Jesus, Siddhartha, and The Higher Self

Jesus embraced the Holy Spirit and became Jesus Christ. In the same way, -- or, rather, in his own way, -- Siddhartha embraced it, and became Siddhartha Christ; the Buddha. Christ is The Higher Self, and when you grow into your higher self, no matter what your first name may be, your last name (and the last name by which you will ever be known) will always be Christ; the Anointed.

Jesus may be your teacher, but Christ is within you. Regardless of who your teacher may be, or what spiritual tradition you may follow, the peak at which all souls arrive, and from which they regard the whole of Creation, is the same. Though our teachers may be men, and our paths may be man-made, the wisdom is from God, and it is God within us who comprehends it.

FAITH, The Supernatural Law

Supernatural laws are not unnatural laws. They are not outside of Nature, and they do not contradict Nature. On the contrary, they are the most natural laws of all. They are that part of Nature which we refer to as Higher Nature, or Supernature. They are the part which can be seen most clearly, not in history, but in prophesy; not in the past so much as in the future. So, in order to master supernatural laws, and manifest supernatural powers, we need to be visionaries. Visionaries look with the eyes of Faith, not to past mistakes, but to future victories.

God has overcome the world, and overcome history. He is that perfect manifestation which exists at the end of time, and which draws all things nearer to Himself, and to their own perfection. The method by which He pulls us forward is Grace, and the method by which we go to meet Him is Faith. Grace is the hand God extends to us, from out of eternity into time, and Faith is the hand we extend to Him, from out of time into eternity. When we respond with Faith to the Grace of God, we successfully bridge the chasm between Finite and Infinite.

So, what is Faith?

The mind thinks, the heart feels, but the soul believes; the mind has thoughts, the heart has feelings, but the soul has Faith. Faith is an affirmation of the unseen, and the visions of the faithful are those things which are not yet, but which will be. The slave who has Faith does not dwell on his chains, but on the freedom promised by God to all who believe. In this way, he becomes free.

By Faith, we claim our birthright. Peace is claimed when we say, "Glory to God, His Peace is upon us!" Love is claimed when we say, "Blessed be the name of the Lord, whose Love enfolds and keeps us!" You are a child of God, who anoints, initiates, and protects you. Your success is even now being prepared, -- and is now. Praise the Lord!

The reason we do not see God is that we do not look with the eyes of Faith. God has overcome the world, and we must look beyond the world, if we are to see Him. He is perfect, so our Faith must also be perfect, in order to see Him clearly.

It is our choice, whether to reason in favor of Faith, or against it. And if we choose to reason against it, it will not stand. With just a word, the dream is cut, and all who dream it die. Faith is subtle, and if we choose not to sustain it, it will not insist. It will vanish like a vision when the eyes are closed. But if we reason in Faith's favor, we reason in Faith. We have it already. We have it without question.

There is the seed of a dream in your heart, and Faith is the only thing needed to nurture that dream into fruition. Believe you can do it, and behold -- you are doing it! Believe in His authority, and you will serve Him. Believe in yourself, and He will promote you. Bring your gifts into the light of day, and your Faith will nurture them. And they will multiply, according to the promise of His Word.

I speak in the language of the Christian tradition, making use of symbols resonant for myself. But the message is universal. All traditions carry a strain, or a stream, of this message; some more thin, and some more broad. My intention is to enter this stream, which merges with the great river of Spirit, that both stream and river may become broader still, as they carry all souls into the vast ocean of God that is Eternity. For the salvation of all souls, whatever path they follow, and by whatever name they call The One.

This Peace Be Upon You.

Glory to God and All Souls Everywhere.

Amen

Beholding

to feel good

for a little while

to feel golden

the work done

the wisdom spoken

to rest immense

the soul at home

in the body

the fire burning

the child sleeping

water turning

wind settling in the trees

wings folded

to walk sacred

beholding

not beholden

Fear

Perhaps the greatest and most terrible power possessed by the darkness, is the ability it has to make itself appear greater and more terrible than it really is. Like certain lizards whose collars spread, or cats whose backs arch, giving them the appearance of larger creatures when confronted, evil seeks to present a more awful face than it has. The shadows of demons frequently loom larger and darker than the demons themselves, and even their countenances are deceptively hideous. They rarely swallow the souls who do battle with them; but they gobble up, by the millions, the ones who stand frozen, overwhelmed at the sight of the grotesque.

