SYs falsely led to belief "supraconscious" Kash, Arwin and Lalita are possessed by evil spirits
Dear All,
Ever since 1993 rank and file SYs have been led to believe by
leaders, and recently by certain WCASY members, that we are a family
of "supraconscious" individuals. The more gentler and compassionate
collective way has always been to murmur and label Kash, Arwinder and
Lalita as possessed or overcome by evil spirits.
It was ex-world leader Yogi Mahajan who began the Inquisytion a
decade ago after discovering that Kash was able to effortlessly have
daily audience with the Adi Shakti whenever he meditated. Kash was
judged to be supraconscious and in Yogi Mahajan's opinion a danger
to the children studying at Dharamsala. Thus i also thought
"supraconscious" was akin to being possessed by some demonic force,
which Yogi Mahajan used as a legitimate reason to justify that
extreme measure in expelling Kash in order to protect other kids.
Today, due to an overnight email containing the dreaded 14-letter word
"supraconscious", regarded by many SYs to mean demonic possession,
i went and checked its meaning. i have to agree with the respected
opinion of WCASY and SYs that Kash, Arwinder and Lalita are indeed
supraconscious.
jagbir
Supraconscious
New Age Spiritual Dictionary on Supraconscious
supraconscious: (psychosynthesis) Autonomous realm from which higher
impulses originate
Supraconscious: Hindu - Hinduism Dictionary on Samadhi
samadhi: (Sanskrit) "Enstasy," which means "standing within one's
Self." "Sameness; contemplation; union, wholeness; completion,
accomplishment."
Samadhi is the state of true yoga, in which the meditator and the
object of meditation are one. Samadhi is of two levels. The first is
savikalpa samadhi ("enstasy with form or seed"), identification or
oneness with the essence of an object.
Its highest form is the realization of the primal substratum or pure
consciousness, Satchidananda. The second is nirvikalpa samadhi
("enstasy without form or seed"), identification with the Self, in
which all modes of consciousness are transcended and Absolute
Reality, Parasiva, beyond time, form and space, is experienced. This
brings in its aftermath a complete transformation of consciousness.
In Classical Yoga, nirvikalpa samadhi is known as asamprajnata
samadhi, "supraconscious enstasy" - samadhi, or beingness, without
thought or cognition, prajna. Savikalpa samadhi is also called
samprajnata samadhi, "conscious enstasy."
(Note that samadhi differs from samyama - the continuous meditation
on a single subject or mystic key [such as a chakra] to gain
revelation on a particular subject or area of consciousness. As
explained by Patanjali, samyama consists of dharana, dhyana and
samadhi.)
See: enstasy, kundalini, Parasiva, raja yoga, samarasa,
Satchidananda, Self Realization, trance, enlightenment.
Supraconscious: Spiritual Yoga Dictionary IV on Samadhi
Samadhi:
Samadhi ("putting together"): the ecstatic or unitive state in which
the meditator becomes one with the object of meditation, the eighth
and final limb (anga) of Patanjali's eightfold path; there are many
types of samadhi, the most significant distinction being between
samprajnata (conscious) and asamprajnata (supraconscious) ecstasy;
only the latter leads to the dissolution of the karmic factors deep
within the mind; beyond both types of ecstasy is enlightenment,
which is also sometimes called sahaja-samadhi or the condition
of "natural" or "spontaneous" ecstasy, where there is perfect
continuity of superconscious throughout waking, dreaming, and
sleeping
Supraconscious: New Age Spiritual Dictionary on Supraconscious
http://www.experiencefestival.com/supraconscious
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Pitirim A. Sorokin and Paul Tillich in dialogue
By Mary Montgomery-Clifford
(July 1, 2003)
In the following column, the reader is asked to put on a bit of a
theological hat. Mary Montgomery Clifford, who has appeared
previously in this column, presents her unfolding ideas on unlimited
love in the context of the work of theologian Pitirim A. Sorokin and
altruism scholar Paul Tillich. Montgomery-Clifford is working on a
doctoral degree in this area at Chicago Theological Seminary.
