The Nature of the sensory world or do we really *know* the ultimate ground of reality?

[Stranger]

Eugene, so far, it's clear to me that Martinus is just as much concerned with the interpaly of the above with the below, the interplay of the spiritual with the physical, as Steiner is.

I never had any problems with blending spiritual with physical. Dualistic state is not related to physical, but it is related to an incoherent perception-interpretation of reality, be it physical or supra-physical.

[Federica]

Eugene, so far, it's clear to me that Martinus is just as much concerned with the interplay of the above with the below, the interplay of the spiritual with the physical, as Steiner is.

I never had any problems with blending spiritual with physical. Dualistic state is not related to physical, but it is related to an incoherent perception-interpretation of reality, be it physical or supra-physical.

It seems to me that you never had any problems with the Above being the exact counterpart of the Below only in principle. But when the correspondence becomes precise, concrete, and exemplified, you typically do have problems. As Ashvin said, the problems appear when "reality is taken from the realm of speculative abstraction into that of living knowledge".
So, from your non-dual "perception-interpretation of reality", the multiplicity of the spiritual hierarchies and their interplay with the multiplicity of the physical world seem to suit you in principle, but not when the principle is boiled down to details of specific spiritual scientific knowledge. Somewhere between the general principle, that you accept, and its concrete applications to this or that particular element within the realm of spiritual reality, a disconnection takes place.


Most recently, for example, we have seen this with the "Mars question". The clairvoyant report of that reality is questioned and promptly labeled "occultic", not based on your own meditative exploration of the question, which would be the correct living knowledge approach, but because it's contrasted with the standard materialistic criteria of secular science, and vaguely felt unreasonable, according to those conventional parameters. Of course it is unreasonable from the viewpoint of secular science, because - as Martinus grants - secular science is not there yet. Secular science, as he says, has a...

..."thought process from below" constituting merely the experience through the coarse physical senses where everything is seen only from the "aspect of substance". Modern science is, for the time being, based on the latter form of sensory perception, but evolution will result in its later coming to see things from "the aspect of life" too, thus becoming elevated above the many illusions and pitfalls that sensory perception from "the aspect of substance" represents.

while the spiritual scientist looks at absolute reality from above. The spiritual scientist has worked to gain that higher perspective. In Martinus' words: "the information that I have to give is a result of "the thought process from above"".


So my point is: you reject the "occultic stuff" on grounds of it not fitting the criteria of secular science. However, the objection is not on-point. I guess the real reason for the rejection is that dislike you have, namely that you are OK with the intrinsic, nested multiplicity of the spiritual world, in principle, but you dislike the living experience of it. And exactly because you don't want to explore that multiplicity livingly, in meditation, you don't find any other ways to dismiss the occultic stuff than by appealing to the standard scientific view "from below". But that's a mismatch.


Moreover, Martinus has plenty of occultic stuff too, livingly known by him "from above", in the exact same fashion (although different language) as Steiner. I will soon come back with an example. But please think about that disconnect between "in principle" agreement and concrete dislike, that makes you appeal (inappropriately) to pseudo-science complaints, and vague complaints of "too much occultic stuff".

[Stranger]

So my point is: you reject the "occultic stuff" on grounds of it not fitting the criteria of secular science.

I never said that criteria of secular sciences are applicable to spiritual science. But now, what are the criteria for SS? For example, if a random guy tells me that he saw in a clairvoyant vision that Mohammed currently lives on Venus (the higher-dimensional Venus, not the physical one), should I just believe him? Would you? How do we distinguish true clairvoyant occultic experiences from false ones? Same thing applies to our own experiences, we can have a large variety of experiences and visions in meditations (and I did that too), but how do we know if they are the products of fabrications of our own mind or if they actually reflect some objective spiritual realities?

