or water. In physiology and psychology, sound is the reception of such waves and their perception by the brain. Humans can hear sound waves with frequencies between about 20 Hz and 20 kHz. Other animals have different hearing ranges. Sound can propagate through a medium such as air, water and solids as longitudinal waves and also as a transverse wave in solids. The sound waves are generated by a sound source, such as the vibrating diaphragm of a stereo speaker. The sound source creates vibrations in the surrounding medium. As the source continues to vibrate the medium, the vibrations propagate away from the source at the speed of sound, thus forming the sound wave. At a fixed distance from the source, the pressure, velocity, and displacement of the medium vary in time. At an instant in time, the pressure, velocity, and displacement vary in space. Note that the particles of the medium do not travel with the sound wave. This is intuitively obvious for a solid, and the same is true for liquids and gases (that is, the vibrations of particles in the gas or liquid transport the vibrations, while the average position of the particles over time does not change).”  This information about sound and light is acquired knowledge, through science not revelation.  But this knowledge helps explain the mechanisms of the laws of nature and more particularly, sensory perception. Naturally, sound is required for hearing and light is required for sight. But these two senses are not required for life.  However “life” requires at least one of the five senses to “live.” The triggers or external stimuli for the five senses produce sensory perceptions of touch, smell, taste, sight and hearing.  A human could not sustain life without at least one of these five senses.
So what differentiates an organism (life) from a rock (elements)?   An organism has a much more complicated level of organization composed of several elements, is living, and corporeal. A rock can consist of a single element or of several elements that “are either tightly compacted or held together by a cement like mineral matrix.”  It is non-living, corporeal and static unless moved by an outside force. An organism emerges from a combination of many dynamically interacting systems, none of which are close to being present in a rock. Non-living things exist without the five senses.  They have no need to perceive their environment. Humans, through reasoned rationality, need senses to make these distinctions.
Human beings were designed to interact and use the natural law.  Touch can differentiate elements, eyes can detect light, and ears can identify sounds.  Human sensory perception operates in conjunction with natural law. Yet human response to these perceptions are governed by the divine law.  In other words, divine law governs all emotions like joy and hatred, moral questions, and happiness. We have previously seen that the lower animals, like dogs and deer, have emotions but are not necessarily faced with moral questions. The lowest living things, like coral and bacteria, have no moral determinations or emotions to analyze and evaluate.   Life’s response to environmental conditions (reality) are processed through the nervous system (or brain) and acted upon through the intellect (soul.) Even though all life has souls, only humans have reasoned rationality through the intellect.  
Does the heart play a part in the functioning of reasoned rationality? Does all living organisms have hearts? The answer to both questions is no. Plants have no hearts. Many animals have no hearts or even a separate circulatory system. In very small animals there's no need for an organ to transport nutrients through the body; diffusion is sufficient. Larger animals like humans, dogs and fish do have hearts.  Sponges have no hearts. They have no organs at all.  Jellyfish and flatworms have no hearts and generally use their guts for circulating nutrients around the body. All microscopic life have no hearts or circulatory systems.  The heart size for ‘life’ that does have hearts is in direct proportion to the size of the animal.  The largest heart is the sperm whale.  A heart’s sole function is to circulate blood around a body. Here are some final conclusions.  A heart, or a lack thereof, plays no part in sensory perception and reasoned rationality. A brain is not necessary for sensory perception however it is necessary for participation in natural law.  Reasoned rationality is necessary for humans to correctly perceive reality through the senses.
There exists an underlying truth to reality. “Being” and the “first cause of things” are definitely not as they seem.  Visual observation of an object in nature does not convey the underlying truth behind the current reality it displays to humans. Humans tend to distort these truths through attempts to fulfill personal desires. Usually humans are completely unaware of their own desires and the truths behind them and they live in a world of misconceptions and assumptions. The only reality of which a human can be certain is the lower laws of nature. Humans, like other animals, seek to fulfill their desires for the lower appetites, like food, sex, shelter, usually with blind abandon. Higher natural laws require discernment.  Divine law requires knowledge and discernment. The heart has no feeling or emotion as previously discussed. The heart is not involved in sensory experiences.  Sensory experience is the reaction and computational response of the brain to some external stimuli.  The main sensory receptor is the eyes, the second are the ears.  Smell, taste and touch are secondary.  Experience is accumulation of the sensory perceptions.  When we touch fire we learn it burns. However the mind can react to non-sensory experience.  Close yourself up in a completely dark and sound proof room with no smells, nothing to taste or touch and the mind will still work.  The mind will produce thoughts replicated from somewhere other than the senses.  Where does these thoughts come from?  Most likely memory.  The mind will regurgitate past sensory experiences.  These thoughts may focus on release or escape from this room, the future.  But this future is only a return to most recent past sensory experiences.  The mind may concentrate on what it will do once released but these anticipated behaviors can only be determined by past history, activity you participated in or performed in the past.  Anticipated behavior may be predictable but one cannot know how the outcome will materialize when released from the room.  One may have an inclination but these inclinations only are a result of past accumulated sensory experiences. To assume to know the future with any certainty would only be a prediction using past experiences. An accumulation of past sensory experiences may approximate a future experience but the experience may never materialize. Can the mind approximate an experience or event that was never experienced in the past? And if so, what are these thoughts of things and events that were never experienced and where do they come from? Humans are like Pavlov’s dog, receive a stimuli and produce a response. A thought cannot exist except for past or current perceived reality, a natural law.  For humans, these stimuli can be immediate or jarred from memory.  Animals too, like deer in contact with humans, usually run the opposite way when they see, hear or smell humans. This is learned behavior from past experiences. The lowest levels of life, have no thoughts.  They merely respond to current stimuli.
