On the Given World-Picture (or 'sensuous manifold')

[Cleric]

And so could you describe the process of 'locating' the particular angel you used to participate in order to respond to this question; the process of that interaction and which mountain and valley specifically did this angel observe?

I already mentioned it - it has to do with the prayerful opening of our soul. In relation to an Angel, we are like a flower that can open its petals and await a visit from a bee in sacred silence.

As also mentioned, our inner growth happens in stages, initially we can find only certain aspects of overlap with the consciousness of higher beings. Thus, in the start it's much easier to discover what is generally true for certain things in the higher strata. For example, in the beginning, when our expanding spiritual being becomes capable of mimicking at least some aspects of the kind of inner activity that is intrinsic to the Archangelic beings (which requires Inspirative consciousness), we begin to understand the most general aspects of their existence (as far as it overlaps with what we can focus down to clear concepts). At that stage, we may resonate with, say, beings traditionally called Michael or Gabriel, but we wouldn't distinguish one from the other because we live in the general element that is common to all of them. This general element is the first and easiest to reach. It requires more refined development if we are to distinguish the unique individual characteristics of these beings.

With that said, I cannot give you the name of an angel or mountain. I have a long way to go. But I assure you that what I described above is achievable.

Speaking of generalities and specifics, it's worth noting that there's one higher being that is actually the most accessible, and in fact, our whole spiritual path takes a very healthy direction if we start from there. This is the being known as the Christ or the Word (Logos). Even though in its supersensible structure it raises above the Angels and Archangels, at the same time it has assumed the most human-like form. So much so, that it acts as a human archetype - the Representative of Man. This is also due to the fact that this Divine being has in fact experienced the embodied state and the passage through the gate of death, so it fully shares in our human evolutionary destiny. Even the Angels, even though closest to us evolution-wise, cannot help us much in the understanding and overcoming of death because they have never gone through it like we do. The Christ, however, has, and even though of Divine status, it knows the human condition in its greatest intimacy and as such is our closest Friend, Counselor, and true Teacher, who passes onto us his direct experience directly within our "I" experience (he Inspires our "I", so to speak).

The same thing about generalities and specifics holds for humans too. Relatively speaking, it is more difficult to resonate with a human being of another culture, nation, etc. than to resonate with the Christ being. With other human beings we can have natural differences that act as repelling forces (like electrons that cannot occupy the same orbital). But the Christ Being is the Human Universal, and thus equally accessible and proximate to all human beings, and as such, is the basis of the true Brotherhood of men that find their unity in the Spirit.

[findingblanks]

But you do know for sure that the angel who agreed to work with you was observing a mountain as you did your research? Can you describe the moment in which yo recognized and checked that this was an actual mountain being observed? I know you didn't just take it for granted or rely on some representation of mountains. As hard as it is to find the language, would you give me a phenomenological description of that moment?

[AshvinP]

"Would you say “I don’t really know, maybe everything ends at the moment of death and that wouldn’t surprise me a bit.” On the other hand, if you feel that clairvoyance gives us some ‘exact’ knowledge on this question, can you share what kind of experiences these might be?"

No, I would not. My experience mixed with my understanding mixed with my studies indicate that the human experiences after death vary greatly, much more than Steiner indicated; however, I am 100% convinced that what Steiner described was drenched with reality from many different angles, and 'angels'

FB, this is quite the brief response to a significant question

I wonder if you agree with Cleric that what exactly we can expect after death, in its lawful relation to our Earthly lives, is of critical importance in our times, perhaps the most critical existential question? If so, then maybe you can elaborate on what it means that "human experiences after death vary greatly, much more than Steiner indicated".

I'm sure you can understand how that means very little, especially if we don't necessarily have a shared understanding of what Steiner indicated. To me, initiatic science through clairvoyant perception indicates the experiences after death are greatly rich and varied, but also lawful and structured such that they can become the object of precise scientific investigation. In fact, if that's not possible, the entirety of initiatic science is drenched in untruths, no matter how many different angles. Please elaborate on your meaning and what your experience-studies of the journey after death entail.

