Transformation of Consciousness as Messianic Age: A Kabbalistic View
Millennialist predictions vary as to what the transformations of 2012 are meant to be. For some, 2012 represents The End of the World, the apocalypse, the destruction of society, or even life as we know it. For others, 2012 represents an inflection point in human consciousness, a tipping point at which our age's accelerating growth in spiritual consciousness suddenly wins out over its equally perilous growth in material chaos and devastation.
In fact, this distinction -- whether the "next age" is about spiritual transformation or material destruction -- has long been a part of Western apocalyptic thinking. The latter tradition is better known: the Rapture, the End Times, the Apocalypse. However, the former tradition is also present in Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. In this essay, I want to share with you some of the Jewish traditions on the "spiritual view" of global transformation, and explore how it may indeed be underway today.
Because of Reality Sandwich's interest in 2012, I feel I should disclose that, as a longtime student of messianic and millennial movements (I am writing my doctoral dissertation on the 18th century messianic figure Jacob Frank), I remain a 2012 skeptic. There have just been too many Times of Transformation: 1666, 1848, Y2K (remember that?), and literally hundreds of others, now long forgotten. Then again, who knows? One of the benefits of the "spiritual view" is that it makes predictions less important. If 2012 is to be the time of global transformation of consciousness, then we'd be wise to get serious about spiritual practice now. If 2012 is not to be such a time, then we'd still be wise to get serious about spiritual practice -- because we're gonna need it to survive. Okay -- disclosure made.
To the sources, then. First, Judaism is both an historical and an ahistorical religion. Ahistorically, Jewish time is cyclical: the Sabbath comes every seven days, and our agriculturally timed cycle of holidays renews itself each year. This Judaism shares with other Earth-based religions. Historically, though, Jewish time is linear. We Jews tell stories of an ancient creation and hold hopes for a future redemption. We involve ourselves in history, in collective enterprises such as Zionism and individual ones such as righteous action on behalf of the less fortunate. For the Kabbalists, the cyclical and linear aspects of time represent the feminine and masculine aspects of Divinity, the power of Now and the trajectory of temporality.
One of Judaism's central historical tenets is the belief in a Messiah, a redeemer who in some future time will change, or even end, history. Jewish beliefs about the Messiah have themselves evolved over time. Initially, the Messiah was seen as a purely military/political leader who would bring independence back to Judea. Later, the Messiah became seen as a cosmic figure who would change the entire nature of reality. Likely under the influence of Christianity, the Messiah was sometimes seen as a semi-divine figure, even one who would atone for the sins of Israel. Because Jewish law is largely silent on matters of belief, all of these views have held sway at one time or another. Today, many Hasidim believe that the last Lubavitcher Rebbe will somehow return from "apparent" death to unite all the world. Many nationalists believe that an "inevitable" war in the Middle East will bring the Messiah. A handful of ultra-nationalists have even plotted to blow up the Dome of the Rock to get the party started. Fortunately, these remain a miniscule fringe.
In contrast to such traumatic and supernatural accounts of messianism, there has been a longstanding Jewish tradition to regard the messianic age as one of evolving consciousness rather than revolutionary history. This view has two major forms.
The first is what Gershom Scholem called the "neutralization" of Jewish messianism which took place in the Hasidic movement in the late 18th century. Contrary to Hasidism today, Hasidism then was a radical, spiritual renaissance. And it arose in the wake of a great historical trauma: the Sabbatean heresy, during which one-third of European Jews believed the Messiah had arrived and now walked the earth. After that Messiah converted (under duress) to Islam, the movement underwent a crisis. Many still believed; some followed their Messiah and converted outwardly to Islam, while remaining secretly Jewish. Many were disillusioned. But for most, the messianic impulse remained -- and remained unfulfilled.
In response, Early Hasidism claimed that the messianic "world to come" could be experienced here and now, in moments of spiritual ecstasy. That is to say, "There is no Messiah, and You're It," in the words of the contemporary writer Rabbi Robert Levine. This redefinition of messianism, which has its roots in older Kabbalistic sources, largely de-historicizes the messianic age. In its most raw form, messianism becomes more a state of mind than anything else.
But there is also a second, hybrid form, which brings together the historical and the ahistorical elements. This view is expressed in the eighteenth-century Kabbalah of Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto ("Ramchal"), reflected in the writings of the founder of Hasidism, Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov, and refined in the work of the twentieth-century Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, that brings the ahistorical and the historical views of the messianic age together. The messianic age, these sources suggest, is a time at which the consciousness that all is God will fill the earth. And it is a time which will come gradually, as more and more people begin to transcend the illusions of the separate self and realize the truth of their natures. The contemporary Kabbalist Rabbi David Friedman writes, "According to Luzzatto, the messianic era (the ‘days of Messiah') is the culmination of one huge evolutionary learning process which was conceived with the Universe, born with the emergence of Life, and becomes mature when Humanity easily achieves Divine Inspiration, Ruach Hakodesh."
