Who is the Giver?

Who is the giver?

What is given, and to whom?

and the receiver, who is that?

and what is gotten?

 

Who is the teacher?

What is taught, and to whom?

Who is the knower of That?

and what is known?

 

Upon knowing, upon realization

what will that one say?

or having said that -

of what value is it?

 

What can that one hope to gain -

What does that one have to give?

Is there any value in what such a one

would offer us?

 

What has been gained?

What great jewel has that one found?

Of what use is his tapasya?

Of what use his penance?

 

At the end, in the desire to give

in the hope that what will be given

be of value and worth, lies a quandry.

 

The evidence of the value of what would be given,

does not yet shine in the life of that one having arrived.

There is no evidence, “but the giving itself.”

 

After the giving, after the sowing

the crop bares fruit, not otherwise.

Yet the Sadhu would give only what has value.

But who is the knower of that value?

 

To the one desiring to give

arises the desire that what would be given,

be of value to the receiver.

That one desiring so, cannot see the worth

until after the fruit is eaten.

 

The taste of truth is not given by the giver

nor does it exist in the sweet words uttered;

“That” lies only in the arising of love

in the receiver.

 

Giving belongs to God, to the consciousness,

never to the Sadhu.

and it is also the consciousness

that is the receiver of the gifts.

 

Yet the Sadhu mutters, “I will not give

a thing which has no value”.

He does not realize that wealth

has no value unless used for the good of all!

 

Selfishness has no part in truth

nor any part in Love. Love that is selfish

is just that; “Selfish”

It is that which excludes and disqualifies

us from realization due to selfhood;

Due to I-Ness and Me-ness.

 

Due to ownership, an I exists!

Due to the mere desire to give

there is a giver, an “I”!

 

True Wisdom is not great knowledge

nor the ownership of understanding;

Wisdom is the realization of charity.

Thus what can be given with wisdom

can only be what is loving to all.

 

Which knowledge is that, and who is the knower of it?

Which knowledge is for the good of all

and who could be the giver of that?

The knowledge can only be knowledge of the One Self

And the giver of such as that,

can only be one who has realized that self.

 

Who is the receiver of great wisdom, of great love?

and who the giver? It is certainly not the one

crying from the mountain-top;

Nor is it the one who seeks value in giving;

 

It is not the one who seeks to be paid homage

neither is it the one seeking absolution.

The receiver and the giver are but one.

 

There can be thus no gain, nor any loss

for in the acceptance of the receiver -

the giver is also the receiver.

 

Wisdom is charity, nothing more.

While it is Love that is the hidden force

of consciousness and the knower of the known.

 

Having known everything, it is time to give.

At this time what can be received?

Nothing what-so-ever,

but the knowledge of “The Love of The One Self”

What can be given?

Nothing what-so-ever, but “The Love of The One Self”.

 

In this way, the one having arrived nowhere

comes home……….. Home to the heart!

Home to Love……. The light then shines.

 

Reflection for March 6, 2009: The Chosen

Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge. 
  --Kahlil Gibran 
 
 
 
Only crime and the criminal, it is true, 
confront us with the perplexity of radical evil; 
but only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core.
 
--Hannah Arendt
 
 
 
 
"Jesus said, `Blessed are those alone and chosen, for you will find
the kingdom. For you are from it, and to it you will return'" (Gos.
Thom. 49).
 
In our Yahoo chat room the other day, someone asked me about this
verse, and generally what it means to talk about "the chosen"
or "the elect" in a Gnostic context. This concept has been another
of the many subjects through which Christianity has attempted to
denigrate Gnosticism, in this case by suggesting that we Gnostics
believe that only a certain (small) class of people are capable of
gnosis, creating a kind of fundamental soteriological hierarchy. In
other words, this would mean that being "chosen" would be a kind of
volitional and constitutive act, presumably by God, without which
one cannot enter through the gate of knowledge.
 
There may indeed have been some Gnostics in the past who believed
this, and who suggested that initiates into their religious groups
could only be drawn from a very small "gnosis-capable" part of the
human population, so to speak. However, the earliest articulations
of Gnosticism, and pre-Gnostic texts such as the Gospel of Thomas,
suggest in contrast a radically inclusive version of "the chosen," a
version that is flowering again today in our neo-classical Gnostic
Renaissance. I would like to take a few minutes here to suggest the
outlines of this understanding, which I hope may be helpful for you
in considering the history and theology of Gnosticism, and your own
personal spiritual outlook.
 
