Personalism 102

First topic message reminder :

This is a topic reminder post……

Personalism 102 is just a continuation Personalism 101…….. as we approach the limit of 40 pages.  

The contention remains that the best possible world is necessarily based on the philosophy and ontology of Personalism.  

The ontology is immaterialism, taken at it’s most fundamental level.

ALL I CAN SAY IS……

https://youtu.be/YTbRsGRWZW0

That ain’t sayin much, then again, there isn’t anything to say really.

For us, there is only what we do that matters and it does matter.

PhsycicX,

We are all born upon a cross, with X marking the division between the polarity and equator, but it's not quite at 45 degrees.

The Earth is not moving or spinning, consciousness is and it creates the illusions of movements.

The geometry is fixed solid as universe is the solid...a crystal as clear as glass.
https://biblehub.com/bsb/revelation/21.htm

And He measured the city with a rod.
144 cubits.
fibonacci.




hobbit

Chivo,

On your recognizance, I’ll give Nasr a pass, but does he even come close to Barfield?  

I didn’t realize that Corbin was a personalist……. thanks.

And thanks for reminding us of the perennial philosophy, per Huxley…….  

The Perennial Philosophy is expressed most succinctly in the Sanskrit formula, tat tvam asi ('That thou art'); the Atman, or immanent eternal Self, is one with Brahman, the Absolute Principle of all existence; and the last end of every human being, is to discover the fact for himself, to find out who he really is.

In this expression it is unreservedly personal.



Hobbit,

But I saw no temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, because the glory of God illuminates the city, and the Lamb is its lamp. 24By its light the nations will walk, and into it the kings of the earth will bring their glory.f 25Its gates will never be shut at the end of the day, because there will be no night there.

The portals will open and the Sun will go out……
………


Nasr was a student of Corbin’s, I see.  

Corbin puts a major emphasis on the (creative) imagination.  

With the perennial philosophy being so decisively personal, do we still need the jguy?  

We need the jguy to give structure to the Metanarrative.  

What is the person without the Narrative?  

Without the Narrative, we are still just lost in time and space.  

The singularity of the jguy speaks to the singularity of the BPW.  

The BPW makes no sense without the jguy.  

Leibniz was a major influence in the Perennialist movement.

The jguy is the necessary keystone of the small world concept.  

The perennialist school has a strong, ultra conservative branch containing no less than the proto fascist, Julius Evola.  

Nazism was strongly influenced by such…… not to mention Vladimir.  

donny wanted so badly to be one of the boys.  
………..


Huxley again…….

the metaphysic that recognizes a divine Reality substantial to the world of things and lives and minds; the psychology that finds in the soul something similar to, or even identical to, divine Reality; the ethic that places man's final end in the knowledge of the immanent and transcendent Ground of all being; the thing is immemorial and universal. Rudiments of the perennial philosophy may be found among the traditional lore of primitive peoples in every region of the world, and in its fully developed forms it has a place in every one of the higher religions.

Here, Huxley is verging on the impersonal, if for no better reason than to avoid a close encounter with the jguy.  
………….


The 800# gorilla in these precincts is Teleology…….

Previously, I’ve spoken of the three ages…… variously…… father, son and spirit coming from Joachim de Fiore (c. 1160), the foremost eschatological figure of the Middle Ages.

My present preference is mythos, (0 AD) logos and (2000 AD) telos.



(cont……..)

The pervasive illusion of separateness
Fine. Go ahead exhaust yourself frantically flailing for phenomena when we already know selflessness grants in gargantuan geomancering gifts encumbering the holy with the super, secret most-sacred burden of custodianship…

Sorry Psychic, need to follow the bouncing ball here.

So Dan, Nasr is also a great admirer and student of Frithjof Schuon, as I am.

I’ve been studying him.

He is way onto the big picture imo.

Schuon was definitely a spiritual genius. He was very close with some American Native Tribes interestingly.

They speak of the Eye of the Heart.

This is their path and way of living back to spirit and whole life.

http://www.worldwisdom.com/public/authors/Frithjof-Schuon.aspx

Corbin and Barfield share the imaginal focus, which comes from Coleridge and Steiner and Ibn Arabi.

Their project was the reenchantment of the world, Nasr describes this as the resacralization of the modern world.

I think this is exactly it.

What all of this is about beneath the surface.

Absolutists and Fundamentalists are out of their depth and just not going to see this.

Blessed are those with eyes to see.

Heraclitus is in all this too and the Stoics.

Man, I could write a killer masters or PhD thesis on all this.

But that’s not my path.

https://www.owenbarfield.org/read-online/articles/anthroposophy-and-the-future/

Ibn is a master of masters.

Corbin must be studied to gain entry to this Islamic world for westerners.

I have his Alone book, really inspired.

https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691058344/alone-with-the-alone

Also see Tom Cheetham, “Green Man, Earth Angel.” He puts it all together well and calls out the gaps in James Hillman, Corbin, and Jung.

“It is just here, at this origin, where mystery and certainty coincide, where the waters and the earth divide, where the symmetries are broken and the metaphoric and the literal separate, where we cannot keep our balance-it is here, in the realm of the inhuman, both divine and demonic, where meaning is born. This is the inundus iinaginalis. And we cannot keep our balance. Myth gives way to Reason. Revelation to Orthodoxy. We must dance or go mad.

