h’ien
ind, ood
ui
un
CONFLICT
’an
uickſilver
ater
ercury
byſmal
linging
oon
ire
ilver
i
PEACE
hên
ên
hunder
’un
ountain
rouſing
arth
eeping till
ars
eceptive
aturn
Iron
arth
ead
EXPAND
rima ateria
CONTRACT
SOLVE
The Evolution of Theology
2016
In my own life, my ideas of religion and theology have passed through a very surprising evolution. Born the son and grandson of Methodist ministers, with my father also a PhD in Philosophy, I was familiar with religious ideas from my earliest years, dutifully attending Sunday School and Church services every week. However, being an intelligent child with an inquiring mind, I was naturally an atheist from at least the age of seven or eight. I suppose it is possible that in my yet earlier and more tender years I may have believed, or at least accepted, my father’s explanations of theological questions, but as soon as I was old enough to understand the ideas which I was expeed to believe, I thoroughly rejeed them. “Just Who does he think is listening to those prayers he makes in church every Sunday morning?” I was embarrassed for my naive and simple-minded father, who had done so well academically, but seemed to be so lacking in mature judgment and critical discernment.
As I grew into adolescence and beyond, my rejeion of all fanciful ideas of religion only hardened into a confirmed atheism. However, I found myself confronted with metaphysical questions which I could not answer.
Even in my earliest days of rejeion of religious answers to the primary questions of philosophy and metaphysics, I had sense enough to realize that
it was not sufficient to proclaim negation; if I were going to reje the religious answers to these questions, I must put forward some credible alternatives which I could believe. In other words, to present the problem in terms of the eight-year-old atheist, if the universe were not created by God, where did it come from? (Or, “Who made God, or where did He come from?”) These questions boggled my little brain, but every time I had to endure the embarrassment of listening to my father’s Sunday morning prayers, I renewed my determination to understand these questions “without the use of theological postulates.” Accordingly, I have spent most of my life searching for answers to these questions. I studied every source of philosophy and religion ~ Christian, Hebrew, Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist, Hermetic philosophy, occult philosophy, Freemasonry, even Satanism, as well as the whole gamut of Western philosophy from Heraclitus, Pythagoras, and Plato to Wittgenstein and Whitehead.
From what started out as a huge chaos and confusion of contradiory ideas, I gradually began to discover some promising threads, finding links of remarkable similarity from widely disparate sources. The alchemical ideas of Hermetic philosophy were some of the first to impress me the most favorably. I began to see some patterns emerging out of the labyrinth of ideas, and I gradually began to understand a principle which seemed to be at the heart of the process of change. I liked the concept of the Philosophers’
stone, and thought I understood the pivotal role it played in the process of Change which lay at the heart of the mysteries. The Greeks were barking up the wrong tree looking for some fundamental particle or “atom” which was the ultimate basis of the universe. Aually, Heraclitus was onto the right approach, declaring that Change was the ultimate reality.
Gradually I developed an understanding of a whole abstra
metaphysics which seemed to bring me closer and closer to an understanding of the primary mysteries of nature (referred to as the Arcana in the old mystery schools). At one point it occurred to me that I might even refer to the Philosophers’ Stone as “God,” and I thought that was pretty clever, to use the name of God to explain the ordering principle of my system of abstra metaphysics. Then, finally, it dawned on me that I had just discovered what many people had meant by “God” all along! But, of course, my own understanding of “God” was entirely abstra and had nothing whatever to do with that funny Being to Whom my father was addressing his prayers!
In this essay, I want to go over all of this ground again, describing how my understanding gradually evolved to a deeper understanding of the nature of God, reaching such astonishing conclusions as an understanding of the three Persons of the Trinity, and even an understanding of a personal God Who might even hear and answer prayer! And ~ most astonishing of al ~ if anyone had ever told my eight-year-old self that I would someday come to recognize Jesus Christ as the most important religious figure of all time, I would not have believed it.
Not that all of my conclusions are entirely orthodox, by any means! I have final y achieved my childhood quest of understanding the creation of the cosmos ex nihilo, and I have even solved the difficulty of the Problem of Evil (“How can we believe in a good, just, and merciful God when there are mosquitoes in the world?” ~ one of many ways in which this old problem can be expressed.) Along the way, I have come to have a radical understanding of God which is contrary to every previous conception of His nature, but
which resolves all of the problems pertaining to our understanding of God.
It is this new interpretation of the mystery of God which I wish to introduce in the present essay.
I wish to carry the evolution of God forward in the same sequence in which it has come to me, beginning with rejeion and atheism, evolving thence into an abstra metaphysics, then emerging as a conscious and personal God, and finally revealing the outstanding importance of Jesus Christ.
Rejeion and atheism is easy. It has always been easier for big sister Lucy to knock over little brother’s house of blocks, laughing, than it ever was for Linus to constru his creative work of architeure in the first place.
“Where does the sky end?” was my earliest problem. It was useless for my father to assure me that the sky goes on forever ~ how can that be?
Infinity is not a concept that an eight-year-old mind can grasp. But the infinity of time is even more puzzling than that of space. It is bad enough to assert that the universe will go on forever, but to go into the past and pretend that it has always existed is patently absurd, as any bright eight-year-old could easily assure you.
Another absurdity is the notion that we should accept the truth of revealed religion on faith! As Bertrand Russell has observed (quoted from memory; not a dire quote), “There are many hundreds of different religions in the world, all of them mutually exclusive and contradiory, so that it stands to reason, as a matter of logic, that no more than one of them could represent the truth, and all the rest of them are just bunk, so why should anyone believe that the religion into which they happen to have been born is
the truth? It is more logical to assume that all of them are bunk.” ~ Bertrand Russell, hy I m ot a hriftian. I fully understand the difficulty ~ since it is considered to be impossible to come to any clear theological understanding by reason alone, the only recourse left to us is to accept our revealed beliefs on faith.
Well, I am here to pick two holes in that analysis. In the first place, as I researched every imaginable source of religious and philosophical ideas, I began to see many of the most important ideas cropping up again and again, clothed, it is true, in an extravagant variety of costumes, but of which certain core ideas kept coming up unmistakably again and again with surprising similarity. Eventually I began to distinguish these ideas and sort them out into a system according to their patterns. Suddenly Bertrand Russell’s whole argument flipped onto its head ~ if the same fundamental ideas keep coming up again and again no matter how widely diverse the sources, there must be something to it!
The second hole in the idea that belief can only be based on faith since there is no way to derive an understanding of religion by reason alone is that I have done just exaly that ~ without relying upon faith at all; in fa, starting from a total rejeion of everything I was expeed to believe on faith
~ I have derived an understanding of metaphysics and theology which I am not only convinced is corre, but which I believe is the only solution possible to the major problems of philosophy. But what ended up as a complete and integrated system of metaphysics started out as just a series of related ideas.
One of my epiphanies along the way was to see that these ideas were most effeively illustrated by the numbers of mathematics. I understood that this was the meaning of the claim by Pythagoras that Numbers were the
Secret Key to an understanding of the Mysteries of Nature. (So, aually, this epiphany occurred to Pythagoras first, but it was an original idea to me.)
“Mathematics is the language of God.” The concept of Number is the mother of all abstraion. The whole field of mathematics is a priori knowledge that can be conceived without any reference to the external world.
There is a mystery associated with the number One, another mystery associated with the number Two, another mystery associated with the number Three, and another mystery associated with the number Four. The mysteries continue, but these first four are the most important and primary.
In fa, the smaller the number, the more important the mystery in a kind of logarithmic scale in which each number is more important than the one which follows. This sequence of the first four primary mysteries comprise what Pythagoras referred to as the etrays. It is represented also by the four letters of the Name of God in Hebrew (the etragrammaton).
I have written about these mysteries all of my life, from my earliest book, ympoum by od and the evil, and the apis hiloſophorum (I especially prefer the third edition), to the very elaborate heophany, which I printed by letterpress from hand-set type on paper made by hand, to the
atterns of Illuſion and hange, and, most recently, etragrammaton, a small book of piures illustrating the primary mysteries, “the Keys to the Arcana.”
In the first two books mentioned, I presented the sequence of Arcana horizontally, one to a page. Then, in a truly major epiphany (assisted, as I recall, by the fortuitous stimulus of LSD, which enjoys a well-documented history of association with divine inspiration), I stacked the symbols vertically, and saw, to my astonishment, that I had recreated the Tree of Life from the Kabbalah! At first I thought it were just an amazing coincidence, but as I looked more closely, I saw that every sphere on the Tree of Life
corresponded exaly to its relative position on my own diagrams. Then, when I considered that both diagrams were intended to convey the same sequence of ideas (“the evolution from God to Man”), I was no longer surprised that my own designs should be praically identical with a design which was several thousand years old. I also realized immediately that the Tetragrammaton was just one final layer of abstraion up from the Tree of Life (the Tetragrammaton has always been said to express the same mystery
~ the evolution from God to Man ~ although its precise meaning has been universally considered to have been lost over the ages).
So now let us briefly review these ideas. In one way or another, all my writings are expositions of these Arcana, but I will try to review them sufficiently here to lay a basis for understanding the evolution of my ideas of theology. The Number One is the most important, but the hardest to speak about. In the words of the ao e hing by Lao Tzu, “From Tao there comes One; from One there come Two; from Two there comes Three; and from Three there come all things.” According to Pythagoras, the best illumination of each mystery is contained in the concept of the Number for which it stands. That is, the meaning of the first and most primary mystery can best be understood by meditating on the Number One. The best I can come up with in words is an idea of Perfeion expressed as a point which has no dimensions, no existence in time, and, in fa, no existence at all until the universe comes into being by the Error or Joke of a Distinion between Al and Nothing, Infinity and Zero (pretending that the two terms mean something different, opposite to each other). Now it is possible to perceive that point of perfeion (after the creation of the cosmos) at the center of a sphere of error, or cloud of confusion, surrounding that point. Of course, we can understand that point of Perfeion as God (the Holy Ghost, in my most
recent understanding of correspondence to the Christian Trinity) and all the manifestation surrounding it as “the Devil.” One very important theological point is this understanding of the Devil not as an organized and conscious incarnation of evil (as many Christians seem to believe), but as confusion and error, “distance from God.” This makes a whole lot more sense theologically; there are not two gods, one good and one evil (that is an old but primitive idea ~ compare Zoroastrianism), but only one God, defining Perfeion at the center, with Dante’s receding circles of Hell the further away one goes from God. God is the light at the center, and “the Devil” is expressed as increasing confusion and error, receding out into chaos, darkness, and death.
But it is a lot more complicated than this. So far we have this pattern of God at the center, with energies of confusion moving out into error.
There are numerous applications of this image ~ for example, we might say that everyone lives their life somewhere on this continuum (which is not linear, but better expressed as a point at the center of a sphere moving out in an infinite number of direions away from God at the center to increasing degrees of error and confusion towards the periphery). Furthermore, it is possible to go closer in towards the center, or to move further out away from God. A praice such as meditation is designed to bring one closer to God, while expressions of anger, over-indulgence in drugs or alcohol, or engaging in crime or war will carry one inexorably further away from God.
So far this might seem to be fairly simple and straightforward ~ going in is good; going out is bad. But it is not that simple! What we see as error and confusion, iniquity and sin, is aually only the excess of that direion of energy, not any movement in that direion at all! Metaphysically, that
direion of energy which caused the universe to break apart from non-being and perfeion into manifestation and reality is the Quest for Novelty, which is the Spark of Life! It is an absolutely essential component of the cosmos, and value expressions of “good” or “evil” are wholly inappropriate. One of the reasons why I enjoyed the ideas of Hermetic Alchemy was its recognition that the most efficient path towards perfeion was not a bee-line to the center (which, if it were even possible, would just result in the annihilation of all manifestation back into the state of perfe non-being), but the alternation of olve et oagula (breaking apart and coming together). All evolutionary growth is a produ of this pattern ~ inhalation-exhalation, expansion-contraion, analysis-synthesis, etc.
So it is only in excess that this “quest for novelty” gets us into trouble.
Initially, this quest for novelty leads to creativity and originality, leading to evolutionary growth and all of the wonders of science and life. However, if the forays out into novelty are not resolved and reintegrated back to the center, the outward moving energy just continues out past creativity and complexity into confusion and madness, eventually leading to chaos, darkness and death.
Now to relate these ideas to the numbers of metaphysics, it is the duality of the Number Two, yang and yin, expansion and contraion. If the Number One represents the ultimate Origin, the reaching out into Novelty of the Number Two represents the spark of life which creates and animates the cosmos. So far from considering this movement “evil,” we consider this essential breath of life to be one of the Persons of the Trinity which is God.