While the limited, exclusive theory of "the chosen" is attributed to
Gnostics by mainstream Christians, it actually is far more clearly a
part of THEIR religious traditions. The notion of predestination,
in particular, has made this idea of "divine election" profoundly
volitional in its metaphysical origins and constitutive in its
metaphysical effects on human beings. What many do not realize is
that a fairly robust form of predestination continues to be
theologically present in the belief systems of many denominations
that no longer emphasize it publicly, such as the Catholic Church –
in the case of Catholicism, as recently as the Council of Trent that
followed the Protestant Reformation, a Catholic doctrine of
predestination was solemnly affirmed. I say this only in passing to
provide you another example of the many inconsistencies in Christian
denunciations of Gnosticism – although, as I have said before, we
should not expect to find any consistency, because Christian polemic
against Gnosticism is not fundamentally concerned with being either
rational or coherent, but rather with foisting off on Gnosticism all
the difficulties, repressions, and forms of guilt that have
accumulated over the centuries in the massive social and cultural
edifice that calls itself the Christian church.
 
Now, on to the contrasting INCLUSIVE theory of "the chosen." What
in fact does it mean to be chosen or set apart? Is this setting
apart purely self-referential, or does it have an object? In other
words, are we just chosen, or are we chosen FOR something? This is
the key distinction that allows us to make sense of the whole
concept. When we embark on the path of gnosis, we are responding to
the basic call of the spirit within us, and the spirit beyond us
that ultimately is God. Because of this response, we are chosen by
God and set apart to be as it were the avatars of the spirit in the
world. As we move forward toward enlightenment, we have more and
more responsibility for the actualization of our own spirits but
also for true spiritual compassion of those all around us. We
are "the chosen" not indeed as if those around us are incapable of
gnosis, but in fact to be the instruments by which their gnosis can
come about as well! This is, of course, not at all the same as the
mainstream Christian notion of conversion, because that is about
dominating the other, about forcing the other into your own
prefabricated "truth." Being called and chosen, we are to form a
kind of sacred river, flowing through the world with what looks to
those outside to be passivity and even surrender, but gently picking
up the salt of the spirit as it were on our way to the sea.
 
So, the idea of a certain "chosen" group does not necessarily mean
in any way that other individuals are incapable of gnosis, for it
seems certain that other human beings, who share the basic
experiences of life with us, must have those experiences rooted in
the same kind of spiritual nature. Rather, being chosen, or
constituting an "elect," is in many ways a practical description,
since most of the people around us, fully capable of gnosis as they
are, are held back by many painful and frightening things from
taking those first steps that set us apart at the very beginning.
This point is made clear by another saying from the Gospel of
Thomas, which is included in the canonical New Testament as
well: "Jesus said, `The harvest is great but the laborers are few.
Beseech the Lord, therefore, to send out laborers to the harvest'"
(73).
 
Look around you: how great is this harvest, how ripe the fruit of
human beings standing just on the front porch of enlightenment,
ready to take that first step through the door! How late the time
is, my dear friends, and how quickly the sands of time are falling;
look at the darkness descending and the blood-red sun sinking low on
the horizon, as our world is weighed down ever more by the pain of
violence and hatred. How many sit in the lingering twilight,
yearning for the night to come – for the pain of living in this
world without joining in the life of the spirit has become
unbearable without drugs, and distractions, and addictions that ease
the pain.
 
We have been called to be those laborers, to be those shepherds, to
live not only for ourselves, but for all. To be chosen is to be set
apart as a gift to others, not to be elevated above others. Pride
is extinguished in love, and the ultimate love leads us to the
sacrifice of the bodhisattva, to the sacrifice of Christ. While the
light is still with us, before the clock strikes the closing of the
day, let us seek love and the fruits of love. For truly "there is
light within a person of light, and that person lights up the whole
world" (Gos Thom. 24).
 
In Christ and Sophia,
 
Matthew
 

	
	
 

Reflection for February 6 2009: The emanation

“Moshe’s anger was not a good sign,” Sidney said. “Moshe later taught there is no anger that doesn’t emanate from pride. At the root of all anger is the question, “How could it happen to me?”

 

“The battle in Moshe’s life was not over a few thousand dollars and a clause in a contract. It was between the rabbi and the Rabbi.

 

“That contract had been written for a Rabbi.”