- Stephen G. Post
The starting point for my doctoral research on unlimited love is an
in-depth study and comparison of Pitirim A. Sorokin, the
acknowledged pioneer in the scientific study of altruism, and Paul
Tillich, one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century. This
simultaneous study is rather like experiencing the point and
counterpoint nuances of a cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach. A
comparison of Tillich and Sorokin reveals numerous parallels, many
of which are profound. These parallels contain both similarities and
differences. When correlated using methods reminiscent of the
integral knowledge methods employed by Sorokin, these similarities
and differences act as point and counterpoint to one another. Like a
Bach cantata, therefore, the Tillich/Sorokin parallels play off each
other in a grand design that is strengthened by their interaction.
My study of Tillich and Sorokin begins with a side-by-side analysis
of Systematic Theology, Volumes One, Two and Three by Tillich and
The Ways and Power of Love: Types, Factors, and Techniques of Moral
Transformation by Sorokin. Only a few of the Tillich/Sorokin
parallels contained in these works can be touched upon in this short
article. However, the examples will serve like the tip of an iceberg
to hint at a much grander and more significant structure.
To begin with, the parallels between the lives of Tillich and
Sorokin are striking. Both lived for 79 years within the same
approximate time period (Tillich: 1886-1965 and Sorokin: 1889-1968).
Both experienced a depth of religious training during childhood. The
thought processes of both men were formed to a great extent by
traumatic war and conflict-related experiences in their native
lands. Both Tillich and Sorokin escaped the oppression in their
native lands by immigrating to the United States. In the United
States, both stood out as leaders in their respective fields. Both
taught at Harvard University and published numerous books and
papers.
The similarities in terms of thought process and method are also
evident. Both Tillich and Sorokin, for example, issued challenges to
established authority. Throughout his Systematic Theology, Tillich
offers up critical challenges to established institutions and
scholarship, including religious, psychological, philosophical and
political structures. Sorokin challenged the narrow and technocratic
aspects of sociology, which he felt was captive to small fragments
of data while lacking in any larger systematic, cultural-historical
framework. Sorokin's challenge was grounded in the Russian tradition
of integral knowledge, a methodology that brought together religion,
psychology, ontology, cosmology, ethics, metaphysics, sociology and
biology. It was this methodology that led him to read and value
thinkers like Tillich, whom he quotes twice in the first chapter of
The Ways and Power of Love.
This reference reveals another similarity. For both men, love is an
ontological concept. Sorokin, for example, underscores the
importance of the ontological/love connection by quoting from
Tillich's The Protestant Era: "Love is basically not an emotional
but an ontological power, it is the essence of life itself, namely
the dynamic reunion of that which is separated."
As a theologian, Tillich explores God as the ground of being
(essence of life itself) in relation to love, equating love as the
dynamic power that forms the connection with God and Being itself.
As a scientist, Sorokin explores the relationship between love and
God through a study of those like Jesus, Al Hallaj and Gandhi, whom
he considers apostles of love. His observations lead to a hypothesis
that parallels Tillich's. Such perfect love, he postulates, can be
best explained by an inflow of love from a higher source that far
exceeds that of human beings: "God," "the Godhead," "the soul of the
universe," "supraconscious" and the like.
Both scientist and theologian independently come to the conclusion
that a special state is integral to the experience of genuine love.
For Tillich, that state is ecstasy, which occurs "only if the mind
is grasped by the mystery, namely, by the ground of being and
meaning." Sorokin suggests a similar state when he points out that
scientific findings on the positive effects of altruism have not
succeeded in making overall human behavior more altruistic. He
concludes that something else must be needed and that the "something
else" may be "moments of immersion into supraconscious meditation
and creativity."
The parallel points of difference in Tillich and Sorokin often serve
to complement rather than negate. For example, Tillich's Lutheran
and Protestant grounding led him to basically devalue the roles of
both saints and rituals. Tillich warns of the demonic danger of
saints who may fall prey to hubris, and he tends to view rituals as
exercises in superstition. The warnings are valuable but so is
Sorokin's enthusiastic study of saints and rituals. Sorokin's
research emphasizes the altruistic lessons that can be learned from
saints and the altruism-enhancing value of rituals and techniques
that increase connections to God or the supraconscious.