The criterium I use is that if an experience (mine or someone else's) coherently fits to the overall picture of reality, as Cleric said, to the "harmony of facts", then there is more likelihood that it is true. But in general I do not claim that the occultic experiences are all false or true, but I consider them to be contingently true with certain likelihood. Is it possible that Buddha lives on higher-dimensional Mars as Steiner claimed? It is definitely possible, why not? Do I believe it with absolute certainty? I don't. So, what I'm saying is: just believing that any occultic or clairvoyant experience gives us true objective facts about spiritual reality is not spiritual science, we need additional truthfulness criteria to accept them as facts. When Martinus talks about the karmic loops in his symbolic pictures, I can see that in addition to his clairvoyant claims, I can also see how it fits with my inner experience of karmic dependencies, as well as how they manifest in lives of other people, so it all fits into the "harmony of facts" and I have more certainty that his clairvoyant knowledge relates to the objective realities. In general, everything that Martinus describes, including his occultic knowledge, (from what I read so far) makes sense and fits into the harmony of facts of my own inner and outer experience. The extent of his occultic content is reasonable and grounded in the harmony of other facts about the reality. That is not the case with Steiner, his writings are overloaded with wild occultic claims that often barely have any relevance to the harmony of facts (at least of the facts of my inner and outer experience). For example, when Steiner talks about the Buddha living on Mars, I have no references for that claim or any ways to fit it into the harmony of other facts known to me, so it just remains an occultic claim on its own for me. And by the way, what Steiner's claims about the Buddha contradicts to what the Buddhist masters claim about him and his current abode. So why would I believe Steiner more than the Buddhist masters?

[AshvinP]

So my point is: you reject the "occultic stuff" on grounds of it not fitting the criteria of secular science.

I never said that criteria of secular sciences are applicable to spiritual science. But now, what are the criteria for SS? For example, if a random guy tells me that he saw in a clairvoyant vision that Mohammed currently lives on Venus (the higher-dimensional Venus, not the physical one), should I just believe him? Would you? How do we distinguish true clairvoyant occultic experiences from false ones? Same thing applies to our own experiences, we can have a large variety of experiences and visions in meditations (and I did that too), but how do we know if they are the products of fabrications of our own mind or if they actually reflect some objective spiritual realities?

The criterium I use is that if an experience (mine or someone else's) coherently fits to the overall picture of reality, as Cleric said, to the "harmony of facts", then there is more likelihood that it is true. But in general I do not claim that the occultic experiences are all false or true, but I consider them to be contingently true with certain likelihood. Is it possible that Buddha lives on Mars as Steiner claimed? It is definitely possible, why not? Do I believe it with absolute certainty? I don't. So, what I'm saying is: just believing that any occultic or clairvoyant experience gives us true objective facts about spiritual reality is not spiritual science, we need additional truthfulness criteria to accept them as facts. When Martinus talks about the karmic loops in his symbolic pictures, I can see that in addition to his clairvoyant claims, I can also see how it fits with my inner experience of karmic dependencies, as well as how they manifest in lives of other people, so it all fits into the "harmony of facts" and I have more certainty that his clairvoyant knowledge relates to the objective realities. In general, everything that Martinus describes, including his occultic knowledge, (from what I read so far) makes sense and fits into the harmony of facts of my own inner and outer experience. The extent of his occultic content is reasonable and grounded in the harmony of other facts about the reality. That is not the case with Steiner, his writings are overloaded with wild occultic claims that often barely have any relevance to the harmony of facts (at least of the facts of my inner and outer experience). For example, when Steiner talks about the Buddha living on Mars, I have no references for that claim or any ways to fit it into the harmony of other facts known to me, so it just remains an occultic claim on its own for me. And by the way, what Steiner's claims about the Buddha contradicts to what the Buddhist masters claim about him and his current abode. So why would I believe Steiner more than the Buddhist masters?

I will let Federica respond more or clarify, but I think she was pointing to an even more fundamental issue than whether you use the criteria of secular science. The issue is that you only understand what the 'facts' are in terms of physical cognition, which of course is the only sort of cognition currently employed by secular science (otherwise it would automatically be spiritual science). Your understanding of the 'fact', "Buddha lives on Mars", is a physical cognitive understanding. Perhaps you don't imagine the 'fact' means he is a physical being walking around the terrain of Mars, but instead imagine it conveys that he lives in a more ethereal form in the atmosphere or something of that nature. That is still a physical cognitive understanding. Cleric has also tried to convey this to you and Lou and others many times. The only way to begin deconditioning from such a physical understanding, if one insists on judging the facts conveyed by spiritual science, is to actually start enlivening one's own thinking.

