Essay: Man, Know Thyself

[Cleric K]

Do you believe that the health of The Garden is better now than during the times of ancient Hindus or when indigenous ways were globally predominant? Overall health and wholeness would be my standard progress.

As we spoke before, the Garden might be in even better health if there were no humans at all
But this is not the point. The status of the Garden and ourselves has reached its catastrophic form because man and other beings, decided to do on Earth whatever they considered desirable, without any consideration for the interconnectedness of Life.
Clearly, if we reduce human population to about few million (as it was back then) and get rid of all technological means for damaging the environment, wildlife will flourish. The point is that this cannot be achieved by turning back time but by growing in consciousness. Not only by trial and error but by living penetration in the spiritual foundations of reality. There we find the interconnectedness of life not only as a beautiful metaphor but as actual reality. Man doesn't need to dissolve into the whole in order to reduce his harmful presence but he can become more and more responsible, knowing, loving being. Then we see that we can't evolve for ourselves, as single units - we are entangled with the environment - social, natural and super(above)natural. The individual living in expanded awareness will be unable to be happy if he sees around him suffering people. At our age this is possible because consciousness is very closed off. But when future men begin to sense the spiritual atmosphere, whenever someone suffers, waves of pain will reverberate and everyone will be affected. It'll be of everyone's interest to help each other. That's how brotherhood becomes reality not out of abstract ethical laws but because of growing consciousness. And at the same time every individual will be a portal for the Higher Worlds to flow more and more into the environment, to make the Garden and Man perfect as they are in their Heavenly Image. Man will be a self-conscious emissary between the worlds. One of the expected changes is that the waking/sleeping cycle will gradually change. Sleep won't be the unconscious state that we now experience but it will be conscious expansion of the astral body into the spheres. There we'll continue with other types of work - it can be compared to a kind of spiritual planning of the Earthly tasks - they'll have to be aligned with the Cosmic rhythms, in accordance with beings higher than us. Then through the day, when we zoom back into the body, these tasks will have to implemented into the physical.

[Eugene I]

I have always found this sentiment rather Self-defeating, pun intended. Are you not proposing an exclusive way when claiming all 'exclusive' ways are "problematic" (which I take to be another way of saying, "wrong")? Clearly you are correct that many within the Western religious tradition feel impelled to 'universalize' their values and purposes. Yet the question still remains, what exactly are those values and purposes and can they be discerned systematically approaching scientifically? The answer to that question, whatever it may be, cannot rest on what we feel is too exclusive or non-exclusive from our rather limited perspectives.

The non-exclusive sentiment is not exclusive because it does not exclude exclusive ways. Neither it claims that such exclusive ways are "wrong" (after all, they may turn out to be true, who knows?). The exclusive ways have their own right to exist, and there are always souls/people who freely support and choose them as their preferred way of living (for example, if you ask people living under political dictatorships, you will find that large proportion of them of them actually deliberately support the system). They are still problematic in a way that, based on their claim of universalism, they claim or tend to deprive individuals who do not share their values from the freedom to choose their own preferred values/goals that are not aligned with the universalistic values/goal. It's the limitation of freedom for people who do not agree with the universalistic values that is problematic here. Also, it's usually the universalists/exclusivists who typically claim that the other ways are "wrong", simply because, in their own view, their universal values/views/goals/ways are the only right ones to exist.

[AshvinP]

I have always found this sentiment rather Self-defeating, pun intended. Are you not proposing an exclusive way when claiming all 'exclusive' ways are "problematic" (which I take to be another way of saying, "wrong")? Clearly you are correct that many within the Western religious tradition feel impelled to 'universalize' their values and purposes. Yet the question still remains, what exactly are those values and purposes and can they be discerned systematically approaching scientifically? The answer to that question, whatever it may be, cannot rest on what we feel is too exclusive or non-exclusive from our rather limited perspectives.

The non-exclusive sentiment is not exclusive because it does not exclude exclusive ways. Neither it claims that such exclusive ways are "wrong" (after all, they may turn out to be true, who knows?). The exclusive ways have their own right to exist, and there are always souls/people who freely support and choose them as their preferred way of living (for example, if you ask people living under political dictatorships, you will find that large proportion of them of them actually deliberately support the system). They are still problematic in a way that, based on their claim of universalism, they claim or tend to deprive individuals who do not share their values from the freedom to choose their own preferred values/goals that are not aligned with the universalistic values/goal. It's the limitation of freedom for people who do not agree with the universalistic values that is problematic here. Also, it's usually the universalists/exclusivists who typically claim that the other ways are "wrong", simply because, in their own view, their universal values/views/goals/ways are the only right ones to exist.