At the point of perfeion, all good things converge ~ clarity, harmony, love, joy, bliss, good health, prosperity, etc. Increasing distance
away from this point leads to confusion, discord, anger, sorrow, confli, poor health, failure, etc. Yet, as long as the energy is continually reintegrated back to the center, the movement outward is life itself ~ novelty, creativity, complexity, and growth. This may seem like a paradox. If all good things converge at the point in the center, how is it that movement away from this point can produce good effes? As I search for an analogy to explain this idea, I find one that may seem unsuitable, yet is really corre.
This movement outward, away from the center of perfeion is like a drug ~
coffee, for example. Coffee provides a positive stimulus, yet, in the first place, it is most effeive the more rarely it is used. And, secondly, the more it is used to excess, the more negative the effes become. The lesson, then, is that this outward movement is very powerful magic, but it must be used sparingly, and followed by a return back to the center to maintain integrity and balance, to assimilate the new information into the path of evolutionary change and growth. Another very coarse example is spontaneous mutation.
Spontaneous mutation is precisely this “quest for novelty” in aion, and is the mechanism of evolutionary growth. Yet if the pace of mutation exceeds a safe limit, the organism breaks down into uncontrolled chaos and eventual death. The COAGULA phase must follow the SOLVE in order for the novelties to be either integrated into the center (as the agency of positive growth), or rejeed and passed over.
Most Christian theologians consider Jesus as the “Son of God” and the second Person of the Trinity, and none of that is inconsistent with my view.
The prime attribute of the convergence of al good things is Love, the ultimate COAGULA. (We must distinguish here, by analogy with mathematics, the “approach to the limit” from “the limit itself.” At the aual attainment of the limit, all bets are off, and all manifestation would be
hypothetically superseded by non-being.) Since Jesus Christ is unparalleled in the primacy of his message of love, we may say that Jesus was “closer to God” than any other person known to history. I have to take issue here with people who seem to think that the message of Jesus is, “Believe in Me and you will never die.” For those who don’t know, the message of Jesus can be found in John 13; 34-35 ~ “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if you have love one to another.”
And also First John 4:7-8 ~ “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”
I find Jesus to be a far more impressive person when understood as a human being who was very close to God, rather than some sort of magical being identified as God Himself. The whole point of the teaching of Jesus was to show the way by example as someone whom we may aspire to follow.
Once you claim that he is God Himself his whole existence and message is belittled and trivialized. His followers may have been dazzled, as the Aztecs were dazzled by Cortez and thought he was God, but the story of Jesus makes a lot more sense to me as an example of the power and glory of God the closer we approach to Him. But as close as Jesus was to God, he also embodied the virtues of novelty in large measure! Time after time his message broke with tradition, bringing us, in every way, a New Testament. An example of his attitude is his reply when questioned about healing on the Sabbath: “The Sabbath was made for Man, not Man for the Sabbath.” Jesus, being close to God, is a perfe exemplar of the Second Arcanum and the Second Person of the Trinity, reaching out into novelty from the perfeion of God.
The funny thing about the Trinity is that it real y does take three perspeives to fully understand God. At the top (Arcanum I), there is od, the oly hoft. Then there are the two forces of the Second Arcanum ~
oddeſs, the other (yin), and od, the on (yang). Altogether they comprise the Trinity of God.
So if the Number One expresses God as the ultimate Origin, and the Number Two expresses the Divergence into complexity represented by the movement outward into novelty (balanced by movement back in to the center), what is the significance of the Number Three? The Number Three represents the expanding consequence of the divergence of the Number Two. Three is achieved by a point of perspeive between Subje and Obje. Where the Number Two expresses abstra direions of energy as complementary ideas, the Number Three brings into being an entire field of energy (for example, the entire manifest cosmos and the infinite consciousness of God) which comes into being between the hypothetical and imaginary limits of Al and Nothing, Infinity and Zero. This Trinity completes the expression of God. The Number Four represents the aual and tangible manifestation of the cosmos, completing the evolution from God to Man. (More information concerning any of this may be found in my books already mentioned, which may be found on my web site:
But let’s take a closer look at this Number Three. The key feature of the Third Arcanum is Life and Consciousness. I have developed this idea at greater length in previous writings, but to make a quick summary ~ by analogy with an atom, which has a nucleus surrounded by a swarm of elerons relatively far out from the nucleus, I imagine that there is a vast
field of energy surrounding every human being. Close to the body there may be an aura, visible to some sensitive people, but there must be a huge field of energy extending out for a considerable distance ~ at least, say, to the outer limits of the atmosphere around planet Earth. What this means is that al life on the planet, human, animal, and vegetable, is occupying the same space! Advancing quickly to a complex idea, I accept the postulate of a being (“aia”) which is comprised of the entire field of life energy on the planet, with a shared consciousness. Now, by the idea that consciousness increases in dire proportion to the complexity of an organism, aia must have a greater consciousness than any of the “separate” people, plants, or animals of which she is composed.
Suddenly all manner of psychic phenomena become very easy to understand, since all life is essentially linked into a single system of energy.
You see where I am going with this ~ it may be that there is a yet larger Being composed of all life in the cosmos, but from our point of view, we may think of aia as the Consciousness of God (The Holy Ghost). Suppose this is not just some abstraion, but is aually real? Is it too much to imagine that this Consciousness is “aware” of our individual thoughts on some level?
And what about the other direion? I have always thought it was stupid and useless to “pray” by submitting a shopping list to God like a child writing a letter to Santa Claus. It makes much more sense to me for us to
“pray” by listening receptively for any messages which God (or aia) may have for us. Perhaps my writings are inspired by God. How was it possible otherwise that I should re-invent the Tree of Life of the Kabbalah so many millennia after its initial appearance? I tuned it in.
Initially I promised an explanation of the creation of the cosmos ex nihilo. That requires some extremely dense metaphysical speculation and is aually beyond the scope of the present essay (but see peculations on
oſmology). However, I also promised to resolve the Problem of Evil, which I now propose to do. The resolution of the problem, as Wittgenstein would advise us, is to be found in the statement of the problem itself. “How can we believe in the existence of an Almighty God, infinite in power, wisdom, and goodness, in the face of so much manifest evil in the world?” Well, the solution to the problem lies in the prior assumptions. Who says God is Almighty, infinite in power, wisdom, or even goodness? Are we like the Aztecs dazzled by Cortez, or like children who believe in the infallibility of their parents? If we understand that God is all of Us, all Life on the planet, and We are just trying to stay alive (and, perhaps, losing the battle), then perhaps We can understand the inadequacy of the attitude to “let George do it.” We need to take responsibility for Our world, the only one We have, and put Our shoulders to the wheel before it is too late.
Our concept of God has evolved considerably from the Old Testament to the New Testament. Jesus has given us a glimpse of a much greater God than anything found in the Old Testament, by teaching that God is Love; a radical idea then as now. Now it is time for us to come of age and participate in the continuing evolution of God and Man. If we just sit back and let George do it, there may be nothing left for our children. Our planet is dying (and that means We are dying), and it is up to Us to rise to the challenge of Our present need and try to reverse that slide into confusion, error, chaos, darkness, and death. aia can’t do it without Us. Do you hear Her speaking to you? If not, then ut up and liften! At the very least, get out of the way if you can’t lend a hand, for the times they are a-changing. It is
up to Us to ensure that the changes bring Us closer to the light instead of delivering Us to the rapidly encroaching darkness.
The most urgent priority is to mobilize a vast army of tree planters to restore the proteive tree cover on the earth. More trees wil improve the carbon balance, produce more oxygen, and help to prevent the destruive cycle of drought and floods by anchoring the soil to the earth, retaining the water when it rains, and returning it gradually during the dry seasons, preventing water runoff and soil erosion. Trees also encourage the survival of smaller shrubs and ground covers, further proteing the earth and its living creatures, including human life.
There are plenty of other problems that need to be addressed, but the restoration of the Trees is such an urgent priority that I don’t want to mention anything else on the same page.
The Glory of God is very much manifest in the Trees, but up until now, the human race has just been dragging Us down. The human race has interjeed an amazing and explosive burst of Novelty, but if We are unable fully to realize that energy and reintegrate it back to God, it will carry Us inexorably further out along the path of increasing complexity leading to confusion and error, and thence to the outer reaches of chaos, darkness, and death. The message here is that it is not enough to say that “God is in His Heaven, and all’s right with the world,” or “God works in mysterious ways, but His plan is surely unfolding as it should.” No! Our world is spiraling out into chaos, and time is running out. Enough SOLVE already! Now it is time for a new COAGULA to bring Us back to God.
Speculations on Cosmic
Consciousness and the Love of God
2016
A while ago (March of 2015) I saw on the news the videos of the soldiers of ISIS destroying all the ancient art, artifas, and architeure from a museum in Northern Iraq. As I write this, I seem to recall that that was even before the unbelievably egregious destruion of Palmyra a bit later on.
All of that is way beyond inexcusable. War is a bad enough business, and, most of the time, both sides seem to be convinced that they are in the right, but wanton destruion of our heritage of ancient art is totally senseless. I am still in shock over the burning of the library at Alexandria, and now this!
Religious beliefs are hard to argue with when people believe on faith the religion they were taught at their mother’s knee. When someone else comes along with different beliefs which he also accepts on faith, there is no common ground for any discussion. Well, here I am trying to establish some common ground. My first proposition, which I offer for acceptance as an axiom (accepted without proof) is that “the meaning and purpose of religion is to get closer to God.” I believe that is a pretty fundamental idea which most people would accept regardless of their religious backgrounds.
Buddhism is not specifically theistic, but I think most Buddhists would
accept the proposition anyway, when they see how I understand the concept.
(In other words, what I mean by “getting closer to God” turns out to be identical with the goals of Buddhist praice, the attainment of enlightenment being simply equated with union with God.) I can hardly imagine anyone claiming a different purpose for their religious praices, but if they do ( e.g., to propitiate an angry God) then my present remarks just do not apply to them.
But, if one accept my starting premise, then I introduce my second premise, which is that the best way to measure a person’s closeness to God is to consider the degree to which they love everyone. I suggest that the most clearly distinguishing feature of the most religious or spiritual people is the love they feel for all of life. Most recognized “holy men” or “holy women” or spiritual teachers are famous for radiating an oceanic love for all life. Once again, it is hard to engage “proofs” for this idea, so I will call it another axiom ~ “The more love one feels for all of life, the closer one is to God.”
So, if we can accept these two propositions, suddenly we have an objeive measure of comparison for religious beliefs and praices. Simply look at your religious beliefs and praices and ask, “Do these beliefs and praices bring me closer to God, or do they drive me further away from God? As I continue on the way of my religious observance, am I becoming more loving to all of life, or less?” If one be looking for a spiritual teacher or guru, simply seek one who most clearly radiates the love of God. In other articles, I have repeatedly described a three dimensional continuum which goes from a center of peace, love, harmony, joy, and clarity outwards in al direions towards increasing tension, anger, disharmony, sorrow, and confusion. God is at that point at the center, and the further away one goes
from that point, the more one is distant from God (“distance from God” is an old and very good definition for the Devil).
So, to make my conclusion, I say to those soldiers of ISIS,
o, you are not obeying the will of llah, as you pound thoſe ancient artifas to rubble, conſumed with your paion of anger and hatred. o, you are loft in confuon and error. I am not an Iſlamic ſcholar, but I am ſure that a diligent ſearch of your oran will ſuggeft new direions for your energies that might bring you cloſer to od than your preſent courſe of anger, violence, and hatred. It is not neceary to convert to hriftianity or uddhiſm; all you have to do is ſeek for those interpretations of your oran that lead you cloſer to the love of
od.
Of course, it is not only Moslems who drift away from God, seduced by false prophets ~ plenty of Christians (and others) have lost all understanding of the original teachings of the founders of their Church and are just as lost in confusion and error as any Moslem. I call upon the leaders of every religion to clarify for your communicants the path which leads to the love of God.
Many people are uncomfortable with any expression of religious belief.
When I was a child, unbelievers would prudently conceal their unbelief.
Now, it is religious believers who hide their beliefs out of a fear of ridicule.