 

–Mitchell Chefitz (The Seventh Telling)

 

 

 

Our Father and Mother God,
you are within us all,
and you make all things holy and united,
as you are holy and united, one God living and true.
Your Kingdom come,
your will be done,
which is love to all that lives in the heavens and on the earth.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and let us give our daily bread to those who have none;
and heal our broken spirits,
as we heal and forgive others.
And lead us, through the darkness of your mystical love,
to the light of the pleroma,
Amen.

 

……………..

Good is the Good to the good, and They set their nature upon those who love their name.

We will seek and find, and will pray and be heard.

We have sought and found, we prayed and were heard in thy presence,

my Lord Yeshu and Maryam d-Hiya, Lords of Healings.

Amen

 

 

Reflection for Jqanuary 26 2009: Do you know what you do not know ?

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it.

 

If we really know how to live, what better way to start the day than with a smile?

 

Our smile affirms our awareness and determination to live in peace and joy.

 

The source of a true smile is an awakened mind.

 

–Thich Nhat Hanh (Peace Is Every Step)

 

 

Yeh Ch’ ueh asked Wang I, saying, Do you know for certain that all things are subjectively the same?

 

    How can I know ? answered Wang I. Do you know what you do not know ?

    How can I know? replied Yeh Ch’ueh. But can then nothing be known?

    How can I know? said Wang I. Nevertheless, I will try to tell you.

    How can it be known that what I call knowing is not really not knowing and that what I call not knowing is not really knowing? Now I would ask you this. If a man sleeps in a damp place, he gets lumbago and dies. But how about an eel? And living up in a tree is precarious and trying to the nerves—but how about monkeys? Of the man, the eel, and the monkey, whose habitat is the right one absolutely? Human beings feed on flesh, deer on grass, centipedes on snakes’ brains, owls and crows on mice. Of these four, whose is the right taste absolutely? Monkey mates with monkey, the buck with the doe; eels consort with fishes. But men admire the beauty of Mao Ch’iang and Li Chi, at the sight of whom fishes plunge deep down into the water, birds soar high in the air, and deer hurry away.

 

    Yet who shall say which is the correct standard of beauty? In my opinion, the standard of human virtue—and of positive and negative—is so obscured that it is impossible to actually know it as such.

 

How do I know that love of life is not a delusion after all ? How can I be sure that he who dreads to die is not like a child who has lost the way and cannot find his home?

    The lady Li Chi was the daughter of Ai Feng. When the Duke of Chin first took her away, she wept until the bosom of her dress was drenched with tears. But when she came to the royal palace, and lived with the Duke, and ate rich food, she regretted having wept. How then can I be sure that the dead do not regret of having previously clung to life?

 

 Granting that you and I argue. If you beat me, and not I you, are you necessarily right and I wrong? Or if I beat you and not you me, am I necessarily right and you wrong? Or are we both partly right and partly wrong? Or are we both wholly right or wholly wrong? You and I cannot know this, and consequently the world will be in ignorance of the truth.

    Who shall I employ as arbiter between us? If I employ some one who takes your view, he will side with you. How can such a one arbitrate between us? If I employ some one who takes my view, he will side with me. How can such a one arbitrate between us? And if I employ some one who either differs from or agrees with both of us, he will be equally unable to decide between us. Therefore, since you and I and another cannot decide, must we not wait for still others?

 

–Chuang Tzu

 

 

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends — hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism — these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility — a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence — the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

 

 

–44^th US President Barack Obama 1/20/09

 

Reflection for January 19 2009: I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper

“Love is the creed I hold: wherever turns His camels,

Love is still my creed and faith.”

–Ibn Arabi

A belief that we are connected as one people. If there’s a child on the south side of Chicago who can’t read, that matters to me, even if it’s not my child. If there’s a senior citizen somewhere who can’t pay for her prescription and has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer, even if it’s not my grandmother. If there’s an Arab American family being rounded up without benefit of an attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties. It’s that fundamental belief ; I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper ; that makes this country work. It’s what allows us to pursue our individual dreams, yet still come together as a single American family. “E pluribus unum.” Out of many, one.

–Barack Obama

God’s absolute perfection, as described from our limited human perspective, has two facets: static perfection (being perfect) and dynamic perfection (becoming perfect). Through you and me, God fulfills His desire to express and participate in a challenging and adventurous process of becoming perfect.