First, I would say the adjectives "problematic" and the comparison with "political dictatorship" are inherently exclusionary, at least excluding those ways from serious consideration. It's easy to say they have their own "right to exist", yet not so easy to defend that statement if push ever comes to shove. Second, I would note that the actual political dictatorships and theocracies which limit basic freedoms the most tend to lay outside the West, where Christianity is not the prevalent form of spiritual belief. That doesn't fit so well with your hypothesis of why it is so problematic compared to 'non-exclusionary' spiritual paradigms.

[Eugene I]

First, I would say the adjectives "problematic" and the comparison with "political dictatorship" are inherently exclusionary, at least excluding those ways from serious consideration.

No, they are not, it's only your interpretation. All that a non-exclusivist says is: "I have my right to choose my way and you have you right to choose your way AS LONG AS you way, once you choose it, does not exclude the possibility of my way and does not deprive me from choosing my way". But once the exclusivist tries to deprive others from such choice, it exactly at this point where it becomes problematic. So, not any exclusivist way is problematic, but only those which actively exclude or limit the choices of people who do not share their way. For example, Judaism is exclusive, but (typically) not problematic, because their way of exclusivity only applies to the members of their religion and their ethnicity, and they have no claims whatsoever towards those who don't. But Islam or communism are problematic because, in addition to the members of their own group of adepts, they also claim to restrict the choices of people who do not share their ways.

Also, please do not interpret the term "dictatorship" in a negative way. Any monotheistic religion is a Divine "dictatorship" in a certain way, but that is not necessarily a bad attribute, and in fact, their followers consider it as a good attribute (for them at least). It is psychologically comforting to live under dictatorship if it is the dictatorship of goodness and if the dictator cares for the wellbeing of his servants. So, it's not the "dictatorship" per se that is problematic, but it's the specific ways it treats people outside of its group, limiting their freedom of choices, that can be problematic.

[Cleric K]

the monotheists tend to think that their telos and values, their "Gate", are universal and that every soul in the Universe should comply with them (voluntarily or involuntarily). "I am the [only] Way [to God] and the [real] Truth and the [real] Life; no one comes to the Father but through Me" (John 14:6), and even though such statement can be interpreted in non-exclusive ways, the predominant interpretation of it among Christians is rather exclusive. And, together with Lou, I see such exclusive attitude quite problematic.

First, we should be clear that no one is speaking of forcing values on anyone. I take for granted that everyone here is mature enough that it's not needed that his or her values be implanted from the outside but they are discovered from personal experience.
Then, I'm not at all saying that Christianity should be forced as the one world religion. Actually, Christianity - as a religious structure - is on its declining path for many centuries already. Christianity has developed around historical and occult facts and events. The structure of the church is something quite external to these. The facts will continue to have their effects even long after the church is gone.

What can we say about the exclusiveness? Here's a somewhat limited analogy. Let's imagine that the Sun speaks to the plant world and says "No plant grows except through my light". Can we accuse the Sun of being exclusive here? Not really. It's only stating a fact taken from reality. Of course if the plants were unaware that they grow by virtue of sunlight they might have the wildest ideas about what makes them alive. But once reality is perceived, everything becomes clear.
We can speak similarly in the spiritual sense. There's a Sun of living Light that gives the beings their Life. It does not matter what name we give to that Sun. One can discover in inner experience this Sun without ever having heard anything about the Gospels.
It can objected that it's not certain that such a Spiritual Sun exists. And that's OK, these are very intimate experiences, we're not trying to convince anybody. There are many NDEs that report about this Sun. Obviously here everyone is being selective to pick the NDEs that fit his or her taste. Everyone is really free to do whatever they want. What's important is to state the truth of the facts and let everyone do whatever they want with it.

In addition, as I said earlier, there is not a single-stream fragmentation-integration process (such as the evolution of the humanity as a whole towards some telos towards the integration with the Divine), but a large variety of involution/evolution processes each being of its own value and importance.