In the meantime, here is a passage which could possibly be helpful, if we try to read it without prejudice and an eye towards understanding the inner meaning conveyed. The main point is that the influence of secular science on our modern habits of thinking resides, not necessarily in its 'criteria', but in the underlying physical mode of cognition which it relies on. Occult scientific facts cannot be understood rightly, let alone judged as 'likely' or 'unlikely', with only that mode of cognition. At the very least, that cognition must be enlivened through intensive and persistent effort thinking through occult research before there is any chance of assessing whether certain facts fit into a greater harmony or not. As usual, we are responsible for expanding the aperture of meaning residing within each outer fact-concept-perception. Otherwise we are only trying to fit those occult facts we come across into the harmony of ideas available to our current physical cognition, which is radically flattened out and incomplete. Then it is no surprise those facts won't fit, like trying to shove square pegs into round holes.

Now within the planetary system there still remain two cosmic bodies, the moon and the comets and the question now is: How do these cosmic bodies present themselves to occult vision? If directed to the moon, which revolves round our earth, what forms of activity does occult vision find there?

Occult vision finds upon the moon nothing of that which is developed as human life upon the earth. An evolution resembling the human is not to be found upon the moon. Nor is there anything to be found upon it, as regards its evolution, which can be compared to our animal kingdom. Neither of these is to be found by occult vision upon our moon. It would, of course, be trivial and superfluous to say that no human beings incorporated in flesh perambulate the moon, or such animals as are to be met with upon the earth; when an occultist uses such expressions he means something essentially different. It certainly might be possible for something resembling the higher principles of human nature (the human ego, or astral body) to be in existence under other conditions on a cosmic body, and there go through a development without being incarnated in a human fleshly or etheric body. That is conceivable — and such conditions really do exist. It is conceivable that an evolution in a spiritual sense might take place upon the moon without the external embodiment, the external stamp of the beings resembling those of man; but it does not happen to be the case.

[Stranger]

The issue is that you only understand what the 'facts' are in terms of physical cognition, which of course is the only sort of cognition currently employed by secular science (otherwise it would automatically be spiritual science). Your understanding of the 'fact', "Buddha lives on Mars", is a physical cognitive understanding.

I explicitly said that the "facts" include all spiritual inner experiences, in addition to any other facts and experiences. Please be aware that, when talking to Lou or me, you are talking to people with decades of spiritual practice and inner spiritual and meditative experiences.

[AshvinP]

The issue is that you only understand what the 'facts' are in terms of physical cognition, which of course is the only sort of cognition currently employed by secular science (otherwise it would automatically be spiritual science). Your understanding of the 'fact', "Buddha lives on Mars", is a physical cognitive understanding.

I explicitly said that the "facts" include all spiritual inner experiences, in addition to any other facts and experiences. Please be aware that, when talking to Lou or me, you are talking to people with decades of spiritual practice and inner spiritual and meditative experiences.

Since you translated the following passage as "Buddha lives on Mars", it is difficult to conclude something other than a reductive physical understanding. But, given your extensive practice and experience, what is your understanding of the passage below?

And you have spoken many times of Masters transcending the Earthly incarnation cycle and going on missions in other spheres - is it not possible to scientifically verify the details of such missions through occult vision? If it possible, then how do you imagine one would go about it?

When the eye of the occultist has been opened and he looks out into the vast spaces of the world, he beholds a remarkable sight. He discovers that the Buddha has now for his scene of action that planet which in physical astronomy we call Mars; and he can do no other than relate in all seriousness how, since the time when the Buddha acquired the faculty which made it no longer necessary for him to appear again in Earth life, he has been given a new mission. This new mission of the Buddha we can discover by making occult observation of Mars.