Humans are composed of body and soul.  The body is composed of elements as previously discussed.  But the soul is not composed of elements. If not composed of elements, what substantiates its existence? This system originally claimed that everything within the universe is composed of elements, everything except souls and its corresponding thoughts and intellect.  The soul is animated but incorporeal. However, to possess animation, the soul must have an independent existence. The soul is a completely separate entity from the human body. There is an uncommon diversity in souls.  This diversity explains the differences in each human personality.  This diversity also explains the omnipotence of God (souls are provided by God, thus God is ever present.). As we discussed earlier, an unanimated human body kept alive by life sustaining machines is just a blob of living tissue (elements).  The brain is unable to flip the correct switches for life.  But the brain does not animate the body.  Neither does the heart. The brain and the heart and the lungs and kidneys are major organs which sustain life but they do not animate life.  The lower animals have these organs also.     Sperm whales (largest brain in the animal kingdom), gray whales, blue whales, orcas, humpback whales, bottlenose dolphins and elephants, all have bigger brains than humans. Many animals also have larger hearts than humans. If the brain and heart are bigger than humans, one would conclude that these animals are more intelligent than humans.  You very well may be right.  A huge African elephant is probably a lot smarter than your average Joe on the street corner. But what makes that average Joe different from an elephant? The soul with its innate characteristics of good and God’s bit of essence which animates the human body is the answer. The soul is created with an instant connection with the creator. Communication is the key, communication within an individual’s mind and soul and communication between other individual minds and souls and with God. Communication is produced by the senses.  Humans smell and see others, and talk and receive thoughts from others. All animals communicate among their species just as humans do.  But humans have the exceptional ability of speech along with a cognitive ability of reason. Yet reasoning causes bias, bias toward the one so reasoning. Reasoning so motivated can distort evaluations and attitudes and allow erroneous beliefs to persist.  An ever present bias towards self-preservation causes irrational reasoning. Remember at the beginning of this paper, without a divine law, everyone would act according to the fulfillment of their own personal desires without regard to the consequences of others. Animals in the animal kingdom act this way and somehow survive in a somewhat orderly yet often violent environment.  Natural law and the laws of nature are sufficient for them. Animals, other than humans, do not have access to divine law.  But Divine law provides humans with a stability (certainty) along with our gift of communicating among our species. Divine law sets a definite moral code and it also dispenses justice.  The soul is a gift of the Spirit of God.  In all ‘life,’ the soul is composed of a little piece of God’s essence and existence. The human soul is composed of a tiny bit of the essence and existence of God. This bit of essence and existence of God within a human soul is the Holy Spirit. The soul is the coadjutant between the natural law and the divine law. Primarily, natural law governs the body and divine law governs the soul.  The body is a temporary living space for the soul. Reasoned rationality under divine law allows the human mind to communicate with its own soul.  Reasoned rationality also allows the soul of one individual to communicate with the soul of another individual. And reasoned rationality allows the soul to communicate with God.
The brain controls the functions of the body. It causes the body to hunger and thirst.  The brain is like central command for bodily functions. As stated previously, there is often a disconnect between rational consciousness and mental activity. For example, irrational mental activity occurs during sleep.  But such disconnects also occur during waking hours.  Consciousness of self without reasoned rationality produces a fake concern for others and we tend to deprecate, disapprove of, frown on, take a dim view of, take exception to others and favor ourselves. In the process we lose ethical and moral concern for both parties. Often this disconnect between conscious, reasoned rationality and general mental activity produces a sympathetic fallacy and fake empathy. Concern for others becomes unreal and not genuine. This conceit leads to lethargic pomposity. This attitude leads to political correctness and all sorts of mental distortions. Divine law becomes unreachable and does not provide structure for sensory perception of reality.  