Complementary differences also give balance to the idea of attaining
altruism within the context of finite human existence. Both Tillich
and Sorokin recognize the ability of humans to achieve supreme love
through direct participation in the ground of being or the
supraconscious. However, Sorokin does not recognize that ecstatic
moments of direct participation are available to all. "It goes
without saying," he states, "that these peaks of supraconscious
meditation and spirituality are reached only by the few `anointed'
and `chosen.'" Tillich acts as an important counterpoint here. He
recognizes that ecstatic connections with the divine are fragmentary
because existence within finitude is itself fragmentary. These
fragmentary experiences, nonetheless, are real, important and
accessible to all. Because of Tillich's insight, a number of the
important techniques described by Sorokin in The Ways and Power of
Love are made more accessible.
The parallel similarities in the works of Tillich and Sorokin
contribute to the bridge that is beginning to span the gap between
science and theology. Even more important is the contribution that
the counterpoint of Tillich and Sorokin's complementary differences
can make to current scientific and theological research and
scholarship in the field of unlimited love.
Mary Montgomery-Clifford is a doctoral student at Chicago
Theological Seminary. She focuses on unlimited love and the other-
regarding virtues.
Pitirim A. Sorokin and Paul Tillich in dialogue
http://www.stnews.org/Altruism-1227.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------
Chapter 9: Jesus and the Unconscious
We saw that for Jung Jesus disappeared under the weight of the
constellated archetypes. He became a carrier of the self and his own
personality was obscured. This is too limited a perspective for any
genuine Christian-Jungian conversation, for there is no room for
philosophy or faith and theology to make their contributions. What I
would like to do is to take another approach that I hope will
illustrate the interactive approach that I have been advocating all
along. But it will be just a sketch rather than a full blown
Christology profiting from the insights drawn from Jung's psychology.
Jacques Maritain, as we saw previously, developed the notion of a
spiritual unconscious, and towards the end of his life, when he was
in his eighties, he applied this idea to the Christology of Thomas
Aquinas and eventually wrote one of his last books, On the Grace and
Humanity of Jesus. St. Thomas, basing himself on texts like one in
the Gospel according to St. John that declared Jesus was the only
begotten of the Father full of grace and truth, had come to the
conclusion that the grace that was in Jesus' human nature in virtue
of it being the humanity of the Word, the second person of the
Trinity, had a fullness that could not increase. (p. 50) But
Maritain, devoted Thomist though he was, felt that this position was
too unilateral and undeveloped, for what did St. Luke mean when he
wrote that Jesus "grew in wisdom, in age, and in grace"? And this
problem was no mere scholastic quibble, but involves the very way in
which we think about Jesus and relate to him. If Jesus was truly
God, was he always conscious of this fact? Dazzled by the sublimity
of the union of the human nature with the divine, and limited by a
view of human personality that tended to equate it with ego
consciousness, theologians imagined that the humanity of Jesus and
hence his ego-consciousness were filled with grace and the vision of
God. When this tendency was carried to an extreme we arrive back at
the apocryphal Gospels in which the child Jesus was aware of his
divine prerogatives and stood on his divine dignity against the
mishaps of childhood by punishing those who dared to offend him. In
short, the fact of the Incarnation inclines us to imagine that Jesus
always had a consciousness flooded with divine light. But if we
accept this approach too uncritically his humanity is diminished and
he is, as Maritain put it, a "god disguised" and not truly a man.
But what happens if we take the opposite course? Then we see Jesus
as a man who had no awareness of the fact that he was God, as if the
most central fact of his personality - literally, his very
personality in strict dogmatic terms -was unknown to him. Then he is
truly a man but he is close to being only a man. How could he
actually be the Word of God and not know it?
This is the dilemma which Maritain sets out to solve, and the way he
proceeds is highly instructive. Maritain was no real fan of depth
psychology as he knew it, which was primarily in its Freudian form.
It was wielded much too reductively and with the unconscious
identified with what he later called the deaf or instinctive
unconscious in the first decades of the century for him to be
comfortable with it. Nor do I think he had much personal experience
of its efficacy or a sense of the , wider philosophical implications
of Jung's later formulations. Yet he realized that the psychological
discovery of the unconscious was one of the greatest advances of our
age, and he reflected upon it as a philosopher. This reflection bore
fruit in his description of the preconscious or unconscious of the
spirit. Thus a psychological discovery is transformed into a
philosophical instrument which is then applied to the revealed truth
of the Incarnation.
