Musing on the fifth dimension

Theologians, philosophers, and scientists have pondered the possibility of a fifth dimension. The first dimension is a line between two points; the second a flat shape; the third a cube (all objects in the world are three dimensional); the fourth time. But a fifth dimension? There lies the speculation.

Here's my take on it. The world of spirit is the fifth dimension. It is confined neither to three dimensional space, not to time, but is "above, "around" "beyond" the four dimensions. We might say the fifth dimension is "eternal," different to space and time. In popular religion (in the west at least) when folk think about "after death" they tend to think about "living forever." This thinking entered the zeitgeist most likely because of the wording of the King James Bible that speaks of "everlasting life." The implication is a life that goes on, and on, and on, and on. In other words, still about time, just a very, very long time. So, when you die, you go on and on, just in anther "place." Place, too, is about three dimensional thinking. So, the popular understanding of "eternal" is living for ever in another place. It does not include the fifth dimension, which is something different altogether from places and times and objects. Alan Watts, thinking about the transfiguration at death (in 1947) speaks of "an eternal present, not an everlasting future."
Fifth dimensional thinking is found in Plato, where Plato speaks of the Forms. The Forms are eternal realities above and beyond the world of space and time. Everything in space and time is an imperfect copy, a reflection of an eternal reality. Human beings came from this reality and will return to it. This Platonic thinking has been very powerful. However, it comes often with a very negative view of the world. The human task is to move away from and beyond the world of sense and feeling, and to return to the fifth dimension. The four dimensions are imperfect, dross. Neoplatonic thinking synthesized with early Christian theology to produce a very negative view of the body (including sexuality). The body most to be feared was the female body—ever a challenge to the higher male body. In severe asceticism the body is best mistreated (starved, beaten, bloodied, abused) for that which counts as important is the spirit, which will one day break free of the body to return to Spirit.
In different guises and with different details, this thinking can be found in both west and east.
Some have suggested a different, minority, tradition that has wanted to affirm the world of four dimensions, without losing the idea of a fifth dimension. (Materialism, of course, has no time for the fifth dimension, for the world of four dimensions is all there is to reality.)
Pantheism is one attempt to affirm the fifth dimension in the world of four dimensions. There is "g*d," but g*d is all things. The chair I'm sitting on is g*d, the iPad Pro I'm writing on is g*d, the air I'm breathing is g*d. Because all is g*d and g*d is all, all is good. All is affirmed. Nothing is despised. (For readers unfamiliar with g*d written with an asterisk, it is a literary devise to suggest we don't really know what g*d is and better to signal that in writing.)
Pantheism is ultimately hopeful, but not quite satisfying for fifth dimension thinking! If g*d is the same as all, and all is the same as g*d then there is no fifth dimension. G*d, too, is enclosed in the world of four dimensions.
Panentheism is perhaps more helpful. All is "in" g*d and g*d is in all. G*d is "in" the chair I'm sitting on. G*d is "in" the iPad I'm writing on etc. but G*d is not the same as my chair. Panentheism tries to hold on to the transcendence of g*d (the fifth dimension-ness) while affirming the immanence of g*d in all things. Panentheism, like pantheism, is ultimately hopeful, despises nothing, but leaves room for transcendence, for the fifth dimension. (This was, I think, more the way of the ancient Celtic Christians, though they too could often look on the world disdainfully.)
If I accept something like panentheism, where does this lead me?
First, to wonderment. Everything has hidden within it g*d, another dimension of realty. Even the simplest thing has an "otherness" about it.
Second, to a joyful affirmation of the whole of life: all people, animals, nature. Nothing is rejected or despised. All are interconnected by g*d in all, the fifth dimension.
Third, to watch out for the experience of the fifth dimension. For though hidden within the four dimensions, every now and then the fifth dimension seems to break into and transfigure the four dimensions. It often lasts but a moment, but its effects last longer: an exquisite night, a day or two of wonderment. There are no guarantees than any of us will experience the fifth dimension. Certain kinds of prayer, meditation and mindfulness can prepare the way, open up the possibility, yet with no certainty. The experience of the fifth dimension is purely grace. Be glad if you have known it and be open to wonder today.