At its apogee, such a change in consciousness becomes an apotheosis, not through transfiguration but by an understanding of the divine state we inhabit already. This is how a nondualist rereads the prophet Joel 2:28: "And it shall come to pass afterwards, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions." And it is how one may understand the epistle of the Baal Shem Tov, in which the rabbi is told that the messiah will come "when your teachings become publicized and revealed to the world, and your wellsprings have overflowed to the outside . . . so that others, too, will be able to perform mystical unifications and ascents of the soul like you."
Notice too the language of "the wellsprings of your teachings are spread out" around the world. Naturally, the eighteenth-century rabbi despaired at this news: how distant it must have seemed to him! Yet today, we may understand it somewhat differently. The "wellsprings" of the Besht's teachings -- that would be their source, not their final expression. And that source? That alzt is Gott, all is God, all is One, separation is illusion. And this source is indeed found throughout the world.
Imagine a world in which everyone understood that all of us are God. Not one in which each person thought he or she was God alone -- that would be disaster. But one in which the nonduality of Being was understood, in some form or fashion, by all human beings. This would be an entirely different world from the one we now inhabit, free of the conflicts and crises, petty and grotesque, which fill our moment. And imagine what it would be like, right now, to believe that, as Ramana Maharshi has said, "civilization . . . will finally resolve itself, as all others, in the Realization of the Self" (Talks, p. 256).
Such a time is, of course, far-off. But this conception of the historical evolution of consciousness helps contextualize, explain, and enliven the development of religious consciousness from its most primitive to its most refined stages. Religious consciousness evolves, as Spirit comes to know itself in history (Hegel). We move through different stages of individual and communal religious consciousness, each at our own rates, according to a myriad of circumstances. But we move toward one non-supernatural Omega point (Teilhard de Chardin): the knowledge -- the intimate knowledge -- that all is One.
Now, in our postmodern information age, the noosphere (Teilhard de Chardin again) is indeed upon us. Already, thanks to global information technology, the hidden mystical teachings of the world's religious traditions are accessible to everyone, as are the great wealth of scientific, cultural, philosophical, and artistic works from the better part of humanity. But even this is just the beginning. The internet, nanotechnology, and wearable computers are but the initial stages of a noetic revolution in which nonmaterial information may displace material matter as the ultimate future of the body. Most probably, we are only a few decades away from being able to upload our minds onto renewable data media. Is this the "immortality of the soul" of which some religions once spoke? What is the meaning of humanity if we are able to transcend the limits of matter? And more proximately, what is the significance of this new knowledge, accessible all over the world -- including, for our purposes, the highest truth (singular!) of so many spiritual traditions, that there is really no one either reading or writing these words?
The messianic age is already unfolding, in this interpretation, and the gradual emergence and dissemination of nonduality is among its signal phenomena. The wellsprings of the Baal Shem Tov's teachings have indeed spread out throughout the world; they are already flowing on every continent and in every city with unrestricted access to the internet. This changes things.
Indeed, the evolution in spiritual/religious consciousness is part of a larger process of evolution toward the "messianic" endpoint. One description of that process, found in the work of Ken Wilber, maintains that the general progression from stages of conventional consciousness to successive realms of unconventional consciousness (gross/nature mysticism to subtle/deity mysticism to causal/formless mysticism to nondual/both emptiness and form) mirrors the progressions of cultural systems, social structures, even the physical structures that compose the material corollaries to so-called spiritual experiences, and the orders of complexity of the material world. For Wilber, this progression can be represented as mineral>vegetable>animal>impersonal>personal>spiritual; for the Hasidim, it is domem>tzomeach>chai>medaber-inanimate, vegetable, animal, speech
What terrifies fundamentalists is that religious meaning evolves over time. Yet from an integral messianic perspective, that is exactly what it should be doing. There is no experience apart from interpretation, not merely because mystics must interpret their experiences according to the language and culture they know, but because those linguistic and cultural structures condition the nature of the experience itself. Perhaps "I" will "have" a "vision" of "angels," but all of the quoted terms are cultural constructions. The structural/historical conditioning of experience is unavoidable, so much so that it makes little sense to speak of "experience" or "God" or "mysticism" apart from the stages in which such experience is interpreted. Put simply, God looks different depending on where you stand.
From what Wilber (following the integral approach developed by the philosopher Jean Gebser) calls the magical stage, God looks like the provider who answers all of your (egocentric) needs. From the mythic stage, God -- as understood in your faith tradition exclusively -- is the sole source of salvation, and everyone who doesn't believe in Him is doomed. From the mental-rational stage, God is a moral principle and the Bible a useful, though flawed, teacher of ethical truths; other teachers may also be valuable. From the pluralistic stage, God is love, expressed in a thousand ways by a thousand religions, all deserving of respect. And from the various integral stages, God is variously Nothing, and all of the above.
Experiences of all types are available to all kinds of people. But the same experience will be immediately contextualized and interpreted according not only to one's religious/spiritual/scientific tradition but also one's "stage" of religious development. Perhaps an experience of light is a spirit, or an angel, or the Agent Intellect, or an opening to the Infinite -- all interpretations of luminous internal light found within Jewish mystical sources. Or perhaps it is merely an experience, which opens the soul but which, in and of itself, is no closer to God than waiting in line at the post office. The point is not that there is a True God perceived in these partial ways; rather, these partial ways define what is meant by "God."