…

This participatory empiricism is based on pathos. It reveals the world of Corbin's Creative Imagination, Blake's Jesus the Imagination, Coleridge's Primary Imagination.

…

And also, this empiricism is not particularly "safe." There are mirages and illusions and demons here.

…

Our democratic ideals tend to become muddled with notions of knowledge as commodity or as information. But we are a long way from capitalist or digital metaphors here. And also, this empiricism is not And also, this empiricism is not particularly "safe." There are mirages and illusions and demons here. Henry Corbin has said that the imaginary can be innocuous, but the imaginal never is. But materialist empiricism is if anything more dangerous, because it pretends to be safe, controlling. It is the world that is not safe. In any case, we have come to the end of materialism. We have no more places in which to dwell, only spaces in which to move.

…

The gnosis outlined by Corbin is in opposition to any kind of incarnational Christianity. For the metaphysics of Ibn `Arabi and other Islamic mystics, the incarnation of Christ is an impossibility, for it historicizes God. Cheetham indicates that in this cosmology, to say that Christ is God incarnate, is equivalent to saying that God is dead. The entry of God materially, wholly, and substantially into historical, material, and public time and space is the archetypal act of secularization. In the gnosis of Islamic mysticism Christ is an ever-present reality of the soul. And, Christ did live, but, in this gnostic imagination, he did not die on the cross. Corbin speaks of Christ as a man, but also as a figure of Light-both. Christ is also the Soul of the World.

The doctrine of the Incarnation in the exoteric version of Christianity collapses any sensibility of the angelic hierarchies. The angelic realms no longer have the power they once did, and that can still be found in esoteric Christianity which is far more compatible with the view put forth by Corbin. We find this collapse evident in religion these days, which no longer has a conception of the creating power of the angelic realms. So, there is an imaginal theology accompanying, even preceding, imaginal metaphysics. This theology is founded on Beauty rather than on Salvation.”

— “Green Man, Earth Angel”

And James Hillman.

https://thehumandivine.org/2021/04/25/creative-imagination-and-mystical-experience-in-the-sufism-of-ibn-arabi-by-henry-corbin/

I have been studying Descartes and his philosophic contributions and Kierkegaard.

Descartes posited an argument that we could be being deceived by a Great Deceiver, kinda Gnostic, that imprinted us with a different logos than the one that created the world. He asks, should you be a total skeptic and doubt everything? This is where “I think, therefore I am” came from, minimal dualism was his answer. He meant even if I must doubt everything, I’m thinking and I exist, so that can’t be doubted.

Throughout his life Descartes was a devout Christian. He believed his arguments did more than simply provide a way for faith and reason to peacefully coexist. To Descartes, faith and reason were intimately bound together.

But reason has been used to usurp his faith, how ironic!

Very interesting to dig more into Descartes.

Corbin saw many correlations in western fairytales and Islamic ones, a big focus of his study.

The Perennialists and Sufis say god could not have become fully embodied, but they acknowledge Christ.

For the Islamic folks, Al-Khadir, the green one, is the mediator.

Al-Khidr is the initiator into this knowledge of those ready to receive it.

The Daemon/Daimon it seems to me.

Our matching angel or guide, Daimon of Socrates.

Well, call me a loon, but I feel I am intimately connected to my holy guardian Angel my Daimon.

It’s showing me all these connections and been close to me for the last 10 years.

Khidr is much like Hermes, Elijah, the Green Man.

The average muppet isn’t going to be able to follow these threads.

I’m sharing part of the inner dialogue I am having with my HGA, it’s not really ready for consumption yet.

Metaphysics is not for everyone, it takes work, and focus.

I have realized I am a Metaphysician.

But man, things are really popping these days for me.

Many threads coming together.

Fun fun.

Poor Tom…….. but, yes, there certainly is a gnostic aspect to the Grand Deception.  

But it cannot be understood in a dualistic perspective, as the Traditionalists insist.  

The Grand Deception is all on the up and up…….. it’s all for the greater good.  

And, yes, it puts the world right where it belongs……. in chick ’s nest 🪺.

The Great Apostasy was just our mid-course correction…… our detour through the Ego……. through the breakdown of the bicameral mind.  

Owen could actually see this.  

Tom Cheetham never heard of Owen Barfield……. how is that even possible?!

Owen also understood the thee stages of history.  

The traditionalists only understand the Fall.  

They do not understand that we must stoop to conquer.  

Their elitism gets the better of them.  

They don’t understand that the first shall be the last.  

Vladdie does not understand the Grand Deception.  

He fell for it…….. hook, line and sinker.  

So……. what’s next?  

Vladdie will fall, and take the Traditionalists with him.  

For a few months, we will be re-enacting the fall of the Berlin Wall.  

Vladdie will take down every tin horn dictator……. in his demise….. even the cartel bosses.  

The capitalists/secular-humanists will be shocked beyond belief.  

Folks will be looking for a culprit.  

The sky will begin to fall.

…….

Am I being just a little bit optimistic?  

At our close encounter with the Eschaton, there is precious little room for pessimism.  

The portals can be activated at the appropriate time….. they will seem to be almost an afterthought.  

The world will be turned upside down and inside out…… overnight.  

There is no way to soft peddle the Gestalt Switch.  

The cosmic Psyche…… the Source…… it is all or nothing.  

It is perfectly personal.

Our global wave-function will collapse…….. it will not stand on anyone (else’s) ceremony.



(cont………)

Woe unto those whose hearts are hardened.

