Templism Q&A

[The_Author]

While the original thread is primarily for discussions about Templism, this thread is for me to spoon feed Templism to the readers. Thus it is for questions such as "what does Templism say about X?"

[anthony]

For Templism: General outlook on video games.

For The Author: Favourite video games?

[The_Author]

Templist Canon speaks of games in general as useful recreations to help us solve non-game problems. It is critical of games that do not require skill or creativity because these are simply movies that people spend an inordinate amount of time "watching". It is critical in a few passages of "escapist gaming".

I liked the MGS games. Hitman is ok but has a problem with mission realism. I'm not that interested in video games anymore. The genre seems unconcerned with realism. I much prefer tabletop games. I used to like Paradox games but their complexity is artificial.

[anthony]

Templist Canon speaks of games in general as useful recreations to help us solve non-game problems. It is critical of games that do not require skill or creativity because these are simply movies that people spend an inordinate amount of time "watching". It is critical in a few passages of "escapist gaming".

I liked the MGS games. Hitman is ok but has a problem with mission realism. I'm not that interested in video games anymore. The genre seems unconcerned with realism. I much prefer tabletop games. I used to like Paradox games but their complexity is artificial.

Interesting answer. Too late for me to answer properly now but I may tomorrow. Maybe in this thread or elsewhere if you don't want this to turn into a giant gaming tangent.

[Reverend Moon Immortal]

“How many Templists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”(just kidding)

But more seriously how would Templism define truth? I do not mean necessarily pertaining to a certain subject but rather truth in itself. Not “what is the truth,” but “what is truth.”

[The_Author]

Maybe in this thread or elsewhere if you don't want this to turn into a giant gaming tangent.

Yeah best not clutter it here.

[The_Author]

But more seriously how would Templism define truth? I do not mean necessarily pertaining to a certain subject but rather truth in itself. Not “what is the truth,” but “what is truth.”

There is a short epistemological section of TC in which it espouses empiricism. There is not directly a definition of truth. It is implied through the work that it holds a correspondence theory of truth.

[Roving Barbarian]

What does Templism say about death? As in, how Christianity says that we should trust God to choose the right time for us to go to heaven or hell. Also, what is the eschatological doctrine of Templism?

[The_Author]

What does Templism say about death? Also, what is the eschatological doctrine of Templism?

There is the metaphysical question about death, the physical, and the ethical.

The metaphysical answer is that death results in the reincarnation of the consciousness. The gods are said to influence where these "immaterial souls" go. I have talked a bit about this in the main thread.

The physical answer is that death can be avoided by breeding within a homogeneous group. Gene pools, ethnicities, local pools of common ancestors in a given geographical area, are immortal, potentially. It is presumed that all human activity is designed (non-deliberately, by evolution) for this purpose and perennial moral recommendations can assist with it, although less socially acceptable strategies are possible for certain people at certain times. It can also be avoided by memorialization, that is reproduction as a "meme". An interesting application of this is that lying is counterproductive to memorialization. Figures like Alexander III etc. do not really exist anymore, because they lied themselves into mythology and out of real resemblance.

The ethical answer, which usually looks something like "do not fear death, because blah blah" does not exist in Templism. Yes of course you fear death, don't lie to yourself, faggot.

The eschatological doctrine of Templism is of the eternal recurrence more or less as it was conceived of by Nietzsche. The universe will collapse and then expand into the same configurations before collapsing again. TC points out that any given collapse/expansion does not necessarily have to coincide with the end/start, because it is possible that multiple collapses/expansions exist within one world-cycle. At any rate the end/start have to coincide with a collapse/expansion. To return to your previous question, this means that all of your incarnations physical and immaterial will also happen for eternity.

[Hatsune Miku Clitoridectomy Groyper]

What is the benefit of following a patchwork cult of medieval cosmology made to conform to the Protestant lifestyle with non-Comically Evil Nietzschean thought thrown in here and there? Why should I not simply start lobbing heads in the name of Wotan? The whole fad sounds like a 'Nobody' thread from /x/ made less gay and Templism brings about no innovation to new-age schmegegges.

[The_Author]

What is the benefit of following a patchwork cult of medieval cosmology made to conform to the Protestant lifestyle with non-Comically Evil Nietzschean thought thrown in here and there? Why should I not simply start lobbing heads in the name of Wotan? The whole fad sounds like a 'Nobody' thread from /x/ made less gay and Templism brings about no innovation to new-age schmegegges.

Not an argument don't care.

[The_Author]

Anyone who asks a particularly astute question, especially one that is already informed about Templist philosophy, has the chance to be immortalized in the Canon in a potential upcoming Q&A post.