[findingblanks]

"FB, this is quite the brief response to a significant question "

You're amazing. I'm have to assume you can feel why you say this sort of thing. You must recognize even just the presuppositions it contains, let alone the implications, connotations, and the rest.

I will not write long paragraph of what I considered to be detailed responses, only to have you both say I'm being 'vague' because I'm not speaking in a way you understand. It is a waste of my time and yours. If we ever find overlap, yes, then I'll elaborate. But you and Cleric will often write six thick paragraphs that have 12 different presuppostions within them that I've already made a comment about. You don't acknowledge many of those basic steps we've taken together, and then you come back with these strange sideways accusations that I'm not giving a long enough, detailed enough response. I know it isn't on purpose. I know that you both are not experiencing the ways you have avoided some of what I've said. I know that. And I know that isn't intentional, nor is it intention each time I don't respond to what you find to be a very specific comment that warrents response. So I'll keep myself brief and see if we get back on a track. But, as I've said, something else is now happening between us that is at least as significant as the supposed content.

"I wonder if you agree with Cleric that what exactly we can expect after death, in its lawful relation to our Earthly lives, is of critical importance in our times, perhaps the most critical existential question? If so, then maybe you can elaborate on what it means that "human experiences after death vary greatly, much more than Steiner indicated"."

There are contexts in which having knowledge about afterlife experiences are very important. I know hospice workers who are studying near-death-experience research in an effort to have more significant conversations with the people they are with during the death process. What they are doing is very significant. The patterns they are learning about NDE's from cultures all over the world are very important. The effects they are having on the souls they work with at death are profound. And they are only grasping aspects of the death process. I know Anthroposophists who work with the dying by using very deep studies of Steiner's work, trying to meet these souls in the most caring, deep, honest, and helpful ways that they can. Some of these people would acknowledge that they aren't even sure if they've experienced the so-called 'spiritual world' in a detailed manner. It doesn't change the profundity or impact of their work. Two of them are people who are very convinced they work directly with various beings in their understanding of the after-death process. Both are certainly helping many of the souls they work with. I would not say that the Anthroposophists are handing 'more detailed' truths than the people working with the more mainstream studies of near-death-experiences.

One dead person whom I seem to have direct contact with is able to make fairly reliable indications of his presence, both in my experience and in how it manifests in the world. The notion that this is the individuality I knew pre-death is based on various inferences that I am making which also touch on some experiences that seem to ground and verify the intution. However, the more I allow myself to go of the still active dogmatic structures within my implicit experiencing, the more I am able to notice that my participation with this phenomena is generating a 'space' in which it appears to me as fairly obviously the individuality of my friend. Now that I am more able to stay with the phenomena in a less dogmatic way, I find that the quality of the connection deepens despite my increased uncertainty. That uncertainty is only on the level of me having a narrative and various kinds of inner, spiritual perceptions at hand. On other levels, the growing 'certainty' is palpable but much less about the 'details' to teach than the process of being present to the engagement. If I were making the same error as those who I am often conversing with in these matters, I'd assume (but not state directly) that the changes I'm experiencing in this engagement are 'more objective', 'the way things should be' and, therefore, others are having less important or objective experiences.

As I've said, I won't be surprised if in three hundred years, no Anthroposophists are describing death experience in ways that at all resemble Steiner's lectures. And, yet: I'm open to the opposite happening. There is a chance that someday we will have exact clairvoyants in the way Steiner said was necessary if we are to evolve appropriately.

[findingblanks]

Ashvin, can you reliably see the etheric body of the plant when you look at a seed?

I can't.

If you can, do your experiences of this first stage of exact clairvoyance match what Steiner said the student will experience when observing etheric bodies in that context?