In the beginning, our ancestors were animists, and polytheists. They believed in "power gods," nature spirits, warrior deities, fertility goddesses. Eventually, some came to venerate one sky god above all others, insisting that all the Divine energies in the world were from a single source alone. Later, philosophical thinking refined these notions of this single source, away from an anthropomorphic deity and toward an impersonal Oneness. Mystics experienced the One in love, and in so doing resacralized the whole world as the veiling and unveiling of the Beloved. Everything became seen as the costume of God. When we gaze into the mirror of the Infinite, we cannot help but project the contents of our minds onto It. And all of these projections are partial truths.
Finally, if a transformation in spiritual consciousness is to take place -- in 2012 or otherwise -- it must by definition be an inclusive, integral, and non-triumphalistic one. In contrast to adolescent images of God (or gods), nondualistic integral messianism does not exclude other traditions and does not depict "earlier" stage religious experiences as variously imperfect approximations of this one true one. No patronizing allegorization of myth and narrative. No reductive confusion of the prerational with the transrational. Neither the offensively naive privileging of mythic-stage gender roles, nor the erasure of mythic power in the attempt at egalitarianism.
Utopian ideal? Exactly -- and that is exactly the function of the messianic urge, here reconfigured away from nationalism, triumphalism, and supernaturalism, and toward the dawning of realization on earth. Will everyone be Christian or Gnostic or Jewish in the messianic age? Will a magical chariot descend from the sky? Of course not -- that misses the entire point. Rather, the nondual wellsprings of the Baal Shem Tov's (and many other) teachings will water a thousand plants in Eden, a biodiversity of spirit which, as in ecology, nourishes the whole by supporting difference. Consciousness will shift until such a point at which even the lion may lie down with the lamb.
We don't have to wait until 2012 to begin doing this work. Imagine the great shabbat, the great resting and relinquishment, that could unfold if we really believed that all concepts are masks. Our certainties and pronouncements would be interrupted by little notes of uncertainty, of unknowing, of remembering that the mystery lies beyond our grasp and that even sacred totems are only best efforts. We return, perhaps unexpectedly, to a state of wonder-both at the One and at the Many. Speedily, in our days . . .
Image by Crystal Writer, courtesy of Creative Commons license.
- 3-20-09
- Jay Michaelson's blog
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Interesting Viewpoint
Like Mr. Michaelson, I too am skeptical that anything will "happen" on 2012. I think of it more as a convergence point for people from all spiritual paths, a place where we can all meet as one, and in doing so perhaps move consciousness forward.
2012, for me, doesn't exist on the materialist plane. It is more like a different channel on the TV.
It'd be great if something happened materially--- though such a happening could engender fear and panic more than spiritual transformation.
And somehow, I don't think God is in the fear and panic business. That S/He leaves to us. :0
Last paragraph:
"all concepts are masks. Our certainties and pronouncements would be interrupted by little notes of uncertainty, of unknowing, of remembering that the mystery lies beyond our grasp and that even sacred totems are only best efforts."
Maybe not that the mystery lies beyond our grasp, but that there is no grasping to do - the mystery has been with us, in our deepest being, all along. We've just misidentified our true natures with with the made up/illusory concepts, creating disharmony, separation and constant grasping (such is the human condition). However the next step, I think, is realizing that we've been the ones creating this little game for ourselves. We are benevolent and have done it all in the interest of a return to harmony, wholeness, but now with an awareness of our being, instead of just the being. (The revealing!)
Rolling up the Hill
Spiritual/Cultural Progression...or Western Prejudice?
Excellent article, Jay..
But I want to share another point of view about Wilber's opinion,as written in this paragraph:
Ken Wilber, maintains that the general progression from stages of conventional consciousness to successive realms of unconventional consciousness (gross/nature mysticism to subtle/deity mysticism to causal/formless mysticism to nondual/both emptiness and form) mirrors the progressions of cultural systems, social structures, even the physical structures that compose the material corollaries to so-called spiritual experiences, and the orders of complexity of the material world.,
This is from Dr. Hank Wesselman, the paleoanthropologist (and shamanic practitioner) . He has spent many years with indigenous people all over the planet :
"In Buddhism, Yoga, Judeo-Christianity, and other relatively recent religious systems, ‘sky philosophies’ predominate in which the concepts of space and sky deities are of greatest religious import (i.e. angels, archangels and the Judeo-Christian sky god). In opposition to this are the earlier religious as well as indigenous traditions in which ‘earth philosophies’ were the norm, focused as they were upon the Earth as Mother as well as other earthly deities or fertility goddesses as the predominate objects of reverence.
Interestingly, in Aboriginal thought, both philosophies are present. The Earth is the basis for all spiritual studies during the first and intermediate stages of life. But with the approach of life’s end, the basic Earth study is completed and there is an ascent of spirit toward the boundless reaches of the sky.
Thus, for the Australian Aboriginals, the highest spirituality is associated not with the Earth, but with the infinity of space—with cosmic consciousness itself. This again is in complete alignment with the great teachings of the Perennial Philosophy.
At this stage, both the body and the mind are absolutely still. This is not the same state associated with the chakras as described in kundalini yoga and the other esoteric schools, for it is beyond such experiences. It is in fact a withdrawal of energy from the charkas so that they no longer have any effect on the mind whatsoever.
