A Great Summary of Modern Initiation

[AshvinP]

I came across the best introduction/summary of Thinking as spiritual activity, i.e. modern initiation, which I have found so far. The full book is a practical manual for modern meditation, which I highly recommend, but I am pasting only the first chapter and part of the second chapter here, concerning modern idolatry, the esoteric structure of the human organism, and some reasoning behind meditative exercises of the sort Cleric has posted here. Also the beginning of the next chapter on spiritual freedom.

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Modern idolatry

Many signs give rise to the theory that dogmatism is the evil of the present time. By way of a radical investigation, it can be acknowledged that the ancient dogmatism of revealed truth could possibly have incarnated today in the form of a rigorous rationality that is hardly identifiable—the dogmatism of dialectics and science.

Endowed with semblances of progress, dogmatism can be recognized by the fact that each doctrine claims to proceed from its own object as if from an original fact, which is nonetheless conceived by means of an inner act that determines its basic value, but which, as such, eludes the subject involved in the research. For this reason, the object becomes the foundation, without really being it. In the intuition from which it moves, the subject does not recognize itself as a collaborative member of the foundation. As investigators or theorists, we identify our own “past thought” with the object; but this goes unnoticed. For this reason, the object arises before us as an entity founded upon itself. Rising to an original fact, sufficient unto itself, the object becomes an unconscious idol—accepted, in reality, according to a subtle faith. The unconscious faith is further developed in relation to the phenomenology that ensues from it—idolatry truly rises again in a scientific-technological form.

The subsequent inductive-deductive process is the dogmatic edifice that is logical, dialectical, and rigorous. But it is erected on a mystical foundation. The presupposition—as an inner act, which, possessed, could guarantee the development of the cognitive process according to reality—escapes conscious thought. Therefore, the object in its alterity excludes the human being. The dehumanization of culture has no other explanation.

The datum of science or dialectics acquires universal value outside the thinking that has validated it. Details illegitimately assume a universal role. It is the dogmatism that today pits one opinion against another, one human being against another, dialectic against dialectic, trend against trend, nation against nation—according to an incommunicability in which the logical-deductive relation substitutes the original relation that has been eliminated. The obtuse condition of thought nonetheless goes unnoticed, thanks to the perfect mechanism of the dialectic that moves it and that gives it the illusion of moving on its own. For this reason, it does not grasp anything of reality except what is thinkable and measurable—its most impoverished aspect, which presumes to be the whole of reality.

The remedy for this situation—which today is the foundation of a collective mental alteration unobserved by most, but surfaces as the common human neurosis, as the mystical persuasion of dialectical solubility of the questions truly impenetrable to dialectical thought, and as the incurable polemics between individuals, between factions—is the conscious restitution of the dynamic element of thinking, namely, a modern path to meditation. It is the reason for this manual, whose practical content springs from the experience of Western spiritual science, which includes, within itself, the ultimate essence of oriental techniques.

Those who believe they recognize, within this manual, the contradiction between the assumption of the conscious experience of meditation and the esoteric references that it uses for its elaboration, can be reassured by the very positivity of the method, which moves solely according to the logical mediations gradually required by the experience, up to that original immediacy of thought, which is the only one not in need of mediation—the true logic, the logic of the Logos. Only from such logic can the liberation of the human soul spring. Technological civilization does not condition us, as some neo-Hegelians have with glib plausibility belatedly concluded. On the contrary, we do not manage to grasp the thinking from which such a civilization is born. The conditioning is not outside us in civilization, in society, or in the technological structure, but rather within us—within our thought, which lacks the inner dimension that allows it to arise as thinking. For this reason, we erroneously think the world devoid of such a dimension and, as such, we erect it, we deify it; we render it dominant in its legitimate logical dialectical form.

Esoteric structure of the human being

As human beings, we have the visible mineral body in common with the physical world, the invisible etheric body in common with the plant word, and the astral body—also invisible—in common with the animal world. By means of these, however, we operate as spiritual beings, becoming self-conscious thanks to a common inner activity that is our own, which, by means of the sense organs, reaches right down into the physical world. Under the first three aspects, we are related to the animal, which by way of the senses is moved by instincts and emotional impulses, since it depends on these without the possibility of autonomy. We, instead, transform our own sensations into thoughts at the corporeal, organizational level. We have the possibility of connecting to the spiritual principle what, on the animal plane, normally utilizes the spiritual according to an opposition to the spirit. We can control instincts and passions.