There is no evil in the world which does not pass, sooner or later, into good. But the evil which remains evil for the longest stretch of time is that evil which has yet to -- and may never -- befall us; and which accosts us only in the form of fear. Tragedy holds many in it's grip, but the fear of tragedy holds many more still. For every misfortune we fall prey to, there are a thousand we fear. This is why, even in the midst of what seems like the most horrible catastrophe, we may be struck with a sudden feeling of relief. Some part of us relaxes, as if to say, "Finally, it has happened. At last, I can stop fearing it."

Letter To Sarah

Good Morning,

I don't have any answers. I don't know if yours are "right", or "right for me", but they aren't finding a foothold in my chasm. They slip right into the dark below. I'm not able, at the moment, to conceptualize God in that way. My coffers are empty. It's time for me to go back up the mountain. I'm seeking genuine revelation. The kind that blasts you apart and puts you back together according to a higher plan, or a better blueprint. I think I'll have a lot to share, very soon. But right now, speaking honestly, I'm destitute and adrift.

There is a story, I think it's a Sufi story, maybe you've heard it. I can't recall the particulars (universals, rather, are my strong suit), but it's similar to the parable in the Bible of the two men praying. You recall: The first man thanks heaven that he is not like other men, full of corruption, etc. The second beats his breast and asks forgiveness for his sins. Jesus says the prayer of the second is more fitting. I'm not always so sure. Perhaps there's a time to every prayer under heaven?

Anyway, the Sufi story goes like this: One man is thanking heaven for the gifts he has received, -- specifically, for the insight he's received into the wisdom of heaven. The second is crying out for more. His prayer might be expressed like this: "My cup runneth over, Lord, but still I thirst. My wisdom is like blindness compared to Thee. Thou hast shown me many wonders along the way, but the path has led me here, to the brink of an abyss. Lord, grant me wisdom like wings, that I may soar over the deep places of the earth. Lord, give me more of You; only You!" Again, the story ends with the assertion that the latter is more pleasing to God. But I don't know.

The shamans say we need entheogens to open to spirit. I mean really open. Like John of the Cross. Like Teresa. They say this is especially true for people living in industrialized societies. They say it is absolutely true for Americans. And most of all, for men. Our egos are fortresses, surrounded by so many ramparts. Even the philosophies we share, coin, buy, or barter, with the purpose of freeing us, just get turned to the service of our egos. We need strong medicine, they say. And after all I've seen and heard, I'm inclined to agree.

I appreciate your kind words of encouragement. I slipped yesterday and allowed my haughtiness to reign in me. The usual shitstorm ensued. Nobody knows how I wrestle with myself. What they say of Scorpios isn't just talk. We have a war within us, between good and evil. What one of those Chilean miners said, when he emerged, was so poignant: "I was down there with God and with the Devil. They fought over me, and God won." I wake up every morning at war. Sometimes it seems like I am a warrior, sometimes a peacemaker. Sometimes I am both; the one at odds with the other. But mostly, I am the battlefield; trampled and stained with blood. Has God created me "only" for this? To be a field of battle, where the eternal conflict, between Himself and all that He is not, takes place?

Thank you for appreciating my gifts with me. I call them mine, but I've never felt they were mine. They were entrusted to me, and I honor that trust by sharing them with the world. With you. You say that I must accept them fully. I don't know what that would entail. How do I do that, Sarah? I very much want to experience the grace you speak of. I want to see doors opening, and all the angels coming to greet me and cheer me on my way...

There is a quote attributed to Goethe, which is really an amalgam of several quotes, none of which in fact originated with him. But since this is the form in which the quotes come down to us through the popular press, and with which so many of us are already familiar, I'll site them here as one quote:

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it now. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid.”

