The Nature of the sensory world or do we really *know* the ultimate ground of reality?

[AshvinP]

Yet as it has been established many ways, this position doesn't differ substantially from any other religious stance which anticipates its Paradisal state after death.

We tried! Until the next iteration...

Misinterpretations again and again. So, repeating again for the 3rd time in this thread:
Christ's message is the appeal to Oneness that we are supposed to internalize as our inner experience in this very human life

“I am crucified with Christ, but I live; yet not I anymore, but Christ lives in me" Galatians 2:20 [meaning: lives in me NOW in this life]
"the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke.17) [meaning that it is already within you, even now, the only thing you need to do is discover it experientially]

You know, pretending to be an idiot does not look funny actually, I know you are smarter than that

It should be clear by now why we don't simply take what you write at face value, Eugene. Because you change your position constantly, contradict yourself in every other post, and sometimes just 'agree' or spit back what someone else wrote because you think this will convince us you have understood without further question. But we are smarter than that

What you call "internalizing Oneness" is simply believing in abstract and dogmatic 'nondual' teachings, which leaves you with the experience of an atomized soul-state on Earth and therefore no practical transformation for the human individual, collectives, or Earthly kingdoms.

Sooner or later though, if not in this incarnation, then perhaps the next one (which will certainly happen for both of us, so maybe we'll meet again ), you will begin to unveil the deeper imaginative meanings of the scripture you have become fond of quoting so much now. And perhaps those in turn will inspire humility.

First of all we must note that this esoteric path to Christ Jesus was also the way of the Evangelists, of those who wrote the Gospels. For although the writer of the John Gospel had himself witnessed many of the events he describes — as you can see from the lecture-cycle on this Gospel — his chief object was not merely to relate what he remembered, for this applies only to those minute, exact details which surprise us in his Gospel. The great, majestic, crowning features of the work of redemption, of the Mystery of Golgotha, were drawn by the writer of this Gospel from his clairvoyant consciousness also. Consequently, although the Gospels are really revived Mystery rituals — this is shown in my Christianity as Mystical Fact — they are so because the writers of the Gospels, following their esoteric path, could procure for themselves out of the super-sensible world a picture of the events in Palestine which led to the Mystery of Golgotha. Ever since the Mystery of Golgotha up to our own times, a person who desired to come to a super-sensible experience of the Christ-Event had to go through the stages which you will find described in earlier lecture-cycles as the seven stages of our Christian Initiation: The Washing of the Feet; The Scourging; The Crowning with Thorns; The Mystic Death; The Burial; the Resurrection; the Ascension. Today we will make clear to ourselves what the pupil can attain by going through this Christian Initiation.

First of all, one essential point. As you can convince yourselves by reading the lectures on this subject, Christian Initiation is very different from the incorrect method of Initiation described in the first lecture of this course. In Christian Initiation certain feelings which belong to humanity in general are first invoked, and they lead to an Imagination of the Washing of the Feet. Thus the picture of this in the John Gospel is not the first thing to be imagined; the aspirant begins by trying to live for a long time with certain feelings and perceptions. I have often characterised this by saying that the person concerned should gaze upon the plant, which grows out of the mineral ground, takes into itself the materials of the mineral kingdom, and yet raises itself above this kingdom as a higher being than the mineral. If the plant could speak and feel, it would bow down to the mineral kingdom and say: ‘Certainly I was destined within the economy of the Cosmos to attain a higher stage than you, Mineral, but you give me the possibility of existence. In the order of beings you are certainly a lower being than myself, but I have to thank you for my existence, and I bow myself in humility before you.’ In the same way the animal would have to bow down to the plant, although the plant is a lower being than the animal, and say: ‘I thank you for my existence; I acknowledge it in humility, and I bow myself before you.’ And so would each being that climbs upwards have to bow down to the other standing below, and also he who has risen by way of a spiritual ladder to a higher level must bow down to the beings who alone have made this possible for him.

A person who permeates himself with the feeling of humility in regard to the lower, who thoroughly incorporates this feeling in his own being and lets it live there for months, perhaps even for years, will see that it spreads itself out in his organism, and so pervades him that he experiences a transformation of this feeling into an Imagination.

[Stranger]

It is right in front of your eyes if you could only remove the veil of your dualistic perception and directly see-experience it.