When the heart is hardened, the connection is severed.

The softening of the heart can only be accomplished through God’s help.

The hardened heart must be emptied.

The veiled heart is filled with confusion.

What is the heart?

It is the center of our being at every level.

Modernism refuses to see a person beyond their body.

Each takes their own path, walks their own pristine beach.

Yes, whatever cannot bend in the wind will be broken……. open…… turned inside out.  

The heart will be exposed to all the elements at once.  

Our imaginations are the only thing that can hold anything together.

Will the economy still function?

After a fashion.



(cont………)

“The proof of the pudding is in the eating.”

Eat this pudding and you will see.

The way through all this is living from the heart, the heart can smell and hear and see what the ego can't.

It is the one true connection to the One.

It is the nexus of the vertical and horizontal aspects.

Why the materialists will suffer so much and others, is because they have not reconnected the vertical and horizontal aspects in themselves.

If one isn't developing their hearts, they will be really hard up.

If you are not looking into what I for one am pointing to, you are going be caught in the jet wash.

I have come to trust my heart and learned to use my intellect.

That’s the key, intellect and reason.

Perhaps Dan on some of your points.

To be clear, Perennialism is full of confusion today.

Rene Guenon sees things Schuon doesn't and vise versa, two of the modern sources for Perennial thought.

BTW, Schuon was a bald face liar in the things and business of the world, he saw the corrupt muppets as not worthy of the Truth, so he would lie about all sorts of things, taxes, marriages, etc.

No one is perfect

The Perennial philosophy is eternal, taught by all great masters, Ibn Arabi being one; and it is not the same thing as universalism, which is what Schuon made of it, vulgarizing, popularizing and turning it into a “movement,” because it came and will go, like everything created by men. He practiced universalism by being ecklectic. There were some crucial links lacking in Frithjof Schuon…major misunderstandings and lacuna in knowledge due to character.

Schuon went off the tracks a bit.

Have to always be careful not to follow any one muppet too close or Guru, but he is damn comprehensive and a genius.

It's murky water.

The Traditionalists are only kinda a subset of Perennialism.

Nothing is cut and dry here.

Religions are not ecumenical, all missing something, all of them have the same esoteric root that connects back to the one, or so the Perennialists think.

I'm not 100% about anything.

John Vervaeke covers a lot of this and makes some connections between Cheetham's work, Corbin, Barfield, etc.

Fantastic syncretic series he has put together on the Meaning Crisis.

I'd check this one out.

https://www.meaningcrisis.co/ep-48-awakening-from-the-meaning-crisis-corbin-and-the-divine-double/

Ok, sports fans……..

The demise of modernism remains in full gear.  

This, along with the demise of religion in general, and Christianity in particular.

A vacuum has been created.  

Postmodernism is an an attempt to forestall any implosion…… with a very self-conscious pluralism.  

The cookie continues to crumble, however.  

The mystical tradition finds finds itself in closest alignment with postmodernism.  

All of these developments abhor any Metanarrative.  

The result is that we are stuck with the default metanarrative of scientific cosmology.  

That cosmology is nothing, if not impersonal…… we are lost in the Void.  

It is everyone for themselves……. and devil take the hindmost.  

The only counter-developments on the horizon are the consciousness movement and the mind-body problem.  

Very few have been convinced that consciousness is just an epiphenomenon.  

Consciousness simply does not fit into the picture of the Big Bang.  

The building block that was rejected, threatens to become the cornerstone of a whole new world.  

And just how big is that threat?  

Opinions vary.  

Is it at the top of anyone’s list?  

Consciousness certainly does not fit into the staid precincts of secular humanism.  

The intelligentsia is not rushing to embrace it.  

There are many on the fringes who tout consciousness as a game changer……. but just try to find someone willing to be more specific.  

Clearly, the consequences would be cosmic…… they would be of biblical proportions……. and that is not intended as a metaphor.

And that is precisely why no one in their sane mind…… in public….. is willing to do anything more than pinch 🤏 the bear .  

If we have an equilibrium here, it is an unstable one.  

Folks hold their breath…… après vous, Alphonse!  

You might think that the mystics would embrace consciousness…… it is their bread and butter…… but no.  

They, as well as any, sense the 800# gorilla …….

Where are the prophets, then?

The KATechon has got their tongue.  

They wait patiently for the cosmic trigger……. for the portal to open….. for the glory in the sky.  

Vladdie has already donned his suicide vest.  

The denouement has already been written in the stars , but the curiosity won’t quite let go.  

If there is a handle on this thing, can I be blamed for wondering if it had ever been within my reach?

If that were the case, it is still likely to be within someone’s reach.  

Is there a better trigger out there?  

I’ll even bet there is a catch phrase that only has to be googled, and voilà.  

However, many suppose that the tinder is too damp to start anything.  

Since when has the Truth gone out of fashion?  

Yes, many have given up on there being such a thing.  

Perhaps we look for Truth in all the wrong places.

If it were to exist, it would likely be whole…… too big to get into perspective.

Much too big to be sifted and sorted.



(cont………)

There is only an apparent vacuum.

You and all of this has always been just fine.

Everything is wonderful.

The ignorance of most muppets is theirs alone.

The sun is here shining for any with the eyes to see it.

The logos is heard and known by those with ability to do so.

Everything is just fine in spite of the anxious and schizophrenic.

Poor muppets.