There is a point in the development of the intellect in which reasoned rationality prevails.  When the mind can distinguish between the various influences of the laws of nature upon the human body and is completely aware of the natural law, the soul can then begin to discern and distinguish the divine law.  The soul with the aid of intelligence through reasoned rationality can implement divine law under all sensory, perceived reality and under all thoughts from memory. Mental activity jumps the gap between mind and soul.  The mind is the playground for thoughts and emotions caused by the basic human desires of the body.  When these thoughts are captured, controlled and packaged within the constraints of divine law and transferred from mind to soul, truth shall be experienced. Thoughts are mental responses from internal or external stimuli and processed by the brain but enforced or carried out through the soul. The soul is the possessor and processer of divine law.  The body is the possessor and processer of natural law. The success in degree and amount of possession of both sets of laws effects the implementation and manifestation of justice, compassion, empathy, prudence, temperance, joy and happiness.  The more successful in intellectual development, the greater the ability to reach the truth. This pinnacle of wisdom can only be reached when all concern for self is left behind and the intellect is focused on divine law with a complete disregard for natural law.
Let’s look at some examples.  We are addressing mental thoughts by humans of external stimuli in nature.  We will examine images of a pretty girl, a lavish buffet and a rock band.  When a male comes into contact with a pretty female (perception by the eyes), he will make an immediate mental determination about her cuteness.  If he finds her unattractive as compared to past images of attractive women, all sexually driven emotions will cease.  If he finds her attractive, the natural laws of nature will kick in.  Should he feed his sexual desires with further sensory examination, he may touch her and experience her response.  He may smell her to see if she is wearing perfume. He will listen to her voice to determine if she has a pleasant personality.  Notice that the laws of nature are still controlling his thoughts.  At some point in this conscious or unconscious inquisition, he will have to make a decision. (I say conscious because our subject may comprehend the laws of nature and be fully aware of what he is doing or he may be oblivious to the dictates of the laws of nature and completely unaware of his actions.) If our human subject is in contact with the divine law, he will weigh these sensory perceptions against the divine law, and may conclude that these thoughts cross the bounds of fidelity, say if he or she were married. Notice that these thoughts lead to actions. This is a natural law. Our subject may or may not act on his sexual desires depending on the familiarity of the natural and divine laws and his obedience to them. Notice that the thoughts of this encounter after it has ended will remain with our subject for minutes, hours, days or even a lifetime within memory. These thoughts are processed through the mind but filtered in the soul, the repository of divine law.  When these thoughts occur under reasoned rationality, they will confirm objective truths.  Without reasoned rationality, these thoughts will lead to irrational actions (behavior.)
These same principles hold true with all sensory perceptions, even images of a buffet and a rock band.  If our subject visualizes a lavish buffet, he will make final decisions based on paste experiences and current taste and smell sensory experiences.  He will either gorge himself, which may or may not eventually validate his gluttony. Or he will eat with reasoned rationality and verify his temperance and prudence.  Sounds of rock bands can lead to all kinds of irrational behavior, especially if our subject is under the influence of drugs or alcohol or both.  
There is an “unmoved mover” which we shall call God and He is responsible for all of creation, life and the elements by His spoken word (Christ).  The spirit is the nous. And what caused the principles or rules that regulate the interaction between the nous and life and the elements?  Providence. The unmoved mover does have a grand plan for His creation.  We are not privy to such inside information.  But be assured that His laws, natural and divine, are in control.  He is legislator, judge and jury. We run around, just the little ants in the ant farm, doing our thing, but He is watching and steers the farm as He sees fit.  (Please note that I do not believe in predestination.)
Ontology
What is the character of our being, becoming, existence and reality? Ontological categories of being, or “the categories", are defined as the highest classes under which all elements of being, whether corporeal or incorporeal, can be classified. These outdated categories are divided into primary categories: Substance, Relation, Quantity and Quality and secondary categories: Place, Time, Situation, Condition, Action and Passion.  Physics is the philosophy of nature (qualitative aspects of matter and motion); mathematics studies quantitative issues and metaphysics is the divine science (study of being as being on a rational and intellectual level). Metaphysics attempts to understand reality on a higher level than that achieved by the philosophy of nature. Traditionally, matter and form equals being.  Matter is quantifiable. Matter has substance in relation to other matter and has a particular quantity and quality.  It also exist in a certain space, in time and is either in motion or not. Of course there is an existence of being without matter such as thoughts, souls, angels and God. This incorporeal existence is called essence. Only living things (animated in the first sense) possess essence. A rock or the elements, for example, do not possess essence.  Essence of being must signify something common to all living natures.  Essence is the definable nature of the incorporeal thing that exists. Essence is the actuality of all acts and the completion of all potentialities.  According to Aquinas, essence and existence are distinct in finite entities.  But we must further distinguish finite entities between living and non-living (life and the elements.)  Immaterial substances (incorporeally) are therefore distinguished from matter.  And essence does not exist in the elements.  So the question becomes whether or not immaterial substances (incorporeals) are composed of matter. If such substances cannot be composed of matter, what accounts for their existence? These old, rehashed, and worn out terms still used in theological and philosophical study perpetuates the confusion but does provide us some foundation to build upon.