For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them. (Matthew 13:15)
"Jesus said, "I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there." (The Gospel of Thomas)
"In front, behind, in all directions, wherever I look - there it is!. Today I, like the Buddha, have cut through delusion." (Saraha)

But sure, see you then after a few incarnations.

[AshvinP]

It is right in front of your eyes if you could only remove the veil of your dualistic perception and directly see-experience it.

For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them. (Matthew 13:15)
"Jesus said, "I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there." (The Gospel of Thomas)
"In front, behind, in all directions, wherever I look - there it is!. Today I, like the Buddha, have cut through delusion." (Saraha)

But sure, see you then after a few incarnations.

Yes, all of these verses have layers upon layers of meaning for the initiated, which progressively become more concrete, more serious, more living, more participatory, more instrumental to all our Earthly experiences from our first incarnation to our last. It is like a symphony. The average Joe can listen to Beethoven's 9th and get tremendous feelings. But eventually the person seeking to participate in creating those feelings, those inspirations for others, will have to pick up an instrument, learn to tune it, and practice, pick up some books and study theory of music, pay careful and loving attention to his fellow musicians and serve the Will of the conductor. For ex.,

"I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there."

Before the twelfth century, the depths of mystery contained in the Holy Communion were especially well understood. It was not widely discussed, but rather was accepted in a manner that enabled a human being to feel everything that was contained in the words, “This is My body and this is My blood.” Christ meant with these words that He would be united with the earth and become its planetary spirit. And because flour is the most precious thing on earth, bread became for human beings the body of Christ, and the sap flowing through plants and vines became to them something of His blood. Through this knowledge, the value of the Lord's Supper was not diminished but was, on the contrary, enhanced.

Yet many people resist this deeper knowledge precisely because it is too intimate - it calls for a level of sacrificial and creative responsibility for their stream of becoming that they are unprepared to accept. Actually, the 'simple folk' usually are prepared to accept a certain level of responsibility, but the theological and mystical intellectuals preaching on behalf of the 'simple folk' (unbeknownst to the latter) generally are not. They want to snap their fingers and have all the veils rent asunder in an instant, without changing a moral fiber in their being. There is a lot of talk about the importance of growing in living knowledge of the Divine, but very little action towards it, only endless excuses and avoidance through mystical 'faith' and dead intellectual speculations and theories.

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

18But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without [f]your works, and I will show you my faith by [g]my works. 19You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is [h]dead? 21Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar? 22Do you see that faith was working together with his works, and by works faith was made perfect? 23And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was [j]accounted to him for righteousness.” And he was called the friend of God. 24You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.

25Likewise, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out another way?

26For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

[Stranger]

And where did I say that hard work is not required? As I said before, I meditate 1-2 hours a day. There is actually a lot of meticulous work you need to do on yourself to approach nondual realization. Metanoia - transformation of nous - is not an easy task at all, but you choose not to even attempt to do it but instead to spend hours on forums intellectualizing against it.

[AshvinP]

And where did I say that hard work is not required? As I said before, I meditate 1-2 hours a day. There is actually a lot of meticulous work you need to do on yourself to approach nondual realization. Metanoia - transformation of nous - is not an easy task at all, but you choose not to even attempt to do it but instead to spend hours on forums intellectualizing against it.

Again it's not only about what you say in any isolated post, but what is plainly evident from threads upon threads in your entire approach and understanding. There is a difference between meditating to passively and blissfully consume perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and sacrificial spiritual practices to actively participate in producing Light and Warmth, in service of the Cosmic Will (which the conspiracy theorists intellectually convince themselves is actually 'evil' and 'dualistic'). I wonder if you have tried even a simple exercise such as the following or whether you feel all of it is beneath your 'nondual realization' and therefore undeserving of any attention. I suspect the latter and that's why I feel fortunate and grateful that I was never ensared in this 'nondual' approach, because I can see clearly how tempting its siren song is.