They suffer as long as they choose to.

TRADITION AND PERENIALISM!

One of the reasons I like Ibn Arabi is because he was considered a heretic by many in his tradition. I also became a heretic in my religion as well. It’s the heretical life for me. It is good to acknowledge your tradition and roots and realize that all traditions have a common root. Ironically the sect of Christianity I grew up with was itself also very heretical in Christianity. They were born out of the Jesus movement of the 60s partly. They were often non-denominational and quite apocalyptic and literal about their faith. In the hick towns, a church full of conmen and women actually, drawn by the show and opportunity to pick the pockets of suckers. I knew some very smart and devout evangelicals too in college, not fools at all. They were radicals who believed to force god to return, all the people of the world had to hear the Good News. This was silly of course, but they dedicated their lives to this goal. I admired that and most were sincere.

This exclusivity thing of theirs and their focus on the end of the world was wrong and always pissed me off. But it gave me a compass to live by for a time that probably kept me from some really dark things, flawed as it and I was. I found my way into the darkness anyway. It seems this is inevitable for any living being. But that allows you to see the colors of the light.

Those were fun confusing times. I went to churches all over the world. I spent time in the mission field myself and was seriously considering a life dedicated to that mission. I was in Belarus after the iron curtain fell in the 90s even on a mission. I was even part of a group called Youth With a Mission, an authoritative, militaristic, even cultish group. I was indoctrinated and everything, kind of brainwashed. It never took in me that well though. I chafe against authority and blind faith. I had a knack for evangelism Evangelicals are a kind of mystic Christian sect. They were ecstatic about god quite often. I didn’t learn until much later, after I left my tradition, how much they missed about life and the unity of oneness.

As every person must do, I have wrestled greatly with myself, that is to say, I have wrestled with God. For heretics to think you are a heretic is quite good I think. Must be doing something right maybe

Back to Ibn.

“Ibn Arabi is perhaps the most controversial figure in the history of Islamic thought. On one hand, he is revered as ‘the Greatest Master’ (Al-Shaykh Al-akbar) and is considered the prime spokesman of esoteric Islam. On the other hand, he is severely condemned by many with charges of heresy, unbelief, blasphemy, pantheism, and even atheism. His name remains very controversial to this day. How can one person trigger responses that contradict on such an extreme level? The answer lies in his Unity of Being theory (Wehdet al-Wujud).”

Ahhh, give me some of that old time “esoteric” religion. It is fascinating how the esoteric in any religion can relate with one another quite well. This is big hint pointing to the Oneness.

“Surprisingly, the term that became almost synonymous with Ibn Arabi’s name was never even mentioned by him in any of his works.  In fact, even the discussion of the contents of what later came to be known as the Unity of Being was not the aim of Ibn Arabi in his works. Rather, his entire literary corpus is primarily concerned with what it means to be fully human. Ibn Arabi’s school of thought can be best described as one dealing with the potential of human perfection and the transformative path towards that realization. The term ‘Unity of Being’ was attributed to his school long after his death, in particular by Ibn Taymiyya, a revered theologian that severely criticized Ibn Arabi. Ibn Taymiyya’s interpretation of Ibn Arabi’s works turned his teachings into a special doctrine seemingly divorced from essential Islamic values. Ever since, the Unity of Being theory has been associated with autonomy and controversy.”

Yes, I share Ibn’s quest to become fully human.

“Surprisingly, the term that became almost synonymous with Ibn Arabi’s name was never even mentioned by him in any of his works.  In fact, even the discussion of the contents of what later came to be known as the Unity of Being was not the aim of Ibn Arabi in his works. Rather, his entire literary corpus is primarily concerned with what it means to be fully human. Ibn Arabi’s school of thought can be best described as one dealing with the potential of human perfection and the transformative path towards that realization. The term ‘Unity of Being’ was attributed to his school long after his death, in particular by Ibn Taymiyya, a revered theologian that severely criticized Ibn Arabi. Ibn Taymiyya’s interpretation of Ibn Arabi’s works turned his teachings into a special doctrine seemingly divorced from essential Islamic values. Ever since, the Unity of Being theory has been associated with autonomy and controversy.

Ibn Arabi has had a tremendous influence on Islamic philosophy, but to call him a philosopher is slightly misleading. The term could perfectly describe him in the general and original sense of the word as a lover (philo) of wisdom (sophia). But if we take philosophy to mean the acquiring of wisdom through rational investigation only, then we cannot describe him as such. Ibn Arabi on many occasions recognizes the dire limitations of human reason, without, nevertheless, denying its importance.”

I came to the same place myself, realizing the limits of my own reason and the reason of others.

“Human reason depends on what can be called black or white logic. It is a logic that comprehends no contradiction, but rather proves its postulates by disproving their opposites. Human demonstrative reason cannot comprehend Ibn Arabi’s black and white knowledge, a knowledge that unifies opposites, much like the Yin and Yang principle in Eastern traditions. That does not mean, however, that Ibn Arabi condemned reason; rather, he finds it incapable of grasping a reality that transcends it, such as the reality of God. He does not arrive at the knowledge he presents to us in his works through rational means, but through a mystical epistemology that allows him to experience God’s unity, and not merely conceptualize it.”

And that is why I saw a kindred spirit in him and in some Zennists, Taoists, and others. You can experience unity. It transcends your thinking. It is mystical. One must go with the mind as far they are able to boot up the next program waiting to be run within you. Who or what has given us this capacity? Now that is the ultimate question, isn’t it?