The spirit that manifests in the mineral as material fixity, in the plant as form, and in the animal as psyche, rises up in the human being as thought. At the level of thought, however, it lacks the power that is expressed as an imprint in the crystal, as form in the plant, as instinctive psyche in the animal. Nonetheless, it attains a self-identity—though initially reflective—in which it begins to express itself directly as the “I.” The task of thinking is to realize, at its own level, the identity with itself, which the spirit renounces at the levels of Nature, in order to express itself as a psychic, vital and mineral structure.

Our inner opus is to realize the mediation that initially appears to us as thought. Thanks to this, we can reestablish the hierarchical correlation of the principles that we bear, that is to say, the “I,” as atman must manage to govern the astral body and, through this, the etheric body and the physical body. When we will have spiritualized the astral and restored the original power to the etheric body, we will have transformed the physical body into a limb of the spirit, whose minerality will have the creative transparency, which for now, we can experience extraordinarily in pure thinking.

For now, the light of the “I” begins to light up only in thinking. When this light lights up, the life of feeling and the current of the will barely rediscover the original correlation. Such a possibility, however, resulting from the correct inner discipline, is rarely realized in us. The astral body normally binds us below to physical nature in the same way it binds the animal. Meanwhile, above, the light of the “I” permeates the astral body by means of reason. The astral body's nature therefore appears double—animal and spiritual. In ordinary human beings, these two natures are not separate. Rather, they are mixed up, and this mixture generates the continual contradiction of the soul's life. The unconscious prevalence of animal nature generates an ephemeral culture, false ideologies, erroneous orientations of science, perpetually unsatisfied passions, egoism, neurosis, and the series of illnesses.

The triumph of our lower nature over reason arises from the astral body's profound bond to the functions of nature. Such a bond ascends as a longing for life, regularly idealized and codified. Longing generates the inferior life of the “I,” or egoism. Egoism generates aversion, an individual's regular opposition to other individuals—the daily human error, which of necessity becomes corrected by pain, sickness and finally death, if it is not dealt with by the spiritual principle that surfaces in the consciousness soul capable of controlling our lower nature by means of reason.

Because of its dual animal-spiritual nature, the astral body simultaneously bears within itself the impulses of sympathy and of antipathy, of attraction and repulsion, of pleasure and of pain, with respect to which, the possibility of distinction, of control and of conscious choice, belongs to the spiritual principle that surfaces as the “I.” The impulses of animal nature and those of spiritual nature are mixed up within the astral body. For this reason, the soul continually oscillates confusingly between pleasure and pain, attraction and repulsion, if the “I” does not affirm itself as the principle of distinction and responsibility.

In the oscillation between the two opposites, as well as in their mix, the “I” is continually led to helplessly approve the soul's resulting chaos. This chaos is essentially an inversion of the hierarchy—spirit–soul–body—that we have already mentioned. The functions of the body involve the soul; the soul conditions the “I” by means of thinking, feeling and willing. As human beings, we are led to find, as true and just, what agrees with the instincts and that really imposes itself, ascending by means of willing and feeling from corporeal life. We believe that we choose by way of logical thought, according to the free “I.” In reality, we give logical form to our choice according to the impulses of our animal nature.

Such an inversion of the spirit–soul–body relationship from which the series of human illnesses are derived—none excluded—has a single conscious remedy, namely, the discipline of concentration. The simple concentration exercise suggested in this treatise, according to rules drawn from direct suprasensory experience, that is, from the type of preparatory spiritual practice belonging to the Initiation of the new times, and not from texts prescribed by traditional Wisdom—from a technical point of view extraneous to the present human situation—restores the hierarchy, spirit–soul–body, even if for a brief moment. This moment, however, through our insistence on the discipline, can be prolonged and repeated with time.

The exercise must be extremely simple, due to the technique to which it conforms and the very aims of its execution. As we shall see, it consists of concentrating thought on an object that is devoid of special meaning. The physical object that we evoke and place at the center of our conscious attention, gives the “I” a way of operating—by means of thought—upon the forces of the astral body and, consequently, by means of these, upon the etheric-physical body.