When you realize that you are part of God’s life and God is part of your life, you will discover your holiness, your ultimate meaning and significance. When you realize that you exist within the Endless Light of God, you will discover that God’s Endless Light is also inside of you. You will understand that an aspect of God’s absolute perfection—the dynamic perfection—is expressed through you. Your divine privilege is to be a human being who serves as a vehicle for God. When you serve the ultimate, then you’re part of the ultimate. When you realize that you’re part of the ultimate, then you experience the perfection of every moment.

Here’s the menu put simply: God is living His secret life through you.

Take a moment to contemplate, feel, and taste this delicious truth. Take a lifetime to live it and celebrate it.”

— David Aaron (The Secret Life of God: Discovering the Divine within You)

I asked him if there was anything that could be done to give people a more balanced understanding of the glow of awareness.

“Nothing,” he said. “At least, there is nothing that seers can do. Seers aim to be free, to be unbiased witnesses incapable of passing judgment; otherwise they would have to assume the responsibility for bringing about a more adjusted cycle. No one can do that. The new cycle, if it is to come, must come of itself.”

–Carlos Castaneda (Fire from Within)

“If you ardently long to attain the wondrous divine illumination
of our Savior Jesus Christ; to experience in your heart the
supercelestial fire and to be consciously reconciled with God;
to dispose yourself of the worldly things in order to find and posses
the treasure hidden in the field of your heart; to enkindle
here and now your soul’s flame and to renounce all that is only
here and now; and spiritually to know and experience the kingdom
of heaven within you: then I will impart to you the science of
eternal or heavenly life, rather, a method that will lead you, if
you apply it”

–Nikiphoros the Monk, “On Watchfullness and The Guarding of the
Heart”, Philokalia, Vol IV.

 

Reflection for January 15, 2009: The Diet Book

Never think you have lost your way
Or when you stumble think the day
Holds no light for you. I myself
Am lost in you — but glad to stay.

–Labyrinth (Rafael Alejandro Jara)

Reason teaches us that nothing is difficult for the high gods: they are able to achieve any effect at will, in any place and upon any created thing, for without reason they are rightly called omnipotent. Perhaps you will sometimes be greatly astonished at the marvelous, stupendous, and indeed divine works that you will hear me relate. For art does all it can to imitate natural things, but divine things are certainly impossible for any created genius and intellect to copy or emulate without divine help and inspiration. For this very reason none should let himself be swayed by doubt, but should calmly take note in his mind that things unknown to us are possible to the higher ones, as I saw for myself.

–Hypnerotomachia Poliphili: The Strife of Love in a Dream

….

In our society, we are great believers in education. We believe that knowledge makes a cultured person civilized. Civilization, however, polishes the person superficially. Subject our noble and sophisticated gentleman to stresses of war or economic collapse, and see what happens. It is one thing to obey the law because you know the penalties and fear the consequences. It is something else entirely to obey the law because you have cleansed yourself from the greed that would make you steal and the hatred that would make you kill.

Throw a stone into a stream. The running water would smooth the surface, but the inner part remains unchanged. Take that same stone and place it in the intense fires of a forge, and the whole stone changes inside and outside. It all melts. Civilization changes man on the outside.

Meditation softens him within, through and through. Meditation is called the Great Teacher. It is the cleansing crucible fire that works slowly through understanding. The greater your understanding, the more flexible and tolerant you can be. The greater your understanding, the more compassionate you can be.

You become like a perfect parent or an ideal teacher.

You are ready to forgive and forget.

You feel love towards others because you understand them.

And you understand others because you have understood yourself.

– Gunaratana Mahathera

Sidney said, “We’ll begin our learning for the day with a text.

“When Moshe left the Temple, his first project was to expand his sermon on the Maimonidean diet into a book. He began by translating the diet from the Hebrew. The text is from that translation.

“The way you learn a text is much the way you tell a story. You need a part­ner. One speaks. The other listens. Back and forth. But a text you question and challenge. The questions are more important than the answers,

“This is a good one to begin with. There will be a lot more before the day is done.”

Sidney distributed the text.

“No,” he said when the partners fell into comfortable pairs. “As much as possible, learn with someone new.” The two young couples split and paired with each other, the man in shorts with one of the long skirts, the remaining long skirts with each of the executives.

Good pairings, Stephanie thought. Enough variety, enough challenge to keep a text alive.