This is the state of dadirri, a form of deep listening.
Dr. Nandisvara describes this state as the borderland between the mind that is connected to this world, and the mind that is not connected to this world—the mind that is absolutely free.
This is the state that the Aboriginal elders seek as they leave their homes and go off to live in the mountains to practice gazing at the sky. This is the shaman’s invitation to the spiritual cosmic force to approach and embrace the focus of our mind. It is and was and will forever be, union with the infinite—authentic non-dual mysticism.
This is why the philosophical models of Ken Wilber, Jurgen Habermas, and Jean Gebser, and the writings of such seekers as Duane Elgin are flawed.
These ‘armchair theorists’ lack any direct experience of the indigenous world and from their decidedly Eurocentric perspective, they simply cannot accept the fact that tribal peoples achieved many millennia ago the authentic mystical connection with the transpersonal worlds that they believe is only available to the “advanced” mystics of the eastern and western religious traditions…
It is also interesting to me that the writings of these theorists sidestep the whole issue of spirits.
Although we Westerners do not live in societies in which experience with spirits is part of our daily reality, the fact remains that more than 300 years of ethnographic writings from travelers, seekers, and the early anthropologists confirm that shamans are able to enter into relationship with spirits, and through their assistance, accomplish various things—like healing for example.
It is time, I think, to acknowledge that the indigenous tribal peoples were not and are not at some child-like form of awareness. Rather, the time has come for us allegedly ‘civilized’ Westerners to seriously reconsider their worldviews and their spiritual practices.
Their ways of being in the world have kept them and their societies alive and well for 40,000 years and more… while we who consider ourselves so highly evolved have only been here for a few hundred… and things are not going well."
http://www.themetaarts.com/2008april/hankwesselman.html
"Wanderer, there is no road,
the road is made by walking". Antonio Machado
Pasito a pasito,Todo quiere ser querido.
Misunderstanding Gebser
I feel the need to step in and defend my boy Gebser. While I can't speak to the writings of Habermas or Elgin, philistine that I am, I am pretty well acquainted with Jean and kw.
While Wilber does take Gebser's terminology and cast it into his own teleological model of progression, Gebser always feels the need to refer to progression as a fiction, "progression." In fact, his ideas about time — specifically linear time as a rational construct — render any notion of progress impossible. What he urges is in fact “time freedom.”
When Gebser speaks of magical and mythical structures of consciousness, he doesn't mention them as being less evolved or less capable of mystical experience. In fact he would argue that it is precisely in those structures where mystical experience occurs. He uses the words “archaic,” “magical” and “mythical” far differently than Wilber. Experiences Wilber labels "transrational" take place in Gebser’s model in the structures with the same names as Wilber’s “prerational” stages, though there is in fact only a partial overlap between what the two writers are referring to with those words. This is precisely the problem with Ken's model: the idea that all true mystics have somehow progressed through a rational and then a postmodern "green meme" stage on their way to enlightenment is patently absurd, as if Buddha developed a Newtonian worldview before moving onto his Derrida stage.
What Gebser does suggest is that it would be useful for the modern West to reclaim the mythical and magical structures. Otherwise they will continue to operate, but beneath the surface and in the shadows with tragic results (it is important to note that “Ever-Present Origin” was written shortly after WWII, the disaster of which her partially ascribed to a deficient, unconscious magical structure that led the Germans to a kind of nationalistic tribalism and the ascription of totem powers to Hitler). The trick is to do this reconnaissance without badmouthing and purging our mental/rational capabilities (think of all the New Age “literature” that would have us stop thinking so that we can listen to our feelings, as if following one’s feelings was a surefire way to sound judgment and not a balance between head and heart).
After all, we moderns live in a world that has been shaped by the mental/rational structure, and our analytics are needed in order to solve some of the problems caused by their current, deficient mode of operation. Neither the magical, mythical, mental or archaic structures can do it alone, but if we INTEGRATE all of them, then the species stands a shot. When Gebser says Integral, this is what he means, and not some deep state of Samadhi, the exclusive pursuance of which he states is not Integral, but a fleeing into the mythical. Once again, developing the mythical is fine, but not at the expense of the other structures.
Also, it should be noted that Gebser does except the existence of gods, spirits etc. While such entities are not real to his mental/rational structure, they are real to magical and mythical structures, and are thus not to be regarded as mere regressive delusions — in the Integral, they would be both real and not real and neither real nor not real, one of the key traits of his Integral being the elimination of these binary “either/or” distinctions.
Once again, he does not consider archaic/magic/mythic structures as primitive, and in fact regards them as the appropriate structures for people living in certain societies. The problem is when we moderns with our giant cities and powerful technology seek exclusive refuge there rather than an integration among all of our structures. As much as some might like to, we cannot simply pretend the rational structure never happened, and denying it is as dangerous a denial of our own capabilities as rejecting any of the other structures.
This is part of what pisses me off about so much Wilber. His writing (along with the tragically overlooked William Irwin Thompson) turned me on to Gebser, but after reading the German polymath I came to find that kw takes all of Gebser’s terminology, plugs it into his own (rationally biased) system, and then says “See, this is what Gebser talked about. But he never mapped the Transrational! You have to read me for that!” when Gebser does cover the “transrational” in a work is far more subtle, erudite and profound.