[Guest]

Anyone who asks a particularly astute question, especially one that is already informed about Templist philosophy, has the chance to be immortalized in the Canon in a potential upcoming Q&A post.

Perfectly themed to my question, what synchronicity!

It can also be avoided by memorialization, that is reproduction as a "meme". An interesting application of this is that lying is counterproductive to memorialization. Figures like Alexander III etc. do not really exist anymore, because they lied themselves into mythology and out of real resemblance.

If I commit great nation-state-level acts while anonymous (or ask great questions while posting as guest) could that allow me to propagate myself into memetic immortality? Maybe if I unify all my anonymous accounts/deeds/dialogue on my deathbed under a single pseudonym?

[The_Author]

If I commit great nation-state-level acts while anonymous (or ask great questions while posting as guest) could that allow me to propagate myself into memetic immortality? Maybe if I unify all my anonymous accounts/deeds/dialogue on my deathbed under a single pseudonym?

Yes of course.

[Guest]

You speak of the gods writing through you in creating the Templist Canon. Can you specify if this is in a sense of the intended meaning? The literal words? What role does your knowledge play in this - are you mostly reciting information given to you, or backing this up with your own efforts?

[ssa]

Author- first of all, the name alone is an incredibly audacious claim ontologically, can you back it up?
Secondly, I've taken a cursory glance at your writings, and you've got the right idea in more than a few places, though not all. One glaring issue is the very supposition that a religion may be founded on principles of overt pragmatism and (in spite of what you claim) a fundamental rejection of dogma. On the face of it, this seems like a retvrn to tradition, since PIE and Indo-European cults were essentially a-dogmatic themselves. However, they were also not religions.

Religion as a systemic, organized, hierarchical and authoritative framework for spiritual and social value framing is Abrahamic in nature, more or less invented by Akhenaten (Moses), and it's what drove the historically highly permissive Egyptian priesthood to radical action, deposing the Pharaoh and exiling him and the slave-caste followers who took to his degenerate teachings from the kingdom. More importantly, it's a topology that hinges on an absolute RHP monotheist cosmological backing, and requires dissolution into an external sole deity and subservience of the personal will to be the ultimate goals of spiritual practice.

The Indo-European cults were not religions, and all attempts to reform them into such failed, because anything that exalts the will and promotes personal heroism (virtue in your words) can't mesh with adherence to a religious authority. How do you plan on addressing this?

I'll grab a copy of the Templist canon when geography allows, and I definitely have more questions already. I'll leave you with these two for now.

[The_Author]

You speak of the gods writing through you in creating the Templist Canon. Can you specify if this is in a sense of the intended meaning? The literal words? What role does your knowledge play in this - are you mostly reciting information given to you, or backing this up with your own efforts?

Miscellaneous quotes regarding this question:

His only inklings of our true existence are the unusual “irrational influences” he sometimes feels while writing the Canon; obsessive-compulsive urges to write something in a certain way, to word something differently, to cease writing, to reflect before writing, or the intuitive sense that something he writes is “wrong” or “right”, or that “there is another part/sentence/paragraph, which will come if you wait or think a moment”.

The “divine influences” spoken of in Templist Canon are similar to those Obsessive Compulsive behaviors. They feel the same. They are arbitrary behaviors that are mandated by imagined threats, such as the threat of illness, or more often the mere threat that “the Canon will not be perfect”. They are the same impulse, to which I am apparently predisposed, recurred and utilized specifically for the purpose of perfecting the Canon. They compel me to make edits, to reread paragraphs, to include concepts, that I would not ordinarily.

So in short I am mostly writing under my own effort. What are called "influences" are generally editorial. There is however still the possibility, which is indicated in such passages as Q&A & Authorian Independence section What Are The Influences of Templism, that the Canon is also divine in the sense that the gods chose me to write it, and manipulate my life so as to make me choose to write it in certain ways, to make it consist of certain information that I happen to have read, etc.

I cannot comment if the divine influences concern an intended meaning or direct words. It doesn't matter though, because the Canon according to its design is supposed to be interpreted literally, even apart from my own interpretation of it (unless I should declare some such interpretation to be canonical). In other words, if I don't write down, within the Canon, a certain interpretation, then no plausible interpretation is forbidden. Interpretations are after all just words added to unclear words, and the words of Templist Canon are clear enough.

[The_Author]

Author- first of all, the name alone is an incredibly audacious claim ontologically, can you back it up?

The name is derived from the fact that Templism is supposed to consist of temple worship. I don't find this to be audacious at all because temple worship is a standard human behavior, deviated only in the last half century as in other degenerate centuries.