Well, the important aspes of my own ideas are quite independent of the religious component. My principle image describing the spiritual state of human beings (a sphere with a center of peace, harmony, clarity, love, and joy extending outward towards increasing anger, disharmony, confusion, hatred, sorrow, darkness, and death) may be applied without any mention of
God. If I label the center “God” and the outer reaches of confusion “the Devil,” that may be understood figuratively rather than literally. Certainly the labeling of confusion, distant from God, as “the Devil” is intended to disavow, once and for all, the idea of the Devil as a kind of conscious and deliberate “evil god.” And, whether you think of God at the center as a conscious being of some sort or just a figurative image to describe the quality makes no real difference. Just as Buddhist meditation can bring you to a state of peace and serenity, so the effort to become “closer to God” can yield the same benefits of peace, clarity, joy, love, and good health, regardless of any theological ideas pertaining to that mysterious point at the center.
The crux of the whole matter is consciousness. I suggest that consciousness (and free will) increases as you get closer to God (or “to the center”) and decreases as you move away into confusion, error, and darkness.
So “union with God” would mean the attainment of cosmic consciousness, as well as enlightenment, Nirvana, limitless love, and total bliss. This, of course, is entirely speculative. I am suggesting, by analogy with the consciousness of animals and human beings, that the more complex and highly evolved the organism, the greater the consciousness. To postulate that the entire field of life energy on the planet is all inter-conneed and, in fa, comprises a single living being, is also speculative, but it is an extremely interesting and provocative concept, and offers no theological problems whatsoever. It is the suggestion that this being (“aia”) is fully conscious and is responsible for the nearly universal belief in some sort of God, that is the most radical idea here. If it were true, it could account for a great many unexplained and/or psychic phenomena as a medium for the transmission of all kinds of energies of communication and even telekinetic aivity, as well as prayer.
At the same time, it is an idea of God that avoids the deal-breaker concept of an Almighty God Who is responsible for everything that happens in the world, good and bad. When theologians try to explain the Problem of Evil by attempting to shift the blame onto humans, when the Deity should have known better, I don’t find their arguments very convincing. I think God is evolving along with Our cosmos, and We are doing the best We can.
Consciousness is a very astonishing experience. But if human beings can enjoy the kind of consciousness with which we are familiar, I do not find it too surprising to imagine aia as a conscious being, trying hard to stay alive but losing the battle due to the endless and growing confusion of her parts.
But, whether you believe that aia is a conscious Being, an unconscious being, or even just a random and unconneed confusion of unrelated beings (human, animal, and vegetable), the path towards an evolutionary growth that can sustain the fragile envelope of life on this planet is all the same ~ a concerted effort for all sentient beings to move closer to that center of peace, clarity, love, and joy, regardless of whether you endow that point with any theological significance or not.
Philosophical Meditations
on the Nature of God
2015 - 2017
11.III.15 Suddenly I am re-thinking the whole aia hypothesis. The problem is that all of the life energies of the planet do not show a level of integration comparable to the single organism of a person, animal, or plant.
It is true that a human being contains millions of smaller organisms that are hostile to the person, and sometimes these hostile organisms destroy the integrity of the person, leading to death. But in this case, those hostile organisms are opposed to the person, not an integral part. I would speculate that the person’s consciousness would not include these organisms but would maintain distinion from it. In the same way, a human body sometimes rejes a transplant; the ego ( i.e., the center of consciousness) refuses to incorporate the alien part. So, in the case of planet earth, I cannot see the analogy of a single organism with a single consciousness. As I try to make sense of it all, I try to follow the consciousness. I have always had a pagan
“many gods” attitude (whether or not there is One overall God) ~ that every family, school, city, state, tribe, language group, biker group, street gang, or interest group (not to mention every river and forest) may have a shared consciousness, so perhaps our world is just a jungle of such “gods,” all
struggling for dominance. Perhaps the God of the Hebrews was just that ~
a parochial god for one tribe of people, not a God who would include other alien tribes (this may be the root cause of much anti-Semitism).
So, if this more accurately represents the spiritual state of the planet, what are the implications for consciousness and/or theology? Of course, I am treading upon unknowable ground, but I am a philosopher, not a scientist. A scientist does not speculate beyond the data, whereas the speculations of philosophers begin where those of the scientists leave off.
My first thought is that I cannot decisively rule out a single consciousness that encompasses all of life. But in view of the jungle of mutually hostile life forms, such a consciousness would not necessarily favor mankind. Perhaps such a consciousness would favor Man’s destruion by fire (nuclear war) comparable to an earlier destruion by flood. Once the failed experiment of human life were cleared from the earth, the evolution of life might proceed again, over here, with a fresh opportunity. As to theology, this view of the nature of the consciousness of God does not offer much comfort (to human beings).
But, whether or not there is some sort of overall consciousness, I consider the status of the next level of consciousness down ~ is there a single consciousness for the human race as a whole, or is the jungle of warring peoples, races, tribes, religions, and lawgivers in an endless struggle for survival or dominance? And what are the implications for the survival of life on earth? Well, as to that, I return to a very old idea of mine, which has been shared by many others over the years ~ there can be no hope for any positive evolution of the human race until or unless the entire planet be unified under a single political entity. This might be accomplished after
devastation by war and conquest, or by political evolution of negotiation and compromise. One idea which I have had from the beginning of my theological speculations about aia is that God is just as much a work in progress as any of the life forms which contribute to His consciousness. If the human race and the planet can be unified under a single political struure, then our God could grow commensurately.
So, after all of this speculation, I am left with a world in chaos, beset by warring faions all over the globe with no end in sight. One idea seems clear enough ~ a gradual and evolutionary movement toward union (COAGULA) is better ( i.e., more conducive to the possibility of the survival of life on earth) than a cataclysmic or expanding confli leading to destruion and chaos (SOLVE).
So, the conclusion of my morning’s meditation is to suggest passing out free LSD to all the warring faions all over the world to promote an elevation of spiritual consciousness leading finally to an ultimate union and the triumph of the love of God over the confusion, chaos, and darkness of the Devil.
The lesson for aia, the consciousness of our planetary god, is the same as that for every person on the planet ~ in order to accomplish a positive elevation of spiritual growth, the life energies on our planet, just as with each individual soul, must come together towards a center of clarity, peace, harmony, joy, and love. The alternative, for each person as for our planet, is confusion, destruion, chaos, darkness, and death. herefore, chooſe
ife. (Deuteronomy 30:15-20)
13.III.15 rimum obile
I may, of course, be wrong in any of my speculations, but at least I have clear ideas about almost every aspe of philosophy and metaphysics.
There is really only one point that is not entirely clear ~ the very first point, the primum mobile. As I have mentioned before, science really has no better explanation for this point than theology. Science can describe the expansion of the Big Bang from the first few millionths of a second after the Big Bang itself, but by that time all of the really interesting stuff is already ancient history. I want to know exaly how and why that Big Bang aually happened in the firft place! So, that is my problem of metaphysics, and there is also my problem of theology and consciousness ~ is there a whole planetary consciousness or is the consciousness limited to lower levels? This is unknowable, but my current thinking is that there is some sort of planetary-wide aia consciousness, even if the parts are in confli.
It may sound funny to put it in this way, but, as a God, aia is way down on the scale of spiritual evolution (about on the level of the Old Testament God). When the life energies of the planet resemble the fully realized saint of “Buddha Nature” or “Christ Consciousness,” then we will be entering a Golden Age or the Kingdom of God on Earth. We have a long way to go ( underftatement alert). So, to clarify my ideas about a personal God Who might hear our prayers or facilitate other psychic phenomena, this might refer to levels of super-consciousness below the planetary level, and these spheres of consciousness may be intermingled in any complex way beyond our comprehension.
But it is the first and most abstra metaphysics that I want to consider now: the primum mobile itself. So, to review, there is the First Arcanum, as
that point of perfeion at the center of our virtual sphere (which doesn’t exist until the Second Arcanum brings it into being). Then the Second Arcanum causes the Universe to split apart and come into being with a Quest for Novelty which moves away from the perfeion of God at the center outward into “error” in any of an infinite number of direions. Does the First Arcanum have any existence or reality “before” the Second Arcanum brings it all into being? The First Arcanum makes sense to me as a senior concept (from which the Second Arcanum breaks away) even in the absence of the Second Arcanum. In the same sense that the concept of Number may have an a priori reality apart from any manifestation in the physical world, so, also, in the same way that we imagine infinity as an approach to a limit, I can imagine an ultimate ain ſoph, total nothingness, as the Original antecedent of the birth of God, which I cal the First Arcanum.
We might cal that ain ſoph the Zero Arcanum, analogous to The Fool of the Tarot.
But it is this Second Arcanum which holds the greater part of my interest! There is something natural and original about the First Arcanum, but the Second Arcanum is really the trigger (or its consequence) which initiates the Big Bang. [The First Arcanum and the Second Arcanum are different; the hange which happens occurs at a point between the two Arcana, in the same way that the First Arcanum already expresses the point in process as it changes from ain ſoph to the first singularity.]
So what is this Quest for Novelty, and whence does it come? It doesn’t seem to be as obvious a given as the serenity and perfeion of the First Arcanum. The Quest for Novelty exists because without it there would be nothing to disturb the serenity of God’s infinite Perfeion. But why does
it exist? It is, obviously, the origin and source of life, as well as all existence, personified as ros. In spite of the fa that it is clearly a “junior” concept to the seniority and perfeion of the First Arcanum, it seems to be responsible for most of the interest. The movement inward, back to the center and perfeion of God, seems to be more like a resolution of the error implied by the movement away from the center (this would be gravity ~ time and/or space is “the measure of error”) but the movement outward, in any of an infinite number of direions in search of novelty, seems to bear all of the dynamic potential of the cosmos and of life. (It also offers a theoretical explanation for the significance of “devil worship.”) So this Quest for Novelty is the final and irreducible primum mobile, after al . It defies speculation as to where It might come from ~ all we can say is that without It there never would have been any universe to disturb the Perfeion of God.
Nothing in these speculations is contrary to any of the findings of science ~ all I have done is to restore the name of God to the Creation.
Until any scientist or theologian can explain the how or why of the Big Bang at the moment of Creation itself, I will prefer my solution, as it showcases the very focal point of the Mystery Itself instead of trying to pretend that it doesn’t exist.
16.XII.16 Another explanation for the primum mobile might claim that the quest for novelty is inherent in the metaphysics. By analogy, we claim that the numbers of mathematics may be entirely derived a priori and
ex nihilo. The concept and meaning of the numbers of mathematics do not depend upon any external realities. In the same way, it may be possible to claim that the metaphysics of the sequence of the primary mysteries of nature is also inherent in the fundamental nature of reality. The metaphysical expansion of the ideas of Number have been there all along, as much a part of the attributes of Number as their use as simple counting markers.
Specifically, as the Second Arcanum reaches Outward into Novelty it is nothing more nor less than the inevitable expression of the Second Arcanum.
In the same way, the Mystery of the Number Three is just as inevitable: once the process of expansion into complexity through the operation of the Quest for Novelty has begun (olve et oagula), it will inevitably generate Life, and, finally, Consciousness. You can call this God, or just call it the natural world doing its thing.
A very interesting idea from Taoism is enantiodromia: reversal in extremis, the idea that as everything makes its round of cyclical progression, at the end of every extremity of yang or yin there is a turning around to go the other way. This is the same as the Quest for Novelty and the Return to the Center, or the olve et oagula of the alchemists. According to this view, the universe had to pop into existence sooner or later, and, as time is meaningless in the absence of existence, it just had to happen. Now, of course, the universe is winding back down to Nothingness once again. This cycle of a universe popping into and out of existence may be analogous to the popping into and out of existence of sub-atomic particles of quantum physics.
On the other hand, it is possible to imagine that this is all Natural and inevitable, and doesn’t require any “God” to put it into motion. Or, you could say that the bursting apart of Original Perfeion into the endless Quest for Novelty and the Return to the Center, is God’s little Joke, and it is His Laughter that we know as the unfolding Universe. This would be God’s way of existing forever without getting bored.
10.I.17 eus fecit
Looking over these meditations, I can see that I have narrowed it down to two possibilities ~ either we accept the premise that the metaphysical extensions of the concept of Number are, in fa, as inherent in the numbers themselves as are their qualities as simple counting units, so that the whole progression of metaphysics is inevitable ~ that the universe just had to pop into existence “sooner or later,” and that the evolution to life and consciousness was also inevitable; or one could deny the associations of metaphysics to the qualities of Number. In fa, one might even reje the claim that Number itself could be derived a priori and ex nihilo. My metaphysics falters on the same rock that stumps the scientist. Certainly, given One, Two must follow, and then Three, and then All Things. But who says the One is given? If even the abstraions of Number be not allowed as given (or as axioms), then the Original Source of the initial One is just as unknown as the hypothetical Big Bang of science.