Since a body must be healthy in order to follow the proper path, since it is impossible to divine any understanding of the Creator if you are ill, it is therefore necessary to remove yourself as far as pos­sible from those things which damage the body and to conduct yourself in such a way as to remain healthy, and this is the proper way. You should never eat unless you are hungry and never drink un­less you are thirsty and should never delay going to the bathroom; rather, when the need arises, you should go to the bathroom at once.

You should never eat to the point that your stomach is com­pletely full. Rather, you should stop one-fourth short of being full. You should never drink water during the course of a meal except for small amounts, and wine should be diluted. After the meal begins to digest in your intestines, then you can drink whatever is necessary, but you should not drink too much water even after the food has begun to digest. You should not begin eating unless you examine yourself carefully; perhaps it is necessary to go to the bathroom. You should not eat until after you have had some exercise, until after your body has begun to heat up a little bit, or until after you have done some work or exercise. Here is the rule: you should exercise every morning until you warm up, then you should rest a while and settle down and then eat. If you should wash in a hot bath after ex­ercise, that is good. Afterward, rest a while and then eat.

If you choose to eat chicken and beef together, eat the chicken first. So it is with eggs and chicken, eat the eggs first; and for lean meat and fat meat, eat the lean meat first. This is the rule: always eat first what is easy to digest and save what is difficult to digest for later.

Sidney allowed the students ten minutes to read and discuss. Then he said, “It took Moshe maybe two hours to translate the entire diet. The entire diet, not just what you have here. For the next two weeks he tried to write the commen­tary. He wrote and erased, typed and deleted. After two weeks the translation still stood naked. He couldn’t add anything to it. He gave up writing the book.

“In the Temple he had given a sermon and taught a class. If you remember, no one lost any weight. Why not? Because the students were learning a diet without the motivation for the diet. The whole diet is in the opening lines. The reason a person is to keep his or her body healthy is to follow the proper path and gain some understanding of the Creator. The purpose of the diet is to in­tensify one’s relationship with the Divine, not to lose weight. When Moshe taught the diet in the Temple, he said that he had lost forty pounds in twenty weeks. He had. But that had been a by-product of his learning, not the purpose of it. When he came to teach Maimonides, he taught the diet. The relationship with God was secondary. With Maimonides, God is never secondary.

“After two weeks, there was no commentary. Moshe was depressed. The Rabbi can leave the Temple, just like that.” Sidney snapped his fingers. “But the Temple doesn’t leave the Rabbi that quickly.

“There is no story associated with the diet, at least not from that time. Later I heard Moshe teach that text. He had learned how. But then, after two weeks. the story was a blank piece of paper.”

–Mitchell Chefitz (The Seventh Telling)

….

“To find life we must die to life as we know it.  To find meaning we must die to meaning as we know it.  The sun rises every morning and we are used to it, and because we know the sun will rise we have come to act as if it rose because we wanted it to.  Suppose the sun should
choose not to rise?  Some of our mornings would then be ‘absurd’–or, to put it mildly, they would not meet our expectations.”

–Thomas Merton

 

Reflection for December 17, 2008: Burning Blackboards

The four heroes of the story, left to right: Sūn Wùkōng, Xuánzàng, Zhū Bājiè, and Shā Wùjìng. (Journey to the West)

I never did anything out of the blue, woh-o-oh
Want an axe to break the ice
Wanna come down right now

Ashes to ashes, funk to funky
We know major toms a junkie
Strung out in heavens high
Hitting an all-time low

My mother said to get things done
You’d better not mess with major tom

–David Bowie

“When we seriously practice any authentic spiritual exercise, we sooner or later come to the recognition that we are not individuals seeking some exalted goal for ourselves, but are sparks of Oneness, the Only Being, aspects of the total embodiment of the Spirit of Guidance that leads all of creation back to the Source, the perfection of love, harmony, and beauty. In our motivation to attain the highest levels of awareness, we eventually release our personal identification and become completely connected with an inner guide, a metamagnetic urge that prods us at all times to let go into the Oneness.”

— David A. Cooper (Invoking Angels forBlessings, Protection and Healing)

………………….

Striving to be absolutely right is a very common attitude among humans. When we are trying to prove to an adversary that he is totally wrong, we fantasize about a moment when the Heavens, the forces of the cosmos itself, will come to our aid. Like small children, we imagine being able to set fire to the blackboard, to call attention to an injustice on the playground. To our disappointment, the blackboard does not catch fire –or, even if it does, the reaction defies our expectations.