Thoughts, ideas, feelings and emotions are all areas for the study of ontology and metaphysics.  For example, why can a person detect or feel the stare of another person?  Obvious to natural intelligence, a stare is not composed of matter just as a thought about a pretty girl is not composed of matter.  But these things, a stare and the thought, do exist.  (Do you ever catch yourself being looked upon by another?) So what are thoughts composed of, if anything? Natural intelligence is the key.  Natural intelligence is the human’s ability to consciously detect the operation of the natural and divine law with God’s assistance.  Natural intelligence is distinguished from book sense in that it is not learned behavior.  It is more akin to common sense but common sense implies learned behavior.  Natural intelligence is innate in living things.  It causes young animals to suckle on their mother’s tit.  It causes a house plant to turn its leaves to face the window.  It causes salmon to leave the sea and swim up-river to spawn. Natural intelligence is life’s response to the natural law.  It is basic and common throughout nature. Humans have a more refined gift of natural intelligence because of our reason and rationality.  We can visualize this behavior in lower life whereas they cannot, even among themselves.  They just respond to nature naturally. Natural intelligence explains life’s reaction to external stimuli but it does not explain what these reactions are composed of or how they materialize.  We know that they are incorporeal thus not composed of matter and that they are innate in living things.  They can only be explained by the natural law.
There has to be a first mover and he is God. The existence of God has been attempted to be explained using hundreds of methods and definitions.  God cannot be explained because no one has ever seen God.  Some have heard his audible voice, some have seen Him in different forms, like a burning bush or plagues or Christ, but no one has ever seen Him personally. How can we describe something we have never seen?  We cannot.  We can only describe how we feel when we come into contact with His different forms.  For us today we do not see Christ or burning bushes, so how do we know when we come into contact with His different forms? Fortunately, we come into contact with His different forms every day.  We come into contact with nature.  If you will look real hard, you will see God in nature, the birds, animals, trees, and humans.   Matter is not substance itself but a part of substance. Matter is the subject receiving the form of nature. Aquinas holds that immaterial substances have an element of potentiality, but this is not the potency supplied by matter; rather, immaterial substances are composed of essence and existence, and it is the essence of the thing, standing in potency to a distinct act of existence that accounts for the potentiality.  Aquinas attempts to establish a real distinction whereby essence and existence are not only distinct in our understanding, but also in the thing itself. Aquinas claims that if there were a being whose essence is its existence, there could only be one such being, in all else essence and existence would differ. Aquinas concludes that only in God does essence and existence not differ.
If we accept Aquinas’ distinction between essence and existence, I propose essence could be compared to natural intelligence innate within life.  That would be the human soul.  And the living part of an entity or being (the living corporeal body) would be its existence.  We shall say that a human body exists with soul and a material body to complete a being. Such existence would be similar to Plato’s matter and form.  But essence is something beyond matter and form.   Plants, animals and humans have existence and essence which are distinct qualities. The soul is life’s essence and the physical body is its existence.   Therefore essence cannot be composed of matter because the soul is incorporeal.  The principles of causality do not apply to essence.  Essence is the fulfillment or perfection of God’s design in humanity. Essence is complete Good. Humans take on potentiality to their existence and attempt to catch up with or rather complete their essence. God’s existence is defined by His essence. Unlike all living things, God is both complete essence and existence at the same time.  At death a soul will venture from the body. When there is no distinction between the two, essence and existence, they are identical, as only it can be in God, if and when the soul has reached perfection, its essence. God is fully complete and actual.  Essence and existence are identical in God but not in humans.
So how does this soul, which is the essence in living things, exist? The soul in living things is provided with a bit of the essence of God at creation.  This is a divine law. The soul in living things is animated by this essence of God yet it is incorporeal.  The soul’s existence is very similar to the existence of thoughts.  Thoughts emerge as visual sensory perceptions of the mind and stored in memory.   Thoughts are either rational or irrational according to proper reasoning.  The soul is formed by running human thoughts through the natural and divine laws and storing the results in the innate essence of the soul.  The essence of the soul either conforms to innate goodness placed therein by God and flourishes or because of the lack of natural intelligence and reasoned rationality, fails to conform to innate goodness and dies a slow, slow incorporeal death. The soul will eventually lose the innate goodness placed therein by God if humans fail to comprehend and implement the natural and divine laws. And even though souls never cease to exist, they do lose their innate goodness.