It's important to note that supporting this idea is possible only as long as the Earthly and the after life are kept at safe distance. This allows us to speculate in the most various ways about the nature of the Earth experience. We can imagine the Earth as a sandbox for beings to have their random experiences without any higher structure or purpose. The idea rests on the assumption that individual experiences are completely independent of the sandbox. It's common to imagine that one is free to go to other planets, galaxies, etc. after death, that the individual path of evolution is completely decoupled from that of humanity, Earth and the Solar system. If one is fully aware that in this he or she is holding a belief, placing a bet - I'm OK. But if we want to move towards actual knowledge, something that can be grounded into the facts of experience - sensory and supersensory - then we'll have to approach these questions more seriously.

[AshvinP]

First, I would say the adjectives "problematic" and the comparison with "political dictatorship" are inherently exclusionary, at least excluding those ways from serious consideration.

No, they are not, it's only your interpretation. All that a non-exclusivist says is: "I have my right to choose my way and you have you right to choose your way AS LONG AS you way, once you choose it, does not exclude the possibility of my way and does not deprive me from choosing my way". But once the exclusivist tries to deprive others from such choice, it exactly at this point where it becomes problematic. So, not any exclusivist way is problematic, but only those which actively exclude or limit the choices of people who do not share their way. For example, Judaism is exclusive, but (typically) not problematic, because their way of exclusivity only applies to the members of their religion and their ethnicity, and they have no claims whatsoever towards those who don't. But Islam or communism are problematic because, in addition to the members of their own group of adepts, they also claim to restrict the choices of people who do not share their ways.

Also, please do not interpret the term "dictatorship" in a negative way. Any monotheistic religion is a Divine "dictatorship" in a certain way, but that is not necessarily a bad attribute, and in fact, their followers consider it as a good attribute (for them at least). It is psychologically comforting to live under dictatorship if it is the dictatorship of goodness and if the dictator cares for the wellbeing of his servants. So, it's not the "dictatorship" per se that is problematic, but it's the specific ways it treats people outside of its group, limiting their freedom of choices, that can be problematic.

Your initial criticism was of Christianity, even quoting scripture to support your point. Now it's of Islam and communism (and I would point out Hindu and Buddhist societies are also rife with their own forms of denying basic freedoms, and granted so is much of the West at this point). And now the word "dictatorship" has no negative connotations. Sorry, my sense is that you are trying to force a 'non-exclusionary' tone to your viewpoint which is anything but that. However, carry on, because I do find your discussion with Cleric to be of great value and I don't want to sidetrack it too much.

[Eugene I]

It can objected that it's not certain that such a Spiritual Sun exists. ... If one is fully aware that in this he or she is holding a belief, placing a bet - I'm OK. But if we want to move towards actual knowledge, something that can be grounded into the facts of experience - sensory and supersensory - then we'll have to approach these questions more seriously.

Yes, I agree, and I think we discussed that earlier. It's the limited scope of our knowledge and of our factual experiential data that we have in the human form which makes our knowledge uncertain and makes the data inconclusive. These limits do not allow us to find the common "actual knowledge" grounded in such common experience. The facts of experience available to us are inconclusive and we can not derive from it much actual knowledge of any metaphysical scope. In such situation of lack of conclusive data we are forced to cope with a variety of co-existing versions of knowledge and metaphysics.

But even if we again look at the NDE accounts, those suggest that such inconclusiveness exist even beyond the scope of the Earthly lives, and even there the available experiential data is still inconclusive and there is still a variety of versions of knowledge, as well as versions of goals and values, and there is a a variety of interest groups sharing such common versions. Still, that sobering fact should not discourage us from attempts to keep searching for the actual ultimate knowledge, but until it's found, we need to learn how to deal with the inconclusiveness of the data available to us so far, and to live peacefully in the environment where a variety of possible versions of knowledge and the groups sharing them may co-exist.

[Lou Gold]

Do you believe that the health of The Garden is better now than during the times of ancient Hindus or when indigenous ways were globally predominant? Overall health and wholeness would be my standard progress.