One glaring issue is the very supposition that a religion may be founded on principles of overt pragmatism and (in spite of what you claim) a fundamental rejection of dogma.

Templism is not a fundamental rejection of dogma. Templism is a dogma. A Templist must believe the Templist Canon as if it were infallible. Templism is a pragmatic dogma, contrasted with useless dogmas.

anything that exalts the will and promotes personal heroism (virtue in your words) can't mesh with adherence to a religious authority.

You are misinformed about the principles of Templism and must read more. Virtue is not personal heroism. Virtue is the set of aesthetic qualities that humans can possess so as to be good in themselves. The will in Templism is spoken of briefly as a way to conduct magic. If you imagine that Templism is suffused with the spirit of the uncouth barbarian hero-worshipper or whatever, or the permissive BAPite basically, you are gravely mistaken.

I don't actually care how Templism relates to ancient paganism. The standard that seems to have been set by Templist Canon is that ancient paganism and Templism are both particular dogmas that are created and utilized by the gods, and each was proclaimed when necessary, rather than that there is some sacred tradition to be preserved. Although there are certain similarities, indicating that those similarities are either eternal truths or otherwise that they must still be useful to the gods. I also don't care anything about the pharaohs. It is distracting to view Templism through any such prism. It is a collection of interwoven propositions, and those propositions are either true and useful or they aren't.

[ssa]

The name is derived from ... temple worship.

I meant your name. Think of its implications thoroughly.

A Templist must believe the Templist Canon as if it were infallible.

I understand your falsehood-lie distinction, particularly as regards your own belief in the canon, however this is the issue. You're claiming the canon as dogmatic, yet framing it in subjectivist terms. Dogma, at least within the religions which have garnered mass traction, has always been stated in absolute terms. You are stating a truth you do not believe in, yet you seem hesitant to empathetically and shamelessly lie- that is, mask your own disbelief- in the service of granting it greater authority. Note that authority is italized, that is central to my question on your name.

I'll hypothesize in advance that you might frame the canon subjectively even if you believed it yourself, simply because the type of civilization-shifting individuals you wish to inspire must implicitly adopt them on a utilitarian basis. If that is so, consider that one doctrine cannot be both pragmatic, and aimed at the elite, as well as dogmatic, and aimed at the masses. Even Christianity has evolved a tiered system of thought in subverting the empire.

Virtue is not personal heroism. Virtue is the set of aesthetic qualities that humans can possess so as to be good in themselves. The will in Templism is spoken of briefly as a way to conduct magic. If you imagine that Templism is suffused with the spirit of the uncouth barbarian hero-worshipper or whatever, or the permissive BAPite basically, you are gravely mistaken.

Then what you call virtue, I call heroism. We both agree on aesthetics, and likely on the will. 

[Paganism, pharaohs] ... It is distracting to view Templism through any such prism. It is a collection of interwoven propositions, and those propositions are either true and useful or they aren't.

My concern is exactly that- is this system useful? I agree that ancient paganism is essentially dead and ultimately useless in the current context. Understanding how it functioned and why it failed, however, is important in analyzing a proposed system which, like it or not, is a lot closer to paganism as it was practiced than any of its urbanite modern "revivals." I'm hesitant to use the term 'religion' in relation to your writings, for reasons I'll expand on now.

Religion, or re-ligere, is the act of mending the individual person's ties with the divine. The "divine" here takes an inherently monistic meaning, all but requiring a monotheistic outlook. What ties does Templism aim to mend, or, what's the general esoteric aim of practice, of personal spiritual development?

I'll close by stating that you've gained some considerable favor. This is not without its merits. I'll be posting a thread on metaphysics and practical magic in the near term. Much of the theory will outright contradict your own, other parts will differ in semantics. Take a look when it's there, you will find more of value than most.

[The_Author]

I meant your name. Think of its implications thoroughly.

It is a shorthand. It means The Author of Templist Canon.

You're claiming the canon as dogmatic, yet framing it in subjectivist terms. Dogma, at least within the religions which have garnered mass traction, has always been stated in absolute terms.

"Absolute" is beneath meaningful consideration. The opposite of subjective is objective. Templism makes objective claims. Whether or not I personally believe them does not affect whether they are true or ought to be believed. Templism is also meta-ethically subjectivist, but contains plenty of moral commands issued by the gods on the basis of threats and rewards. It also contains "divine suggestions", which are taken to be appeals to subjective interest that are so divinely wise as to be beyond anything a mortal could come up with to advise himself. Such suggestions and commands easily enable a dogma. Further, Templism is also exclusive, in the sense that anyone who does not initiate himself, and believe in the Canon as infallible, cannot call himself a Templist or associate with Templists. This is another incentive that adds to the dogma.

