Abstract, Awesome, and Absolute

 

 

 

 

Blasie Pascal

1623-1662

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

       My very least favorite subject in school was English. I found its ideas abstract and annoying: “i before e except after c, and sometimes y, or unless it sounds like an a.” Now what kind of rule is that? Its not a rule, it’s a rhyme. A rhyme that doesn’t.

          My favorite subject was math.  A rule there is a rule. Period: the square of the hypotenuse  is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides. Absolute.  I never met a hypotenuse whose sides did not qualify.

          Then there is the awesome:  “In the beginning, God.” Or. “ For God so loved the world”.

    You will not meet many people  who are enamored by the abstract, the awesome, and the absolute all three. Blaise Pascal was one.

          Pascal was a 17^th century mathematician, physicist, inventor and writer. He invented the first calculator, postulated about the mathematics of fluid control, and loved the Lord. What a guy. His fierce ideas about Catholicism laid siege to the thinking of the priests.  (Did you ‘c’  all those i-e words in that sentence?)

          Two of my favorite quotes from Pascal are as follows:” Human knowledge must be understood to be believed, and divine knowledge must be believed to be understood.”

   And secondly, though not exactly quoted, is  “ there is inside each of us is a ‘God-shaped hole’–a place inside of our hearts that only God can fill.”

          Now let me garyphrase all that for you. (garyphrase mans to bring it down to where we can understand it): “No one can be happy in life until they understand Gods purpose for their life, and they can not understand that purpose until they first believe it.”