“What is important to note so far is that a lot of meaning is lost when we attempt to translate non-discursive and non-conceptual mystical knowledge into theory, which is to say that explaining his very dense and metaphorical writings can never do justice to what Ibn Arabi intended to express, but can only take us closer to its meaning. The legacy of his works gives us a lantern to guide our understanding, but our understanding will always be lacking by definition so long as we have not tasted the metaphorical fruits of experience ourselves. Nevertheless, the journey is worth taking, for even if our theoretical explanations cannot perfect our understanding of his works, they certainly provide us with a wealth of insights that inevitably contribute to our intellectual evolution.”

To make it simple, the ontological unity of the Divine Essence is basically the unity of ‘God’s Being’. That is what is meant when we say God is one.

Simple, right?

Hehe.

“Ibn Arabi contends that God is not a thing or an entity that we can say exists or does not exist, but He is existence itself, pure Wujud.  If God is Wujud, how can we speak of any ontological plurality? It is logically impossible to conceive that there are two or more Wujuds, for what is other than existence itself but non-existence (i.e. unreality)?  Wujud is one in that sense, and it is in that sense that polytheism is impossible.

If we think of several Gods, we cannot be thinking of them as pure Wujud, for in order to conceive of their ontological plurality we presuppose their quiddity (i.e. entification or thinghood). This is the meaning of the unity of Being (wehdet al-wujud) and the meaning of the statement ‘God is one’. It is also why God, understood as existence in itself, is considered the ultimate ground of reality, for God is the ontological source of any reality we conceive of.”

Maybe beyond simple?

I could go on and on.

I haven’t proven anything.

And yet…here we are, all together now.

Sharing mostly the same DNA.

Struggling with the same things.

Experiencing similar hopes and love.

Dreaming similar dreams.

Some have more intellectual capacity.

But just a little is all you need to be one with what you are.

As sure as you are about anything, it isn’t.

This is a Visionquest.

“But all I ever settled for is that we're born to live... and to die... and we've each gotta do it alone... each in our own way. And I guess that's why ya gotta love those who deserve it like there's no tomorrow... because when you get right down to it... there isn't."

Ok, then………

Ibn Arabi emphasizes what is at the core of Islam…… the perfectibility of the human….. into the Oneness of God……. God proposes…… the human disposes.  

This is the trans-historical fate of humanity.  

Christianity, on the other hand, managed to mire itself into the dualism of good and evil.  

Well, the Christians couldn’t have everything.  

What the xians did have was an overweening notion of Redemption.  

For instance, there is no concept of original sin in Islam.  

In Christianity, nature was caught up in the need for redemption……. thus science and technology……… felix culpa.  

But wasn’t alchemy an Islamic concept?  

Alchemy was practiced universally in the ancient world.



(cont……..)

The Sufis are quite spiritually advanced.

Alchemy came out of Egypt actually, also see Hermetic sources.

Who knows how far it goes back really.

Just like all religions, there is an esoteric root that was received by humans and started the tradition, and then fundamentalist and orthodox branches grew, etc.

For those with the intellect, they can find direct contact and experience of oneness.

The true source of any religion is reality, not a book.

Islam began from the direct words of God transmitted by Gabriel to Muhammad.

Beauty is the root of perennialism.

You can imagine a single spring feeding many unique bodies of water. Each of the religions is a way of bringing fresh Water to the thirsty. God is the universal water, how it gets into the people is the work of religion.

Perennial Philosophy affirms that each religious tradition, in its healthiest and most mature expression, is a genuine expression of and invitation into, what is Absolute and most Ultimate, namely, God.

We have exoteric and esoteric religion.

Can’t discount my man Heraclitus.

He, like Ibn, described the work is to unify the opposites.

See Alchemy's Mysterium Coniunctionis: Union of Opposites.

Heraclitus believed in a God of some kind.  His exact theology cannot be determined from the fragments, but some characteristics can be determined.  God is more beautiful and wiser than men, just as men are higher than apes or children.  God sees things the way they really are, where as men have a tendency to confuse and divide things incorrectly.  God is seen as a set of opposites in and compared to fire.

Heraclitus was very critical of popular religion.  He calls the mystery religions unholy.  He claims that the acts of worship to Dionysus would be shameful if they weren't being done to that particular god.

Heraclitus saw the Oracles as divine. I think he directly experienced the same Oneness we can.

Henry Corbin wrote:”…The mundus imaginalis is the place, and consequently the world, where not only the visions of the prophets, the visions of the mystics, the visionary events which each human soul traverses at the time of his exitus from the world, the events of the lesser Resurrection and the Greater Resurrection "take place" and have their "place," but also the gestes of the mystical epics the symbolic acts of all the rituals of initiation, litrugies in general with their symbols, the "composition of the ground" in various methods of prayer..., the spiritual filiations whose authenticity is not within the competence of documents and archives, and equally the esoteric processus of the Alchemical Work, in connection with which the First Imam of the Shi'ites was able to say 'Alchemy is the Sister of Prophecy.'" Henry Corbin, Spiritual Body & Celestial Earth, xi.