In the simple concentration exercise, the spirit-soul-physical hierarchy—normally always altered—is temporarily restored. Therefore, it is the exercise that is least welcomed by our instinctive nature. It is also the most tiring despite its simplicity, and despite being the least fascinating. Sensational yogic or mystical exercises that appeal to our sentimental, or instinctive (animal) nature appear more convincing.

When we comprehend the wise use of concentration for restoring the intuited hierarchy, other types of exercises will gradually need to give the resurgent correlation (spirit–soul–body) a way to connect with the intentions of the human Archetype, so that our lower nature does not take advantage of it in a more subtle form. This lower nature tends to take on a spiritual vestment, and to use the spirit's initial powers for purposes that escape a rising self-consciousness. This is the present danger of irregular paths to the suprasensory.

All paths, for the fact that they exist, correlate to levels of the soul's development. But with respect to the evolutionary impulse of the present day, they can be recognized as irregular to the degree in which they ignore the process of thinking by means of which the spirit rises directly in the soul—according to a movement that is the inverse of the “traditional” one, where the soul once avoided thought in order to connect with the spirit, essentially escaping the human being.

Freedom

The freedom to which we aspire—giving it different meanings according to the level of our own development—is really (and solely) an event of thinking. Those who take away the freedom of others essentially have the power of giving substance to their own unfree thought. With such thought, they act as if they were free—ideologically and ethically convinced of their own prerogative.

Freedom is thinking that actualizes its own true nature, normally altered in the dialectical process. Dialectical thought can be free only on the dialectical plane. But, spiritually, such freedom is nothing. Thinking is free when it discovers its connection with the “I.” This connection never really manifests, because dialectical thought is reflected, and in being reflected it does not have a connection with the “I” but, rather, with its psychic projection, the rational-sentient “I,” the ego, the reflection of the “I.” In order for thinking to realize its true nature, it must experience its own free being; it is the soul's greatest experience.

Thinking, in fact, normally manifests as the mediator of all sensory or extra-sensory knowledge—but never of itself. It is able to perceive itself only if, by means of concentration, it becomes isolated, even temporarily, from the psyche, from instincts, from sentiments, from sensory contents, from its own intellectual expression and from every content that is not its own pure being. In this pure being, it actualizes its own real nature. It becomes living. It expresses its own essential force as content—independent of the mechanism of dialectical intelligence. By means of such content, it can really encounter the sensory world, bearing to it the inner being that it lacks in appearing. It can, as a vehicle of the essence, simultaneously penetrate the soul.

Will and freedom proceed at an even pace in the discipline. The elevation and creative intensity of feeling, spring from thinking's agreement with the will. The training of the will corresponds to the liberation of thinking. The harmony of the three forces is the path of reintegration of the soul's light of life, capable of modeling physical corporeality—the ultimate sense of human earthly experience.

Scalifero, Massimo. A Practical Manual of Meditation . Lindisfarne. Kindle Edition.

[mikekatz]

Scaligero, not Scalifero

[Federica]

Ashvin,

Maybe one day you will reveal the phenomenology of your ‘coming across’ written works
You recently mentioned that you were not finding quotable esoteric writers active beyond the 1950s, but here you are opening the way into the 1970s... way to go

I was not aware of this thinker, thanks for bringing these works to our attention! I see Scaligero's books are many, and following the thread, I am finding lots of interesting material, other figures, and connections with Steiner. For sure, new quotable material awaits...

[Federica]

Scaligero, not Scalifero

Mike, you did it again
You couldn't resist breaking out of your lurking retreat
Now while you're at it, would you please tell us what you think?

[AshvinP]

Ashvin,

Maybe one day you will reveal the phenomenology of your ‘coming across’ written works
You recently mentioned that you were not finding quotable esoteric writers active beyond the 1950s, but here you are opening the way into the 1970s... way to go

I was not aware of this thinker, thanks for bringing these works to our attention! I see Scaligero's books are many, and following the thread, I am finding lots of interesting material, other figures, and connections with Steiner. For sure, new quotable material awaits...