[findingblanks]

My 'research' indicates that what we call 'angels' do not perceive at all what we would refer to as an individual car. Yes, I know that there are accounts, even from Steiner, of angels working with everyday objects in ways that imply the angel would have some way of recognizing it as a distinct entity. This gets into the complex mesh of filtering despite having objective interactions with reality. I knew for a fact that my deceased friend "Phil" was doing very interesting things with quarters for about three years after he died. I've come to discover that while "Phil"'s individuality was involved with these incredible events, it was nothing like the early clairvoyant experiences suggested. But there was no hope of me beginning to see the role my filters were playing until I went through a heart-shattering set of epistemological and ontological experiences. Does it matter? I think in most contexts it doesn't really matter if we make certain kinds of errors in understanding what the actual interaction is.

Despite knowing that Newtonian mathematics is simply wrong, NASA still uses Newtonian physical models to get things into space, They know exactly why the model is simply wrong. They even know the models that capture the mechanics much more accurately, and yet those models are more cumbersome to use for most practical purposes. And those models don't share any of the core presuppositions of Newton. Science and ontology should never be conflated. Science will always produce models that change because the empirical reality will always be changing. When we throw out a very useful model, our basic ontology might not change a jot. This is 1000-fold for 'higher' experience.

Does it matter if we think an 'angel' can directly have their own way of perceiving 'a car' (mountain, river, sand dune)? Probably not in most situations. For all practical purposes, we are probably getting what we need out of our current esoteric experiences of such things. Anybody who think Steiner wasn't carrying forward a vital aspect of reality is clearly filtering out that very reality. There need to be people who only pay attention to Steiner, his way, his methods, and their results. In other words, there need to even be people who feel deeply clear there is nothing else even approximating Steiner's exactness and clarity. It wouldn't make sense if this wasn't happening. And it is a healthy thing in general. It doesn't matter how intricate the actual spiritual 'dialectic' is. That will be the case regardless of how healthy various communities and commitments are to specific traditions. That level of change is inexorable. The question will increasingly be how sensitive the various 'folks' become to the way in which they require cross-fertilization with 'groups' that the currently see as not quite getting it exactly. But even so; yes, a certain number of folks need to begin demonstrating this kind of perceptual capacity, but we STILL will need people who remain hunkered within a given teacher's work and don't stray very far from it. They will still be producing important shifts. This is my experience of the times.

If I am correct that no kind of angel perceives 'a car' (mountain, valley, sand dune) this will only matter in a very specific groove of what is developing at our time. It's kind of like those lectures Steiner gave in 1915 where he made it clear they only had value if a very very specific kind of person from central Europe heard them. Not that I necessarily agree with him in that particular context, but I think he was very aware of why some grooves have to remain very small and might not (must not) flower until much later.

[findingblanks]

To be clear to the 'future' readers:

When Cleric or Ashvin 'ignores' elements of what I said, I do not assume this comes from a weakness or shadow element on their part. I can. And it might. But I notice my shadow rise up when they'evade' aspects of the conversation, and I counterbalance that by recognizing those elements of my shadow and then also finding real reasons they may have not commented on those elements. All sorts of understandable reasons. This has stopped me saying certain comments that presuppose they shoulld pay more attention or respond in ways that reflect deeper understandings of what I'm saying.

It has also caused me to genuinely see how my limitations play a role in the very action that I instantly judge. It's not fun or very comfortable to let my shadow be front and center in such moments.

In the meantime; yes, we can keep watching the relationship between the words spoken and unspoken; the assumptions in the short sentence, and the efforts of the long paragraphs. What I know is that there are sparks of warmth; and we've seen some genuine moments of real listening.

There is a kind of odd communication that can happen which, at times, can help increase the warmth and can even nudge the conversation back to something that feels a bit more human. But, yep, my shadow wants to work against that at time. It can be embarrasing to publically acknowledge it; especially in a tradition that almost has almost no history of people acknowledging and sharing such things in real time.