You are stating a truth you do not believe in, yet you seem hesitant to empathetically and shamelessly lie- that is, mask your own disbelief- in the service of granting it greater authority. Note that authority is italized, that is central to my question on your name.

This is very true and a particular quirk of my character. It is also part of the character of Templism. Templist Canon says:

Templism is self-consciously a way of organizing and rewarding “those like The Author”. It proceeds from his thought and so obviously those who think like him, and who are of the nature to accept it, will rally behind it. This is selfishly in his interest, but it is also in our interest. This particular kind is necessary for our present task.

The "particular kind" is those who are honest and not gullible, but a little bit sly. Authorian Reflections speaks of this at greater length:

I recall once reading, in some work of Plato I think it was, that Odysseus, despite being an eminently sly character, never told a lie in the whole Odyssey. I am rather like that. In what way is it really a lie if I tell you a false statement, and then tell you that statement is a lie? This is the same as saying “the following statement isn’t true”, which is not a lie. In Templist Canon, I tell lies, and I also say “these are lies”, and I further say “but it is necessary to believe them”. This is the same as saying “you should believe the following false statements”. This is an honest statement. Actually, more specifically, I say: “I believe that you should believe the following false statements, but, since I am fallible, these statements which I believe to be false might be true. You should believe them one way or the other” and ideally, as actually true.

consider that one doctrine cannot be both pragmatic, and aimed at the elite, as well as dogmatic, and aimed at the masses.

Yes it can. The tiered system of thought you mentioned is the tool that enables this. The difference is in what echelon the tier-system is based on. Christianity was built on a foundation of stupid shit for poor people, and it had to be rationalized by elites following that. Templism is built on an elite foundation, to be received by elites, the so-called Templist Vanguard who are prophesied to advance it, and any time in the future that it becomes necessary to proselytize to a lower rung, a simpler tier can be invented. Such simple tiers will of course be non-canonical, which makes them properly subordinate to something that isn't retarded and useless rather than the other way around.

Religion, or re-ligere, is the act of mending the individual person's ties with the divine. The "divine" here takes an inherently monistic meaning, all but requiring a monotheistic outlook.

This is not the definition of a religion. It is commonly accepted that Hinduism, for example, is a religion, and that the Romans, for example, had a religion (although that religion was not "paganism" in general). A religion is a belief system that involves gods, magic, and a creed.

Your supposition that religion is defined by a "monistic" divinity is unfounded. This aspect of your thought seems like some kind of weird quirk laden in jargon you have picked up I assume from some affectatious intellectual or another, who I in the tempelstaat would remove the tongue of.

You are pretending that religion, since it is etymologically derived from a "binding" to the divine, and since "the" divine taken collectively is something "singular", which therefore makes it "monistic" because "monistic" is similar to "singular", and therefore makes it "monotheistic" because "mono" means "one" and so therefore "monotheism" has a superficial resemblance to "the divine taken collectively and singularly", and in particular to the "mon" in "monistic", refers to binding oneself to a single god. Setting aside the illogic in jumping from "divinity in general" to "monotheism" that stems from an associational manner of thinking, definitions don't actually work that way. Things are defined by the concepts presently and in common language evoked by the word in question. This level of discourse is contemptible, and it is an example of the "particular kind" that the gods seek, to hate it. Whoever you read that stupid shit from, throw their shit away and read Templist Canon, presuming that you are of a "particular kind".

Casting stupid fucking bullshit aside, there is a real question beneath it. That is question is basically, "how do Templists relate to the gods and what is the canonical purpose of their doing so?" Templists relate to the gods by praying to them, receiving prayer-requests from them, following their laws and suggestions, as well as believing what the gods demand is necessary to believe "as if infallible". The purpose of prayer, first of all, is to obtain prayer-requests or positive favor from the gods. The purpose of prayer, secondly, is to propitiate the gods directly because the gods are eminently virtuous, and therefore more important than any human or human aim. The purpose of adhering to suggestions is to have a good life in the material world. The purpose of adhering to laws is, first of all, to reincarnate favorably because it is the gods who allocate immaterial souls. The purpose of adhering to laws is, secondly, to avoid the corporeal punishment of the gods and to gain corporeal favors from them. It is also said that initiation confers corporeal favors.

There is an additional factor which is present in Templism, but missing in some other religions. Most other religions are primarily relational. They concern one's relationship with Allah and how they follow his laws, etc. Templism, in addition, has a large component of humanity exercising that in the world which the gods want them to achieve, which is spoken of in posts such as Imperium, Kings, and others. So part of the canonical purpose of a Templist's relationship to the gods is, you may say, world-historical. Which all religions are, but not always overtly.