Ethics  
Morals are the ideal standards of human behavioral law, ethics is the process of implementing them and virtue is the measure of success in there comprehension and implementation.  Morals in this system are part and parcel of divine law. Perfect morality is divine law.  Morals deal with the controlling principles of right and wrong in behavior and compels one to conform to a standard of right behavior. What, or rather, who determines what is good, moral behavior? Divine law, created by God, governs humans, angels, and all life and governs both good and evil. Divine law also preempts natural law even though both were created by God. What encourages one to conform to divine law? Certainly not natural law.  But the natural intelligence of innate goodness draws one to conform.  Divine law was previously explained, but in this context, it provides a system or pattern for which humans should live life. Divine morality is distinctly delineated. There can be no confusion in the interpretation of divine law enacted by God.  Human actions within and reactions to their environment can be either good or evil.  There exist no middle ground. Murder, abortion, execution and euthanasia are bad.  Divine law requires humans to respect life.  Love, generosity, compassion, and empathy are good.  In-bred into human souls is an innate quality from God to do good and it cooperates with natural intelligence. But nature confuses humans. Humans possess a privation of the full essence of God.  We are not God, like Christ was.  We are humans, a lower species than the angels. Interior human nature and exterior outdoor nature allows for this privation of good.  Natural law, and especially its laws of nature, produces natural responses rather than divine responses to sensory perceptions.  God is all good and His creation is all good but He allows for deviation because all of His creation does not possess the full essence of God. In other words, creation is not all powerful, all-knowing, all present and all good. We lack the complete essence of God. Nature can be defective because of our basic constitution, animals living within the natural world. We live under the laws of nature. This privation is a divine law. Theologians claim our defectiveness is a result of the Fall and original sin.  Atheists claim no moral defect or if it is acknowledged, it is based on concupiscence.  This paper claims that humans act against the moral good because of a lack of developed natural intellect, not a privation of good. Reasoned rationality has not been perfected in humans.  Human disease and evil in nature, like pollution, is not a privation of good, but a deficiency or lack of complete application or understanding of the natural law just as a depravity in humans is not a privation of good but a deficiency or lack of complete understanding of divine law.  Our parents, our principals, our president, our preachers and our priests fail us. We seek the truth yet we do not find it. Finally, theologians like to blame our depravity on free will. Free will is either a rebellion against natural and divine law or a refusal or inability to grasp them. If humans always sought the good with regard to divine law and avoided unhealthy and evil desires associated with natural law, free will can be subdued. The soul could, in theory, never allow the body to sin. One last idea needs mention.  Death is not a privation or evil.  All life eventually dies.  Death is a natural law.
 During the history of philosophical inquiry, knowledge of self (being) and the reality in which we lived gradually shifted from an examination of interior motives, desires, and perceptions to an examination of external realities. They realized that human internal nature and outdoors (external) nature seemed to be governed by universal truths but these inquisitors could never determine what these truths were. To know self and reality, we must examine both our internal motives and desires and compare our response to our perception against the reality of the external stimuli.  This subjective comparison then must be measured against our knowledge of divine law.  When done under reasoned rationality, natural intelligence and wisdom of the laws, truth emerges. Where did these universal truths, divine and natural laws, come from?  We now know they come from God. We must examine our perception of external stimuli in nature and compare our human response within the soul under divine law. But are these laws (natural and divine) innate in humans and born into humans at conception and birth?  Are they like the color of your hair, skin and eyes except written in the mind, the intellect?  How about the laws of nature that control the outdoors? Are they innate to nature? If these outdoor laws are constant and never changing, they could not have developed over time in order to conform to the current state of external nature.  They had to have been put in place at a certain period of time, like at creation.  Take the principle of gravity.  Has it evolved over time to accommodate the changing size of the universe and the relation of our planets in our solar system?  Or has the mathematical formula which describes gravity remained constant since its inception?  With regard to the divine laws as they relate to humans, in particular morals and virtue, did they evolve over time to accommodate then current societal norms or did they appear one day and have remained constant ever since?  And man’s attempt to seek the ‘good’ and the ‘truth’, is that attempt innate in humans or is that desire an acquired yearning?
These moral and ethical laws (divine laws) have been constant since inception, just like the natural law and its laws of nature.  Good and evil does not change. People, their environments and societies do. The only thing that has changed is the way humans have interpreted reality or rather misinterpreted reality. Divine law and natural law has been constant since they were promulgated by God. Moral good is innate in humans at conception yet man’s misinterpretation of these sets of laws has created confusion within humans and in society with regard to morals. Thus this innate goodness can be lost. This innate goodness has been described as connatural-normally existing at birth, mankind's connatural sense of the good, connected by nature; united in nature; inborn; inherent; natural.  Innate goodness exists in humans only because the soul is a composed of a bit of God’s essence and existence.  We were created like God but are far from being in essence and existence of God.  But the human body is burdened with the natural law and more specifically the basic laws of nature.  This pull of the bodily desires by the mind weakens the innate divine laws within the human soul as soon as one is expelled from their mother’s womb. Humans tend to follow the natural law rather than the divine law only because they are constantly exposed to and continually reinforced with natural law results and outcomes.  If this disconnect is not eventually repaired or at least interrupted, humans live their entire lives under the natural law. The morals exposed by divine law and the virtues acquired by use of the divine law, never causes the innate goodness within the humans soul to flourish.