"We have here a mineralogy, a crystallography, a botany, a zoology whose 'objects' are used and studied as mirrors. The beings of the three Kingdoms are mirrors that render visible the constellations of the superior world..." "The alchemist operates - meditates - on all the metals as the hermeneut practices the symbolic exegesis... of a text." "...[I]t is the true imagination that makes the link between the alchemical operation and the interior transmutation." Henry Corbin, Lectures, 1973 - Quoted by Pierre Lory, Introduction to Corbin, l'Alchimie comme Art Hieratique, Paris: l'Herne, 1986, 11-13.

Henry Corbin said that “the Active Imagination is not a theory, it is an initiation to vision.”

Angela Voss wrote:Becoming an Angel: the mundus imaginalis of Henry Corbin and the Platonic path of self-knowledge by Angela Voss
in Alchemical Traditions from Antiquity to the Avant-Garde ed. A.Cheak, Melbourne: Numen Books, 421-433

The profoundly alchemical implications of Corbin’s imaginal hermeneutics, in a spiritual sense, are illustrated by his interest in the hieratic art of statue animation, which he describes as:

neither a simple dramaturgy of the unconscious or psychological allegory, nor a simple manipulation of materials practiced in the manner of a mere chemist or pharmacist (droguiste). It is an operation at once material and spiritual, the juncture between the two aspects remaining the hidden secret underneath the symbols of the “Philosophers” (as the alchemists designate themselves).

Alchemy for Corbin is essentially the inner, spiritual work of attaining union between the human soul and its heavenly counterpart within the mysterious ground of the ‘hidden secret’ pointed to by the symbolic image. This is the intermediate place between spirit and matter, the mundus imaginalis, where the spiritual world assumes an objective reality, and where the transmutation of the prima materia of the human psyche into the subtle or spiritual body is the work of an alchemical opus that involves encounter with an angelic presence through the faculty of the active imagination. In this paper, I intend to explore the nature of this encounter in the context of the neoplatonism of the Islamic mystical philosophers to whom Corbin dedicated his life and work.

This is final participation in a nutshell.

Becoming an Angel: the mundus imaginalis of Henry Corbin and the Platonic path of self-knowledge -
https://mythcosmologysacred.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Becoming-an-Angel.pdf

Quite a web of connections.

Beyond any human intellect to invent.

We are tripping fools.

What I have been writing about is an autonomous path of knowledge.

I write from a phenomenological perspective rather than from a reductionist one.

The organ of metaphysical knowledge in man is not the individual reason but the heart, which is identified with the nous of Plato or the “uncreated and uncreatable” Intellect of Meister Eckhart.

By the power of “reason”, one can “think about” transcendent truths, but it is with the Intellect that one “sees” the Absolute.

This experience and process of seeing changes you. A shift occurs from abstract reasoning to first hand experience.

The essence of things is revealed through union and participation.

This is more how primordial man experienced the world.

You have to side step Aldous Huxley‘s spiritual eclecticism and his emphasis on mystical experience, which are antithetical to Traditionalist and Perennial perspectives, when writing about these topics.

The reason I am focusing on Perennialism and Schuon in this apocalyptic time, is because of his Eye of the Heart way of knowing, which is a real example of final participation. He also addresses errors such as existentialism, rationalism and the so-called realism that labels as "abstractions" all principial realities.

“Beauty is the splendor of the True," is a Platonic view that expresses the primordial, intimate and inalienable relationship between the Real and the Beautiful. This path refutes the systematic ugliness of the modern world. This correlates with Owen Barfield’s theme as well, using beauty as a way of knowing.

Our status as knowers makes us cognitively privileged beings; for, to know is to take possession of a world. Knowing sets us apart from that world, as Owen Barfield explains:

“The real world, the whole world, does not consist only of the things of which we are conscious; it consists also of the consciousness and subconsciousness that are correlative to them. They are the immaterial component of the world. But today the only immaterial element our mental habit acknowledges is our own little spark of self- consciousness. That is why we feel detached, isolated, cut off not only from the world as it really is, but also from those other little sparks of detached self-consciousness we acknowledge in our fellow human beings.”

‘Psychological exile’ is not, however, a permanent condition to which we are irrevocably condemned. Barfield points out, on the contrary, that although self-consciousness is ‘an obvious and early fact of experience to every one of us, a fundamental starting-point of our life as conscious beings, we can see from the history of our words that this form of experience, far from being eternal, is quite a recent achievement of the human spirit.

If we are to take our potential as self-conscious knowers to a deeper level, the first step is to acknowledge our cognitive separation imposed by modernity and the suffering it can provoke, a sense of which is conveyed in this passage by poet, Paul Matthews:

“Many people today have developed a deep concern for the Earth, and feel Nature’s wounds as their own, but how many realize that language too is involved in this eco-logy (this ‘house-logos’)?”

The wound manifests as a kind of longing, a yearning for something lost, a vacuum where something else should be. Although we each feel this longing as our own (for that is what self-consciousness implies), we find, if we look closely, that it is there in the world. Can we not see a stone released from the hand as exhibiting longing in its fall to the earth, where it belongs? Does a plant, in reaching upwards to the light, not reveal its affinity for the sun? Does the heart not pulse in its yearning for more blood? (To offer explanations of gravity, photosynthesis and blood circulation respectively to a child too young to handle abstraction will no doubt result in a blank, if not resentful, stare.) Can the consonant not be seen as longing for the vowel? Does the caged bird not long to fly? There are many such examples, but in every case the longing is a desire of the thing to be itself.