The reality of dissension is that when it is based on and legitimated by human experience, it is not built on right/wrong or hero/villain dichotomies. To be able to overcome it or continue in the name of Heaven, we must understand that Heaven has no power to resolve discord. This is because the dynamic of such discord is to produce something unknown to and not invented by the Heavens.

We are like children who wish that their parents would come to school one day to teach everyone, for once and for all, who we are. It is painful, but we know this is impossible. Communication can truly take place only within the reality of the school, its playground rules, its etiquette, and its own conventions. A parent’s presence in school breaks communication and prevents us from being our true selves.

It is very difficult to deal with the expectation that justice will be done. Justice does express itself, as the sages say, but in its own time. And even though time seems ungrateful, leaving many situations unresolved, these will persist for as long as they are issues for the sake of Heaven. We will always have the comfort of knowing they won’t see closure until they are resolved.

Discord that is not for the sake of Heaven will not last, and the energy spent proving who is right is wasteful, not at all constructive. Knowing when to invest in discord and when to avoid it is a question of economy and intelligence.

–Rabbi Nilton Bonder (The Kabbalah of Envy)

………………….

“Monkey,” the Bodhisattva said, “do you know who I am?” The Great Sage opened wide his fiery eyes with their golden pupils, nodded his head and shouted at the top of his voice, “Of course I recognize you. You, thank goodness, are the All−Compassionate. All−Merciful Deliverer from Suffering, the Bodhisattva Guanyin from Potaraka Island in the Southern Sea. You’re a very welcome visitor. Every day here seems like a year, and nobody I know has ever come to see me. Where have you come from?”

“I have received a mandate from the Buddha to go to the East and find the man who will fetch the scriptures,”

she replied, “and as I was passing this way I decided to come over and see you.”

“The Buddha fooled me and crushed me under this mountain−−I haven’t been able to stretch myself for five

hundred years. I desperately hope that you will be obliging enough to rescue me, Bodhisattva.”

“You wretch,” she replied, “you have such an appalling criminal record that I’m afraid you’d only make more

trouble if I got you out.”

“I have already repented,” he said, “and hope that you will show me the road I should follow. I want to

cultivate my conduct.” Indeed:

When an idea is born in a man’s mind

It is known throughout Heaven and Earth.

If good and evil are not rewarded and punished

The world is bound to go to the bad.

The Bodhisattva was delighted to hear what he had to say.

“The sacred scriptures say,” she replied, ‘”If one’s words are good, they will meet with a response from even a

thousand miles away; if they are bad, they will be opposed from the same distance.’ If this is your state of

mind, then wait while I go to the East to find the man who will fetch the scriptures; I’ll tell him to rescue you.

You can be his disciple, observe and uphold the faith, enter our Buddha’s religion, and cultivate good

retribution for yourself in the future. What do you say to that?”

“I’ll go, I’ll go,” the Great Sage repeated over and over again.

“As you have reformed,” she said, “I’ll give you a Buddhist name.”

“I’ve already got a name. It’s Sun Wukong.” The Bodhisattva, very pleased, said, “I made two converts earlier,

and their names both contained Wu (‘Awakened’). There’s no need to give you any further instructions, so I’ll

be off.” The Great Sage, now aware of his own Buddha−nature, was converted to the Buddha’s religion; and

the Bodhisattva devotedly continued her search for a saintly monk.

–Journey to the West

http://www.chine-informations.com/fichiers/jourwest.pdf

The problem in my country is war and malnutrition. My parents and my brothers were killed in the war. I joined the forces when I was twelve because I was told I would have food and should take revenge on the death of my parents. Please don’t be afraid of me. I am not a soldier anymore. I am just a child. And what I want to say is that people fight because they think they can take revenge. But there is no revenge. You kill and you kill, but it will never stop. There is no such thing as revenge.

–Ishmael Beah, Age 15 (Sierra Leone)

 

Reflection for November 24, 2008: Nothing is hidden

I am alone in the world with a different loneliness form that of
Christ. He was alone because He was everything. I am alone because I
am nothing. I am alone in my insufficiency–dependent, helpless,
contingent, and never quite sure that I am really leaning on Him upon
whom I depend.

Yet to trust in Him means to die, because to trust perfectly in Him you
have to give up all trust in anything else. And I am afraid of that
death. The only thing I can do about it is to make my fear become part
of the death I must die, to live perfectly in Him.