Once we have this instrument our dilemma begins to look more
approachable. The human personality of Jesus is not limited to ego
consciousness with the result that we are forced to choose either
that Jesus was aware, or he was unaware of his divinity, or he was
filled with grace, or was not. Instead, Maritain distinguishes in
the humanity of Jesus between a "supraconscious of the spirit
divinized by the Beatific Vision" (p. 55) and a human consciousness
that embraces the ego, the infraconscious and the normal spiritual
unconscious. This divinized supraconscious is unique to Christ and
is not to be identified with the spiritual unconscious we all
possess. Rather it is as if the deepest center or roots of Jesus'
human soul, his spiritual unconscious, is transformed and elevated
by becoming the humanity of the Word. This supraconscious escapes
Jesus' normal consciousness, not because it is infraconscious but
because of its excessive brilliance:
"Imagine that I am in a cellar and I am reading there a book by the
light of a candle. To my left, beyond the circle of light of my
candle, there is the darkness of the cellar, and if I place my book
there I cannot distinguish anything in it, - this is for the
infraconscious. And to my right there is a ray of the midday sun
which, passing through a window and falling on the surface of some
object in the cellar, makes there a zone of dazzling light. If I
transfer my book there I can absolutely not read anything there
either, I am dazzled by a brightness disproportionate to the
strength of my eyes. This is for the divinized supraconscious." (p.
55, note 8)
Jesus' consciousness exists in two different states. In his
divinized supraconsciousness he was aware of his divine identity and
he had a fullness of grace. But in what Maritain called
his "terrestrial" or "crepuscular" consciousness into which the
higher supraconceptual knowledge could not enter as such, he grew in
age and in wisdom and in grace. This does not mean for Maritain that
the "unconscious" of the divinized humanity of Jesus had no
communication whatsoever with his human consciousness; although
there was a "certain incommunicability" the separation between the
two was a "translucid partition" which Jesus in his human
consciousness could cross, but his supraconsciousness could only
partially enter into a human consciousness founded on the working of
the discursive mind. It is not a question of two ego
consciousnesses, but one ego-awareness surrounded by
various "unconscious" dimensions, and the divinized unconscious has
more right to the title of the center of the soul than the ego
itself. Maritain goes on to work out in considerable d tail and with
appropriate theological nuances the relationship between these two
states of consciousness, but his basic statement of the principle is
enough for our purposes. Such an approach will allow us to begin to
see how Jesus could feel the agony of abandonment if the
supraconsciousness in which he was united to the Father became
inaccessible to him at the time of the Passion. And there is no need
to make the child Jesus in his child consciousness have all sorts of
human knowledge so that his life with Mary and Joseph would be more
a charade than a true time of learning. While the different states
of consciousness in Jesus represent a unique case, we can find
certain analogies in the form of "examples from below" among which
Maritain cites Fr. Surin, the troubled French contemplative of the
17th century, "whose intellect found itself at once under a state of
mystical union that was most lofty and under a state of
psychosis..." (p. 80) With this example we have rejoined the
reflections of the previous chapter on how the archetypal psyche can
influence the spiritual life of the individual and even have an
impact on the development of dogma.
In the case of Jesus, however, the fruits of psychology are brought
into theology itself in order to help us explore the inner awareness
of Jesus. Maritain has opened up a way for us by which to tackle one
of the central questions of Christology, and if instead of
Maritain's view of the unconscious of the psychologists we
substitute Jung's psychoid unconscious, then our task will become
both easier and richer. Instead of trying to replace dogma with the
world of the archetypes, it is within the humanity of Jesus that the
Trinity and the archetypal psyche meet. The more we understand
Jung's psychoid unconscious the more we can pose questions of the
greatest interest for understanding the Incarnation. Let's explore
two possibilities.
The first centers around the human soul or form and its intrinsic
inclination to unity. The very nature of the human soul moves us
toward wholeness which happens within and without and on different
ontological levels. On the psychological plane, this quest for
wholeness expresses itself within in the process of individuation
and the variety of different types without. On a metaphysical level,
the very "weakness" of the human form is at the heart of its
multiplicity, and its self -realization demands matter and space and
time all within the context of the human community. But what will
happen if the human form becomes the human soul of a divine person?