Yes: I have said repeatedly that I find value even in the materials I'm not convinced of by other profound teachers.

If a person learned Freud's system, they would begin to be able to spot certain patterns. And they would miss others.

A person who studies Occult Science might become more sensitive to spotting certain patterns. You'd have to ask them how their direct knowledge of Steiner's cosmology (not their creative musings) informs their perceptions of daily life. Many teachers in Anthropsophy will not by shy when it comes to informing you as to how Occult Science has made them more perceptive.

When you directly begin to directly study the way beings on Old Sun prepared for our lives, how could you not feel in awe? How could you not want other people to know this for themselves? Is there anything wrong with trying to spread the word and help others to see they, too, can begin to directly see what Steiner saw? I don't think so.

If I am at all correct that Anthroposophia is attempting to increasingly incarnate as a profound translative capacity, we will notice that in an increasing unconscious AND, more importantly, conscious cross-fertilization, not only between various groups and traditions, but within them, and within the individual members themselves. This will appear on one level to be an 'erasing' of a detailed landscaping of the spiritual world. However, it won't be an 'erasing' for those who aren't attempting to see specific patterns.It will be an infilling of reality for others. But it will require Anthroposophia to constantly rebalance the tendency to get lost in genuine power and utility of specific representations.

This is why IF we move increasingly into a future in which the kinds of spiritual scientists don't exisit that Steiner said would be populating the planet by the year 2000, this does NOT suggest he was wrong or that Anthroposophia isn't alive and well. That said, I think she's struggling with some of the dogma; I don't mean simply dogma that MIGHT exisit within the anthroposophical movement. I mean dogma's deep structure in all well motivated souls trying to more deeply understand the nature of reality. Steiner was a great pioneer. I understand why the majority of his students would say that I'm wrong, that if we don't eventually (and relatively soon) produce the kinds of spiritual scientists he insisted were necessary, we are...well, not doomed but...yeah. It won't be pretty. And, even Steiner said that if things go GREAT, it's gonna get a lot uglier soon. So, either way, it's gonna get pretty bad for a while. However, Steiner's picture of it getting bad at least involved an increasing numbers of spiritual scientists with exact clairvoyance introducing deeper knowledge into earth life. We are talking people who were not merely capable of reliably seeing the etheric bodies of plants placed before their physical eyes. He gave great examples of what Anthroposophical doctors would be capable of perceiving around the year 2000.

[AshvinP]

I would not say that the Anthroposophists are handing 'more detailed' truths than the people working with the more mainstream studies of near-death-experiences.

You offered more than enough at this point for us to know in clear outlines how you understand clairvoyant perception as it relates to particular domains of inquiry like after-death experience and Angelic consciousness. We are not the ones who are saying you are vague in most of these recent posts (except the one or two liners), you are the one claiming to be vague (or not good at conveying your intended meaning) so as to imply we have never understood you.

But you have made things clear, we have understood them, and I will bookmark the above quote for now. By "Anthroposophists", again we should be thinking of initiatic science as cultivated through modern cognitive and moral exercises, not the average spirtualist who just likes to consume intellectual cosmologies and whatnot.

Now if we tell you at this point that you have not understood what we mean by clairvoyant experience, regardless of whether we are right, wrong, perceieved etheric bodies or angels, etc., but simply the plain fact that our understanding of higher cognition or clairvoyance is not at all the same as your understanding. If we tell you that, are you going to feel automatically insulted and refuse to consider it as a possibility? Is the mere fact that we question your understanding in this domain seen as the highest possible insult, the line which cannot be crossed in any "civilized" discussion, even though it obviously must be crossed if we feel it is true?

If that's the situation, then obviously we won't make any progress conveying how we understand these things, because you feel you already know how we understand them and therefore feel like any such attempt can only be an gravely mistaken error on our part. That seems to be why you basically wrote off Cleric's entire response to your Angel/mountain question. On the other hand, if you feel there is even a slight possibility that you don't fully understand what we mean by higher cognitive perception, then you leave open the opportunity of learning what we mean (again, not agreeing it is true, but simply learning what we are intending to convey).