The student has also to bestow a further care on the world of sound. He must discriminate between sounds that are produced by the so-called inert (lifeless) bodies, for instance, a bell, or a musical instrument, or a falling mass, and those which proceed from a living creature (an animal or a human being.) When a bell is struck, we hear the sound and connect a pleasant feeling with it; but when we hear the cry of an animal, we can, besides our own feeling, detect through it the manifestation of an inward experience of the animal, whether of pleasure or pain. It is with the latter kind of sound that the student sets to work. He must concentrate his whole attention on the fact that the sound tells him of something that lies outside his own soul. He must immerse himself in this foreign thing. He must closely unite his own feeling with the pleasure or pain of which the sound tells him. He must get beyond the point of caring whether, for him, the sound is pleasant or unpleasant, agreeable or disagreeable, and his soul must be filled with whatever is occurring in the being from which the sound proceeds. Through such exercises, if systematically and deliberately performed, the student will develop within himself the faculty of intermingling, as it were, with the being from which the sound proceeds. A person sensitive to music will find it easier than one who is unmusical to cultivate his inner life in this way; but no one should suppose that a mere sense for music can take the place of this inner activity. The student must learn to feel in this way in the face of the whole of nature. This implants a new faculty in his world of thought and feeling. Through her resounding tones, the whole of nature begins to whisper her secrets to the student. What was hitherto merely incomprehensible noise to his soul becomes by this means a coherent language of nature. And whereas hitherto he only heard sound from the so-called inanimate objects, he now is aware of a new language of the soul. Should he advance further in this inner culture, he will soon learn that he can hear what hitherto he did not even surmise. He begins to hear with the soul.

[Stranger]

Again it's not only about what you say in any isolated post, but what is plainly evident from threads upon threads in your entire approach and understanding. There is a difference between meditating to passively and blissfully consume perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and sacrificial spiritual practices to actively participate in producing Light and Warmth, in service of the Cosmic Will (which the conspiracy theorists intellectually convince themselves is actually 'evil' and 'dualistic'). I wonder if you have tried even a simple exercise such as the following or whether you feel all of it is beneath your 'nondual realization' and therefore undeserving of any attention.

Let's now follow a rule: before you claim that I said something, first give a quote, and please attempt not to misinterpret it as you usually do. For example, where did I say that the spiritual work only consists in "meditating to passively and blissfully consume perceptions, thoughts, feelings"? I said many times and saying again that the hard work of metanoia is in "denying your self", in removing the debris of the egoic soul structures and dualistic self-centered perception and action in order to become a clean vehicle so that the Holy Spirit can fill it and Christ and the Father can enter and dwell in it and act according to his Will, his Love and Compassion. The only thing blocking the way of uniting with the Divine is our "separate self". But if you think that "denying yourself" is an easy task that can be just done by reading philosophical or esoteric books and intellectualizing about them on forums, then it means you never actually tried it.

Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. (Matthew 16:24)
“I am crucified with Christ, but I live; yet not I anymore, but Christ lives in me. (Galatians 2:20)

In such state there are actually no capricious "wants" to follow, so if I say to myself that "If I don't want to reincarnate then this is the Divine speaking" then I am simply fooling myself here. But having no "wants" does not mean that there is no spiritual activity, it's just that this activity is not based on "wants". The activity simply remains in the state of Self knowing Itself and then acts according to what needs to be done for the good of all, therefore, its activity is based on compassion and the progress of spiritual development of the Cosmic Consciousness as a whole, because it sees Itself everywhere and in all its individuated activities (souls). But this activity is never deterministically shaped by "what needs to be done" because the Self is fundamentally free and has Free Will as one of its fundamental aspects. In simple words, it does not have to do good, but it still does.

Oneness implies love and compassion (those and not "feelings", but aspects of the nondual state of consciousness), so a being in the state of Oneness cannot possibly do any harm to other beings while being One with them. The closer someone is to the realization of Oneness, the more they think and act in harmony with love and compassion. Therefore, someone close to or in the state of Oneness cannot possibly "say the best way to fullness, unboundedness, and freedom is eradicating every human being in the Cosmos", because in the state of Oneness harming even one human being is impossible regardless of how poorly that being behaves.

___________________
I am amazed by your relentless energy and motivation to write tens of pages and spend so much time to twist, misinterpret and deny such a simple and straightforward spiritual pat that requires no intellectualization but rather a lot of hard work. It consists of basically three parts that need to be accomplished in our current human life: sacrificial, faith-prayer and fulfilling the Divine Will:

- The sacrificial part. The only thing blocking the way of uniting with the Divine is our "separate self". It leaves no gap for the Divine to fill our soul with its Holy Spirit. Our work is to deny and sacrifice the "separate self", and empty and clear the space in the soul so that the Holy Spirit can fill it and bring all the knowledge we need to know. But this is easy to say but very hard to do, it requires consistent work of dis-identification from the "separate self", metamorphing the psyche (metanoia) to turn it away from the self-centered egoic behavioral and cognitive patterns, of mindfulness in catching, not enacting and sacrificing the desires, thoughts and activities of the egoic self, and so on.