Yes well it is only because your comment on the other thread reminded me of his treatise on living thinking (initially sent to me by Max), which I quoted there. Then I wondered if he had written anything else and came across all the other books on Amazon. I am really impressed with the precision and clarity of this one, which also manages to be concise.

I have a feeling Mike is not so impressed, though

[Federica]

Ashvin,

Maybe one day you will reveal the phenomenology of your ‘coming across’ written works
You recently mentioned that you were not finding quotable esoteric writers active beyond the 1950s, but here you are opening the way into the 1970s... way to go

I was not aware of this thinker, thanks for bringing these works to our attention! I see Scaligero's books are many, and following the thread, I am finding lots of interesting material, other figures, and connections with Steiner. For sure, new quotable material awaits...

Yes well it is only because your comment on the other thread reminded me of his treatise on living thinking (initially sent to me by Max), which I quoted there. Then I wondered if he had written anything else and came across all the other books on Amazon. I am really impressed with the precision and clarity of this one, which also manages to be concise.

I have a feeling Mike is not so impressed, though

Ok I wonder if this "double nature of the astral body" is expressed in Steiner as well? I have not finished Theosophy yet, I have found it a bit overwhelming in a way that is difficult to describe, as if it required a strength that I have not really developed. The idea of double nature of the astral body sounds useful though, to support the understanding of what we are doing wrong in our standard approach to life…

Mike has carefully analysed your post, as it were, so in a sense he must be 'impressed'

[AshvinP]

Ashvin,

Maybe one day you will reveal the phenomenology of your ‘coming across’ written works
You recently mentioned that you were not finding quotable esoteric writers active beyond the 1950s, but here you are opening the way into the 1970s... way to go

I was not aware of this thinker, thanks for bringing these works to our attention! I see Scaligero's books are many, and following the thread, I am finding lots of interesting material, other figures, and connections with Steiner. For sure, new quotable material awaits...

Yes well it is only because your comment on the other thread reminded me of his treatise on living thinking (initially sent to me by Max), which I quoted there. Then I wondered if he had written anything else and came across all the other books on Amazon. I am really impressed with the precision and clarity of this one, which also manages to be concise.

I have a feeling Mike is not so impressed, though

Ok I wonder if this "double nature of the astral body" is expressed in Steiner as well? I have not finished Theosophy yet, I have found it a bit overwhelming in a way that is difficult to describe, as if it required a strength that I have not really developed. The idea of double nature of the astral body sounds useful though, to support the understanding of what we are doing wrong in our standard approach to life…

Mike has carefully analysed your post, as it were, so in a sense he must be 'impressed'

I'm sure it is - I will let you know if I come across a passage soon : )

My understanding is that there is a double-nature to all the four members of the human organism, a lower and higher aspect. The lower etheric, for ex., works from the instinctive memory of our animal nature, which finds expression in the mental picturing of our normal waking consciousness. Our longing-attachment to the lower aspects serve to render our experience of the world as a bottom-up process, the body conditioning the soul conditioning the spirit. This results in the lower "I" which experiences itself as passive witness, consuming impressions, with the mind container at the apex of waking consciousness. Hence we get all the modern bottom-up philosophies and sciences, which were logically deduced from this inverted experience.

It's a real catch 22 for the modern soul - the conditioned longing-attachment results in the inverted experience which further strengthens the longing-attachment, etc. Many people in the mystical persuasion would feel the "I" as passive witness is a 'humble' approach to life, unambitious and non-assuming, putting itself beneath the great Universal power, waiting for the "I" to dissolve itself after death. They never give their "I" the opportunity to experience itself in the active flow of Cosmic intelligence emanating from the top-down, revealing the Cosmic "I" who inspires inward, practical humility, because this goes against all the evolutionary ages of conditioning, which are also conveniently ignored for the same reasons.

PS - the 'Scalifero' typo should be blamed on whoever put together the Kindle version, as it is auto included whenever a section is copy and pasted. Although I can take some blame for failing to correct the typo!

[Federica]

I'm sure it is - I will let you know if I come across a passage soon : )

My understanding is that there is a double-nature to all the four members of the human organism, a lower and higher aspect. The lower etheric, for ex., works from the instinctive memory of our animal nature, which finds expression in the mental picturing of our normal waking consciousness. Our longing-attachment to the lower aspects serve to render our experience of the world as a bottom-up process, the body conditioning the soul conditioning the spirit. This results in the lower "I" which experiences itself as passive witness, consuming impressions, with the mind container at the apex of waking consciousness. Hence we get all the modern bottom-up philosophies and sciences, which were logically deduced from this inverted experience.

