Many posts on this board have stressed the relationship between spirituality and culture. The real question for me is if it is better to pull religion down to the level of society and its morals or for society to raise itself up to the level of the essential religious understanding? Since I believe it has become impossible at this point due to the influence of technology which according to Rudolph Steiner is and influence of Ahriman and further into materiality, the value of religion can never become recognized. We’ve become too involved with the material. Efforts to relate common sense will only be annoying to society. The hope rests with the individuals who are brave enough to annoy this great beast with the expressions of common sense.
At this point I will pass the buck and not take full responsibility for my claims and post an article the majority of which I believe is true.
In the Fall, I hope to be participating in a weekly discussion on esoteric Christianity eluded to in Prof.Jacob needleman’s book “Lost Christianity.” I’d like to include diverse viewpoints and especialy at least one woman’s so I’ve been studying Simone Weil and it appears you, dear reader, through reading this, may suffer uneasieness as a result of her extraordinary being even though I’m learning what I have to.
One correction in the article. Simone didn’t die of anorexia nervosa:
She always did this. At five years old she refused sugar when she learned that the soldiers didn’t have any. She always formed solidarity with those who were being used and suffering.
Anyhow, I won’t go deeply into this now since I don’t know if anyone will find it worth discussing. I’ll just throw out ideas related to the article that intrigue me.
This is the question for those that have felt their spiritual calling as more than secular. We can’t serve two masters so how do we divide ourselves?
Yes, our attraction to prestige does much to keep us oblivious of ourselves and our potential.
People cannot see themselves equal in “affliction.”
This is the fundamental error of the argument of equality represented by material goods. The concept of “prestige” as such a strong motivating force is ignored.
Prestige itself must at some point strive towards unreal distinctions.
Egotism distorts the objective search for our individuality, for ourselves, our soul. It degenerates it into a battle for imaginary prestige.
This distinction between Marx and Weil is worth its own thesis and I agree with her. But our insistance on throwing money at problems completely out of proportion indicates to me that most side with Marx.
I believe she is right but only a relative few understand this gem of true human psychology. Much of the purpose esoteric Christianity is based on compensating for the loss of the Holy Faculty of Attention that invites the “social beast” that a spiritual person, at some point from the results of their being more “real”, will have to annoy.
Is society, as it exists, a necessary evil since we would be in a worse position without it? It seems absurd but true to me at the same time. Is their anything hopeful in any of this?
Though I don’t believe that unconscious society can awaken to her profound common sense, I do believe, as she, that the real individual is of great importance as a mediating influence for society as well as an awakening force fortheir own being for other individuals open to it.
Both love and justice perceive what is invisible to the world of social ideologies, that is, the individual sufferer. True attention literally creates personality in the sufferer. Far from leading to political quietism, Weil’s philosophy of “creative attention” leads to authentic political action.
So patriotism as we know it is the degeneration of the concept of mutual support in humility into the expression of power through self importance void of humility. How insultingly true but utterly elegant.
All of true inner work is based upon self development in which a person experiences his realistic responsibility to the above and below: God and his fellow man as individuals and within society. Only a small minority of individuals are engaged in such realistic efforts free of the effects of "experts"and open charlatens but this is one case where I believe quality can become fruitful in a way impossible for quanities of experts.
As an aside, here is an account of an incident told to Dr Jacques Cabaud, Simone Weil’s first biographer which he passed along in a radio interview. I don’t believe in reincarnation for all but there are times when a certain something has been acquired in a lifetime that warrants more incarnations to work through. These are incarnations of “old souls” one of which I believe was Simone Weil. Her efforts were just beyond normal human capacity for some one not in an esoteric school. For her it was natural. It was already known. Anyhow, I surely can’t vouch for the truth of such accounts but since I do believe in a level of conscious humanity, I cannot discount it either. Anyhow, I post it in hopes it was true because she definitely deserved a higher life.
