The opposite means of attaining Godhood in theological materialism

Traditional religious founders defined the soul and god as the absence of gross material desires, what Schopenhauer called the absence of willing, a state not connected to desiring material life. This was a deeply negative worldview and definition of god. The religious founders (Schopenhauer and Kant too) also linked this state of no-desire to the most "objective" kind of knowing.

That ascetic inward path is the opposite means of attaining Godhood from theological materialism, which brings life back to religion, and does not do so grudgingly, as St. Paul did, saying to a follower, in effect, "well, if you must get married than I suppose that is better than rejecting religion entirely."

The "essence" in theological materialism is called the Spirit-Will---although it is a material drive within material life---and it activates the desires of material life to evolve toward the highest success in survival and reproduction, defined as Godhood, working within whatever the natural environment may be, at any given time in the cosmos.

Unlike the views of the religious founders, and unlike Schopenhauer and Kant, the blocking of the will and the secession of all desires---and thereby the sucession, at least temporarily, of both desire and suffering---can only be seen as a symbolic glimpse of what it is like to fulfill sacred desires. But then, there appears to be no end to evolving life, no end to higher evolution, and so there are always gods arising and evolving in the cosmos, which has no end, and probably no beginning.

This is a worthy positive view of reality, fit for man and gods.