Boethius, The Consolation 3.31

. . . “Look then,” she said, “whether it is proved more strongly by this too: there cannot be two highest goods which are different. For where two good things are different, the one cannot be the other. Wherefore neither can be the perfect good, while each is lacking to the other. And that which is not perfect cannot be the highest, plainly.

“Therefore if two things are the highest good, they cannot be different. Further, we have proved to ourselves that both happiness and God are each the highest good. Therefore the highest Deity must be identical with the highest happiness.”

“No conclusion,” I said, “could be truer in fact, or more surely proved by reason, or more worthy of our God.”

'”Besides this let me give you corollary, as geometricians do, when they wish to add a point drawn from the propositions they have proved. Since men become happy by acquiring happiness, and happiness is identical with divinity, it is plain that they become happy by acquiring divinity.

“But just as men become just by acquiring the quality of justice, and wise by wisdom, so by the same reasoning, by acquiring divinity they become divine. Every happy man then is divine. But while nothing prevents as many men as possible from being divine, God is so by His Nature, men become so by participation.”

'”This corollary,” I said, “or whatever you call it, is indeed beautiful and very precious.” . . .

—from Book 3, Prose 10

An old joke has it that a bright-eyed young country fellow once met a fine young lady from the next town over. They fell in love, and the young fellow wanted to ask for her hand in marriage. He had still been raised with manners, so he called on the girl’s father.

As the girl and her mother sipped tea on the porch, the boy went inside the house to make his case. The women were waiting expectantly, when the young man suddenly stormed out the door, tears streaming down his face, and then ran off down the road, waving his fists in the air.

“Daddy! What did you say to him? He’s a good man!”

“That he is, my dear, that he is,” said the father. “But there was no way you two could ever be together. There was too much there to keep you apart, and I can’t have any daughter of mine being so miserable.”

Why, oh why?” cried the daughter. “He’s from a decent family! He loves me! He goes to church every Sunday!”

“Yes,” replied the father, “but he’s not our people.”

“Daddy, we’re both Baptists!”

“Yes, but we’re from the Baptist Congregation of America, and he’s from the American Conference of Baptists. Can you imagine how terrible it’ll be, when you both make it to Heaven, and you’ll be separated by a barbed wire fence for all of Eternity?”

Yes, it’s quite a corny joke, quite the eye-roller, but it also says quite a bit about how we like to divide, to fragment, and to break apart our happiness into little bits. The joke, of course, is about small-minded traditional prejudices, but the reality in an age that supposedly preaches such equality, solidarity, and universal acceptance is still not all that different.

Lady Philosophy gets straight to the point. The Divine, however we may squint at it, is that which is perfect, that to which nothing can be added. Happiness, however we may squint at it, is that which is perfect, that which leaves nothing to be desired. There are not many different absolutes, but only one. There are not many objects of bliss, but only one. Describe the same thing over and over, and you still have the same thing.

That which is complete, by its very definition, admits of no absence, for otherwise it would not be complete. There are no fences dividing the Universe, and there is no barbed wire keeping all of us apart.

For all of the striking differences human beings have from one another, they share the very same nature as human. For all of the perspectives there may be on what rules the world, there is only one world, and only one rule. Happiness, as the very end of human nature, is only complete when it is in harmony with the order of all things. They are one and the same, totally inseparable.

I have struggled with it, and I can’t seem to find my way around this profound and inspiring fact: we all proceed from the same origin, and we are all made to return to the same goal, and we are describing an identical thing. I am happy when I become most fully myself, and I become most fully myself when I become Divine.

I am not God Himself, but I am His creature. I become Divine not by being the Creator, but by participating as fully as I can in all that such a Creator is. I am like the part that only has meaning and purpose within the context of the whole, the effect that only makes sense through the design of the cause. Without this beginning and this end, there is quite literally no “me” at all.

I would sometimes snigger at people who spoke of being “Godlike” in their lives, perhaps because I saw so many for whom it was just part of playing a prideful game. To be like God, I began to recognize, was not about being everything for myself, but about being myself for everything. It was not about being served, but about being of service.

Any and every man will become like God when he shows love, complete and unconditional, for all that is. In this way, all of us are made to be Godlike. There is no need for any barbed wire fences.

Written in 9/2015