It will be, by that very fact, elevated and transformed in its
depths which Maritain called the superconscious of the spirit, the
light and gravitational pull of which will effect the rest of Jesus'
psyche. The natural urge towards unity that the soul possesses will
be intensified. Jesus in some mysterious way will become the new
center of humanity with his very humanity becoming the connatural
instrument by which we are attracted to God. His divinized
supraconscious will become the model for our own inner
transformation and contemplation. If in our first parents the unity
of the human race existed in embryo, a unity that was not only of a
natural order but one of grace as well, then in Jesus this unity is
reestablished. Then we look to Jesus to see what we ought to become,
and any examination of his inner personality and its dimensions of
infraconscious, preconscious and divinized supraconscious will find
its counterparts by participation in us.
This brings us to our second consideration. If Jesus was truly human
what was his personality like? Was he a certain body and
psychological type? And if he was a certain type did he have a
fourth function? And if he had a fourth function did it have the
inferior character that we are so used to or must we make a
distinction between inferiority and lack of development? Did
original sin impose on us a certain lack of integration that goes
beyond the scope of normal development so that Jesus could develop
without the negative qualities and the outbursts we associate with
the fourth function?
How did Jesus experience the process of individuation? What would
his dream life be like? What symbols swirled through his unconscious
under the attraction of the divinized center of his soul? If his
human soul reached a new intensity because of its elevation as the
humanity of the Word, then would it have been the center of more
powerful synchronistic events? Could Jung's notion of synchronicity
undergo philosophical reflection and become an instrument for
exploring the kinds of knowledge that Jesus had? All these
suggestions - and they are only suggestions - are but the beginning
of a process that would happen if Jung's psychology were applied to
the study of the humanity of Jesus. Every major element could be a
stimulus to the development of a renewed philosophy of nature which
in turn could find a properly theological application. And one of
the more promising fields for such an interactive approach is the
Christian interior life which mirrors the life of Jesus.
Chapter 9: Jesus and the Unconscious
http://www.innerexplorations.com/catjc/jc9.htm
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Spirit of Angels
Literally "messengers", angels may be anywhere the spirit force
moves. Angels are messengers who must be heard in their own
language. As messengers in the sheerest meaning of the word, angels
may come from any realm of earth or cosmos. Angels may be visible or
invisible but all angels bear a message. The most important thing
for those who converse or wish to converse with angels is the
ability to hear and understand their messages.
THE PLACES OF ANGELS
The first power was placed in the four corners of the world, the
four cardinal directions or the four primary forces of the world.
These four states correspond to four elements of all existence in
heaven and earth:
Conscious
The conscious is all that one knows and recognizes with awareness.
It perceives and recognizes the elements of existence and copes with
survival issues. The driving energy of the conscious mind rises from
an unseen scheme of primal instinct and soul desire just beyond its
vision. The conscious mind expands its periphery by recognizing the
unseen power that motivates it. "There is no consciousness without
discrimination of opposites. This is the paternal principle, the
Logos, which eternally struggles to extricate itself from the primal
warmth and primal darkness of the material womb; in a word, from
unconsciousness. Therefore its first creative act of liberation is
matricide... Nothing can exist without its opposite; the two were
one in the beginning and will be one again in the end. Consciousness
can only exist through continual recognition of the unconscious,
just as everything that lives must pass through many deaths."*
Unconscious
This reservoir of untapped information lies just beyond the grasp of
the conscious mind, compelling the conscious by its invisibility.