But that is al good ~ if the claim that the metaphysics is inherent in the concept of Number be not considered sufficient to say that the universe
made itself, then Whatever or Whoever brought it into being, we might as well call God.
The concept of enantiodromia is the foundation of Taoism. It is even a definition of the Tao, as in “From Tao there comes One . . .” [I], which started off the whole chain of events. The dichotomy and alternation of All and Nothing, Infinity and Zero [II], is inevitable, and the alternation between the two sets up a field of energy between them [III] which, in turn, creates the manifest cosmos [IV]. Zero and Infinity may be equivalent at the limit, but in the hypothetical movement between the two a whole potential field of energy comes into being, reaching out into Novelty, hence the ensuing evolution into the cosmos as we know it.
So we can trace the origin of the cosmos back to the Tao. But, of course, whence comes this Tao? I think it is irreducible. Either we accept the Tao as original and fundamental, out of which the cosmos created itself, or we append the name of a causal agent: eus fecit. It’s all one.
29.I.17
The fundamental axiom of Western Logic is that “A Proposition is either True or False.” From this axiom, the whole system of mathematics, philosophy, and science is deduced analytically. In the binary logic of computers, each bit in the string is either On or Off. This may seem straightforward enough, and, like Newtonian physics, it generally suffices for most of the tasks to which Western logic is put.
But, just as Western logic and mathematics prove inadequate when dealing with sub-atomic or quantum levels of reality, they are also inadequate when dealing with macrocosmic questions such as the creation or origin of the universe. No, for those questions we must employ the more comprehensive potential of Eastern logic and philosophy.
Where the Western philosopher or scientist takes as his starting axiom that a proposition is either true or false, the Eastern philosopher allows for a proposition to be either “True,” “Not True,” “both True and Not True,” or
“neither True nor Not True.”
Careful analysis of the last two possibilities reveals that they are essentially the same, but from the point of view of opposite perspeives.
Thus, we can simplify the Eastern position by suggesting that there is a
“Third Way” in addition to the two values recognized by Western logic, philosophy, and science.
This “third way” throws an enormous monkey wrench into any effort to get a grasp on reality. To begin with, we must regretfully give up the concept of “certainty.” We can never be certain of anything, at all. To get an idea of what it might mean in terms of our efforts to understand the cosmos, I want to combine the ideas of Heraclitus and Lao Tzu. From Heraclitus we get the idea that nothing can exist without the simultaneous existence of its opposite. From Lao Tzu and the concepts of Taoism we get the idea that Yang and Yin succeed each other in turn. So we might evolve a new idea, that, to start with the binary logic of computers, each bit is either
“predominantly On,” “predominantly Off,” or “fluuating so rapidly between On and Off that its state is indeterminate.”
In the ordinary reality of daily life, these fluuations mostly balance each other out, but on the level of quantum mechanics or macro-cosmology, the indeterminate nature of reality is inescapable. This is the loophole that
“lets the magic in,” allowing our cosmos to exist at all, with the possibility of expanding towards limitless complexity in search of endless novelty.
So, sit back and watch the show, or sit up and participate in the unfolding of our astonishing universe.
29.IX.17
Question ~ is Enantiodromia (reversal in extremis, the Tao) sufficient to explain the Quest for Novelty? Or is the Quest for Novelty the elder idea, which requires the utilization of the principle of Enantiodromia, the Tao, to implement its intention?
It seems to me that I have failed to find a First Cause sufficient to create the universe ex nihilo. My candidate, the Tao, is silent when asked whence he comes. So if we say that the Quest for Novelty utilizes the Tao to obtain its effes, the position of this Quest for Novelty is sounding more and more theological al the time. But I can’t think of any other way to account for it. Otherwise, if we say that the Quest for Novelty is derived from the Tao, it is the same situation, just calling the First Cause by a different name. eus fecit.
24.X.17
My problem has always been the rimum obile ~ how did it all begin?
I have a metaphysics which explains the endless expansion into complexity that is our universe, but I feel like the scientist who describes the original expansion of the cosmos from the Big Bang, beginning ten millionths of a second after the big bang happened ~ who cares about those minor details? I want to know how it al began.
The sequence of the rcana are as fundamental and a priori as the numbers of mathematics. The Primary Mysteries, illuminating the unfolding evolution from God to Man, are inherent in the Numbers, as Pythagoras so famously figured out so long ago. And the sequence of the first four comprise the Tree of Life of the Kabbalah, and the Name of God, the etragrammaton. Why, it is enough to make one give up eating beans (as required by followers of the school of Pythagoras).
So far, all of this is the answer to the question, “Where do all of these ideas come from?” So we are only really left with one problem ~ why did the Big Bang happen to have happened when it did? Aually, this is the easier question ~ obviously “time” has no more meaning than anything else prior to the moment of creation.
As to these unfolding Mysteries, starting from Arcanum 0, the ain ſoph, then all three of the primary Arcana come into being at once ~ I, II, and III. Then comes IV, the manifestation of our cosmos springing to life ex nihilo, as the consequence of the metaphysics set up by the first three,
followed by the endless expansion into complexity, which is still going on.
(“This trip is going on.”)
The sequence of the rimary rcana are a description and illumination of the unfolding evolution from God to Man, just as the sequence of primary numbers expresses the same thing more abstraly. The
etrays of Pythagoras, the ree of ife of the abbalah, and the four letters of the Hebrew Name of God ( etragrammaton), are all expressions of the first four primary mysteries.
22.XII.17
Contemporary binary logic suggests a linear sequence of points, each of which is On or Off, just as Western Logic assumes that a Proposition is either True or False.
Suppose, as an alternative logic, a non-linear succession of points, each of which is either On, Off, or Indeterminate (True, False, or neither/both).
Thence proceeds a triangular logic of great complexity, leading to a whole new world of logical possibility.
[2018: This may not be just a crazy and impossible idea of mine; I have recently (long after first writing those words above) been reading about
“Quantum Computers” featuring “qubits” which “are capable of being in both states at the same time ~ 1 or 0”).]
27.XII.17
What non-binary logic might look like as applied to our own world ~
Binary: On, Off, On, Off, On, Off . . .
Non-Binary: at random intervals, a point might be Indeterminate, which would then be followed by either On or Off, or both.
. . . On, Off, Ind. --> On, Off, On, Off . . . --> Off, On, Off, On . . .
This is the flaw in Perfeion that “lets the magic in,” and perhaps allows our Cosmos to come into being at al . If, at any point, a link in an energy stream becomes indeterminate, it can be followed by going in either direion, on or off, true or false. The possibility of this happening can be entirely random, or there may be an average “cosmological constant novelty faor.” It seems to me that the indeterminacy must be totally random; otherwise, it makes no sense at all.
The first bifurcation of Reality, from infinite Perfeion to the endless interplay of Yang and Yin, All or Nothing, was the spontaneous Creation of the Cosmos. Since then, this potential for novelty has kept our world expanding outward into endless unfolding complexity and further growth.
The Noosphere
March, 2017
I am just reading over he henomenon of an by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, one of the most significant books in the history of philosophy. His thesis is that the evolution of the universe is the evolution of Life, and that the evolution of Life leads inevitably to the evolution of Consciousness.
He sees this evolution on an inevitable trajeory towards an increasing of consciousness towards some unknowable future state which he calls the Omega oint. He leaves it there, not hazarding a speculation as to the nature of such a point, but he understands it as a transformational point by which ontogenesis, biogenesis, and noogenesis make a major breakthrough to a whole new plateau, as profound as the initial transformation into Life from the chance agglomerations of matter, or the transformation into the level of refleive thought and consciousness from the instinive level of lower animals.
Today’s meditation is a speculation as to the nature of that evolutionary advance which will lead life and consciousness into these new levels of experience.
I suggest that this transformational point which we are in the process of crossing is the transition from individual consciousness to planetary-wide
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bio-consciousness. Aually, Teilhard de Chardin suggested as much, but he clearly anticipates that there will be much about this new experience that is beyond speculation. This evolutionary leap may take a great many years to be fully accomplished, but I expe that we will see more and more people sharing a planetary-wide consciousness as the years go by. Together we wil form a whole new plateau in the expression of Life leading to monumental changes in every aspe of our existence.
I have always felt that I were “tuning in” messages from the planetary-wide “aia consciousness,” not only in terms of philosophical ideas, but also in terms of planetary evolution. Now, some of my ideas may seem way beyond radical ( ide, e.g., One orld otal akeover), but eventually the ideas may be seen as being in line with what the desperate state of our world requires.
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TETRAGRAMMATON
he eys of the rcana
The Theory of Everything
by John Roland Stahl
. .....
....
to future generations
of life on earth
© MMXVIII
The Evanescent Press
WWW.TREE.ORG
tree@tree.org
ISBN: 978-0-945303-22-0
THE ARCANA
ermetic hiloſophy is the roceſs of hange.
ythagorean hiloſophy is the ltimate ature of eality, and the eaning of ife.
athematics is the anguage of od. ythagoras ſuggefted that it is an expanding attern expreing and revealing the ltimate ature of eality. he ſequence of
atural umbers correſponds to the ſame ſequence of the
rinciple yfteries of ife in the order of their Importance; and the eys to theſe yfteries are the umbers themſelves.
he ſequence of the firft four umbers and their aociated yfteries is the baſis of the ree of ife of the
ebrew abbalah. he etragrammaton, the four letters of the ame of od, repreſents the ſame ſequence of umbers and yfteries. ythagoras cal ed the ſame ſequence of ideas
etrays, repreſented as piured on the itle age.
eraclitus had the idea that othing could exift as a
hing in Itſelf, but could only exift by the multaneous exiftence of its oppote. e expand this idea by combining it with the aoift principle that the direions of ang and in (On and Off, expanding towards Infinity and contraing towards ero), ſucceed each other in turn, as when reaching the imit in either direion, they turn to go the other way (enantiodromia: Tao).
he ppearance of the niverſe is the fluuation between ll and othing, the endleſs atterns of which thence enſuing evolving eventual y to produce ife and
onſciouſneſs, on its way to endleſs expanon into further
ovelty and ever increang omplexity.
e are alive.
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Kether
Yod Arcanum I.
Binah
Chokmah
Moon
Sun
He Arcanum II.
SOLVE
Geburah
Chesed
Tamas
Rajas
Vau Arcanum III.
COAGULA
Tiphereth
Satva
Hod
Netzach
Water
Fire
Yesod
Air
He Arcanum IV.
Manifestation
Malkuth
The Tree of Life
Earth
ARCANUM 0
ain ſoph
.
ARCANUM I
Yin
123
.
— —
———
Yin
Yang
Passive
Aive
Contraion
Expansion
Receptive
Creative
Inertia
Novelty
Gravity
Energy
Apol o
Dionysus
God
Eros
Positional Chess
Combinational Chess
Theology
Metaphysics
COAGULA
SOLVE
ARCANUM II
Yang
124
“From Tao there comes One.
From One there come Two.
From Two there comes Three.
From Three there come all things.”
~ Lao Tzu
ao e hing
ARCANUM III
Tao
125
Wands
Cups
eſod
od
Air
Water
SUMMER
AUTUMN
Old Yang
Young Yin
———
———
———
— —
Swords
Pentacles
etzach
alkuth
Fire
Earth
SPRING
WINTER
Young Yang
Old Yin
— —
— —
———
— —
ARCANUM IV
Life
126
s bove,
he reſent oment
apis hiloſophorum
o elow.
ARCANUM V
Change
127
COAGULA
GIVE
old
RECEIVE
in
un
opper
upiter
reative
enus
oyous
eaven
entle
ake
h’ien
ind, ood
ui
un
CONFLICT
’an
uickſilver
ater
ercury
byſmal
linging
oon
ire
ilver
i
PEACE
hên
ên
hunder
’un
ountain
rouſing
arth
eeping till
ars
eceptive
aturn
Iron
arth
ead
EXPAND
rima ateria
CONTRACT
SOLVE
128
God ~ Life ~ Light
Consciousness ~ Free Will ~ Health
Love ~ Harmony ~ Peace
Clarity
xpanſion
ontraion
into ovelty
to the enter
Yang
Yin
Confusion
Hatred ~ Anger ~ Confli
Chaos ~ Karma ~ Disease
The Devil ~ Death ~ Darkness
129
Meditation on Consciousness
April, 2018
Frequently, in my philosophical speculations, I don’t know which way to apply symbolic representations of yang and yin. The issue is greatly clarified by the concepts of Young Yang, Young Yin, Old Yang, and Old Yin from the I hing. Thus we have the All and Nothing of the Old Yang and Old Yin, but there is also the expanding and contraing of the Young Yang and Young Yin. But then the issue is further complexified by the concept of enantiodromia, that the consequence of the extreme of either yang or yin is a reversal into its opposite direion.