[Cleric]

But you do know for sure that the angel who agreed to work with you was observing a mountain as you did your research? Can you describe the moment in which yo recognized and checked that this was an actual mountain being observed? I know you didn't just take it for granted or rely on some representation of mountains. As hard as it is to find the language, would you give me a phenomenological description of that moment?

Let’s say I respond to you in the following way:

“The more I allow myself to go off the still active dogmatic structures within my implicit experiencing, the more I am able to notice that my participation with this phenomena is generating a 'space' in which it appears to me as fairly obviously the presence of the Angelic being. Now that I am more able to stay with the phenomena in a less dogmatic way, I find that the quality of the connection deepens despite my increased uncertainty. That uncertainty is only on the level of me having a narrative and various kinds of inner, spiritual perceptions at hand. On other levels, the growing 'certainty' is palpable but much less about the 'details' to teach than the process of being present to the engagement. Thus, in this opening space, when I radiate out the wordless meaning of ‘Can you distinguish a mountain in the Earthly environment?”, and when I further cleanse myself from any dogmatic presuppositions and expectations, I feel the deepening intuitive sense of a resounding ‘Yes’.”

Now I wouldn’t be insulted if anyone receiving this explanation raises an eyebrow. Please understand, that I’m not giving the above as a criticism of your experience. I have no reason to doubt it. In fact, to my understanding we are always within the presence of such departed individuals, the question is whether we are looking to make such a contact.

Yet, one can object to my experience in the following way: “This communion with an angelic being is at least two levels more uncertain than communion with a departed soul. First, we know from our Earthly experience how we feel when we are in the presence of a friend. We know their individuality, how they think, how they joke, and so on. This gives us lots of clues to recognize the invisible presence of that soul. The same cannot be said about the angel. We don’t find such beings walking on Earth, so we don’t know what their physical presence feels like in the way we do for a human being. For this reason, when we feel such a presence in the opening space we don’t really have anything to compare it with. If we have never heard about angelic beings it may never occur to us that this presence may be such. We are more likely to feel that we are in the presence of an unfamiliar, yet very virtuous departed human soul. The second level of uncertainty comes from the fact that we ask questions. How do we know whether this presence is really observing a mountain as it answers or only recalls an experience? How do we know that this presence is not lying to us – how do we know that it really distinguishes the mountain and it is not only telling us that it does so?”

These are all valid concerns. But notice that in this way, when we avoid pursuing details (because they necessarily gnaw at us as probably being only projections of our dogmatic conceptions), we drive ourselves into a state where the most we can say is “I feel the presence of this or that individuality” (and some may say that even this already rests on subconscious beliefs).

So, is this the exact clairvoyance of the future that we are looking for? At what stage do we expect a growing palpable certainty that not only confirms the “process of being present to the engagement” but also about some of its ‘details’? What should our next steps be? Do we start asking questions to our departed friends? But then, can we ever experience palpable certainty about the answers? How do we know that they are not kidding us, or that something becomes ‘lost in translation’?

This kind of experience can be seen as a kind of mediumism, except that much more cautious. We don’t care about any specific details but only about the most phenomenologically immediate fact that some kind of spiritual intercourse is taking place, that we are in the presence of a being and eventually identifying it. Classical mediumism would lead us further into asking questions and then receiving answers in some way (a form of divination).

Seen through this lens, it is very clear how the communications of Initiatic Science could be nothing more than a card tower. Steiner felt spiritual communion – this is something that most people can accept, although for the physicalist even this statement is already the first floor of cards. Then we conceive how Steiner, in his opening space, felt the palpable certainty that he is in communion with an angel. There goes the next floor of cards. Then he further feels certainty that this angel operates in certain higher spheres of being. There we are with the next floor, and so on. It’s only natural that we can say “Alright, but if at some point the initial communion with the angel turns out to be some kind of illusion, then the whole tower collapses!”

