It is often said:
“By abandoning the self,
one receives Jesus as the true Lord;
and in doing so, the <I> dies,
and only Jesus lives.”
But is this really accurate?
What matters is this:
Within that very statement,
the one who kills is <I>,
and the one who receives is also <I>.
In other words,
despite the declaration that the self has died,
in the very act of “abandoning” and “receiving” —
in that cognitive operation —
<I> still stands firmly alive as a subject.
Put differently,
the proposition above is nonsense,
erected without sufficient philosophical reflection
or rigorous thought.
Is this not similar to the logic found in Buddhism?
That by killing the <I>
and killing the world as illusion,
one reaches liberation?
For while one attempts to kill the <I>
as the subject of desire and thought,
one fails to kill
the <self-I> who desires liberation.
The self does not die.
It only weakens.
The self does not die.
Its subjectivity
is merely damaged
by circumstances and by objects.