It's a real catch 22 for the modern soul - the conditioned longing-attachment results in the inverted experience which further strengthens the longing-attachment, etc. Many people in the mystical persuasion would feel the "I" as passive witness is a 'humble' approach to life, unambitious and non-assuming, putting itself beneath the great Universal power, waiting for the "I" to dissolve itself after death. They never give their "I" the opportunity to experience itself in the active flow of Cosmic intelligence emanating from the top-down, revealing the Cosmic "I" who inspires inward, practical humility, because this goes against all the evolutionary ages of conditioning, which are also conveniently ignored for the same reasons.

PS - the 'Scalifero' typo should be blamed on whoever put together the Kindle version, as it is auto included whenever a section is copy and pasted. Although I can take some blame for failing to correct the typo!

Yes, I get an idea, but I'll have to do with an interim understanding of these members for now. Is there an intention to underline the idea of hierarchy that makes you use bottom-up and top-down? I was having Deep MAL in mind, and a dandelion of emanating intelligence immersing the I, rather than a pyramidal top-down, but maybe I'm too biased by corporate world analogies.


PS - Yes it is a common typo across the internet, I am seeing it on goodreads and even googlebooks.

[AshvinP]

I'm sure it is - I will let you know if I come across a passage soon : )

My understanding is that there is a double-nature to all the four members of the human organism, a lower and higher aspect. The lower etheric, for ex., works from the instinctive memory of our animal nature, which finds expression in the mental picturing of our normal waking consciousness. Our longing-attachment to the lower aspects serve to render our experience of the world as a bottom-up process, the body conditioning the soul conditioning the spirit. This results in the lower "I" which experiences itself as passive witness, consuming impressions, with the mind container at the apex of waking consciousness. Hence we get all the modern bottom-up philosophies and sciences, which were logically deduced from this inverted experience.

It's a real catch 22 for the modern soul - the conditioned longing-attachment results in the inverted experience which further strengthens the longing-attachment, etc. Many people in the mystical persuasion would feel the "I" as passive witness is a 'humble' approach to life, unambitious and non-assuming, putting itself beneath the great Universal power, waiting for the "I" to dissolve itself after death. They never give their "I" the opportunity to experience itself in the active flow of Cosmic intelligence emanating from the top-down, revealing the Cosmic "I" who inspires inward, practical humility, because this goes against all the evolutionary ages of conditioning, which are also conveniently ignored for the same reasons.

PS - the 'Scalifero' typo should be blamed on whoever put together the Kindle version, as it is auto included whenever a section is copy and pasted. Although I can take some blame for failing to correct the typo!

Yes, I get an idea, but I'll have to do with an interim understanding of these members for now. Is there an intention to underline the idea of hierarchy that makes you use bottom-up and top-down? I was having Deep MAL in mind, and a dandelion of emanating intelligence immersing the I, rather than a pyramidal top-down, but maybe I'm too biased by corporate world analogies.


PS - Yes it is a common typo across the internet, I am seeing it on goodreads and even googlebooks.

From a functional perspective, I think it just makes sense to describe as 'bottom-up' when the philosophy/science conceives of the world we experience now as arising from perceptually and conceptually small-simple units which combine into ever-larger, more complex organizations, finally resulting in thinking sentience. Top-down is a way to describe an inversion of this process, except the scientific spiritual view understands that what is 'higher' (more evolved) is supra-perceptual and conceptual, so we can't imagine spatial properties as having much to do with it in any direct way, and linear sequential time also ceases to have so much meaning on higher planes of consciousness. Nevertheless, the spatial symbols of up, down, north, south, etc. which we normally experience are lawfully connected to these higher, supra-spatial, non-linear dynamics, and through imaginative thinking the reasons for these connections become very clear.

[Martin_]

Interesting. I've been looking for some practical specific instructions on how to perform meditation in this manner. (Apart from Clerics texts) Does this book have such instruction, and if so, would you be able to share an example?