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I'm writing about a union between man and God in Christianity. And this union has a property of not being confluent, meaning that the person of man doesn't dissolve in the person of God but they exist together in the union "not confluently but not separately".
What is the best noun to describe the property of "nonconfluence" or maybe this term fits well into this context?

To put it another way, I'm looking for a specific antonim of "separation" which means 2 become 1, like 2 rivers merge into 1 or salt dissolves in water. And then I need to negate this antonim. Negation is important, because I'm describing union between God and man by saying what it is not.

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  • duality; parallel; ...
    – Kris
    Commented Oct 29, 2014 at 7:13
  • Lamination. In fact, one could have "lamination lamentations".
    – Hot Licks
    Commented Oct 29, 2014 at 11:32
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    This sounds like a precise technical term in religious studies. You might get better response in christianity.SE
    – Mitch
    Commented Oct 29, 2014 at 13:04

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Two fluids which can't be mixed, where you cannot dissolve one in the other, are termed immiscible.

If you pour immiscible fluids in the same container and stir vigorously, they will be together, but stay separate, and create an emulsion.

Illustration of an *emulsion* in 4 separate states

Image credit: Wikipedia

Now, "numinous" means "permeated with the presence of divinity", so the situation you're describing might be termed a "numinuos emulsion".


If the literal, chemical answer is too clinical for you, there are some other options available from Catholic theology.

The words "indwelling", "circumincession” or "perichoresis", and "co-inherence" (all synonyms) are typically applied in the study of the "Trinity", and describe how the three persons of the Catholic deity can exist "together but separately" in one being.

But the words have also been applied to the relationship between the divine spirit and the body and spirit of a living person:

The crucial point, in a word, is that the relation to God, and to others in God, that establishes the individual substance in being is generous. The relation itself makes and lets me in my substantial being be. This “letting be” implies a kind of primordial, ontological “circumincession,” or “perichoresis,” of giving and receiving between the other and myself. What I am in my original constitution as a person has always already been given to me by God and received by me in and as my response to God’s gift to me of myself ― indeed, has also, in some significant sense, been given to me by other creatures and received by me in and as my response to their gift to me.

From David L. Schindler in "The Embodied Person as a Gift and the Cultural Task in America: Status Quaestionis"

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  • Is this the same or different from a 'colloid'?
    – Mitch
    Commented Oct 29, 2014 at 10:56
  • I think of a colloid as particles (solids) suspended in a fluid (liquid), but they're so well suspended that they essentially never settle out.
    – Dan Bron
    Commented Oct 29, 2014 at 11:04
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    Thanks for detailed answer. In my case immiscible would be the best choice.
    – leemour
    Commented Nov 7, 2014 at 15:51

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