Though I suppose now the Wilberite will say that Gebser committed the “Pre/Trans Fallacy”…
Retrieving a integral indigenous cosmology
Thank you, G-Pack,
it's a useful diferentiation.. I have to confess I don't know well Gebser...
I put the piece by Wesselman because I read it recently and I thought it was a good one on the debate of the so-called integralism...
Since the first time I read Wilber, many years ago, I "felt"(as in "felt sense" in Focusing, http://www.focusing.org/ ) something "wrong" about his view.
Years later, I read, for coincidence, a entry of his published "Diary", where he mocks with incredible arrogance,of the green movement, Clarissa Pinkola Estes...
Later on, reading a Stan Grof book, I found a passage where Grof tells how Wilber doesn't recognise at all the range of transpersonal experiences of identification with the mineral, vegetal, animal realm of the Earth that can be experienced again and again with entheogens, breathing..etc,( or spontaneously) ...is that an "integral" view..or an dangerously isolated, solipsistic buble..?
When I read he practices,and recomends "bodybuilding" as a physical practice, I understood with a sudden insight: Ken Wilber is escaping from his feelings, "armouring" himself against them...I imagine what Wilhem Reich could comment on that preference....
Later I had confirmation, through other persons, of incidents related to his emotional inmaturity... that I feel, compromises and makes unbalanced and flat his "integral" view...
So, I agree with you, we need a real integral cosmovision; integrating what the post-jungian psychologist Stephen Gallegos call "the four modes of knowing": Thinking, Feeling, Sensation, Deep Imagination("Dream Time"),with Intuition manifesting through any of them.
Interestingly, from his direct experience with the Psyche, Gallegos says Feeling and Imagination(Dream Time Consciousness), are the most damaged modes of knowing in the western world, in sharp contrast with indigenous people all over the world, who treasure feeling and imaginal as really important for survival, as Hillman says :
"When a farm is subdeveloped, acres of trees go down or there's an oil spill in town, you feel it deeply and it goes on in you for so long, every time you walk past that place," said Hillman, who has successfully fought road extensions and subdevelopments in his town. "That never comes into consciousness. It is never talked about on the community level. People all know this inside their bodies. That's the horror. It hurts. When I see old healthy trees go down it hurts."
The real problem comes when that person then tries to convey that feeling at a Planning and Zoning meeting, which is a cut and dried forum. How does one quantify the impact on a community's psychology of sprawl, widened roads or oil spills?
"It is almost as if we need a huge revolution of thinking, and I don't think it's a spiritual revolution either," said Hillman. "It's something else. It's that feeling of being hurt when those cows are gone and you walk past that place and you see those houses stretching to the horizon. How do you present that in the cosmology that rules the world, whether you call it bottom line thinking or administrative language, whatever system you want to call it, that rules the world, all the world?"
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/20714
"Wanderer, there is no road,
the road is made by walking". Antonio Machado
Pasito a pasito,Todo quiere ser querido.
Four Modes/Four Zoas
"The mountain teaches the Dreaming"
Yes!! I love Blake..."Eternity is in love with time productions"
For years, some verses from Whitman, Blake (Proverbs from Hell) and Novalis (The disciples in Sais) , the poet-seers, have been my dearest "soul medicine"...now, I appreciate their inspired, inspiring words, more & more...
Now I'm hooked with Antero Alli's work, specially with his recent shamanic/ecopsychological "re-calibration":
http://www.paratheatrical.com/guboo.html
G-Pack, thank you for sharing the information about the 4 Zoas
"Wanderer, there is no road,
the road is made by walking". Antonio Machado
Pasito a pasito,Todo quiere ser querido.
Danke
And much gratitude for the information on Antero Alli. He's new to me, and it is much appreciated.
As you can probably tell by my posts, while I am familiar with other traditions, I am most intimate with the "Western" philosophical/poetic canon, from Homer and Plato on down to Jean Gebser and Thomas Pynchon. While the West certainly has its shortcomings, it is also a dynamic producer of genius like Blake and Whitman (my favorite poet), and I always feel compelled to defend at least the best parts of the tradition that produced these folks.
But I am always very happy when someone adds another degree to my compass, allowing me to draw a larger circle...The next phase in humanity will have to harness the collective cultural memory of the entire species (and even those life forms that proceeded us) from every corner of the globe. The past can never be repeated, but the future is only created out of its remains.
Or, as the Greeks said, the muses are the daughters of memory.
Once again, gracias.
Hmmm. Interesting . . .
I can think what I want, do what I like, and eventually . . . someday . . . I'll be right!
. . . according to popular or synthetic amalgamation!
How interesting!
======================
[Obligatory cutesy quote here]
Let's go!For sure, we can
Let's go!
For sure, we can broach new horizons by being fearless and bold and courageous and . . . .
What?
It seems to me it possible that we might miss something in the bold statement:
Everyone is God.
Yet, without a verifiable standard as to what 'God' is, we might be blowing wind.