As we spoke before, the Garden might be in even better health if there were no humans at all
But this is not the point. The status of the Garden and ourselves has reached its catastrophic form because man and other beings, decided to do on Earth whatever they considered desirable, without any consideration for the interconnectedness of Life.
Clearly, if we reduce human population to about few million (as it was back then) and get rid of all technological means for damaging the environment, wildlife will flourish. The point is that this cannot be achieved by turning back time but by growing in consciousness. Not only by trial and error but by living penetration in the spiritual foundations of reality. There we find the interconnectedness of life not only as a beautiful metaphor but as actual reality. Man doesn't need to dissolve into the whole in order to reduce his harmful presence but he can become more and more responsible, knowing, loving being. Then we see that we can't evolve for ourselves, as single units - we are entangled with the environment - social, natural and super(above)natural. The individual living in expanded awareness will be unable to be happy if he sees around him suffering people. At our age this is possible because consciousness is very closed off. But when future men begin to sense the spiritual atmosphere, whenever someone suffers, waves of pain will reverberate and everyone will be affected. It'll be of everyone's interest to help each other. That's how brotherhood becomes reality not out of abstract ethical laws but because of growing consciousness. And at the same time every individual will be a portal for the Higher Worlds to flow more and more into the environment, to make the Garden and Man perfect as they are in their Heavenly Image. Man will be a self-conscious emissary between the worlds. One of the expected changes is that the waking/sleeping cycle will gradually change. Sleep won't be the unconscious state that we now experience but it will be conscious expansion of the astral body into the spheres. There we'll continue with other types of work - it can be compared to a kind of spiritual planning of the Earthly tasks - they'll have to be aligned with the Cosmic rhythms, in accordance with beings higher than us. Then through the day, when we zoom back into the body, these tasks will have to implemented into the physical.

The point is that this cannot be achieved by turning back time but by growing in consciousness. Not only by trial and error but by living penetration in the spiritual foundations of reality. There we find the interconnectedness of life not only as a beautiful metaphor but as actual reality. Man doesn't need to dissolve into the whole in order to reduce his harmful presence but he can become more and more responsible, knowing, loving being.

HOWEVER, indigenous and aboriginal peoples already have said this. If awareness of interconnectedness and responsibility for the Garden is a standard of progress, why are they not rated as more progressive? They were the ones who offered the term "Wetiko" meaning a mind virus or evil curse that afflicted the invading Europeans. And, these indigenous peoples were hardly unaware of larger spiritual forces or "the need to act responsibly between the worlds." Your words astound me as if a pontification somehow independent or ignorant of everything that Wade Davis and so many anthropologists have reported. And if you are thinking of countering with the boogey man of tribal warfare, consider that the Haudenosaunee ended tribal war with a thousand years of peace and significantly informed the creation of American democratic forms. Notably, Ben Franklin who brought the indigenous wisdom to the Constitutional conventions, said, "If the savages can do it, why can't we?"

Yes, I know there was trial and error, good use and abuse in the past. You are asserting that now consciousness will transcend beyond trial-and-error or war-and-peace based on the guidance/direction/whatever of advanced astral beings. However, the reports I receive from the Astral say that there is a war going on at that level as well. I am not romanticizing the past, which was full of plusses and minuses. What is your evidence or whatever that you are not romanticizing the astral? Are you offering a story, a sweet, kind, loving story of progress toward an eventual paradise that includes a new awareness of time? OK, it's a nice story. There are other stories. Don Hoffman speculates that Consciousness might evolve to where abundance replaces scarcity. In another storyline the sacred purpose of humans is to scatter, spreading biotic life into the universe. They might be unaware of this purpose. They might by driving themselves off-planet for this unconscious purpose. That it might take billions of years of planetary development elsewhere, especially if all that we spread is bacteria, matters little because the sense of time from higher dimensions is quite different. It may be a mere "wrinkle in time." Another story-set asks, "If not here, where? If not now, when? If not me, who?" Stories, stories, stories! The question is not whether they are stories. It's which stories do we want to tell our grandchildren? So here's the thought experiment -- Imagine you are speaking to a five year old. What would you say?

[AshvinP]

A lot of this discussion reminds of the 'post-modern' maxim that, not only is there is no canonical interpretation of a set of 'facts', but all interpretations are equally plausible. When we leave everything in, we are soon left with nothing meaningful. I prefer Spinoza's maxim, "everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare".

[Lou Gold]

A lot of this discussion reminds of the 'post-modern' maxim that, not only is there is no canonical interpretation of a set of 'facts', but all interpretations are equally plausible. When we leave everything in, we are soon left with nothing meaningful. I prefer Spinoza's maxim, "everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare".

Yup! I actually prefer the shamanic way, which is to save what works. I, for one, do not advocate hanging onto everything. Just, whatever works.