–Thomas Merton

In eternity there is indeed something true and sublime. But all these times and places and occasions are now and here. God himself culminates in the present moment, and will never be more divine in the lapse of all ages.

–Thoreau, “Walden“

Often people come to Gnosticism or whatever spiritual path because they feel cheated, empty or angry. They are running from religion in a perceived need to remove themselves from old modes of being that are perhaps “spiritually” insufficient and maybe unsatisfying. As people most of us prefer a “satisfying meal” than just a “snack” to keep us fed for the day. Give us this day our daily bread, as Christ said….

Religion means to tie or to bind. To bring together. Religion typically here in the west is often though of as exoteric and esoteric. Exoteric meaning for the many and esoteric for the few. It is tempting to place a greater value on one depending on your perspective.

However one could argue that there is no inner or outer, no esoteric or exoteric, no occult (Occult means “hidden”) or unhidden. There just is. One could argue the very “act” of supposing or “making’ the esoteric/occult/inner creates a false separation.

The Esoteric (for the few) is often used to mean the “spiritual” or more “in depth” or closer to the divine than the Exoteric (for the many).

As Brother Lawrence states:

The time of action does not differ at all from my time of prayer; I possess God as tranquilly in the bustle of my kitchen –where sometimes several people are asking me different things at one time—as if I was on my knees before the blessed sacrament…It is not necessary to have great things to do. I turn my little omelet in the pan for the love of God; when it is finished, if I have nothing to do, I prostrate myself on the ground and adore my God, who gave me the grace to make it, after which I rise, more content than a King. When I cannot do anything else, it is enough for me to have lifted a straw from the earth for the love of God.

–Brother Lawrence

Largely then once could argue those “fixated” on the “occult/esoteric” will never really “gain the grail” they will just “sup from the grail.”

This “argument” would be like saying something like “I want a secret decoder ring, by using my secret decoder ring I am special, I no longer need the cereal box it came in, I don’t care that I will be starving to death by not eating…cause I have a special decoder ring”

So perhaps the idea that one “only needs inner initiation” is incorrect in that, it is like saying

“I no longer need to eat; ‘cause I can now sup from the grail, but actually obtaining it (becoming the Grail) is not something I will reach, as I only need my decoder ring, not my cereal.”

This is perhaps typified in two Buddhist quotes I like:
….

There are no mundane things outside of Buddhism,

And there is

No Buddhism outside of mundane things.

–Yuan-Wu

…

I gained nothing at all from supreme enlightenment
It is for that very reason it is called supreme enlightenment.

–Buddha

The problem occurs when people “think” they are involved in the esoteric and/or the occult and thus no longer need the exoteric or the un-hidden

To put it into real world less flowery language terms…

It is like a person who partakes in the Atkins diet. The Atkins diet works by cutting down on carbohydrate intake and increasing protein intake. Yes, I know first hand the Aitkin’s diet does work. Cutting down on “carbs” and eating predominantly meat will indeed promote weight loss. But there is the danger of keeping with that diet. Which would cause imbalance, clogged arteries maybe, and even death….?

Does this mean too much esoteric and too much occult without their “opposites” leads to death? In a very real sense, I would say yes….

I think this is very similar to Christ’s temptation by Satan and Buddha’s temptation under the Bodhi tree

A good way to combat this would be to actively “Be in the world but not of it.” Join a local church or group. By actually serving, we are actually serving.

“Like grapes, we ripen best on the vine.”

…………..

Further:

The Grail a Brief Introduction

 

Reflection for Nov 4, 2008: what longs to be burned to death

In Christ we die to the letter of the law so that our conscience can no
longer see things in the dead light of formalism and exterior
observance.  Our hearts refuse the dry husks of literal abstraction and
hunger for the living bread and the eternal waters of the spirit which
spring up to life everlasting

–Thomas Merton

“And these tow kinds of natures are mingled with each other in the course of rebirths, like wheat and chaff that are mixed with each other. Then the farmers separate those things from one another with the mighty power of the wind and the flail, and lay them and bring them.

Thus this man is also similar to that wheat, and my children are similar to the farmers…My mind and my true Word are similar to the wind, and the just Law is similar to the flail. And when the elect preach my Word, then those that come to paradise become manifest.”

–Iranian Manichaean parable

Tell a wise person, or else keep silent
because the massman will mock it right way.
I praise what is truly alive,
what longs to be burned to death.