Philosopher John Armstrong says something of the experience as developed by the Greek scholar, Plotinus:

“The pain of beauty occurs because it puts us in touch with an aspect of ourselves that we value highly (our ‘true home’), an aspect of existence in which, for a while, we feel that we are what we should be. An order of value is made apparent to us. But we also see, also feel, that very much of the time, nearly all of the time, we neglect and disown this part of ourselves, or feel that we have to smother it in order to get on with the business of living. Thus we feel that we have betrayed or lost what should have been the most precious aspect of ourselves. It has become marginal; we have disowned ourselves.”

My journey has been one that has resacralized the world. The world has come alive again in my heart and showed me how to sing and dance with it. I have been shown and led into final participation with reality. It has been an absolutely incredible journey I am only now finally able to give meaningful descriptions of.

We can replace alienation and nihilism with a living flowing sacred experience. I think this way of knowing is the most important thing missing in our world today.

This is an old/new way to be with the world and become part of it in the most profound way possible.

We’ve had the Grand Deception and the Great Apostasy…….. what we have now is the Great Evasion.  

What is being evaded? M

It’s not just the Person, it’s the necessary historicity of the Person…….. the Metanarrative of Gnosis.  

If there is a core to this evasion, it is the Buddhist doctrine of Anatta.  
………


But the Buddha is in agreement with the BPWH…….

The individual selves, atta, are an illusion relative to Brahman…….. the cosmic Self.  We are not just soulmates…… we are soul twins.  
……….


UAPs are back in the news with the shoot down of the Chinese ‘weather’ balloon .  

A report to Congress last year specified over a hundred uaps that remain unidentified, and potentially adversarial, exhibiting flight characteristics which remain unexplained.  

This raises the old tic-tac story by a notch or two……. but, hey, I’m no longer in that loop.  

Well, I’ve been temporarily excused from that loop.
………..


Back to Buddha……….

We have no problem with the relativity of souls……. relative to the I Am.

Everything is relative to love, which is the most personal thing we know.



(cont………)

So many flock to any light they find in the dark landscape of modernity desperate for reality.

Really it is our darkness which seeks to smother and devour the light mostly.

One must uncover and bring their own light with them the wise ones have taught us.

I concur.

There is a distasteful far right tinge to the perennial/traditionalist and orthodox religious folks.

A bit too authoritarian for my taste.

They are right on as far as living from the heart I feel.

Smelly s are gonna roam the fields and mountains ️

Keeping your head down and your mouth shut is not a bad strategy me.

When you stop looking for ultimate answers and focus on just being the best you can be now, things really flow best.

All have their own way unique to them.

We are imperfect vessels and should keep a good sense of humor about ourselves and others in tact.

When someone starts claiming to speak for God, it’s best to give them a wide berth.

Humility, kindness, curiosity, playfulness, gentleness, an open mind and heart are some good smells if you are trying to find good sources of knowledge that can help you in your seeking.

If your leader wants to get everyone naked or drinking cyanide koolaid, time to back off I think.

Discernment is a key skill to develop.

One must always look into their motivations.

Spending a good amount of time silent and still are some other valuable skills.

One should never believe their own bullshit or that of others too much I think.

The question arises as to whether Buddhism is nihilistic.  

This applies particularly with anatta.
……….  


Sunyata is closely associated with the concept of pratītyasamutpāda…… because everything is codependent there are no essences.  

Sunyata……… ‘nothing is real, nothing to get hung about……’.

But then there is garbha……. the ground of being that arises in connection with Buddha Nature…… it appears to be a cognate of Logos Spermatikos.  

Garbha has a definite feminine connotation….. as in womb…… as in contrast with the Greek.  

Then we have to remind ourselves of JAW……. no phenomenon is real unless observed…… yes, what is the cosmic trigger (RAW)?

And who is the primordial observer, if not the I Am?  
………..


Pratītyasamutpāda supplanted Brahman, from the Vedic tradition, as the ground of Being……. the ground of Buddha Nature.  

I’m sorry, but, if Buddha Nature is not personal, then what is it?  

Buddhism that prides itself on its impersonal character, has, nonetheless, imported personalism right into the core of its ontology.  

Are we surprised ?  

Buddhism was supposed to be the last refuge of the impersonalists.  

Buddha-nature has a wide range of (sometimes conflicting) meanings in Indian and later East Asian and Tibetan Buddhist literature. Broadly speaking, the terms refer to the potential for all sentient beings to be a Buddha,[4][5][6][7][8] since the luminous mind,[9][10][11] "the natural and true state of the mind,"[12] the pure (visuddhi) mind undefiled by kleshas,[9] is inherently present in every sentient being, and is eternal and unchanging.[13][14][15] It will shine forth when it is cleansed of the defilements, c.q. when the nature of mind is recognised for what it is.
…………

The primordial or undefiled mind, the tathagatagarbha, is also equated with sunyata;[10] with the alaya-vijñana ("store-consciousness", a yogacara concept);[10] and with the interpenetration of all dharmas. The Chinese Yogacara school came to regard buddha-nature as an eternal ground[19] and the ultimate source and support of all phenomenal reality.

……….


We have to wonder who would have thought that any forum might benefit from an anonymous ‘dislike’ button.  It’s difficult to imagine.

It does give the verbally challenged a say, after all.



(cont………..)

1400zulu…..

Poor chick struggles to give voice to his voiceless critic, above.  

Ok, blasphemy I can understand……. maybe that’s all it is.  