But another consideration that I run into repeatedly is that, given any microcosm (or Macrocosm, for that matter, as a good Hermeticist), while some aspes are expanding as yang, others are contraing as yin. Thus, for example, we have the world exploding into astonishing levels of complexity, typified by the apparently limitless potential of computers and the internet. One thing is for sure ~ we haven’t seen anything yet. The whole computer and internet age is just in its veriest infancy. But this has divergent consequences ~ some of the consequences are very good, while others are very bad. One simple example is the unbelievable access to information. In so many ways, this opens up whole new worlds of possibility, accelerating the pace of advancing science and technology, but it also means the total end of
privacy as we know it. Children are now being born into a world where everything is known about everything and everyone, and plenty of people seem to welcome this development, or at least accept it as the inevitable price of our unprecedented access to information.
Other developments are a bit more sinister ~ “the more theoretical control is gained, the more aual control is lost.” For example, chemical pesticides and herbicides may seem to augment the capacity of the earth to grow more food to feed more people (arguably, not at all a good thing on the face of it), but, in fa, they may be destroying the ecosystem of the earth, killing off not only harmful inses, but beneficial inses as well. Bees are massively dying off, and the deaths of people to cancer, caused by our increasingly toxic world environment, are not far behind. And, quod erat demonftrandum, modern technology may create incredibly powerful nuclear weapons, but, rather than making the world more secure, they threaten to destroy all life on earth.
Change happens slowly, too slowly to notice. Personal privacy is not the only thing that is being lost to the modern world. Many of today’s young people know nothing of trees, gardens, or fresh food. Four-fifths of every supermarket consists of produs which I don’t recognize as food, from sugary drinks to processed “food.” And hamburgers are not only destroying the last of the ancient rainforests (one of the major sources of pollution is the smoke from the thousands of acres of rainforest burned off every day to make room for more burger-beef), but they are also destroying the health of anyone so misguided as to eat them, thinking they are a kind of food, washed down with sugar water and greasy fries.
But none of this was what was on my mind when I took up my pencil today (I am happy to edit by computer, but I compose by pencil, an ancient wooden artifa filled with carbon, formerly used for writing before the advent of computers).
I wanted to discuss consciousness. I have been using the imagery of spiritual elevation leading to convergence at a center of unity, clarity, cosmic consciousness, love, joy, and health. Distance from this center leads out progressively into error, disharmony, subje-obje divergence, anger, and confli, leading finally to chaos, darkness, and death. But there is an aspe
of consciousness that increases as a funion of complexity ~ higher organisms, representing increased orders of complexity, exhibit greater consciousness. How do I reconcile those concepts? Isn’t the expansion into complexity the pattern of moving away from the perfeion at the center? But “a little knowledge leads one away from God; a greater knowledge brings one back, closer to God.” This is a case of two movements in different direions going on at once ~ the yang energy of separation and expansion into diversity, and the yin energy of the coalescence of consciousness back to the center of unity, clarity, and love. These are independent movements ~ the elevation of consciousness towards unity can be going on in spite of an ongoing expansion into complexity.
I don’t have a finished idea to present here; that’s why I call it a meditation.
I think where I’m going with this is that some “New Age” writers seem to assert that the ultimate origin of the universe is pure consciousness, from which all manifestation has been derived. This has a really nice “feel good”
aspe about it ~ you know, the Original Mind of God as the Creator of the
universe. But as I look back on my theological speculations, I seem to have been suggesting a more impersonal explanation for the origin of the universe, that the universe somehow “created itself” ~ came into being spontaneously as an inevitable manifestation of ultimate a priori principles ( ide: he
volution of heology, peculations on oſmic onſciouſneſs and the ove of od, and hiloſophical editations on the ature of od). Then, not only is consciousness a later development, but God Herself is evolving along with Her Cosmos. In other words, until and unless we find some more evolved beings somewhere, as far as we know, We are the cutting edge of Consciousness, and God and aia are evolving along with us. This is a total reversal of most New Age dorine, but it makes more sense to me.
In many ways, I think I am getting at what Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was talking about as we expand our evolutionary growth of consciousness towards an unknowable Omega Point ( ide: he henomenon of an by Teilhard de Chardin). This evolution of life and consciousness is still going on. Compare the evolution of Man’s understanding of God, from the very primitive, vengeful, and petty God of the Old Testament (not welcome at my house; if the Old Testament God were to show up at my house, I would offer Him a meal and a place to sleep, out of Christian charity, but then send Him on down the road), to the far more enlightened God of Love of the New Testament, to present conceptions of aia, encompassing not just the tribe of Hebrews, nor even the whole human race, but the entire field of life energy on the planet.
Human consciousness, too, is evolving on all sides. Perhaps the Omega Point of Teilhard de Chardin represents the convergence back to the center of unity, clarity, love, and light which enlightened mystics have been
describing for a long time. Perhaps one day a critical mass of enlightenment will propel the human race, along with all life on earth, towards a new Golden Age.
Let us hope that the energy towards such a convergence will overtake and displace the contrary energy towards divergence, destruion, and chaos which is riding us rampantly (transitive verb) to the edge of darkness.
Gravity
May, 2018
I have briefly mentioned my idea of gravity as the yin force of a “return to the center” which balances the yang force of the “quest for novelty”
( hiloſophical editations on the ature of od, 13.III.15), but I want to take a closer look at it today.
One of the fundamental questions which continue to bother scientists and philosophers is, “Why is there any universe here at all, instead of just nothing?” I have also been confused by that problem, and my solution is not altogether satisfying even to me (that the universe just popped into being spontaneously, in accordance with some inevitable ultimate reality).
But I don’t want to belabor that problem anymore here ~ what I want to do is to accept those two opposing forces as given, and try to understand how those two forces might explain the nature of the cosmos as we know it.
I start by agreeing that the “natural” state of the cosmos is nothingness, non-being, ain ſoph. This is not yet “zero” ~ zero is already far along on the road to the manifestation of being. Now comes the “Laughter of God” (or however you like to express this mystery) which separates nothingness into two parts, Al and Nothing, or an expansive force which creates and maintains a subje/obje distinion, and a complementary force which
resolves all such distinions back to “the center” (the singularity which started and/or ended it al ).
I am happy to see that some recent speculations on the nature of the cosmos tend to see some sort of endless cycle expanding out of a singularity and finally resolving back into a black hole, whence it might re-emerge to form a “new universe.” This has always made more sense to me than the facile postulation of an original Big Bang ex nihilo. However we may wish to explain the expansive force, or attempt to account for its presence or existence, it is clear to me that the opposite force, of reduion back to the center, from diversity back to singularity, is what we know of as the force of gravity.
Since nothingness is the “natural” state of the cosmos, some force or intervention is required to create and maintain a distinion. One of my earliest philosophical pronouncements (dating back to my book of okes, 1975, letterpress, miniature) is “Time is the Measure of Error.” I might slightly update that pronouncement as: “Time and Space are the Measures of Error.” Thus, the expansive yang energy of subje/obje distinion is identified as some sort of error, like the grain of sand in an oyster which generates a pearl. So, as that initial force dissipates, and the distinions resolve back to singularity, the manifestations of time and space tend to return back to zero. (A singularity, as a point of no dimensions, is indistinguishable from zero, the reverse of the First Arcanum, which refers to the emergence of the Singularity from the Zero Arcanum of ain ſoph. ) This whole process of the return back to the singularity is what is observed as the “force of gravity.” That is, the “force of gravity” isn’t real y a force, at all; it is just the dissipation of the contrary force which generates
expansion into proliferating distinion. In other words, yang expresses an aive force reaching out into novelty and distinion, while yin is the passive return to the equilibrium of nothingness. The Hermetic alchemists summed up the whole process as olve et oagula.
So, is everything clear now? Of course I have side-stepped the whole question of the origin, nature, and meaning of that yang force of distinion, the quest for novelty. Words are wholly inadequate (which is why I resort to quotation marks so often), but to suggest that the whole “Laughter of God”
is somehow based on some sort of error, or “crack in the cosmic egg,” seems to me to be hinting, in some poetical fashion, for an interpretation of the ultimate mystery of why there is anything here at all, instead of just nothingness.
The Religion Taboo
August, 2018
Continuing along the line of the observation that if we draw a map of the world in which every area is colored according to my scheme of aura colors, then there is a startling overlap of the most volatile areas, in the colors of Red and Purple, with the range of Islam over the globe. But that’s not the Islam I know ~ isn’t Islam all about peace, and obedience to the Will of Allah? So why is the face of Islam so mired in the Red of aggression and violence, and the Purple of oppression and defeat?
I know that it is not considered politically corre to question another person’s religion, but I have found that, even though all religions speak of similar themes, there seem to be differences among the major religions that suggest to me sorting them out according to the colors of their aura. This is a pretty radical political venture. It suggests that there are differences in spiritual or ethical value among the religions of the world: that some are better than others.
All of the placement of the colors seems to be obvious, except perhaps the Orange of Hinduism, but I see Hinduism as a religion of engagement with the world, where Buddhism is a religion of withdrawal from the world (Blue). Christianity has always been the clearest voice for the message of
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love (Yellow). The Jews have historically been oppressed people (Purple), while Moslems seem to be on an endless jihad (Red).
GOD
Union
CHRISTIANITY
GRACE
Aive Love
Receptive Love
HINDUISM
BUDDHISM
Engagement
Peace
ISLAM
JUDAISM
Aggression
Oppression
SATANISM
Death
So here it is possible to see the levels of value, with the Black of Satanism on the bottom, and the Jews and Moslems slugging it out, literally, on the line between life and death, with Hinduism and Buddhism at a clearly elevated plane of consciousness above. This puts Christianity close to the top, along with the Grace of God (Yellow and Green). Above is the merger into Cosmic Consciousness at the apex of Union (White).
I am just sitting here stunned at the extent to which this is al politically incorre. How can I sit here and make these judgments? Well, I just call them as I see them, and I find Christianity to be the clearest expression of the highest religious experience. Leaving aside Hinduism and Buddhism, both of which impart valuable spiritual values to their followers, that leaves Islam and Judaism as problematic religions, and I look at them not through their theology, but through the aions of their adherents. I find them both to be primitive (somewhere on the level of the Old Testament God). Someone should send missionaries to spread the message of higher levels of consciousness.
Well, intelleual honesty compels me to acknowledge that I do not believe that all religions are equally worthy of respe, but that some are better than others (from the point of view of world harmony). I have eaten fearlessly from the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the Apple of Discord. According to Homeric myth, the Apple of Discord was the source of the origin of the cosmos, which I cal “The Laughter of God.”
As I look over what I wrote yesterday, I see that it is deeply flawed. I have been critical of both Islam and Judaism, not because of their theology or stated principles, but because of the way the people live their lives.
Obviously this is a gross generalization ~ I am just reaing to what I see on the ground, and that is the unconscionable behavior of the Israelis towards the Palestinians as they pursue the “final solution” to the “Palestinian problem” without any appreciation of the historical irony, and the endless jihad of Moslems all over the globe. I must, in fairness, dissociate the state
of Israel from the Jewish people worldwide, most of whom seem to live their lives innocuously enough.
However, in the case of Christianity, I have unfairly focused on the essence of what it is all about, rather than the aions of Christians. But even if we only look at the present day, and ignore all of the historical atrocities committed in the name of Jesus Christ, the piure is not unequivocal. The United States is predominately Christian, overall, yet its government is out of control in planetary-wide life-threatening depravity.
Perhaps it is more accurate to charaerize the United States as essentially lacking in any religious awareness at all. In any case, it is very hard to find any uniform standards by which to compare the integrity of religious beliefs.
I guess I have to conclude that my catalog of religious beliefs according to the predominant aura color is just an idle amusement which cannot be seriously defended. But it is useless to consider the value of religious teaching while negleing the way that teaching influences the moral expression of its adherents.
I wrote all of that several days ago, and I have been unhappy about it ever since. At the very least, we will have to say that it is grossly oversimplified, if not entirely misleading and worthless. And yet, something about the idea persists, and I just can’t let it go. The basic problem is that it deliberately targets both Jews and Moslems as living under a substandard religious influence, with negative consequences.
But, if that is the core of the issue, perhaps there is something to it.