For example, to take an etymological approach, we find the word has in the Indo-European lexicon, something very vague, but akin to 'awe'.
We see in modern extant language the sound of our Germanic-Saxon terminology the term that corresponds to 'Good'.
In numerous other languages and their roots, the word for the 'Supreme' being or 'Cause' doesn't sound at all like this word: 'God'.
The prophets took some pains to delineate, at least in my reading, that the 'highest Principle' was very concerned about issues of kindness, justice or fairness, 'right-use-ness' or 'righteousness' and equity and all that such terms entail and a willingness to sacrifice selfish interests for the sake of either elderly or widows, orphans, and the disenfranchised or the bereft: the poor.
In Hindu lore, in the Upanishads, it is said: To say the word 'AUM' (OM): is to be instantly poor.
That is, if we are generous with the poetry all these lore and saws are rendered in: we have a short-handed way of talking about another issue as to of what 'Divinity' is concerned.
And it seems not easily reducible to just 'physical' or 'personal' poverty, at all.
It does seem to point to the attitude of generosity and charitableness that allows others to have what the realizer finds as a fundemental truth: all things do exist and the substance of that existence is not confered by any one on another one. Period!
Or the 'Law' is defunct in the very first: no real good but 'I AM'. Our version of 'consciousness' isn't original. It is derivative due to language. As language adumbrates or limits root cause or causes.
And I should trust your version: why?
By our fruits: we are known.
By the means we use: we are known.
Don't like the means? We have the right to revolt, or even so-called 'law' would never change.
Thus, in the perspective of this kind of approach to what 'shines' (DIV) or what is 'glorious', we are advised: let not the strong 'glory' in their physical strength or any form of strength, but let them glory in the ability to be kind, fair and truthful or factual in what they aver and avow.
Vow and pay is an ancient saw that obtains not only in spiritual terms but in commercial terms.
Otherwise, we become liars.
So, say "I AM GOD"! By all means! Vow and pay.
For my money, this has to be only a self-admission of responsibility to all others about the facts that obtain for everyone else, even if not everyone else says such or has appropriated the WILL that must follow along after that or in that. And that is mostly about service as the very joy of living. Otherwise, the statement is a symptom of the most inflamed form of ego that there can ever be. And in that case: madness therein lies.
This might explain why for some traditions, saying or referring to that at all is always by a surrogate term.
Once we put our hand to the plow, we must make furrows, plant and heal-in the seed and tend this to maturity. Otherwise, we have these false starts and perhaps starve thinking: I dug the furrows!
We are also advised: don't start something you are unwilling or unable to finish.
NOt that I think this something very difficult when disburdened from all manner of detritis or false-extrapolations added on to the simplest of tasks: plant, grow and reap.
There's work there. No doubt. It seems the work involved is what dissuades people from doing the thing to the end aimed at.
That is a question of habit and efficiency of taking as much as can be distributed evenly by a judicious method.
Piece by piece.
These are purely moral issues; the issues of the energy required to finish moral self disciplines and expunging from personal character the things that might revert to selfishness and so leave the entire task unfinished WHICH can result in profound confusion and a lashing out that is utterly self-defeating no matter how far the personal work progressed. All can fall.
I believe that this kind of backlash stems from a sense of guilt and self-recrimination that stems in turn from really not accepting outwardly what the inner impulse attempted to convey: you are as good as the good you present. So it behooves us to study good and goodness and the wisdom of goodness. Then, perhaps, we will truly respect the goodness of wisdom as a secondary approach or in its ways back to the simpler thing: good.
The latter is simple. The former is varied and highly complex and always seems to devolve on different tongues and traditions. So we are advised by the wise: sifting and winnowing and getting kernals and germs that can sprout and grow and nourish. We are also advised in the most ancient of our traditions: the seed shall be your meat. But we seem to think eating the fruit without the seed, having life in it: that the mere fruit is enough. This is against the advice.
Such may be what you mean: The unification of the 'selves' or the patterns of thought that may here and there be appropriated or accepted as probative or valid but which don't stand the test of time? And the 'last one standing'? good? And so perception of good evolves?
Evidently we are pointed to a simpler way: be nice. Be kind. Share. Don't plow all the way to the corners. Feed the poor. Be generous. Do as you would prefer that others do to you. This is, evidently, the core advice. In that case: good. What tends to starvation or sterility? Not so good.
Some call this 'individuation' or 'internal unification'.
Yet something still stands quiet apart and remains dubious when we even say: 'that's right!' and 'amen'!
Suiting action to word is one thing. Making both word and action subservient to a well honed will: that's another.
-30-
Cyclic Progression
So-called progress will always be as micro-cosmic as macro cosmic ... following along the lines of Zorro's last coment ...
That there is no such thing as linear progression. That the stages of development are as much within ... individual ... as without ... collective ...
That there are also larger and smaller versions of "collective consciousness" ... family, community, nation, species ... all beings ... etc.
Each and every version, large or small follows similar principles of development, always cyclic however ... never standardized ... {the information age dream}
Even in relation to micro-cosmic chakra understandings ... there are daily "up and down the energy centers" ... there are the weekly and/or fortnight influenes ... {Sabbath-moon cycles etc }... solstice developments, seasonal ... yearly ... etc etc.
