24. On Scotus Eriugena

Jakob Böhme has an idea that is very similar to this. He compares the world to an organism. Every single limb is alive. The hand is just as necessary to the whole of the organism as the foot or any other part of it. It is what it is only in the context of the organism. When the hand is separated from the organism, when it dies, it is no longer a hand; as a hand it must be permeated by the organic. Thus the manifold is only good because it is connected with the original source. Can this prevent one hand from injuring the other? Because the organism is made up of parts, it is possible for parts to come into conflict with each other. Thus disharmony is not rooted [in the organism]. But it can arise if the organism appears to us as a manifold. When the parts of the manifold have returned to unity, then disharmony can no longer come about, then the forces can no longer be turned against each other. As long as the world is a manifold, parts of it will continue to turn against each other. Although the whole is good and in harmony, disharmony is still possible. If we could see through time and space at a glance, then every single thing that seems bad to us would turn out to be good, every disharmony would cancel itself out in the harmony of the whole. We only see a part because we ourselves are a member of the manifold. Thus, for Scotus Eriugena, this doubt is resolved by the fact that he does not assume God's dominion, but God's integration into the world. Thus evil must also have only an illusory nature, and necessarily so, because God assumed matter.