As I look at what I know of Judaism and Islam (and I take my knowledge not from their sacred literature and traditions, but from an observance of the effe of their religion on personal behavior), I have to say that I don’t see much of any tendency to love thy neighbor. Islam gets points for their hospitality to strangers and travelers, and I have always felt that one of the most charming traditions of Judaism is the Seder, some special memorial dinner in which one is urged to find someone who is alone and invite him to share the meal together with your family. I also want to mention that I have traveled extensively in Moslem countries and I have encountered numerous instances of very friendly people who have gone out of their way to be helpful to me, and I have never personal y witnessed any moral shortcomings of the Moslem people. But that still leaves the unimaginable depravity of the State of Israel against the Palestinian people, and the endless jihad of Moslems, mostly against other Moslems, not just against The Great Satan and other Western countries. If it is unfair of me to malign these religions on the basis of the aions of some minority of their adherents, I would say that it is up to the religious leaders of both Judaism and Islam to speak out against those abuses and clarify the position of their faith. lace your bets here: will the leaders of Judaism be the first to speak out against the State of Israel, or will the leaders of Islam speak out against the endless wars carried on in the name of Islam?
On the whole, Christianity is way out in front expressing the high ground of spiritual consciousness. new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye alſo love one another.
y this al al men know that ye are my diſciples, if ye have love one to another. (John XIII: 34-35)
Now I want to get down to cases. First of all, levels of spiritual consciousness contain both sides in their aura ~ Yellow and Green, Orange and Blue, and Red and Purple. I have placed the Moslems on the Red side, and Jews on the Purple side, but in the case of the relationship between the Jews and the Palestinians in Israel/Palestine, the Jews are clearly the violent aggressors (Red), and the Palestinians are the oppressed viims (Purple). I have seen as a general observation of human nature that when someone commits an injustice upon someone else, rather than apologize for their error, they double-down and increase their violent attacks against their viim. Here, the Israelis are clearly exhibiting the charaeristic behavior of persons ruled by a Red/Purple aura, which typically oscillates between aggression and violence on the one hand, and then further oppression as viim on the other. It is a vicious cycle that can only be transcended by going upwards.
More and more I am thinking that my “facetious” suggestion that Jews should convert to Christianity and Moslems to Buddhism is literally the way forward in this thousand year old confli in the Middle East. If the Jews were suddenly visited with Christ Consciousness (like Saul on the road to Damascus), they might make a sudden leap upwards in spiritual consciousness, open their borders to returning Palestinians, end all embargo by sea, rebuild the infrastruure that they have been so persistently demolishing for the last hundred years, and offer cash reparations to Palestinians who have been forcibly removed from their land. If they were to do all of this, then relations between the Jews and Palestinians might
approach normal conditions in as little as two or three generations. And, as for Moslems embracing Buddhism, I think that would be the best thing for the peace of the earth. They need to try meditation and find peace within; they need to let go of all of the anger and aggression and return to the love of their families and friends.
Anyway, instead of fighting against any of these people, either Jews or Moslems, they should be offered opportunities of religious education, something like Christian Science Reading Rooms (rather than, for example, more aggressive Missionaries). Whether Jews or Moslems aually convert to Christianity or Buddhism, or whether they just advance new ses which embody higher levels of spiritual awareness and expression, it all amounts to the same thing in the end.
The Holy Ghost
September, 2018
The Holy Ghost is the Cosmic Consciousness of God. In this sense, it is easy to see that the same God which is the entirety of the Cosmic Consciousness of God is also that rimum obile which caused the cosmos to come into being, bursting out with Novelty as it expands into endless complexity. There are two direions of energy known as God (or God and the Devil) : God as the movement in, back towards the Center, and God as the creative movement outward into Novelty, away from the Center.
Altogether it is a Trinity, the understanding of which is the traditional Secret of occult philosophy.
God and Our universe come into being as God divides Oneself into yang and yin. olve et oagula.
Uncertainty
Oober, 2018
Is it a Quest for Novelty or simply the fundamental error rate of the cosmos? In my search for God, I value this reaching out into novelty just as much as I value the return to the Center of Perfeion. And I keep wondering (reverently) whence comes this outward quest into novelty? But perhaps it all comes down to the fa that our universe just isn’t perfe, after all, but is subje to some mean failure rate. Perhaps there is some smal chance that any particle of matter or energy could flip into its opposite expression at any time or at any place. This fundamental uncertainty would be what makes our cosmos lurch along at random, exploding into novelty as it expands.
So, according to this theory, the primum mobile is the expression of that inescapable potential for error in the cosmos. At some point in time (which didn’t exist until that moment) the Universe slipped out of Perfeion and fell into Being . Naturally, there is a powerful force for the restoration of Perfeion again (gravity), equal to the energy which broke it apart, but that potential for error in the cosmos just seems to keep pushing the universe further out into complexity. Perhaps, because of that error potential, there is no chance of restoring perfeion, or stopping the cosmos from spinning out into ever increasing complexity, finally leading to darkness, chaos, and death.
So now I don’t know whether the universe wil finally contra back to a
singularity again (Perfeion) or if each universe just plays out until its heat death (the opposite pole of the Singularity) and then we wait for the cosmos to slip out of perfeion again some time, falling into Being one more time. I look, but I ſee it both ways.
If the Universe were perfe, it wouldn’t exist; existence implies error.
But there’s a flaw somewhere. Earlier I was writing about incorporating uncertainty into a non-binary logic for a computer. Suppose that at any place, at any time, there is always a chance ~ very small perhaps, but not zero
~ that “anything” might reverse into its opposite expression (remembering from Heraclitus that anything or any idea can only exist along with its opposite). Suppose that this is just a fa about our universe here ~ No; it isn’t perfe; there is always the chance that anything could suddenly flip into its opposite expression “without intervention”, i.e., without perceivable cause according to the known laws of physics. And perhaps this fundamental Uncertainty is one more of the laws of physics.
The good news is that it is this Error which allows our universe to come into being at all, for which I am thankful and grateful. As for this endless potential for uncertainty, it isn’t necessarily bad news ~ perhaps it is what accounts for the persistent novelty reaching into the Unknown with a new idea, and is responsible for all of the interest in this silly world of ours.
And what if that were the whole idea all along? Perhaps the Consciousness of God came into being with the first event or error. This particular universe with its Conscious God is alive and going on, gathering momentum as it expands. We always knew that nothing could be Perfe ~
there always has to be some flaw somewhere, or it can’t exist.
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. Error
January, 2019
God is absolute erfeion and the movement in towards the center.
But the movement out into rror is also an important part of the understanding of God, because without error, there would be nothing at all.
Error is the source of life. If you look for the ultimate rimum obile, you wil find error, the æmon that is looking for something new. In some mythologies, this æmon which caused the cosmos to come into being is identified with ros, the god of Love.
This it is that al ows Life to happen, reaching out into Novelty. It is this error that inspires the Laughter of God, which we experience as our unfolding universe.
That’s our Cosmos, a priori and ex nihilo, caused by random error.
Thank you, God.
Loving Everyone
February, 2019
The familiar image of Hermetic philosophy and alchemy is the transmutation of lead into gold. This movement through the seven metals has been considered by philosophers as correlating to the stages of growth of the consciousness of man. This range and progression of the planets and metals along with the colors of the aura, matching the same sequence of ideas in the Trigrams of the I hing, is the basis of Hermetic philosophy and esoteric alchemy.
Today I just thought of another way of expressing that progression of consciousness. I have related the rising of consciousness to the expansion of a feeling of love for everyone. hen you take about 300 mcg of you ſee
od, and you love everyone. But this doesn’t mean that you love all people equally ~ there will always be some that you love more or less than others.
But what happens is that the whole level rises, as there are fewer people whom you love less, and more people whom you love more. I have thought of graphing this pattern over that familiar Wheel of Change.
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If you represent a circle to include all the people you know, and then shade the portion you like less than the others, the piure seems to follow the familiar pattern with remarkable fidelity.
To clarify what this diagram means, if the Aura of a person be known, that person might have a like/dislike profile similar to what is suggested in the diagrams.
A Personal God
March, 2019
Now I am reading over oneft to od and he oneft to od ebate, and it seems to me that John Robinson, Bishop of Woolwich, doesn’t really seem to understand God, so it is no wonder that he is all confused. I agree that many of the “supernatural” aspes of Christianity may have to be clearly relegated to the euphemism of historical analogy, myth, and symbol, such as the Virgin Birth (Immaculate Conception), the Divinity of Christ, the Resurreion, and the Transubstantiation. But then Bishop Robinson goes on to conclude that we will also have to let go of the phantasy of a Personal God, now that we have “come of age.”
And yet, according to my theology, God is very much of a Trinity of ideas, all of which seem to be independent ideas, but all of which are necessary and inseparable for a complete view of God. Of these, “the Mother and the Son” correspond to the primary Yin and Yang with which God brought Herself into Being, Whose metaphysics I have been trying to elucidate in my books he aughter of od and ore aughter. But it is the Holy Ghost that ties it all together and infuses the Whole with life and consciousness.
I understand fields of consciousness at every level ~ every family, tribe, nation, language, or interest group contains a center of consciousness which constitutes the center of life for that entity. Thus, our world contains all of
these fields of consciousness simultaneously in a complex and interconneed dance. To posit that these fields are conſcious and alive may seem to be debatable, but to me it seems to be the whole essence of the matter ~ to be alive is to be conscious. I am aware of the consciousness of trees, other plants, and animals, and have no trouble communicating with them.
I go up to the most inclusive field of consciousness on planet earth, comprising the entire biosphere of life on the planet, and I assume that it is alive and conscious, and currently receiving mail as “Gaia,” but I have no trouble imagining a more al -inclusive consciousness as comprising the entire field of life in the universe, but, as I have said before, the consciousness of
aia is the primary focus for the idea of God on earth, and must be known, understood, supported, and proteed, as essential to our own survival and well-being.
Consciousness is the essence of life, and it is certainly personal. Every center of consciousness is aware of its smal est component parts, and communicates with them. Likewise, each part sends its messages back up the line to the center of consciousness, analogous to the experience of living human beings.
So, yes ~ we can pray to God, or aia, and (if we can learn how to listen) we can also hear messages and replies coming to us. I wish more people would pay more attention to this voice, as it is coming with increasing urgency.
So, all of this makes me praically Orthodox, with a belief in God as a Trinity, and including a very Personal God in the person of the Holy Ghost.
Add to this the person of Jesus Christ, showing us clearly the path to eternal
life as a path of love, and we have the essential message of the Christian Gospel in a nutshell.
But, lest I leave too orthodox a taste in the mouth, let me recount my understanding of some of the historical aspes of the Christian story.
To begin with, there is the matter of the Virgin Birth. Out of respe
for the mother of Jesus, I will stipulate that no other interpretation of the historical events other than that of the virgin birth story can be imagined. If Mary never had any sexual congress with Joseph, then clearly the father of Jesus must have been God Almighty. (If there were a cute stable-boy who might have had other information, no memoirs of his have survived.) Incidentally, the claim that Jesus was of the House of David is carefully documented from King David all the way down to ~ oſeph, which, of course, can have no bearing upon the ancestry of Jesus.
Moving right along, what about the divinity of Jesus? If we accept the record of the Gospels, it seems to be clear beyond dispute that Jesus considered Himself to be divine in a much more primary sense than that “all living things partake of the divine to some degree.” Perhaps Jesus was very close to God, hence “divine,” and yet it seems clear that Jesus had visions of a grandeur some orders of magnitude beyond that. No problem; so Jesus was a simple fisherman, who need not be expeed to have comprehended all of the complexities of metaphysics. I consider Jesus not as a God, but as a teacher whose message was clear and important, matching the wisdom of the Hermetic philosophers and alchemists who taught a similar aspiration towards higher consciousness under the analogy and symbolism of the transmutation of the baser metals into gold.
Next, I come to the sacrament of Holy Communion. I believe that community and fellowship are very important. I think it is a wonderful idea to commemorate the last supper of Jesus with his disciples. Today, whenever two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midft of them.
By all means, let us break bread together with our friends in fellowship and love, but anyone who needs to take the words of Jesus literally and assume that they are eating the flesh of Jesus and drinking His blood are requested to keep such unwholesome phantasies to themselves.
Then there is the crucifixion and resurreion of Jesus. Many people seem to think that this is the real essence of Christianity. How can anyone be a “Christian” unless they believe in the death and resurreion of Christ?
Well, since you ask, Jesus himself explained how ~ y this ſhall all men know that ye are my diſciples, if ye have love one to another.