As we become more advanced in age, we tend to revert to a childlike simplicity ... seeing grandchildren as equals ... learning more than teaching.
There is no expansion of our human species that does not have these natural "momentums" of organic cylclic development ... all the way up to a global humanity sharing the planet as a collective.
It is just never frpm point "A" to point "B" ... but rather "from zero" {Zero Point Field State} to "of zero"
The very attempts to describe "inconceivable sublimity" in terms of "pragmatic empiricism" is also nothing but a mere cyclic tendency within the collective.
Every thinking society has variations on this theme ... from secular humanism to belief for belief's sake religion.
Back in India, around the time the Bhagavsd Gita was being spoken 5100 years ago ... there was about the same percentage of mixed philosophical tendecies that there are today.
Just like every religion has it's monks and it's warriors ... it's musicians ... and merchants ... it's fantical fundamentalists ... and it's scholars ... non-different from secular versaions.
There are alway similar variations in philosophical tendencies leaning more towards the material ... or more towards the spiritual. ... and all the "shades of gray" mixtures inbetween.
Individually we have infinite moments of all of these possibilities before us ... collectively ... nothing new under the sun either
The trick of the mystic {poetic license} is to not bite the fruit of "speculative judgement" ... for it is never possible to understand the nature of developmental cycles of dharma ... separate from experiencing those cycles in real time
Not a one of us may share the views we intrigue ourselves with today, in the distant tommorows of yesterday
... "knowing" is always stationary ... "knowing about" forever cycles around ...
My latest vision...
Order of operations
A 'linear' or linearlity is a 'bugaboo' for some.
"For Wilber, this progression can be represented as mineral>vegetable>animal>impersonal> personal>spiritual; for the Hasidim, it is domem>tzomeach>chai>medaber-inanimate, vegetable, animal, speech."
Are you sure you have this right?
You may have. I find that very interesting if so.
It's even possible that a primal source is not, either, 'alone'.
You probably know about the format of writing that is extant and propogated by even modern-day Hindus derived from, I think, specious interpretation of the original Sanskrit:
The Vaisnavas like to tell that Vishnu while sleeping on Ananta (the symbol of 'vitality' for a Churchward refering to the people of 'MU') and both in the 'Ocean of Milk' as 'First Cause' . . . yet Vishnu is awakened from His 'serene repose' (to paraphrase Emerson) by: HIS WIFE, who aimed her Husband at two 'characters' wreaking 'havoc' in this primal condition!
In Mahabharata, in chapter 'Bhagavad Gita' (a mere chapter), when an elder was killed by numberless arrows and who yet chose the time of this death, according to this 'record': many different people appeared out of 'nowhere' to commemorate this dying warrior.
'All the Gods' was there. Krishna was there (NOT his brother Baalaram, though), and this goes on and on and the poet, very 'Shakespeare'-like took liberties: AS WRITING.
Who is this 'All-the-Gods' fellow?
These 'gods' talked about past events as if present and future events as if current. Yet they are given as if the Sanskrit used 'past-tense' terms.
Wonderful!
Genius! even.
How liberating!
Yet we are under the impression, still: nothing really to learn. No REAL growth! Just a GORDION KNOT of ever-present issues revolving about a simple 'play'.
Do we go: ergo: we must all play our role and accept that there is only GOD being all players?
Or, so assuming, do we castigate 'complainers' for either a 'small part' or 'too big' a part or role?
Well! Then, if so: what we complaining about?
Here's one possible answer: adoption of such 'philosophy' may merely be 'rationalization' for being LAZY.
Lazy thinking which is then vouchsafed as 'veritable' because simply put in the DOGMATIC VOICE proves . . what?
We are, of course, capable of being damaged by assumptions and presumptions.
And if there is any factuality contained in the generalization that an whole is differentiated into many parts which contain the same original 'potency', we would still have to find a way to negotiate the perturbations lacking perfect memory that must arise as we 're-learn' this.
This is what I deem implied by a 'non-linear' assumption and ALSO, the idea that some linearity also exists. Hence, that some forgetfulness perforce must be entailed. Otherwise: there would be no arguments.(?)
This discussion (not my own as above) is concerned with very deep stuff.
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IOW:
Speech versus speaker ('man')
History of 'thoughts' and the ways that schools of thoughts are 'conquered' or 'incorporated' or 'accomodated'.
The methods of delineating such 'histories' as summations and 'personalizing' such as mnemonic-methods. Etc. and later generations misunderstanding ancient methods of 'intelligence'.
And not even talking about side-issues of 'sciences' existing 'back then'.
Possibles.