Through age and experience, change and growth and contact with natural intelligence through reasoned rationality, our intellect develops the notion that a privation of the essence of God is within us because of the human, natural body. Reason and logic are needed to discover these truths. And the compilation of knowledge only strengthens our desire to further investigate these compounding and accumulating facts of nature. Hopefully this disconnect will be resolved.  This usually occurs by a movement within the soul aided by grace and the Holy Spirit.
From ancient philosophy, reason migrated from some abstract system of belief in sensory experiences (I am thinking of Plato’s cave) to the empirical discovery of natural laws. Knowledge of divine laws flows from these empirical discoveries in natural law. The accumulation of these laws (truths) bring us closer to absolutes which apply across the spectrum of human experience and existence. Yet we do not gain our theological basis for existence from the natural law.  Natural laws only explain the proper functioning of life within nature.  A natural law cannot say what is good or bad.  They are neutral with regard to morality.  Every single thing that occurs within nature, i.e., elements and life, can be explained by natural law. (Even though we may not have discovered all the laws yet.) But the consequences of the natural law are neither good nor bad.  Morality is gained from the discovery of divine law by humans who participate in nature under natural law.   Our knowledge of the truths of divine law is still limited.  Where does this natural and divine law originate. From God.  So to become successful at life, we must first seek God and know Him.
Anthropology
Both natural law and divine law apply to humans. The two sets have a reliance on one another.  Humans could exist without divine law, but there would be no comprehensive system of moral direction.  Natural law would pervade.  Humans would act based on pure emotion and desire. Every act would be neither good nor bad, just necessary to fill a desire. Who determines what is good: is there a set of divine laws or is it just the relationship between two individuals that both seek the best or individual satisfaction or outcome between the encounter.  That is purely subjective. The same exact encounter between two different pairs of people could, in theory, produce two, totally different outcomes or results. People act contrary to the moral norms either because they are unaware of the moral imperative or because compliance would be against their perceived self-interest.  Intellect is the reasoning power of the brain; mind is conscious power of the brain; accumulation of knowledge and truths fuels the intellect. We are simply animals living an existence in which the natural laws are being effectuated. The divine law provides order, justice and peace.  We may or may not perceive the divine law. 
Besides elements and life, there is an essence of being called by various and sundry names, spirit mind, soul, intellect, noes, reason, wisdom, free will, thoughts, etc.  This essence of being controls or guides the relationship between natural law and divine law within the human mind and soul. Every action of the brain that does not control the basic functioning of our human body is part of the essence of being.   Descartes distinguishes intellectual perception and volition as what properly belongs to the nature of the mind alone while imagination and sensation are, in some sense, faculties of the mind insofar as it is united with a body. Ideas are “modes” or “ways” of thinking, and, therefore, modes are not substances.  Ideas require, in addition to God’s concurrence, some created thinking substance in order to exist. He distinguishes three kinds of ideas, namely those that are fabricated, adventitious (happening or carried on according to chance rather than design or inherent nature), or innate. Fabricated ideas are mere inventions of the mind. Accordingly, the mind can control them so that they can be examined and set aside at will and their internal content can be changed. Adventitious ideas are sensations produced by some material thing existing externally to the mind. But, unlike fabrications, adventitious ideas cannot be examined and set aside at will nor can their internal content be manipulated by the mind. Finally, innate ideas are placed in the mind by God at creation. These ideas can be examined and set aside at will but their internal content cannot be manipulated.  Our system supports Descartes’ modes of thinking to an extent. He fails to make a distinction between mind and soul in controlling thought and he is incorrect that the mind cannot set aside adventitious ideas.
