Class on Journey to Reality Chapter 02: God, go, Arche'

In this episode, Fr. Anthony examines the nature of ultimate reality—God, gods, and the arche'—through Scripture and the Fathers. With insights from Journey to Reality, he shows how God transcends all categories and draws us into worship and transformation.  Enjoy the show!

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Ultimate Reality: God, gods, arche'
Fr. Anthony Perkins; 10 September 2025

Text: Zachery Porcu, PhD. 2025. "Chapter 2 – Ultimate Reality" in Journey to Reality; Sacramental Life in a Secular Age.  Ancient Faith Publishing.

Verses to Frame the Discussion

Exodus 24:10. And they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness.

Exodus 33:11. Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses turned again into the camp, his servant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, did not depart from the tent.

Isaiah 6:5. And I said: "Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!"

HE IS GREATER EVEN THAN THIS (SOME FUN WITH AN "INCONSISTENCY" 

Exodus 33:17-20. And the LORD said to Moses, "This very thing that you have spoken I will do; for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name." Moses said, "I pray thee, show me thy glory." And he said, "I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you my name 'The LORD'; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But," he said, "you cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live."

St. Ambrose: "Who shall see my face and live?" Scripture said, and rightly so. For our eyes cannot bear the sun's rays, and whoever turns too long in its direction is generally blinded, so they say. Now if one creature cannot look upon another creature without loss and harm to himself, how can he see the dazzling face of his eternal Creator while covered with the clothing that is this body?

St. Gregory of Nyssa: He would not have shown himself to his servant if the sight were such as to bring the desire of the beholder to an end, since the true sight of God consists in this, that the one who looks up to God never ceases in that desire. For he says, "You cannot see my face, for man cannot see me and live."

Scripture does not indicate that this causes the death of those who look, for how would the face of life ever be the cause of death to those who approach it? On the contrary, the divine is by its nature life-giving. Yet it is the characteristic of the divine nature to transcend all characteristics. Therefore he who thinks God is something to be known does not have life, because he has turned from true being to what he considers by sense perception to have being.

Job 38:19-20.  "Where is the way to the dwelling of light, and where is the place of darkness,   that you may take it to its territory and that you may discern the paths to its home?

1 Timothy 6:16. I charge you to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ;  and this will be made manifest at the proper time by the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords,  who alone has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.

John 1:18. No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.

On the resulting religion:

Revelation 9-11.  And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives for ever and ever, 10 the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever; they cast their crowns before the throne, singing,

 "Worthy art thou, our Lord and God,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for thou didst create all things,
and by thy will they existed and were created."

2 Corinthians 3:18.  And we all, with unveiled face, beholding[a] the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

St. John Chrysostom.  The Spirit is God, and we are raised to the level of the apostles, because we shall all behold him together with uncovered faces. As soon as we are baptized, the soul beams even more brightly than the sun because it is cleansed by the Spirit, and we not only behold God's glory, we also receive from it a kind of splendor.

Segue to the book chapter (theosis requires a repentant mind)

Religion should be more than our consumer society would lead us to believe it is.

"What is the nature of reality?"  What does it all mean?

Mankind wants to know, and he has tried to provide answers.  Many involve a mysterious higher power we call God.

The problem with the word "God."

[Psalm 94:3.  For the Lord is the great God, the great King above all gods.]
[Isaiah 45:5.. I am the Lord, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God.]

Zachary Porcu's solution: Arche'

Other solutions? Capital "G" God.  "I AM".  Unmoved Mover. Light.  True God. Tian, Brahman, Absolute.

What is the Arche' like? (P. 25; J) Life (essence).  Light (essence)

Arche compared to gods, angels, men, and rocks.

Last paragraph of chapter;

So then, when we ask about whether there is a God in this sense, we are not asking whether there is some specific superhuman entity that orders or governs the universe.  That is thinking far too small.  We are asking about the arche' of all being: the source, principle, the thing that is being itself.  This is the highest of all questions; there is nothing the answer does not affect. 

NOTE: The question of whether the God of the Old Testament was the arche' or a demiurge was settled decisively: God was, is, and always shall be perfect and uncreated.