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I critique Wilber in my
I critique Wilber in my masters thesis, "Epicenters of Justice" (2001) linked at http://nonduality.com/hempel.htm
On distance healing -- thanks for the clarification -- I was a TEST case for Jim Nance doing DISTANCE healing and I assure you it was VERY effective. He was opening my third eye and my brain was burning up with bliss. Essentially I was at the qigong class and everyone was gone except me and Jim who was still in full-lotus. He said he was going up stairs to meditate more and I said: Can I join you? He said MAYBE LATER. So I was thinking that maybe in a later class I could join him which would be awesome. I bike home and I hadn't had any food that day even though I had biked some 10 miles to 15 miles. So I dumpster dived some bagels -- the total ANTI-qigong diet. haha. THEN I went back into full-lotus in my room and for some reason the energy was so strong in the center of my brain -- burning hot with bliss -- I had to STOP meditating because it was just over-whelming. The only time that has happened is when Chunyi Lin, one time, also did a distance healing on me during his retreat -- he had left the room after reading my aura (and I had been fasting for a week with just half a glass of water). So I knew the energy I was experiencing in my third eye was way more powerful than my own energy and it wasn't from the full moon since it wasn't the right time. Nevertheless I let it go, just accepting that the energy was overwhelming me and I had to stop meditation.
I continued my week where I sit in full-lotus every day, etc. I bike to class the next week and before class starts Jim Nance pulls me into the hallway, looks into my eyes and says: DID YOU FEEL ANYTHING? I look at him at first in ignorance. I think for a second and then remember what had transpired between us after class and then what I had experienced the same night. I was COMPLETELY FLABBERGASTED. I couldn't say a word. I just looked at him and he knew what I was thinking and I might have said: "that was you!" But I think I didn't even say anything. It was shock. That was in 1995 -- right before Jim Nance was declared a qigong master by Chunyi Lin.
To do distance healing Chunyi Lin just needs the first name, age, sex and location (city) of the person he is healing. I would assume it's the same for Jim Nance as well. The CONSCIOUSNESS does the healing -- so you focus that information and then from that conceptual awareness you GO INTO THE EMPTINESS -- aka consciousness -- and the information gets transmitted by the consciousness to where it needs to go. Jim Nance told me that when he goes somewhere he REALLY IS THERE -- it's just as real as being awake. So he can definitely do long distance spirit travel healing.
One time in the class back in 1995 Chunyi Lin was teaching long distance healing and asked for anyone who needed healing. The lady in front of me said her friend was in the hospital and very sick. So Chunyi Lin got her friend's name, age, sex and did the healing. You could see him focus his awareness back into his third eye and his eyes were still open but they were looking into nowhere really. The healing just took a couple minutes -- and that's how long the phone healing takes as well.
The next week in class the lady was in front of me and she said that EXACTLY at the time Chunyi Lin did the healing her friend in the hospital recovered. The lady in front of me was STUNNED and literally went into shock -- saying: BUT HOW CAN YOU DO THAT? Chunyi Lin nonchalantly raised his arms to stretch while the lady was getting more and more worked up -- starting going into hysteria. Then an amazing thing happened. Chunyi Lin slowly lowered his arms and as he did so he faced the palm of his left arm towards the lady (right in front of me). We were several rows back so maybe 15 feet from Chunyi Lin. Suddenly I felt this ball of energy (blissful electromagnetic heat) shoot into the lady and she immediately calmed down into this peaceful state. I was amazed -- NO ONE ELSE SEEMED TO NOTICE -- it was just because I was right behind the lady that I too felt the energy. Otherwise Chunyi Lin acted as if nothing had happened and the class continued.
Transformation of Conciousness
Jay, I am new to this website and would like to say I found this article very inspiring. I perceive you have a healthy skepticism about anything big happening on 12-21-12 while also having an open mind about the potential for a higher form of conciousness to arise for humanity and showing how it may happen in a way that is beleivable.
David
Poison
The doctrine that "all of us are God" is poisonous and will not lead this or any culture to humanity.
http://www.tranceparents.org/
I'm hoping poisonous was a typo
the date is unimportant
The date of 12/21/12 is unimportant, though beautifully synchronous, a bit of a cosmic pun perhaps, with the next year of 2013 suggestive of the 20 X 13 matrix of the Tzolkin.
This article in itself reveals the process that is underway and is accelerating. I think it is clear that this time is not like other times in the amount of creative and destructive potential available to humanity. Either we master ourselves and our projections into matter in a relatively short period of time, or we will not have much of a future ahead of us. The rapid dissemination of esoteric traditions and a nondual worldview is a crucial piece of the puzzle. Separation and dualism have been promoted by the state, by religions and corporations that seek to maintain power over people. The mass media has locked the mass consciousness in a miserable egotism. Nonduality just needs a better marketing campaign. It could catch on fast.
With the global communications and social media currently at our disposal, we have a window of opportunity to disseminate a new signal, a new frequency of consciousness, around the world.
The same tools that have been used to indoctrinate people and make them into slaves can now be used to liberate them.
The collapse of the financial system is going to accelerate this process in many ways. When people have time on their hands, they will start to see through the deceptions and self-liberate. They will then use their skills to help others.
"Will the transformation."-Rilke
Bad Marketing
"Nonduality just needs a better marketing campaign."
This statement reminded me of Tzvi Freeman's article, "Sighting Moshiach":
"The first thing Moshiach does is do away with bad marketing...
Moshiach's marketing people will get people's minds back on the right track....
Once that's done, just about everything else we need to create paradise is here already."
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2811/jewish/Sighting-Moshi...
May it catch on fast.
gone fishing
Gone!
Fishing.
Ha, ha. Ha! . . . I thought it was funny.
But what do I know?
No humor
Not interested.
anymore.