The existence and essence of the body and soul, respectively, includes conscious and sub conscience thoughts, desires, cravings, emotions, passions, sensations, feelings, ideas and even beliefs. Our mind brings them to consciousness when we in fact meditate and rationalize on the perceived reality. When we analyze individually perceived reality and look behind the thought or image without making preconceived judgments and conclusions, we can reach the truth within the soul. We can either combine the two laws for a conclusion or distinguish the operation of the two laws to realize that either one or the other is controlling the current perception of reality. All thoughts (including the three distinctions made by Descartes) can be examined and set aside at will and certainly all three can be manipulated. The power that governs reasoned and rational impressions (good and correct perception of reality) is divine law.  Miracles are the perceived realization between the cause and effect of divine law. As one gains more and more knowledge of the natural and divine laws, one comes closer and closer to the truths behind natural law and divine law.  The soul can decide whether any thought is either good or bad almost immediately after the thought is conceived by the mind.  Every thought has a reason and it is either rational or irrational. Why does everything must have a reason for its existence? Thoughts exist to complete the essence of the soul. Plants exist to provide food and oxygen for animals.  Animals exist to provide food for humans.  Why do humans exist? We exist because we are overseers of the lesser beings and the elements under God’s tutelage. We are designed to return to the Father.
Theology
Christian narratives form the basis for moral, ethics, virtues and happiness. Secular narratives cannot provide such a basis.  Secular narratives have no moral foundation to hang its hat.  But everyone would agree that the ultimate goal in this life and the next is happiness. But what is happiness?  Happiness for one may be living in a beach front shack on an island in the Caribbean, and for another, cooped up in a log cabin in the mountains painting nature. Happiness seems to be subjective, but both of these people are “happy.”  So there is a common denominator.  A more precise definition may be “peace of mind.” But what does that mean?  Does it mean a satisfaction with life?  I may be satisfied with a dog I purchased from the pet store but as soon as I get home and he begins to pee on the floor and chew my slippers, I no longer have peace of mind.  When does one become ‘satisfied’ with ‘life’? In this context, the word ‘life’ does not mean just the living nature of a human being, but also the situation or condition one finally achieves in society. But ‘satisfied’ is a rather ugly term. It implies compromise. Is one ever really ‘satisfied with life’? Our definition of happiness may be more attuned to satisfaction with the progress one has made with the perfection of the observances of the divine law within one’s life and, of necessity, within society and with God.  These observances lead to truth and the truth sets your mind free from doubt and burdensome desires. Moral concerns disappear.  Morality becomes second nature.  Freedom of truth leads one to peace of the soul and wisdom. Secular theology clearly cannot provide such a moral or ethical schema since it is not general and applicable evenly throughout society but can only apply subjectively between two individuals within a closed community. 
Theology is the study of divine law. Divine law is absolute, determinative and never changing.  Divine law explains how humans are to interact among themselves, how humans are to act when alone and how humans are to interact with nature and God. Divine law sounds very sterile and unexciting.  It is.  Divine law is morally significant. We have not been revealed all of divine law. The only way I can explain divine law is all of the “good” qualities preached by the prophets of old, Jesus, Paul and the apostles, but also those qualities possessed by God.  Divine law must be taught, and, if not followed, enforced, to achieve an orderly and functional society. For example speaking about someone in an emotive way and with them not being present is gossip. Such a conversation would be a violation of divine law.  Having thoughts about someone, even if the other is in your presence, in an emotive way, is per se gossip and a violation, if not vocally expressed to the other.  And if expressed with the result of negative criticism or condemnation or complaint without a valid reason or exhortation, is a violation.
Humans are concerned with their own interests and they often use words to effect an emotional suggestion or control over another.  When the words are used dynamically, they achieve their purpose. They either hurt or achieve domination. But with such uses, truths with regard to ethics losses all value.  The only concern becomes satisfying personal desires.  And any actions or words which accomplish this result become “good.”  These concepts seem to me to come directly from Protestant theology.  Man is inherently depraved and each man can determine for himself what good means and can do just about anything to realize his desires.  Morality and divine law are not designed to function this way. Christ presented another way.  We are to become slaves to the other and loose our self-concerns, anxieties, worries and fears.
Why would God do this (crucifixion and ascension)? God did these things to change humanity.  He did this so humans can grasp, understand and value the divine law.  All souls upon death retain animation and remain incorporeal. Their tendency is to return to God, the One from which they came.  But the divine law of justice prevents some from returning.  Resurrection is an award to the souls who have filtered the impure desires implanted by the natural law and its laws of nature and who have attained wisdom of the divine law through reasoned rationality and fulfilled the innate goodness of natural intelligence.  This judgment is only applied to humans.  All of life’s other souls return to their creator upon death. One thing is certain.  The essence and existence of God does not change.  God does not change into human flesh. God’s Spirit became the soul of the human Christ. That soul infused with the Holy Spirit allowed a human Christ to perform miracles. If Christ was free from sin, then to be like God, he had to have complete goodness, knowledge, and understanding under the Divine law.  His ascension allows human souls to participate in this goodness, knowledge, and understanding under the Divine law here on earth and become refined to rejoin the Father in Heaven. 
