<div dir="ltr">Wow That's a lot to digest. I feel I've been genuinely out-theologized. However, I have to say that despite the clear conflict within a person in the form of different experiences, different drives, etc, I'm not focusing exclusively on that kind of "unity" in the sense of unidirectional experience. What I meant by unity of the soul was whether scientifically, so to speak, the speculative and investigative person would describe his immaterial self as "one" entity, despite the distinct dimensions of experience. Why or why not would we be able to describe ourselves as one? What definition or conept of unity would we require? What definition are we looking for when we talk about ourselves as entities distinct and separate from the divisible, particulate world of the physical? How about when we say that G-d is one? The problem is thus more epistemological and analytical than psychospiritual. For example, I just heard R Akiva Tatz quote the Ramchal as using the human notion of unity of the self to describe the unity of G-d. I also refer you to the medieval philosophers' discussion of the unity of the soul and of G-d, as in writings of Rambam, Ralbag, R Saadia Gaon. Though I tend to avoid getting tied up in medieval Jewish philosophy, which is more metaphysical than psychospiritual (like Maharal and the Gra who were Renaissance & forgive the term "Enlightenment" thinkers), but here their focus on the phenomonological is helpful for what I'm asking. It's hard to begin to ascribe transcendant qualities to the One True G-d if you don't know what it means that He is One. If however, someone were to focus only on a subjective spiritual view of religion, then actual phenomenological or mathematical unity is irrelevant, which is how unity of the soul ties in to my original post of whether holiness is an objective mode of existence or merely an emotional state.<br>
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