The unconscious takes its force from two fundamental aspects. The
first is comprised of those unconscious elements entirely personal
to the individual, relating to the unique experience of the
personality and soul. The other element is the inborn, genetic
images called the collective unconscious by Jung. "I have chosen the
term 'collective' because this part of the unconscious is not
personal but universal; in contrast to the personal psyche, it has
contents and modes of behavior that are more or less the same
everywhere and in all individuals. It is, in other words, identical
in all men and thus constitutes a common psychic substrate of a
suprapersonal nature which is present in every one of us... Normally
the unconscious collaborates with the conscious without friction or
disturbance, so that one is not even aware of its existence. But
when an individual or a social group deviates too far from their
instinctual foundations, they then experience the full impact of
unconscious forces. The collaboration of the unconscious is
intelligent and purposive, and even when its acts in opposition to
consciousness its expression is still compensatory in an intelligent
way, as if it were trying to restore the lost balance." (The
Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious, C.G. Jung)
Superconscious
The "I Am That I Am" that transcends personality from lifetime to
lifetime is the superconscious. It exists beyond the personality
identity of the conscious and the genetically inborn collective
unconscious. As Jung suggested, the superconscious is what the Hindu
called the "higher" conscious. It communicates in synchronicity and
intuition and is comprised of soul memory and past-life experiences.
The "I Am That I Am" of the superconscious is the soul that
transcends lifetimes. Jung did not postulate the existence of a soul
beyond a single lifetime as a scientific fact, although his
identification of the collective unconscious is unparalleled. Much
research has proven the existence of the soul beyond a single
lifetime, notably Raymond Moody's research in Near Death Experiences
and the success of Brian Weiss' research into past-life therapies.
Head of the Department of Psychiatry at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Miami
Beach, Florida, Weiss' premier past-life therapy is chronicled in
Many Lives Many Masters.
Supraconscious
The supraconscious is the aspect of pure spirit that transcends all
limits of identification from which existence on any level takes its
form. The supraconscious is the undifferentiated godhead and the
essential character of unconditional love and union.
Spirit of Angels
http://www.timestar.org/angel.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------
Question 1
You said, "Do you really know what you meant when you said 'tap into
cosmic love and wisdom'? Many people, especially those who have read
much but have practised little, often use phrases like this without
fully realizing their true meaning."
I can easily answer your question: Yes, I know what I meant. I mean
that I want to be able to fully use the entire range of my conscious
mind. In every single task, I attempt to make full use of my
thoughts, feelings and then act. To me that is a life time task, and
actually I even believe that it is a very simple task! All it takes
is that I am attentive -- open minded and curious, like a baby --
that I actually see, hear, feel, taste and smell all there is. Maybe
it is the sum of the five senses.
Kenneth, Denmark
Answer 1
Different people from different culture and training will
understandably give different answers. Yours is a typical answer
from an educated westerner. Before I provide my answer from the
perspective of my Shaolin training, I would like to give some
comments to your answer. Needless to say, these comments are
definitely not meant to criticize or belittle your answer, as here
there is no such a thing as a right or a better answer -- it is a
matter of different perspectives. The comments are meant as sincere
pointers to help you review your answer from a different
perspective, and hopefully gain some depth from your review.
"I want to be able to fully use the entire range of my conscious
mind." What about your unconscious mind, or your supraconscious
mind? Many western scientists themselves believe that the
unconscious or supraconscious constitutes 90% of your mind, the
conscious only 10%. Would you agree that tapping into the cosmos for
love and wisdom would concern more of the supraconscious than the
conscious?
"In every single task, I attempt to make full use of my thoughts,
feelings and then act." Many essential life tasks, like breathing,
digestion and hormonal production, are done without thoughts,
feelings and direct actions. They are done by your unconscious.
"To me that is a life time task, and actually I even believe that it
is a very simple task!" Most of the simple, yet profound, tasks are
done by the unconscious. Indeed the conscious often makes things
complicated. Imagine how complicated it would be if you consciously
try to regulate your breathing to adjust to constantly changing air
temperature and chemistry. But why do you regard making full use of
your thoughts, feelings and then act (which is also to you a simple,
life time task) as taping into cosmic love and wisdom? In what ways,
for example, has eating your lunch with full thoughts and feeling,
anything to do with cosmic love and wisdom?
"All it takes is that I am attentive -- open minded and curious,
like a baby -- that I actually see, hear, feel, taste and smell all
there is. maybe it is the sum of the five senses" Do you mean that
when you are not attentive, such as when you are sleeping, you would
be unable, or inadequate, to tap into cosmic love and wisdom? Do you
mean that there is no cosmic love or wisdom outside your five
senses?