As we enter upon this study, the true and original mission of the Buddha becomes clear to us. We find by occult investigation that the beings on Mars who correspond to men on Earth — they are of course of quite a different nature, but for the moment let us call them “Mars men” — at a certain time in their evolution were in a similar condition of need as were the Earth men in the Fourth Post-Atlantean period when the Christ had to come to them. And as Christ became a Saviour and an Awakener to Life, as that was a mission for the Christ in regard to Earth humanity, so is it a further mission for that Bodhisattva after he became the Buddha, to be a Saviour and Redeemer of Mars men. He has to accomplish on Mars an event similar to the event that the Christ had to bring to fulfilment on Earth.

[Stranger]

Since you translated the following passage as "Buddha lives on Mars", it is difficult to conclude something other than a reductive physical understanding. But, given your extensive practice and experience, what is your understanding of the passage below?

And you have spoken many times of Masters transcending the Earthly incarnation cycle and going on missions in other spheres - is it not possible to scientifically verify the details of such missions through occult vision? If it possible, then how do you imagine one would go about it?

As I said above, it is possible that Buddha lives on (higher-dimensional) Mars, but it contradicts with clairvoyant accounts of Buddhist masters and has no relevance with my own inner meditative experience. So, I have no reasons to believe that it is true, but likewise, cannot claim that it is definitely wrong.

[AshvinP]

Since you translated the following passage as "Buddha lives on Mars", it is difficult to conclude something other than a reductive physical understanding. But, given your extensive practice and experience, what is your understanding of the passage below?

And you have spoken many times of Masters transcending the Earthly incarnation cycle and going on missions in other spheres - is it not possible to scientifically verify the details of such missions through occult vision? If it possible, then how do you imagine one would go about it?

As I said above, it is possible that Buddha lives on (higher-dimensional) Mars, but it contradicts with clairvoyant accounts of Buddhist masters and has no relevance with my own inner meditative experience. So, I have no reasons to believe that it is true, but likewise, cannot claim that it is definitely wrong.

Please share or summarize one of these clairvoyant accounts with us. It would be seriously interesting to compare. Where is the Buddha and what is he doing now, according to those accounts? If something "contradicts" a detailed account from sources you respect, then you certainly have reason to say it is wrong or inaccurate, even if not with 100% certainty.

[Stranger]

Also, I asked you a while ago: if Steiner indeed had such far-reaching clairvoyant abilities, including the knowledge of elemental and animal domains and their lawful structures, then why he could not he get any new knowledge of the actual laws and structures of these domains ahead of the scientific knowledge of his time? Anything about cellular biology? About viruses? About the functions of organs? Likewise, anything about the lawful structures on elemental level? Laws of physics? Nope, nothing at all.

[AshvinP]

Also, I asked you a while ago: if Steiner indeed had such far-reaching clairvoyant abilities, including the knowledge of elemental and animal domains and their lawful structures, then why he could not he get any new knowledge of the actual laws and structures of these domains ahead of the scientific knowledge of his time? Anything about cellular biology? About viruses? About the functions of organs? Likewise, anything about the lawful structures on elemental level? Laws of physics? Nope, nothing at all.

Federica was 100% spot on when saying:

The clairvoyant report of that reality is questioned and promptly labeled "occultic", not based on your own meditative exploration of the question, which would be the correct living knowledge approach, but because it's contrasted with the standard materialistic criteria of secular science, and vaguely felt unreasonable, according to those conventional parameters.

Of course Steiner did investigate the lawful functioning of the human organism - anatomy, chemistry, biology, physiology, etc - in ways most people are completely unaware of and don't suspect, even today, but you expect that research to conform with past and current theories of secular science, which are only aware of dead mineral processes in the human organism, ignoring those of life, soul, and spirit. We can't actually understand the lawful functioning of the human organism without factoring in the last three, which was done extensively by Steiner. You expect that 'clairvoyant abilities' simply extend the past theories with new intellectual factoids which would have anticipated the trajectory of secular research. That is not how it works. If you simply took time to work through the material on the fourfold convolutions presented by Cleric, Steiner, or other Christian esoteric streams, these confusions would not arise for you. Then you would understand that the latest 'laws' of secular science are simply the decohered image of life-soul-spirit laws of an aesthetic and moral nature, including those of the planetary Spheres and Karma, which have been explored for centuries and made scientific through streams such as Anthroposophy.