We move on.  

But, wait, we need to be more precise……

What is it that makes so many of us so defensive relative to God?

The Crusades and Inquisition garnered no small amount of popularity in their day.  

How might this differ from simple patriotism……. hurray for our side?  

We like our heroes to remain heroic.  

That jerk next door becoming one with the One…… no way!  

Or perhaps it’s an objection to the meer thought of I Am……. we don’t need one of those.  

And our minimalist I Am might be the first to concur.  

Who needs a quantum/cosmic observer?  

Well, it’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it……. if there is gonna be something rather than nothing……. and I think we’ve already decided that there can’t just be nothing…… for nothing to be is an oxymoron.  

The Logos Spermatikos/garbha…….. is it going to turn tail and run?  


2300zulu………..

What the pantheists/panpsychics don’t get is that there is qualitative distinction between sentience and sapience.  

There is no comparison.  

Well, states of pain would be recognizable between the two, but that may be about it.  

The difference is conceptual……. cosmological…… contextual….. narrational.  

None of those register within sentience.  

What is an observation without a cosmic context?  

Who observes the observer?  

What is an observation without an interpersonal context?  

What about the Easter Islanders before history?  

Was there no sapience…… no observation?

Do we rescue them from oblivion?

Well, they brought with them a great deal of cultural baggage.  

But was there actually a pre-history?  

Is archeology a phantasm……. the Paleolithic?

Scientific cosmology is a phantasm.  

Science is a phantasm…….. a sometimes useful one, when taken in the proper context.  

Yes, there is an observational currency…….. and where does the buck stop ?

Nowhere, if not in the context of the I Am.

The Creator is a phantasm without a Creation…… without the context of the best possible Creation, which is also the only possible.



(cont………)

Most of the time there is nothing to say.

It’s like coming to the banquet and seeing and tasting all the wonderful food.

You can spend time asking where the food came from, whose house it is.

But really, our host wants us to enjoy the feast!

You can learn to be with the silence and stillness.

You are then filled with this, dance with this, sing with is, enjoy this, flow with this.

What is revealed, reveals us.

Before Abraham was, I AM.

To try to nail it down is impossible and will only end in frustration.

We insist our view is the only view, we create idols and cause terrible suffering and conflict.

Do what Owen suggested, smash the idols, good advice.

You can only speak of it well poetically.

You can’t provide a rational explanation.

There is no need for an explanation.

Just flow with it and enjoy the view and experience.

Become like a child.

Reason and Imagination are gonna have to work it out in each of us.

  We have to wonder who would have thought that any forum might benefit from an anonymous ‘dislike’ button.  It’s difficult to imagine.

It does give the verbally challenged a say, after all.
 



God forbid any of you Deep State spooks get challenged

I do believe in a deep cosmos……… but not by way of deep space or deep time which are illusory metaphors for the depths of the transcendental/transpersonal spirit.  

To what extent any state actors have ever been able align themselves with this spirit……… any such alignment is more likely to be by accident than intent.  

However, every one of us is always expressing some aspect of the spirit……. be it superficial or not.  

Each one of us incarnates an aspect of the spirit….. up to the point that each one of us becomes one with the One, whether we wish to or not.  
……….


Was the recent earthquake an act of God?

No more, no less than a car accident or heart attack.  

We can read The Bridge of San Luis Rey.  

We can be the friar trying to make sense of the collapse.

Is every seemingly chance event pre-determined, or the result of quantum randomness?

We could have microcosmic determinism from the bottom up, cosmic determinism from the top down.  

Photography adds to the impression that at each instant, the external world is objectively fixed…… lending much credence to microcosmic determinism.  

I’m a tad skeptical of the objectivity of photography.  

Photographs are not observers.

An observed photograph does not necessarily constitute an observation.  

Remember to ask yourself……. who is observing the observer?

Who is Wigner’s friend?

My friend is the jguy……..

… And [he] was a sailor when he walked upon the water
And he spent a long time watching from his lonely wooden tower
And when he knew for certain only drowning men could see him
He said all men will be sailors then until the sea shall free them……

Yes, where does the observational buck stop?  

Where does the objectivity begin?  

It is the Alpha and the Omega that determine the rest of the world.

There is that of the A/O in every one of us.  

In its every day aspect, the world is only ever provisional.  

We are the providers……. in the beginning and the end…… and the opera is not over…….

Photographs are another aspect of the cosmic dream.  

Do not be seduced by anyone or anything purporting objectivity.  

Love is the only ground of Being.  

I will put love up against Samuel Johnson’s stone in the path, anytime…… see argumentum ad lapidem.   

In the end, Truth will overshadow any and all facts.

How will that be possible?  

Truth will dispel every remnant of our dreams…… it will melt our dreams away……. like the Sun on a foggy morning.  

Now we see as through a glass darkly……..

Yes, we are having a very lucid interpersonal dream.

There is no fault in investing in this dream.

We have been given a Royal invitation…… the Grand Deception.

It was designed precisely to fool the best and brightest of us, and it has met every expectation.



(cont……….)

Earthquakes are consciousness overloads.
This creates time displacements that to those observing look like movement.
They are ripples in time, look to the moon for clues.

Volcanoes are the opposite, they are where huge resistances to the outrush of consciousness occur, earthquakes been implosion based.


If GOD is consciousness then yes GOD created these overloads, otherwise they are system based , where the system is wrongly called GOD.

hobbit