Escaping the Matrix

A. Boyd Gregory, Al Larson

Description

In some way or another most of us are "stuck"-in a secret sin we can't control or maybe by an inability to stand up for ourselves.In Escaping the Matrix, authors Gregory A. Boyd and Al Larson use the vehicle of The Matrix film trilogy to argue that our struggles with habitual sin, thought patterns, damaged emotions, and phobias happen because we do not know how to take charge of the way we experience reality. The authors draw on biblical and psychological insights to provide practical resources for helping believers escape the matrix of the world system that ensnares them. While this book is aimed at the newest generation of Christian readers, all ages will be inspired by the book's innovative strategies for experiencing a deeper life in Christ.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2005
• Nombre de lectures: 3
• EAN13: 9781441201379
• Langue: English

Extrait

© 2005 by Gregory A. Boyd and Al Larson
Published by Baker Books a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.bakerbooks.com
Ebook edition created 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-0137-9
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture is taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
Scripture marked KJV is taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
Scripture marked NASB is taken from the New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org
Scripture marked NRSV is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
The internet addresses, email addresses, and phone numbers in this book are accurate at the time of publication. They are provided as a resource. Baker Publishing Group does not endorse them or vouch for their content or permanence.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Introduction: The Bible, Neuroscience, and the Matrix
Part 1 What Is the Matrix?
1. A Splinter in Your Mind: Waking Up to the Matrix
2. Interpreting Electrical Signals: The Magnificent Brain and Its Neural-Nets
3. Entering the Matrix: Exploring the Nature of Thought
4. Waging War within the Matrix: Learning How to Take Thoughts Captive
Part 2 Escaping the Matrix
5. Opening Up Our Eyes: Getting Free from Matrix Images of God
6. Taking the Red Pill: Experiencing the True You
7. The Kiss of Trinity: Experiencing Freedom to Love
8. Matrix Revolutions: Overcoming Wounding Memories
9. Finding the Road That Leads Out: Overcoming Depression
Notes
Bibliography
About the Authors
Books by Author
Most of her life Mary had been depressed. She didn’t know why and didn’t know how to get out of it. She loved Jesus, had a near ideal upbringing, and went to church regularly. She had been in and out of therapy most of her life, took antidepression medications, and had been prayed for repeatedly including several attempted exorcisms. Yet Mary remained depressed. A not-quite-professional term Mary used to describe her condition was that she was “stuck.”
In one way or another, most of us are stuck. You may be stuck in a rage you can’t control or an inability to get angry when you should. You may be stuck in a fear of intimate relationships or an inability to avoid them, even when they’re inappropriate. You may be stuck in an inability to get excited about much of anything or in a virtual addiction to excitement. You may be stuck in a pattern of lustful thoughts or in an inability to become sexually aroused toward your spouse. You may have a compulsion to shop, an inferiority or superiority complex, a judgmental attitude you can’t shut off, a persistent feeling of guilt, an ongoing and pervasive anxiety, a tendency toward self-hatred, or an addiction to pornography. All are evidence of being stuck.
Now, no one likes to be stuck. It’s always life-inhibiting, usually painful, and often downright destructive. In all likelihood you’ve tried hard to get unstuck. Yet, despite all the self-help techniques you’ve tried, the willpower you’ve exerted, the resolutions you’ve made, and the prayers you’ve prayed, you remain the same.
What’s particularly frustrating and puzzling about this for believers is that Scripture seems to promise us that things would be very different. Aren’t we supposed to be “more than conquerors” (Rom. 8:37)? Aren’t we supposed to be “new creations” in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17)? Aren’t we supposed to experience abundant life and be filled with the love, joy, peace, and power of God himself (e.g., John 10:10; Phil. 4:18; 1 Thess. 1:6; 2 Tim. 1:7)?
What is the problem?
Oddly enough, we submit that a most profound clue to an answer to this question is found in the blockbuster movie The Matrix .[ 1 ] Few movies have captured the imagination of people like The Matrix , along with its two sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions . These three movies but especially the first one have inspired a remarkable amount of philosophical and religious discussion. Much has been said about the ingenious way in which the Wachowski brothers weave together Christian, Gnostic, Buddhist, and ancient Greek ideas, myths, and symbols. And a good deal has been written on the assortment of intriguing philosophical and psychological questions raised by these movies. Are humans free or determined? What is the nature of reality? Is technology a friend or a foe?