The concept of sin is a complex issue.  Sin is a natural law. Humans are supposed to have acquired sin with the disobedience of Adam.  Was Adam sinless before his disobedience?  If he was sinless before the Fall, then that means humans can be sinless, never possessing an ounce of sin their entire life, although only one person has ever done that, Christ.  Has mankind again been given the opportunity to become sinless after the appearance of Christ? The question becomes “For which sins did Christ die?”  Original sin, individual sin or both?  Has original sin been defeated completely with the crucifixion of Christ? Is the spoils of the defeat only activated through baptism? Is man again inherently good as Adam was before his disobedience? Why does God place a depravity within humans if He came to overcome Adam’s disobedience? We know that we are created with an innate goodness within us. The church says that the nature of sin is born innately into humans, even for humans born after the ascension of Christ.  The Church says that humans must undergo baptism to remove the vestiges of original sin. So once the stain has been removed, can man now remain sinless after baptism?  If humans do sin after baptism, for the bible says that all fall short, can man become sinless with grace?  If born with original sin, but washed with the laver of regeneration (baptism), can a man proceed with the rest of his life without sin? Such a status would be a very difficult possibility, but a possibility nonetheless.  Or if he does sin after baptism, he can be forgiven, thus sinless again, and with grace, possibly remain sinless?  Sin results as a failure to fully understand the ramifications of reasoned rationality, natural intelligence and consequences of implementation of the divine law. Sin is either a deliberate or an ill-informed violation of the divine law.
Grace is the mind of God as understood by God Himself. Grace is God’s sensory perception of His universe which is all good. Grace is closely akin to the Spirit of God but they are not the same. Grace is the loving act of God when He gives the Spirit.  The Spirit is the agent who reveals to humans the effectiveness of divine law. The holy spirit is the vehicle which brings life to the essence in living things of God.  The Spirit is a merger of divine law and natural law. The Spirit is the law that bridges the gap between natural and divine law. The Spirit is a force which keeps all of creation, both the elements and life, cooperating and efficiently progressing without some massive upheaval or destructive apocalypse.
Because of the appearance of Christ, Christians are forced to explain God as a trinity.  Are there three Gods in our God?  Where did the Jews get there conception of God?  Was Christ and the Spirit in the Old Testament? Jews believe in the Holy Spirit.  The Spirit is mentioned numerous times in the Old Testament.  But Christ was never specifically mentioned in the Old Testament, although, through analogy, the Church Fathers found Him everywhere.  Today the Jews do not believe that Christ was really God.  They still believe in a messiah but not necessarily Christ.   Muslims believe in Jesus as a prophet, and their religion believes that Christ will return at the end of time to judge man. They believe in the whole of the Old Testament. This puts us in a quandary.  The three major religions of the world all believe in God and the Old Testament.  I submit that we all believe in the same God for there can be only one. Happiness is the process of discerning the truth that God has proclaimed in the divine law and living life in His wisdom until natural death.
Political State
Let’s briefly look at the success humans have made with the implementation of divine law.  Rome would eventually fall and the Jews faced diaspora. Muslims appeared and began a march of conquest. Christians isolated themselves within the Dark Ages. Around the time that the crusades began in order to capture Jerusalem from the Muslims in 1094, the Christians were also on the move in Spain to remove the Moors from the Iberian Peninsula. By 1492 the Muslims were finally driven out of Spain.  They had been retreating to northern Africa for 300 years.  What did they decide to do?  They began to move east and conquered Constantinople in 1453, excluded the Christians with the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the creation of the Ottoman Empire.  The discovery of the Americas and the Protestant Reformation tended to have a calming effect on the political states. Even though wars continued, religion was no longer the primary cause. Humans sought freedom of religion and freedom from political dictators.  The German quest for power and domination disturbed the peace in the twentieth century.  The Ottoman Empire eventually sided with Germany in WWI and was broken up after the Germans were defeated.  The Islamic states were created out of the Ottoman Empire.  Israel was created after WWII.  With the rise of Israel again, Islam began a march for conquest again. Since September 11, 2001, the Muslims have been in jihad.   Now the Muslims have instigated a silent jihad around the world through displaced emigrants. They have not discerned the divine law.  Christians, who once had possession of it, are losing the knowledge of divine law at an ever accelerating rate.
I fear for our political states and mankind’s future.  We have not learned from any of the mistakes of the past. In fact, wars and hatred and violence are on the rise. We proceed in life with deliberate abandon and indifference. Relationships between humans, relationships between humans and society and relationships between countries are dominated by recklessness and unrestraint at all levels of human existence. Humans have, for the most part, also abandoned their relationship with God.  Humans are no closer at following divine law today than the time when the Torah was written or when Jesus appeared. Civil laws are no longer based on divine law but are based on phony and ill-conceived personal rights. In fact, divine law has been relegated to subjective, interpersonal encounters. God has been forgotten or is being deliberately avoided.   Unfortunately, the moral decay of our society is nearly complete. Natural law will soon pervade.