As I consider the story of the resurreion of Jesus, I wonder if there are any other interpretations of the data (as in the story of the virgin birth, for example). Sure enough, other possibilities arise. I might suppose that Jesus survived the crucifixion, for example. As I look over the story, I see nothing about that experience that precludes survival ~ they didn’t even break his bones. I think that perhaps we may tend to think about historical events in the precise categories of modern terms, when the aual events may not have been so inflexible. Certainly one was not expeed to survive crucifixion, but the certainty of death need not have been assumed. The importance of the crucifixion was the enormity of the torture. Whether or not anyone might survive such an ordeal was beside the point.
But the Crucifixion of Christ was a devastating failure. It seems evident from the tale as we have it that Jesus expeed to be “glorified by the Father,” Who would be coming down to earth surrounded by his Choirs of Angels to exalt Jesus and bear him off in Glory and Triumph to His Celestial Home, to the sound of Hosannas of Joy and Praise to the Lord and His Son.
That didn’t happen. The poor old fraud just suffered his agony on the cross, leaving his exhausted and wasted body to be gathered up by Joseph of Arimathæa, with Pilate’s permission. Upon cleaning the body for interment, Joseph discovered that the poor wreck of a man was still alive, so he whisked the body off to a safe house where he might be nursed back to health. Later on, the disciples had the wit to make the best of a bad situation by claiming that Jesus died on the cross, al right, but that he then arose from the dead on the third day, etc. But, as for Jesus, he had just been shown up as a fraud, so he made only rare appearances to his closest disciples. Perhaps Paul never knew.
Whether he then slunk away with Mary Magdalene, making it as far as France where they had some babies, whose heirs eventually included the Merovingian Kings of France, is a story which may be considered apocryphal, as the evidence for anything like that is generally considered to be meagre.
Everything is for the Best in this
Best of all Possible Worlds
November, 2019
The idea that everything is for the best in this best of all possible worlds comes from Leibnitz, but it is probably best known from andide, the hilarious story by Voltaire, in which the idea is mercilessly pilloried by Voltaire’s matchless wit. The poor hero Candide, his wife Cunegonde, and his philosopher Pangloss suffer the most horrible adventures imaginable, while Pangloss is trying to explain to Candide how all of their sorrowful catastrophes can be understood within the context of this “best of all possible worlds.” But, funny as that story is, I have been increasingly inclined to agree with Leibnitz! The key to understanding the concept lies in the operative word “possible.” In fa, this is the only possible world; hence, it must surely be the best.
I have been reading the very enjoyable and brilliant book by Paul Davies, he ind of od, which examines many of the fundamental questions in which I have been interested all of my life. There is one point to which he returns again and again (and he is not alone in this fantasy; I see it all the time among philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians) ~ he expresses astonishment at our amazing and complex world, full of some
special set of particular “laws of physics” which just happen, by chance or otherwise, to apply to our world. He continually speculates about all of the infinite variety of other possible universes which may happen to enjoy some completely different set of physical laws. However, it is my belief that what we know as “the laws of physics” are inevitably derived from the ultimate nature of reality as revealed by many inspired writings and esoteric traditions, such as the Hebrew Kabbalah, the I Ching, the Taoist writings of Lao Tzu and his followers, as well as the ideas of Heraclitus, Pythagoras, the Hermetic alchemists, and many others, all of which I have tried to restate in as clear and consistent a presentation as possible.
I am a die-hard Platonist, believing that all of the metaphysical ideas which I derive from the numbers of mathematics are inherently real and inescapable. That is, these ideas are not “invented”; they are “discovered,”
and it is not surprising that many speculative philosophers and mystics have come up with very similar views of this ultimate nature of reality. This means that all of the elaborate metaphysical implications of those ultimate symbols, the numbers of mathematics, are not clever inventions, but are ongoing discoveries about the ultimate nature of reality.
So I say to all of those philosophers who like to speculate about all of those other “possible universes,” some going so far as to suggest that there are an infinite number of possible universes, “No ~ you’re all wrong! This universe and its laws of physics are not just a happy colleion from amongst some infinite pool of imaginary “laws of physics,” but that every aspe of the world we know is inevitably derived from the same ultimate and universal metaphysics which may be derived deduively from those Original Symbols,
the numbers of mathematics, according to the famous epiphany of Pythagoras that “all is number.”
So we suggest that the numbers of mathematics are not just some clever inventions, but represent a window into the Mind of God. The metaphysics which we derive from the numbers of mathematics are not only derived a priori from those symbols, but the metaphysics derived from the numbers of mathematics constitute the only such metaphysics which may be derived from any other symbols or ideas. There are no other symbols comparable to the numbers of mathematics in their a priori purity and perfeion. Any other symbols you might enjoy are all derived from the lower world, created, according to Plato, by the Demiurge from the pure ideas of the upper world of perfe forms.
In fa, all of this is so obvious and clear to me that I am really surprised that many otherwise brilliant philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians can speak so blithely about all of those infinite other possible universes with some seleion out of an infinite pool of possible laws of physics! No, all of what we know as the laws of physics must be ultimately derived from the same original metaphysics (the only possible metaphysics) revealed by the numbers of mathematics. Some of these mathematicians speak of an arbitrary set of “input conditions” out of which some novelty univerſe du jour might be hatched.
By the way, in case anyone wants to know, I have figured it out ~ the egg came first. If you have to ask where the egg came from, you haven’t been paying attention.
The Finger of God
November, 2019
“The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it seems pointless.” ~ Steven Weinberg.
Oh, no ~ the universe is brilliant! As I said so felicitously and mellifluously somewhere earlier, the universe expanding with endless novelty into ever greater complexity is God’s way of living forever without getting bored. The universe is an endless exploration and celebration of the Quest for Novelty.
There it is ~ the meaning of life, and the solution to the enigma of why there should be any universe here at all, instead of simply nothing. I seem to be just summing up here because I come again to the origin of the universe as ros, forever reaching out into Novelty; but remembering also that this is just one Person of the Trinity of God (the Mother, the Son, and the Holy Ghost). And all three come into Being simultaneously, habens tres partes hiloſophiæ totius undi. ompletum eft quod dixi de Operatione olis.
And the universe thence proceeding is the aughter of od, unfolding into the infinity of eternity.
. . .
I have been thinking of the idea of quantum uncertainty ~ that
“anything,” in order to exist at all, must exist as both some thing and it’s
opposite, after the epiphany of Heraclitus. And they can reverse into their opposite expression at any time, randomly ~ it is just the fundamental nature of reality. But the inherent uncertainty of quantum physics becomes more and more averaged out when you consider higher (more complex) levels of manifestation.
However, this ripple of uncertainty can always bubble up into any level, creating an apparent anomaly, or error. The potential for this error is at the heart of the creation of the cosmos. What we refer to elsewhere as
ros, and the endless Quest for Novelty, we are here looking for the equivalent mathematical expression, and I want to illustrate this with a computer program. Let us take, for example, a program that generates a continuously expanding fraal. Now, suppose we introduce a bug into the program that allows (with an average random degree of frequency depending on the complexity of the program) any pair of bits to switch into their opposite expression, on or off, yang or yin. Now we run the program and see what happens. By tinkering with this rate of novelty, we might generate programs of varying levels of interest, an examination of which might suggest interesting speculations. It would probably have to be rare, because unrestrained error would probably quickly crash most programs. In terms of the replication of fraals, it might be pretty interesting. The range of
“useful” rates might be narrowed down to some theoretical range, varying from radical change to very slow evolution. Too far to the left beyond radical change leads to explosive expressions, and too far to the right leads to stasis and constipation. (You are welcome to compare political analogues.) Now, over and above all of this “random change,” is the teleology sufficient to suggest evidence of design? Is the principle of design anything
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more than the endless novelty, or is the finger of God somewhere in evidence? (I am wondering if there is any way that the sense of that line might be perverted, but any such efforts seem to be meaningless. Perhaps someone with the patience and affliions of Job might lament ruefully at the finger of God ruining his life. Hey, I guess that works, but it’s not how I meant it.) But perhaps half the time the finger of God sends blessings, but the other half brings affliion. So believers in God’s goodness and mercy will consider all of their blessings and be grateful and thankful, all the while trying to ignore or transcend all of their affliions, but there may be others for whom the finger of God has given them nothing but sorrow. Am I avoiding the Question, or is it unanswerable? I want to believe in a search for the Good, not just a mindless quest for Novelty. This has to be the Holy Ghost, making order out of chaos. But in the quest for this ultimate Good, there is certainly a whole lot lost in the debris from the finger of God.
The Holy Ghost
Search for the Good
Quest for Novelty
Mother, aia
Son, ros
In Honor of Jesus Christ
December, 2021
In honor of Jesus Christ, I want to review the eight layers of consciousness, represented by the series of planets and metals of astrology and alchemy, the trigrams of the I Ching, and the colors of the aura. The familiar quest of the alchemist was to transmute lead into gold, as represented by the following sequence of colors.
On the bottom is Black, solitude or death, depending on your frame of reference. Nothing to see here. Then, from the view of the bottom of the whirlpool into Black, we see the struggle for life between the anger and violence of Red and the oppression or defeat of Purple. For a large part of the human race, this is the horizon of consciousness ~ dog eat dog, and rat eat rat, as people strive to get ahead of others by theft, deceit, or violence. At a higher level than that, there is Orange, confli or engagement, which may be anything from war to market struggle, or any work involving close interaion. At a far remove from all of that, above the fray, there is the peace and rest of Blue, where everything is in harmony with Tao. This is the obje of Buddhism.
As the horizon of consciousness rises, it includes the earlier layers, but each layer is only aware of those at that level or below. Levels higher than the ideals of Buddhism are hard to find, but there are two more levels above the Blue, not counting the union, White, at the top ~ Yellow and Green,
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love and grace. Yellow expresses the radiance of positive energy as love, and Green expresses the blessings of the grace of God.
The most important lesson to be learned from this alchemical sequence of the transmutation of lead into gold is that everything gets better as the level of the consciousness rises. If everyone would understand this, everyone would want to raise their consciousness as high as possible. Jesus Christ is the most famous advocate of this level of consciousness, and this is the foundation of his message. The theology of the Christian Church has been developed by later scholars, but his foundational message coincides exaly with the secret tradition of alchemy which studies the transmutation of lead into gold.
new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye alſo love one another.
y this all al men know that ye are my diſciples if ye have love one to another.
John XIII, 34-35
eus erditus
August, 2022
I always keep looking for the root causes of problems. It is useless to keep stretching new band-aids over festering wounds, when what we really need is something much more fundamental. I look at the political problems facing the United States, and the Rest of the World, too, and I compare it with the escalating Climate Catastrophe our planet is experiencing, along with the Pandemics, and the Fires that are literally burning our planet up, and I try to think, “What is the Root cause of all of this mayhem? What is really causing this?”
My standard answer, for the last fifty years or so, has been that the wanton destruion of our planetary heritage of Trees is the biggest problem underlying everything else. Now they are telling us that planting trees is not even sufficient anymore. No, it is not ufficient, but it is eceary. This planet is too far gone to be restored to vitality merely by re-planting the Trees that we have destroyed. But it is the underlying pre-condition before anything else can really begin to help. It’s not just about carbon. There is a whole organic biosphere that needs to be restored, and packing compressed carbon dioxide into barrels buried in the ground (at astronomical expense gleefully financed through the Banks) is not the solution. A much better solution is to restore all of that carbon to the planet as Trees that have always been the foundation of its health and vitality.
But I have realized that this problem cannot even be addressed in today’s world, as long as the planet continues as a lawless raging jungle, activated solely by financial considerations. I have said before that Money is the same as Power, in the same way that Matter may be converted into Energy ~ they are two names for two expressions of the same underlying concept. And, just to emphasize again the main point, that is no way to run a railroad , let alone a Planet. That whole cloud of psychic energy which we call Money (or Power) is what runs this planet, and has been causing its inevitable collapse, which is now upon us.
So, before we can address the physical dying of our planet, we have to address the raging conflagration of Power Points ( e.g. , Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Google, Amazon) all struggling for dominance, which is the cause of the planet’s disease. Yes, of course this is the same old theme, because there really isn’t any other hope unless we figure it out ~ that reliance upon financial gain and profit is not ſuitable as the motivating force driving all aivity on the planet.
But today’s idea is to see the problem from a yet more fundamental view ~ always trying to get to the ultimate Root of the Problem. And I find that all knowledge of God seems to have been lost to the present generation.
eus ortuus, eus bſconditus, aut eus erditus. Is God Dead? Or is He only in Hiding? Or has He been Lost?
Since my father was a Methodist minister, I encountered the problem of God at a very early age, but couldn’t understand it. Since then, I have made it a major study, and long ago I began to figure it all out. Now it all seems so simple and obvious. Whether you believe in God or not, at least it is clear what it means. od is to the World as a ardener is to his arden. Did
the Gardener die? Has he turned from his garden and hidden himself away?