Yet, what is in our minds the most profound aspect of the Matrix movies has not been addressed. It concerns the basic metaphor of the Matrix itself.
In the movie The Matrix , humanity is enslaved by an artificial intelligence we ourselves created. Humans are kept in pods while their bodies are used as energy sources to support the machinery of artificial intelligence. To keep us enslaved, the artificial intelligence creates a massive, interactive, virtual reality for humans. And by meticulously controlling the neurons in our brains, the artificial intelligence manages to deceive us into thinking this virtual world is the real world. Though we are in fact enslaved in cocoonlike pods, we experience ourselves and our world just as we do now. Everything seems normal. Everything feels real.
The neurologically controlled virtual reality that keeps us imprisoned is the Matrix.
The most profound aspect of The Matrix and its sequels is the powerful way in which the Matrix metaphor fuses biblical truth with the findings of neuroscience. On the one hand, the metaphor illustrates the biblical concept of a “pattern of this world” (Rom. 12:2) that has an evil, cosmic force a “god of this age” (Satan) as its architect (2 Cor. 4:4; see also Eph. 2:2; 1 John 5:19). On the other hand, the metaphor brilliantly illustrates the neurological truth that our entire experience of reality is rooted in the electrical-chemical firings in our brains.
At one point Neo asks Morpheus if his experience in the Matrix is “real.” Morpheus responds, “What is real? How do you define real? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.”
The plausibility and profundity of the Matrix concept resides in the fact that Morpheus was speaking accurately to Neo. The fact is our entire experience of ourselves and the world is indeed a neurologically generated construct a matrix. Everything we experience is at base a network of neurons in our brains firing on one another in patterned ways. Everything you experience is in fact “electrical signals interpreted by your brain.”
The book you’re holding and the words you’re reading right now, the smell of your coffee nearby, the feeling of the weight of your body on the chair in which you’re sitting, the room you’re in, the sounds you’re hearing, your memory of yesterday, and your thoughts about tomorrow all are electrical-chemical reactions in your brain. Based on information stored in neurons, your brain automatically attaches meaning to every distinct aspect of this electrical-chemical activity. It interprets one pattern of electrical signals (called a “neural-net”) as a book, another as the smell of coffee, another as a chair, and another as a thought about tomorrow. And it interprets each of these activated neurological networks as conveying “the real world.”
Yet, it’s just possible that your interpretation of your electrical signals is wrong and herein lies the neurological plausibility of the premise of the Matrix movies. It’s just possible that at times something other than “reality” is stimulating your neurons to fire the way they do. It’s just possible that what’s activating the brain’s neural-nets is not the “outside world” at all but a sinister artificial intelligence or an evil, cosmic force.
The central thesis of this book is that, from a biblical and neurological perspective, the premise of the Matrix movies is not only possible, but to a significant degree it’s true ! No, we’re not going to suggest that our sense of the physical world around us is illusory. You really are reading a book right now. But we are going to show that much of what we automatically interpret as “real” is not true. A “god of this age” (2 Cor. 4:4) has seized the world and created a deceptive pattern, a “dream world” a Matrix that holds us in bondage. We are to a large degree conformed to “the pattern of this world” instead of to the truth of who we are in Christ (Rom. 12:2). We find ourselves imprisoned in patterns of electrical signals that we interpret as real but that are not true. Our experience of reality is to this extent aligned with the schemes of an evil Architect (Satan) rather than God. Hence, we do not experience ourselves as we truly are in Christ.
This, we shall show, is the most fundamental reason why Mary (whose story we will tell) remained stuck in her depression and why each of us remains stuck in one way or another. We are caught in the Matrix.

In The Matrix , Neo is offered a red pill that opens his mind to the bondage of the Matrix world and frees him to see and experience truth. It is our prayer that God will use this book as a sort of “red pill” for its readers. “Taking the re