This becomes a point of theology simply because Western Christians ignore it, or are hostile to it.
The essence of the Fall was choosing human reason over faith. Human reason and intellect is inherently hostile to genuine faith. To then rely on reason to justify faith is the height of stupidity. In Scripture, the very concept of faith — commitment to Jehovah as Lord — starts with subjecting the intellect to the heart. In the Bible, the heart is the seat of conviction and the sole point of contact with the Holy Spirit. Conviction is awakened by the presence of the Holy Spirit. Without conviction, the heart is merely the seat of sentiment, however strongly held.
The heart is also a sensory organ that can directly read and assess the divine moral character of God woven into reality. That is, the heart is able to discern moral truth from Creation itself. However, the mind was given by God to formulate and implement the human response to the demands of faith. The brain must be taught and conditioned by Scripture, especially the Law Covenants, so that it is ready to respond properly to the move of conviction and the wind of the Spirit blowing through our souls.
The breaking point is when the soul embraces self-death. This is when the very root of who we are kneels at the Cross, which is the current manifestation of the Flaming Sword at the Gate of Eden. The Old Testament’s turning the Flaming Sword on your fallen nature is the same as the New Testament’s nailing your fleshly nature to the Cross. There is no possible way of explaining in clinical terms how the soul arrives at that point, but we do know that Christ made it possible to reach that without first going through the Law Covenants. We have an advantage not available to folks who died prior to Christ, in that we can turn to Him as the Living Law. But all of this assumes you will still seek to know Biblical Law after embracing Him.
As those who seek to manifest the Covenant of Noah, we must understand that the heart-led way is inherent in that covenant. It is essential to serving Christ, Whom you cannot know without engaging the heart as the center of conscious awareness. You most certainly can belong to Him without shifting to heart leadership, and you can know that you are His, but you cannot follow Him without the leadership of the heart. That is inherent in the gospel message, because it was an a priori assumption of His Hebrew cultural and intellectual background.
This fundamental orientation was lost when Hellenism collided with the Hebrew people. This is the primary failure behind the Talmud and Judaism. The heart-led discernment is personal in nature; the intellect without the heart leadership presumes to be logical and objective, and refuses to admit that it cannot shed the personal biases of the flesh. The mind is arrogant and contrary to revelation. This was just getting rolling when Jesus confronted His nation and called them back to the ancient mystical ways.
In the New Testament, you can see references to faith, convictions and being led by, or filled with, the Holy Spirit. All of those refer to the heart-led way, but did not use such language because they took it for granted everyone understood it that way. Since those days, the church leadership of each succeeding generation drifted farther and farther away from it. Today we have major leaders insisting that faith must be reasonable, when Scripture says reason is hostile to genuine faith. Faith is inherently unreasonable.
You are not following Christ if you aren’t a mystic who follows the heart-led way.
“The mind is arrogant and contrary to revelation. This was just getting rolling when Jesus confronted His nation and called them back to the ancient mystical ways.”
Another possible future area to explore. What was the mind like, in Eden. We can only make guesses, but I’d venture to say it was in perfect harmony with the heart, like it operating on the same plane. The fall distinctly separated the two and the mind as an individual apparatus, could be utilized to grasp at truth. Obviously it’s not suited for that, but we can’t consume that revelation in the absence of conviction.