The individual will have to annoy the great beast of society in their spiritual obligation to help others to awaken to the limitations it places on their being. That’s evil enough by contemporary standards to warrant being boiled in oil.
I think the prestige debate has something going for it - even if your opening post was far too long. We are being lamed by the search for prestige by those who have power, but many normal people are pulled in by the undertow. This has a disastrous effect on society in general, but also on live in particular.
The effectiveness that many personalities could have is lost in upholding an image instead of a character. The outward appearance is more important than inner values and the markets promote this illusion. If you were to ask me, what is the biggest problem with modern society, it would be the overall ineffectiveness and produce of waste, which, of course is precisely how the market doesn’t want to appear.
Effectiveness is revealed when people get things right first time and is achieved by taking the required amount of time – which is often not a lot longer. There is less waste, less effort and more prudence. Our modern society measures effectiveness by haste, which pretends to be speed. The thought that “the Way is the aim†is something perverse to the modern mind, but the human mind learns by doing things in an effective pattern of behaviour, not by continuous trial and error attempts.
Spirituality is about strengthening the character, giving it purpose and structure, using the holy truths that mankind has discovered over millennia to affect a better future. Spirituality accesses a source of wisdom that is inexplicably external but common to us all, even though it is coloured by the influence of society. Access is generally intuitive, aided by various techniques of meditation and relaxation which sharpen the attentiveness.
Much like the usage of the “other†side of the brain can give people the impression that a lever has just been rolled over with a loud “clunkâ€, so do people who experience access to this Mystery speak of “rebirth†and life having a new foundation, direction and fullness. If we experience such a fullness of life, we can even be satisfied if it is not so long.
Of course, the impatient point to the quick answers to impending problems, but prudent planning, rather than quick answers, reduce the need for sudden reactions.
What have I done to the page? Well tried to express a flow of ideas in conjunction with the article but I guess it may have been better psychologically to divide it into two posts. Live and learn.
The Great Beast written of by Plato in Book VI of the Republic represents the prejudices and passions of the masses. Politics acquires force through votes by calling its likes good and its dislikes evil.
The attempts to satisfy this “good” leads to rapid change and much waste. But the assumption remains that somehow this is all progress.
The authentic, non-secular, essence of religion refers to the unchanging patterns of things and its “good” is the good itself and not something believed to give access to the good. As Simone Weil says, it must be wanted.
But can character without understanding translate into action for more than a week if not applauded? There seems to be two opposing attractions. One is for the eternal unchanging truths and the other is described best by: “I want my MTV.” It is the open invitation and acceptance for the illusory to replace the discomfort of becoming open to the real. It is very easy for ourselves to blame others for our inability to retain character. But the fault is ours. This fluctuation and loss of aim is normal for our own plurality, the nature of our being. We lose awareness of the eternal unchanging truths and most often just say “screw it and pass me the remote”
But there has always been prudent planning. We have a whole United nations devoted to such planning. But it will always take second place to good scotch and its results will be just lawful manifestations of the collective level of human being that through its plurality finds comfort and purpose in the illusory world rather than the inner disturbance of becoming open to the eternal unchanging truths.
This is why the Great Beast encourages the expression of thoughts but discourages impartial thinking.
Plato thought there was a higher form of knowledge than mathematics which explains thought. The “dialectic” places thought in the service of the openness and impartiality of moral character.
Since I hold morality to be internal understanding rather than defined by external reactions, the purpose of the dialectic begins with ourselves,our own being. This knowledge doesn’t just add to our pool of knowledge stored in the computer in our head. The way in which it is received is what gives it its worth for ourselves at the cost of the Great Beast.