I've always admired this, and looked to find proof of it. I think, if there is proof, and a reason for it, the proof must be found in the life of one who is "at one" with himself, at least, on a given matter; and the reason that the world seems to cooperate with him, is because he no longer defeats himself. There are no more opportunities than before, except for the opportunities that arise from the seizing of other opportunities; that is, the man now sees and embraces the opportunities which were there all along, and by doing so opens the door to further opportunities. This is an instance of light attracting light. But there is another law, contradictory to this one, which we have already touched upon.

Here is how I see, and would express it: A well-lit man goes out to meet the darkness. By "turning the other cheek", some enemies are converted to friends, while other, far more sinister, enemies are made. And this is what has always terrified me, Sarah. The apprehension that, the closer we follow Christ, the sooner we reach the cross. What is that Antonio Porchia quote? "Suffering is above, not below. And everyone thinks that suffering is below. And everyone wants to rise." We all place our faith in the resurrection, as if that would "save" us from the crucifixion. But the words of Kierkegaard, perhaps, ring louder than any others: "Christianity is a demand, not a consolation."

I speak of Christ, but not of Mary, and I suppose this is the very substance of my affliction; my guilt. For I have said that Mary is mercy, and the purest consolation. Mary is not a call. She, perhaps even more than The Holy Spirit, deserves the appellation "comforter". She does not call us to follow Her. She does not set "heavy burdens and grievous to be borne" upon our shoulders, and bid us heave them up the hill to be a sacrifice for all the world. She is not The Christ. But it may be that She is the guide of all of us who are yet unfit to follow Him. She is "milk for babes", and He is "meat for strong men". I look to Her, increasingly, because I am ashamed to look Him in the eye.

You are one of His treasures. I know that much.

Thank you again for being a friend,

Samuel

Medical Materialism and Religious Genius

From: "The Varieties Of Religious Experience" by William James

There can be no doubt that as a matter of fact a religious life, exclusively pursued, does tend to make the person exceptional and eccentric. I speak not now of your ordinary religious believer, who follows the conventional observances of his country, whether it be Buddhist, Christian, or Mohammedan. His religion has been made for him by others, communicated to him by tradition, determined to fixed forms by imitation, and retained by habit. It would profit us little to study this second-hand religious life. We must make search rather for the original experiences which were the pattern-setters to all this mass of suggested feeling and imitated conduct. These experiences we can only find in individuals for whom religion exists not as a dull habit, but as an acute fever rather. But such individuals are 'geniuses' in the religious line; and like many other geniuses who have brought forth fruits effective enough for commemoration in the pages of biography, such religious geniuses have often shown symptoms of nervous instability. Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius, religious leaders have been subject to abnormal psychical visitations. Invariably they have been creatures of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led a discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a part of their career. They have known no measure, been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas; and frequently they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which are ordinarily classed as pathological. Often, moreover, these pathological features in their career have helped to give them their religious authority and influence.

If you ask for a concrete example, there can be no better one than is furnished by the person of George Fox. The Quaker religion which he founded is something which it is impossible to overpraise. In a day of shams, it was a religion of veracity rooted in spiritual inwardness, and a return to something more like the original gospel truth than men had ever known in England. So far as our Christian sects to-day are evolving into liberality, they are simply reverting in essence to the position which Fox and the early Quakers so long ago assumed. No one can pretend for a moment that in point of spiritual sagacity and capacity, Fox's mind was unsound. Every one who confronted him personally, from Oliver Cromwell down to county magistrates and jailers, seems to have acknowledged his superior power. Yet from the point of view of his nervous constitution, Fox was a psychopath or detraque of the deepest dye...

Perhaps the commonest expression of this assumption that spiritual value is undone if lowly origin be asserted is seen in those comments which unsentimental people so often pass on their more sentimental acquaintances. Alfred believes in immortality so strongly because his temperament is so emotional. Fanny's extraordinary conscientiousness is merely a matter of over-instigated nerves. William's melancholy about the universe is due to bad digestion- probably his liver is torpid. Eliza's delight in her church is a symptom of her hysterical constitution. Peter would be less troubled about his soul if he would take more exercise in the open air, etc... We are surely all familiar in a general way with this method of discrediting states of mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use it to some degree in criticising persons whose states of mind we regard as overstrained. But when other people criticise our own more exalted soul-flights by calling them 'nothing but' expressions of our organic disposition, we feel outraged and hurt, for we know that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities, our mental states have their substantive value as revelations of the living truth; and we wish that all this medical materialism could be made to hold its tongue.