Or has the Garden lost its Gardener?
Al this talk about the Gardener makes me sound very conservative, certainly paternalistic (although, of course, the Gardener we are looking for might be either male or female, or even something in-between).
Authoritarian is the word, I guess. Yes, certainly ~ it is all about the ource of uthority ! That is the fundamental problem of the world, and the one which must be addressed first of all, before the other problems can be sorted out. You need a King to keep the Nobles in check. The King, whose power comes from God, allies with the People, in the same way that the whole Free Farm economy and all the free services of health, education, food, and transport are all to support the People, while the Nobles are taxed by the King to pay for it all. But the King cannot be just the most powerful bandit of the lot ~ He must be on a higher level, in which the King is really identified as God. It is no coincidence that this pattern is exaly the pattern of human society from its infancy. So, yes, we long for the Return of the God-King, as in all the best fairy tales, and, lest you misunderstand, we are certainly not talking about the Donald ! What a comical joke for people who somehow yearn for the eturn of the ing to see someone like Donald Trump as the possible Messiah they have been looking for. My viewpoint rises quite a bit higher on the Conservative scale than that ! No, we need to recreate a new King as an Avatar of God in a dedicated Alchemical Vessel.
A lot of people are very fearful of the implications of all of this, but it is certainly clear to me and to a great many other visionaries that our little garden would be a whole lot better off if the Gardener would come back.
Please, if we have lost our Gardener, let us cultivate a new one. If we gather
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a Seminary of healthy young people from all over the world, and give them the best encouragement we can in every way, then surely an Avatar of God will come into Being among them. That’s how magic works.
And if you can figure that out, you will not only understand Magic, but you will also understand God.
The Canary is Dying
January, 2024
What is going on ? I am not surprised that the world is overwhelmed with chaos. Of courſe our world is plunging into chaos ~ there are so many huge problems tearing this planet apart that there are going to be some strange days ahead for the foreseeable future. Oh, no, Toto, forget about Kansas ~ those days are never coming back; that bal oon back to Kansas has sailed long ago. Tensions exploding into war over larger and larger portions of this frail planet of ours ? ~ get used to it. Maniacs attempting to seize power with the help of scared and confused people who don’t know what to think ? ~ what else is new ? [ hich maniacs do I have in mind, here? tart a lift. ]
The whole “Conservative” trend that has been going on lately confuses a lot of different ideas which need to be sorted out. I have considered that the more relevant fulcrum upon which the world turns is to be found in the continuum between the extremes of harpening and eveling. Not to review the whole idea here, but basically it is arpening that leads to effes of diminishing tolerance variously called right-wing or fascist, and leveling that leads to effes such as socialism or free farms. The important point here is that neither idea is right or wrong ~ it is all a matter of degree (and application, time, place, and situation). A certain amount of sharpening promotes an increase of excellence, but an extreme of sharpening becomes fascism, just as surely as ripe fruit begins to rot by a continuation of the same ripening process (oxidation). It is only when the fulcrum between
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sharpening and leveling goes out to extreme distances in either direion, that the probability of revolutionary change increases. This is pure Taoist philosophy here ~ when an extreme of Yang or Yin has been reached, the energy reverses direion, and goes the other way ( enantiodromia). In a complete life cycle there are four such points of change, two of them very gradual, and two of them very sudden. [ vide: End Notes, below]
Yes, one of those sudden changes we are talking about here is the ad
ews. So, the more we see rising symptoms of increasing sharpening all over the world, lurching toward the right-wing, becoming less and less tolerant, more and more hostile, and increasingly angry and violent, the closer and more inevitable that looming ad ews becomes.
None of this, as I have said, is the least bit surprising. All of this is perfely evident to quite a number of people, world-wide, who express their dismay, aghast with unbelief and horror. But what I find most astonishing, and even quite scary, is that nowhere do I see the slightest glimmer of interest, anywhere, in addressing the roblem !
As I have said before, quite a number of times, there can be no progress moving forward until the entirety of planet Earth be united, and cultivated as a Garden by a Trustee who receive ones authority from God.
If you don’t understand what we mean by God, don’t worry about it ~
enough people have understood it over the years to keep the light visible at the end of the tunnel. One way to get an understanding of the idea of God is to compare our present world (without God, or where God has been abandoned) with a potential world united under a single, established institution designed to promote the channel from God to the life of our planet and its flora and fauna, including human beings. This present world of ours is a rolling catastrophe of endless war, greedy mining, raping, and pillaging under the aw of the ungle. That world is now in smoking ruins ~
just ask anyone in Ukraine, Gaza, Yemen, Syria . . .
But a world gratefully accepting the Grace of God in the person of an incarnate Avatar who would supervise the restoration and cultivation of this Earth of ours back to the Garden it once was, would be a game changing improvement, a transformative revolution analogous in scope to the Omega
oint of Teilhard de Chardin (quod vide).
oney is a universal abstraion which describes the movements of human energy on the planet. Thus, a new Bank must be established under an entirely new principle. Money would be created as needed and dispensed to fund every enterprise important to the health of the planet. A funioning economy has to have a free flowing movement of money, so the new Bank would fund farmers to grow food and people to plant trees. All public services, health care, education, research, public transit, struural maintenance, and more would all be direly funded by the Bank, as
authorized by the Trustee. Other services could be provided, such as non-profit food distribution, and free farms for the indigent. Other aspes of life, such as the manufaure and sale of consumer produs, would be provided by a free market.
The Bank would manage the value of the new currency it creates by a system of taxation. A primary tax would be imposed for any pollution or resource extraion of any kind. For example, a very large tax would have to be paid to the Bank for every barrel of oil pumped out of the ground, or every tree cut down. This would force the prices up, so that much less oil would be pumped out and fewer trees would be cut, and those taxes would continue to increase, pricing oil out of the market entirely (except for very specialized industrial uses), and making wood produs very expensive. But after these taxes, a general property or wealth tax would be colleed from the wealthiest of persons or companies. A progressive tax rate wouldn’t even start until around $10 million or so, at very moderate rates, but then rates would increase rapidly at the upper levels of wealth so that it would be the super-rich who pay the great bulk of the tax, while everyone else not only pays little or no tax at all, but receives all of the free services above enumerated for the smooth and happy funioning of the world. Best of all, who among the super-rich wil come forward to complain about the tax ?
The amount of ones tax would be an ultimate status symbol.
Anyone else would be free to operate any business without hindrance, as long as there be no infraion of the extensive climate or environmental regulations, taxes, or fines. With a network of free farms, “where everyone is welcome and everything is free,” anyone who runs out of financial resources for any reason could just live a simple life for free (until or unless taking up a
new position in the outside world again). An immense host of social problems would fade away once it were no longer necessary to obtain money at any cost.
There would be very little need for any other international regulation apart from the enormous influence of direing the creation and spending of money. However, the same Avatar, incarnation of the living God, would also exercise the funion of final arbiter of Justice in the court system, in addition to authorizing the disbursement of funds by the Bank. There would be no more use for war, since wars only move one backwards. War creates a nadir of prosperity, which, in turn, creates more anger and violence, which leads to more and more mutually self-destruive war, (this is the self-perpetuating negative cycle of Red and Purple consciousness ~ did you know that there is also a self-perpetuating positive cycle way up above, at the level of Yellow and Green?) Since ultimately it is money over which people go to war, territorial distinions won’t make much difference. It really doesn’t matter who “owns” regions of eastern Ukraine, since everyone would live by the same laws anyway.
All of the transaions with the Bank could be done instantly, by computer. All taxes and fees paid back to the Bank would be simply erased, as the only funion of the taxation is to maintain the value of the currency by trimming the excess off the top. The atural aw of oney (in case you hadn’t noticed) is that it is constantly being vacuumed up to the top, so the obvious principle of taxation, and the role of the State, should be to take it off the top and return it to the base via all the free services described herein.
Notice how the “role of the State” here differs from the Jungle economy, in which the “State” is maintained by the wealthy for the purpose of conserving
and increasing their wealth. The present Jungle economy must be replaced by a Trustee whose authority comes from God. The founding of a Seminary for this purpose has been discussed elsewhere.
Under the beneficent regulation of this Trustee, or Advocate, who speaks for God, a new Golden Age of peace and prosperity would supervene.
Anger and confli would begin to recede; “the war will be over;” soldiers can return to their families and their farms; and the agenda of regenerating the living biosphere of the Earth can begin in a systematic way ~ planting more trees, retreating from the fossil fuels in favor of renewable energy, and more
~ for example, inhumane faory animal farms will be taxed or fined out of existence. Non-organic farming praices will also be taxed away or outlawed.
It is hard to calculate the net effe of all of this on the general index of happiness and prosperity, but it seems to me that a world under the direion of a Gardener under the authority of God would vastly outperform our present world, and the contrast between the chaos rampaging all over the globe at the present time and a world carefully cultivated by the Gardener of God would finally allow anyone who hasn’t figured it out yet to understand what God means, after all.
nd otes: Further information about the ideas mentioned here can be found in the Author’s colleed essays ~ One lanet akeover (tree.org/One Planet Makeover.pdf) and eleed rticles, etaphyſics and
heology (tree.org/Seleed Articles.pdf).
The Meaning of Life
May, 2024
At last! Some good news: “.. gnals ſupport for poible I ſanions over Iſrael arrants. ” But then, when I go to read the article, it turns out that the sanions under discussion are sanions against the International Criminal Court for daring to suggest that Israel had done anything wrong!
We are told that the I CC has made a “profoundly wrong-headed decision.”
That’s worse than Donald Trump instigating an insurreion when he fails to get re-eleed. Both the United States and Israel need to take off their blinders and see what they look like in the eyes of the rest of the world.
Both countries are aing from a very primitive level of consciousness. But since levels of consciousness have been plunging precipitously all over the planet, it is all the more important for some visionaries to exercise some leadership at a higher level, to guide this wayward planet back to health, because, of course, the planet’s prevailing level of consciousness is direly related to the prevailing level of biological health. As one goes down, so does the other. It is the unintended conſequence of climate change.
Oh, how the mighty are fallen! This used to be a great country (relatively speaking) as recently as 1950, but it’s all over now, Baby Blue.
The rate at which stuff that goes on in this world is spinning out of control is rapidly accelerating. I must be getting old, if everything I see happening is wrong, wrong, wrong, and getting worſe. I take some comfort from the fa that most of my views align with those of the very young, who
are concerned about climate change, and consider it a real issue, unlike the endless parade of useless news that is just out there to distra us from what is really going on. Most young people, all over the world, want to see charges dropped from Julien Assange (and given a Congressional Medal of Honor, into the bargain), and are strenuously opposed to the genocide perpetrated by the State of Israel against the Palestinian people, who were living on the land before the Jews came along to take it from them.
Anytime I say things like this I have to repeat that I do not dislike Jews
~ it is the odious State of Israel and its leaders that I dislike, with their unreconstrued view of Zionism ~ very Old Testament, and repugnant to modern sensibilities. In the same way, I do not dislike the Russian people or the American people; I just dislike the wicked governments of same.
What else do we agree on, young people and I ? ~ the insurgents in Burma (calling itself Myanmar, these days), and the people of Ukraine, Tibet, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, al of whom want to be free. Tax the rich, especially billionaires, who can most easily afford it, and, in return, provide a Universal Basic Income for the rest of us (similar to my suggestion of Free Farms ~ I still like the free farm idea; it’s more fun, cheaper to implement, and an altogether better solution for people who run out of money). Tax Big Oil and any other criminal gang profiteering from the rape of the earth.
Settle international disputes by diplomacy instead of war. Free the herb, of course, but free LSD, too, and all the rest of the agents of change, while we are at it. Free people should be allowed to make their own choices about the way they want to live their lives [thank you, imi endrix]. Education should be the only legal recourse against anything with which one has a problem. If people want to tattoo their bodies, change their gender, abort
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their children, love someone whom other people consider inappropriate
[which is worse ~ loving someone of an “inappropriate” age, gender, or status, or not loving anyone at all?], jump off the Golden Gate Bridge, or otherwise behave in ways at variance with the dominant paradigm, it is nobody’s business but those who are direly involved.
I think the voting age should be twenty-five. Anyone over that age shouldn’t be allowed to vote.
There is a reason why the large strand of human energy flows in the way that it does, but creative variations all around the central cord, in constant search of an alternative, are the energy of creative evolution, the endless quest for novelty. It’s the Meaning of Life, after all.