It is only the rare individuals that can rise above this level, have access to power through prestige, yet refuse it for the sake of opening the path within their being that leads to “The Way” in contrast to the satisfactions of escapism The byproduct of this is the inspiration for others not as internally strong to feel something of more importance in themselves than offered by life within the Great Beast and, as you point out, the garbage it produces.
sorry for not answering sooner, I have a lot of work on …
I agree that we are sold “progress†in this way, just as we are sold anything else that the powerful want to push through. In the past they have used labels like “Socialâ€, “Christianâ€, “Democratâ€, “Republicans†etc. nowadays they don’t even try to pretend. Going a long way back, it was this kind of strategy that took the Christian Church out of the hands of the believers – which was repeated over and over again.
Agreed, but in your sentence you have used good three times. It is the yearning for the “good itself†that spiritual people are concentrating, but they are still within the context of cruel reality. This may colour their language and make them a little pragmatic like me, but that doesn’t make them adversaries. I think you are often fighting those who are on your side.
Your pessimistic attitude is very apparent in much of what you write and you even sound a bit elitist at some times. Of course there are a lot of people out there on “Opium†– which isn’t just Religion. The age old strategy of bread and games is as effective in the modern empire as it was in the old. But you only have to have a little empathy to feel the emptiness and hunger in people.
You know as well as I do that the UN is politics. The prudent planning I am talking about stems from the inner balance of spirituality, irregardless of material wealth. Material wealth is the illusion of salvation and material shortage is the devil that has to be exorcised. Globalisation is the Inquisition of modern times, freeing the savages from the devil, promising salvation at the price of being a denunciator for the cause – or excommunication if you don’t comply. So you see, the old strategies are still being employed, even if it isn’t the Pope in command.
The Great Beast was said to have been the Pope and numerous other characters, but it is really the head of the movement that enslaves people. Of course it is the Antichrist, Christ being the exact opposite in his humility and love. But then again, this too is a metaphor that has been used more than once.
I would be pessimistic if I denied hope and as you know, I’ve stressed hope in regards society resting with the few individuals able to be the authentic black sheep.
I am not elitist as to myself and do not ask for any extra considerations. I am a believer in a teacher student relationship where the teacher must be considered superior in what is being taught. If not, why should they teach? This is why I have such little respect for the experts. I know what a good teacher is capable of in matters of the human psych and how these misguided egotists and charlatans leech off of them. So if you want to call my respect for this theoretical distinction between student and teacher or my respect for the black sheep elitism, I’ll plead guilty since I support them as valuable.
Our differences is primarily as asked in my initial post:
I don’t have any belief in social change of any depth but just adaptations to circumstances. All this business about uniting religions and the like is just fantasy for me if for no other reason than the prestige factor and the even deepeer need for roots. We are what we are so life will continue as it is It is only the real individuals that will have the ability appreciate the common ground of religion since they need it. Their influence because it is so much in the minority will just become more valuable. So my emphasis is in being in a limited servile way, part of the influence that creates inner freedom for people rather than the part that sympathizes with sleep. This is not to suggest a lack of respect and the refusal of being a good person. All this is secondary to the primary purpose of assistance to the cause of awakening.
This is another reason why I dislike the secularization of Christianity. It deprives society of its benefits by putting it on the same level as society itself further sustaining the yearning that you wish to empathize with. Which is better, empathy or solutions for the questions of the heart?
As you know there are threads going about good and evil and the nature of man and such. Yet the essential question that underlies all of this is rarely touched simply because it would be to awkward to do so. The question is not whether the nature of man is good or evil but if we are naive and gullible collectively and individually including ourselves? If we admit to being naive and gullible that leads to the dominance of the Great Beast, how can we become less so?
I see this is going to lead to a thread on “Simone, Plato, and the Allegory of the Cave”. The Great Beast is the societal relationship between the gullible and those that take advantage. It is these rare individuals that have grown to see the cave for what it is that have the capacity to limit the deteriorating effects of the “Great Beast” through their emphasis on awakening as revealed through the results of their “presence”. A hint of things to come:
Do we just feed the Great Beast through pacification or try to help feed the persons who hunger in their heart but have never experienced an alternative to what the Great Beast offers?