Medical materialism seems indeed a good appellation for the too simple-minded system of thought which we are considering. Medical materialism finishes up Saint Paul by calling his vision on the road to Damascus a discharging lesion of the occipital cortex, he being an epileptic. It snuffs out Saint Teresa as an hysteric, Saint Francis of Assisi as an hereditary degenerate. George Fox's discontent with the shams of his age, and his pining for spiritual veracity, it treats as a symptom of a disordered colon. Carlyle's organ-tones of misery it accounts for by a gastro-duodenal catarrh. All such mental over-tensions, it says, are, when you come to the bottom of the matter, mere affairs of diathesis (auto-intoxications most probably), due to the perverted action of various glands which physiology will yet discover.

And medical materialism then thinks that the spiritual authority of all such personages is successfully undermined... But now, I ask you, how can such an existential account of facts of mental history decide in one way or another upon their spiritual significance?... A good example of the impossibility of holding strictly to the medical tests is seen in the theory of the pathological causation of genius promulgated by recent authors. "Genius," said Dr. Moreau, "is but one of the many branches of the neuropathic tree." "Genius," says Dr. Lombroso, "is a symptom of hereditary degeneration of the epileptoid variety, and is allied to moral insanity." "Whenever a man's life," writes Mr. Nisbet, "is at once sufficiently illustrious and recorded with sufficient fullness to be a subject of profitable study, he inevitably falls into the morbid category.... And it is worthy of remark that, as a rule, the greater the genius, the greater the unsoundness."

Now, do these authors, after having succeeded in establishing to their own satisfaction that the works of genius are fruits of disease, consistently proceed thereupon to impugn the value of the fruits? Do they deduce a new spiritual judgment from their new doctrine of existential conditions? Do they frankly forbid us to admire the productions of genius from now onwards? and say outright that no neuropath can ever be a revealer of new truth? No! their immediate spiritual instincts are too strong for them here, and hold their own against inferences which, in mere love of logical consistency, medical materialism ought to be only too glad to draw...

In the natural sciences and industrial arts it never occurs to any one to try to refute opinions by showing up their author's neurotic constitution. Opinions here are invariably tested by logic and by experiment, no matter what may be their author's neurological type. It should be no otherwise with religious opinions... Immediate luminousness, in short, philosophical reasonableness, and moral helpfulness are the only available criteria. Saint Teresa might have had the nervous system of the placidest cow, and it would not now save her theology, if the trial of the theology by these other tests should show it to be contemptible. And conversely if her theology can stand these other tests, it will make no difference how hysterical or nervously off her balance Saint Teresa may have been when she was with us here below...

The medical materialists are therefore only so many belated dogmatists, neatly turning the tables on their predecessors by using the criterion of origin in a destructive instead of an accreditive way... But the argument from origin has seldom been used alone, for it is too obviously insufficient. Dr. Maudsley is perhaps the cleverest of the rebutters of supernatural religion on grounds of origin. Yet he finds himself forced to write:-

"What right have we to believe Nature under any obligation to do her work by means of complete minds only? She may find an incomplete mind a more suitable instrument for a particular purpose. It is the work that is done, and the quality in the worker by which it was done, that is alone of moment; and it may be no great matter from a cosmical standpoint, if in other qualities of character he was singularly defective- if indeed he were hypocrite, adulterer, eccentric, or lunatic..." ...In the end it had to come to our empiricist criterion: By their fruits ye shall know them, not by their roots.... Our practice is the only sure evidence, even to ourselves, that we are genuinely Christians...