And here we come back to the question that acts like the Apple of Discord in these conversations. Could it be that there’s a fundamental misunderstanding about what higher cognition is? Is it possible to have palpable certainty of something more than the most general fact that we experience interfacing at the threshold of the spiritual world? In other words, can our consciousness grow into the spiritual world, instead of only feeling presences of the departed at the threshold?

To make this more specific consider the following. It is conceivable that your departed friend experiences a first-person existence of some sort. He lives in a certain kind of inner phenomenology and navigates his existence. Notice that when we feel the presence of our friend we do that from ‘our side’ – we experience what the presence of our friend means to us, how it impinges on our inner space.

Now imagine that we develop interest not in our experience as the presence of our friend fills our inner space, but we want to reach some comprehension of the first-person inner experience that our friend is having while in the disembodied state. We have an interest in stepping in his shoes, so to speak. We have roughly two routes.

The first is to seek some way of questioning our friend’s soul. It’s like our friend is overseas in a remote rehab center and we are having a phone call. We ask “So how is it? How’s the place? Can you describe the natural environment? Do they feed you well? What do you do in your spare time?”, and so on. In this way we remain in our own sphere of experience, we feel the presence and the intuitive communications of our friend and try to build a picture of his inner state of existence. Naturally, we may never reach that palpable certainty because we can always doubt the whole chain of communication. In the end, our picture of the after-death state feels like a janky card tower.

The second route starts with the realization that the only way to have a true experience and thus first-person knowledge of the after-death, is by somehow dying, yet without losing our connection with the body. Then we would experience the first-person state from within and describe it ourselves.

Let’s focus very precisely on this: do you conceive as possible that we can not only feel the presence of the departed friend but somehow develop potentially slumbering aspects of our being that would allow us to enter the same kind of first-person mode of existence that our friend is going through? Can you recognize that then we would be able to ask the question differently: instead of asking whether the departed soul or an angel distinguish an Earthly mountain, we enter a state of consciousness similar to theirs, which puts us into the same disembodied environment they live through, and then ask (not in words, of course, because this intellectual mode of cognition has been left behind) “Do I, in this mode of existence, distinguish something in my new environment, which somehow intersects with the Earthly mountain that I can contact with the bodily sense organs?”

I’m not evading your initial question, I would gladly return to it, but unless we resolve this central discrepancy – this difference in comprehension about what higher consciousness is – all further communications will diverge.

Do you think it is possible to develop the same kinds of consciousness in which we live and perceive the spiritual environment after death, while we are still here on Earth?

[findingblanks]

"Now if we tell you at this point that you have not understood what we mean by clairvoyant experience, regardless of whether we are right, wrong, perceieved etheric bodies or angels, etc., but simply the plain fact that our understanding of higher cognition or clairvoyance is not at all the same as your understanding. If we tell you that, are you going to feel automatically insulted and refuse to consider it as a possibility? Is the mere fact that we question your understanding in this domain seen as the highest possible insult, the line which cannot be crossed in any "civilized" discussion, even though it obviously must be crossed if we feel it is true?"

Nope. 20 years ago, all three of us would be nodding along happily, the way you and Cleric nod with each other. I would have been saying and reflecting and translating my experiences exactly as you do now. Sure, each of you have your own style and we all have struggle with our own metaphors and favorite ways of expression, but I was in your fold 100%. So I'm not at all confused by why you are nodding with each other and why you feel certain I'm off base. And I don't think you two really understand each other. You shouldn't. That's not a critcism from my Anthroposphcial view. And I don't think you understand Steiner. You shouldn't. But you have areas of enough overlap that you can go, "Ah, that gesture seems to be like this one!" and that is the point. Modern science has it wrong that 'shared understanding' is having the same empirical experince plus map.