More significantly, you have not attempted to clarify what you mean
by cosmic love and wisdom. What you have explained can be applied to
tapping into cosmic hatred and ignorance, or doing mundane jobs, or
in fact to anything. What you have suggested is being attentive, in
thoughts and feelings, in whatever you do, but you have not
explained why or how this will lead to cosmic love and wisdom.
If I use the phrase "tapping into cosmic love and wisdom", generally
my meaning is as follows. Cosmic love is to be distinguished from
personal love, and cosmic wisdom from worldly wisdom. If I go hungry
so that my child could eat, it is a manifestation of personal love.
Personal love is instinctive; every mother knows this very well. If
a mother gives away her child's food, even though her child is
hungry, to a stranger who needs the food more urgently, it is a
manifestation of cosmic love. Cosmic love is usually not
instinctive; it has to be acquired through cultivation.
All the knowledge we have gained through science and (western)
philosophy is worldly wisdom. Knowing that a molecule of water is a
compound of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen, is an
example of worldly wisdom. Thinking that if a student studies hard,
he will pass his examination well is another example.
Worldly wisdom is bound by a set of conditions -- a fact that many
people may not be aware, and which often causes some scientists to
be dogmatic. Water, for example, is a compound of hydrogen and
oxygen only if we use the conventional western scientific paradigm,
which constitutes a set of conditions. Ancient scientists of other
cultures, who were equally intelligent and capable but who used
different sets of conditions, described water differently.
Even when we use the western paradigm, but if we change the
conditions slightly, such as studying the water under an electron
microscope instead of using electroanalysis, water would no longer
be a compound of hydrogen and oxygen but a mass of distantly spread
sub-atomic particles. Thinking out conditions why studying hard does
not definitely enable a student to pass his examination well, is
quite easy.
Cosmic wisdom is transcendental, i.e. it transcends sets of
conditions, and at the highest level is not bound by any conditions.
Cosmic wisdom is almost always obtained by great masters from direct
experience at heightened level of consciousness. Lesser minds learn
such cosmic wisdom from the masters. When Jesus said that those who
believe in him and follow his teaching, will go to heaven, Jesus was
generously sharing some great cosmic wisdom.
I am not a Christian, and therefore do not follow a set of
conditions normally applied to Christians, yet from my Shaolin
training, which has nothing to do with Christianity directly, I can
vouch with conviction that Jesus was stating a great cosmic truth.
Indeed, Jesus is a shining example of cosmic love and cosmic wisdom.
How does one tap into cosmic love and cosmic wisdom? Through
meditation, which is the training of mind to bring it to heightened
levels of consciousness. In Shaolin terminology, it is entering Zen.
Hence, meditation is not just sitting cross-legged, and Zen is not
just speaking in riddles. Basically, meditation or Zen is mind
training, and has to be properly learnt from a master -- not read
from a book and then teach others.
The most fundamental way to meditation or Zen is sitting in a lotus
position thinking and feeling nothing. It is a most simple and
profound task. It is difficult for those not initiated into Zen to
appreciate, or even imagine, how such an apparently simple task can
help the practitioner tap into the cosmos. On the negative side, it
is easy for many people, especially in the West where traditional
Zen training is rare but where Zen is usually studied (as
distinguished from practised) from books, to learn it superficially
and quickly teach others, thereby wasting their own and others'
time, and sometimes bringing adverse effects.
In the Shaolin training, Zen is also attained through kungfu and chi
kung. In fact kungfu, chi kung and Zen are integrated; it is in the
much diluted kungfu and chi kung which are wide-spread today, that
the energy and mind aspects are missing. When you, for example,
perform a kungfu movement and directly experience (not merely recall
having read) your energy flowing with your movement, or when you
perform a chi kung movement and directly experience your mind (or
spirit) merging into the universal mind, you are tapping into the
cosmos.
But there are other forms of meditation which you can practise on
your own. One such form is prayer. If you pray sincerely and deeply,
especially if you do so habitually, you can raise your mind to
heightened levels of consciousness, and tap into cosmic love.
Another good example is chanting scriptures, sutras or mantras. At
first you may not understand what you chant, but when your mind has
reached heightened levels of consciousness through devoted chanting,
glimpses of cosmic wisdom will flash into you.
http://wongkk.com/answers/ans99b/oct99-3.html
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