In the calm water of the love-nights,
where you were begotten, where you have begotten.
a strange feeling comes over you
when you see the silent candle burning.

Now you are no longer caught
in the obsession with the darkness
and a desire for higher lovemaking
sweeps you upward.

Distance does not make you falter.
now, arriving in magic, flying,
and finally, insane for the light,
you are the butterfly and you fare gone.

And so long as you haven’t experienced
this, to die and so to grow.
you are only a troubled guest
on the dark earth.

–Goethe (The Holy Longing)

“The theology of love must seek to deal realistically with the evil and
injustice in the world, and not merely to compromise with them.  Such a
theology will have to take note of the ambiguous realities of politics,
without embracing the specious myth of a  ’realism’ that merely
justifies force in the service of established power. Theology does not
exist merely to appease the already too untroubled conscience of the
powerful and the established.  A theology of love may also conceivably
turn out to be a theology of revolution.  In any case, it is a theology
of resistance, a refusal of the evil that reduces a brother to homicidal
desperation.”

–Thomas Merton

Don’t forget to vote.

 

Reflection for October 21, 2008: What is the Purpose of Dogma?

“Ideas and words are not the food of the intelligence, but truth. And
not an abstract truth that feeds the mind alone. The Truth that a
spiritual man seeks is the whole Truth, reality, existence and essence
together, something that can be embraced and loved, something that can
sustain the homage and the service of our actions: more than a thing:
persons, or a Person. Him above all Whose essence is to exist. God.

Christ, the Incarnate Word, is the Book of Life in Whom we read God.”

–Thomas Merton

……………….

What is the purpose of Dogma?

I think of it like this:

I can eat soup with a fork, but it is easier to use a spoon.

Just as soup eating is easier with a spoon, if I am painting my home with a brush
and I have no more to paint, I should put down my paint brush until I need to repaint.
There is no need to stir my tea with a paint brush.

I also mean someone else’s dogma….not just a “personal dogma.”

Take the Christian dogma, this dogma will allow a person to eat their soup with a spoon. To change their “mindset.”

In order that they may be awakened toward Gnosis….

“We see things as we are, not as they are.” –Gibran

Thus there is nothing wrong with religion per se, as it allows or as the word actually means, to bind or bring together;
it allows us to be brought together… to be a sheep, yes… so that one can grow toward Gnosis.

If you want to dance, it is far easier to get classes, than it is to simply watch a Madonna video.

Thus, personally, I feel it is problematic to simply disregard religion, as many “seekers” do….
there is nothing wrong with religion, unless you refuse to grow.

–Benjamin

………………

The fourth letter of the divine name represents Shekhinah, divine presence as it dwells in matter, the sparks of holy light scattered throughout the world. This final letter of God’s name has been separated from the three that precede it, wandering through an eternity of exile, just as we have been wanderers in that great and painful chasm that lies between revelation and redemption, between our first glimmer of Y-H-W-H and our ability to transform the world in the light of that vision. Our return home is the return of Holy One and Shekhinah to one another, the reunion of cosmic male and female, cosmic parent and cosmic child. It is also the rejoining of Y-H-W-H within to Y-H-W-H beyond, the reunion of Being-in-all-its-forms with Eyn Sof, the changeless One. Here, we proclaim that ‘beyond’ and ‘within’ are one, that the great unity is one with all and with each of us wandering sparks.

Home is Y-H-W-H, the beginning and the end of our journey. The One who has sent us forth on our way and the One we discover at the end of all our wanderings are truly one and the same. Only as we come home do we understand that every step of the journey had its special place and meaning, that our particular face of the One had to be encountered in just this way and no other.

Home is earth, the mother we abandoned so very many centuries ago. Homecoming is our return to our source within this world, to the great womb out of whom we are ever being born, the one to whom we ever return. Homecoming is the rejoining of matter and spirit, an understanding that this most primal of all separations stands as the cause of our alienation from ourselves, from the deepest roots of our own tradition, and from the earth that nurtures us. Our return is the great act of healing, one directed toward all of these at once: we must heal ourselves, for we are fragmented, we must heal our tradition, for it has been distorted, leading us to less than a full embrace of the One, we must heal the earth, restoring to her that which generations have plundered while there is yet time. The hour is late. Our homecoming takes place not a minute too soon.”

- Arthur Green (Seek My Face)