[The] nature of genius has been illuminated by the attempts, of which I already made mention, to class it with psychopathical phenomena. Borderland insanity, crankiness, insane temperament, loss of mental balance, psychopathic degeneration (to use a few of the many synonyms by which it has been called), has certain peculiarities and liabilities which, when combined with a superior quality of intellect in an individual, make it more probable that he will make his mark and affect his age, than if his temperament were less neurotic... The cranky person has extraordinary emotional susceptibility. He is liable to fixed ideas and obsessions. His conceptions tend to pass immediately into belief and action; and when he gets a new idea, he has no rest till he proclaims it, or in some way 'works it off.' "What shall I think of it?" a common person says to himself about a vexed question but in a 'cranky' mind "What must I do about it?" is the form the question tends to take.

In the autobiography of that high-souled woman, Mrs. Annie Besant, I read the following passage: "Plenty of people wish well to any good cause, but very few care to exert themselves to help it, and still fewer will risk anything in its support. 'Some one ought to do it, but why should I?' is the ever re-echoed phrase of weak-kneed amiability. 'Some one ought to do it, so why not I?' is the cry of some earnest servant of man, eagerly forward springing to face some perilous duty. Between these two sentences lie whole centuries of moral evolution." True enough! and between these two sentences lie also the different destinies of the ordinary sluggard and the psychopathic man. Thus, when a superior intellect and a psychopathic temperament coalesce- as in the endless permutations and combinations of human faculty, they are bound to coalesce often enough- in the same individual, we have the best possible condition for the kind of effective genius that gets into the biographical dictionaries. Such men do not remain mere critics and understanders with their intellect. Their ideas possess them, they inflict them, for better or worse, upon their companions or their age...

To pass now to religious phenomena, take the melancholy which, as we shall see, constitutes an essential moment in every complete religious evolution... Few of us are not in some way infirm, or even diseased; and our very infirmities help us unexpectedly. In the psychopathic temperament we have the emotionality which is the sine qua non of moral perception; we have the intensity and tendency to emphasis which are the essence of practical moral vigor; and we have the love of metaphysics and mysticism which carry one's interests beyond the surface of the sensible world. What, then, is more natural than that this temperament should introduce one to regions of religious truth, to corners of the universe, which your robust Philistine type of nervous system, forever offering its biceps to be felt, thumping its breast, and thanking Heaven that it hasn't a single morbid fibre in its composition, would be sure to hide forever from its self-satisfied possessors? If there were such a thing as inspiration from a higher realm, it might well be that the neurotic temperament would furnish the chief condition of the requisite receptivity. And having said thus much, I think that I may let the matter of religion and neuroticism drop.

Maternal Love

Ultimately, we love things best when they contain an element which is universally beautiful. Unless prejudice prevents our seeing it, then no matter what our perspective is, we will all find it beautiful. For example...

It is clear that everyone loves their mother uniquely, in a unique way. There are very specific memories, utterly impossible to replicate; combinations of smells, tastes, images, colors, sensations, sounds... This is not some abstract mother. This is Mother. Your Mother. She has a name and a history. And every inch of it enriches our experience of her reality and its fullness. In mysterious ways, it informs your love for her.

But, what you love most in your mother is something universal. Something we all love. The experience of motherly or maternal love is one we can all relate to. Even those of us who have never had the experience. We may have had no mother at all. No memories. But we relate, somehow, on a profound level, to the experience of having a mother, and being loved by her; held, cradled, soothed, and treated like the most precious object in the universe.

The ones who have had some taste of it, want more of it, and the ones who've never tasted it, what to drown in it for eternity. That is the beauty of the Shekinah.

We should endeavor to see it shining in the center of all that we love about our own mother. And we should endeavor to "flesh out" our conception of the Shekinah, without skimping on the imagination. The archetype of The Goddess, like our own mothers, ought to be specific. It doesn't matter if you imagine Minerva or The Lady Madonna, but that you see her clearly, and movingly, in your mind's eye.

Set before yourself an image befitting the exalted state of emotion you wish to inspire. As a result, your soul will be shaped like clay in the hands of a potter, and you'll be transformed into a holy grail, fit to hold and to dispense the sacred waters of life.

This is how the alchemy of religion is accomplished.