- The faith and prayer part. Open to the Divine and pray that it will reveal itself and fill and abide in the cleared space of our soul with its Divine presence. The Holy Spirit will fill the soul and bring it automatically into the state of Oneness, because the Holy spirit is indivisible, there is only one Holy Spirit in the entire Cosmos.

- Once the Divine enters the soul and abides in it, it will act according to its Will of Love and Compassion towards all living beings in the Cosmos through our individual spiritual activity.

There is a great Orthodox Christian prayer that I always use in my practice:

O Heavenly King,
the Comforter,
the Spirit of Truth,
Who art everywhere
and fillest all things,
Treasury of Blessings
and Giver of Life,
come and abide in us,
and cleanse us
from every impurity
and save our souls,
O Good One.

[Stranger]

PS to the above post: Our separate-self-ego will resist this path fiercely because it literally means its crucifixion and death, so it will fight for its survival with all energy and resources it has, including producing all possible justifications and reasons to reject this path.

So what I would suggest is to stop this intellectualized discussion going already over 50 pages and involving all kinds of possible distortions and misinterpretations and ways and justifications to rejects this straightforward path, but rather go and do hard work to accomplish it for those who chose and want to do it. And for those who don't want - there is no judgement or expectations, you don't need to spend so much time justifying why you don't want to do it. Just don't do it if you don't want and you can happily continue living as a separate self pursuing any secular or esoteric spiritual activities of your choice if you really believe they can make you happy and fulfill your goals.

[AshvinP]

Again it's not only about what you say in any isolated post, but what is plainly evident from threads upon threads in your entire approach and understanding. There is a difference between meditating to passively and blissfully consume perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and sacrificial spiritual practices to actively participate in producing Light and Warmth, in service of the Cosmic Will (which the conspiracy theorists intellectually convince themselves is actually 'evil' and 'dualistic'). I wonder if you have tried even a simple exercise such as the following or whether you feel all of it is beneath your 'nondual realization' and therefore undeserving of any attention.

Let's now follow a rule: before you claim that I said something, first give a quote, and please attempt not to misinterpret it as you usually do. For example, where did I say that the spiritual work only consists in "meditating to passively and blissfully consume perceptions, thoughts, feelings"? I said many times and saying again that the hard work of metanoia is in "denying your self", in removing the debris of the egoic soul structures and dualistic self-centered perception and action in order to become a clean vehicle so that the Holy Spirit can fill it and Christ and the Father can enter and dwell in it and act according to his Will, his Love and Compassion.

Eugene,

I don't know how many other ways to explain this basic point to you, but I know exactly why the explanation is resisted - the same reason who you feel insulted, demeaned, etc. and get defensive whenever it is pointed to concrete, living soul-tendencies which need to be worked on, right here and right now, rather than simply talking about working on them in the hypothetical and abstract.

It is an obsession with outer forms, rather than inner meaning (spirit). You feel that simply writing things, putting all the words in a certain order, repeating things like a clanging symbol, is the equivalent of inner understanding, inner disposition, etc. But the latter reveals itself to us, not from the mere isolated outer forms, but from a holistic assessment of the patterns which emerge from our extensive dialogues with you over the last few years and especially since you returned. Your overall mystical approach to Oneness has basically remained the same, except you have recruited Christianity and Anthroposophy (when it suits you) to your pre-established preferences. You speak of the critical importance of higher cognition and approaching the living details, but whenever these living details are actually engaged, you find manifold excuses and erect all sorts of defenses to avoid them at all costs. Instead you say something like, 'well Cleric is already doing a great job on that, so I have nothing to add'.

When we have inner deficiencies in these areas, that is exactly when we are most likely to outwardly compensate with various repetitive slogans, virtue signaling, constant invoking of "Christ" and scripture. I can admit that sometimes I do this compensation as well too, relying on quotes from others instead the power of my own inner understanding and reasoning, but not nearly as much as you have been doing here. "The lady doth protest too much, methinks."

[Stranger]

It is an obsession with outer forms, rather than inner meaning (spirit).

I was only talking about the inner spirit and its inner experiential meanings.

Anyway, you can continue to be in denial to join the Divine Oneness, there is really no expectations or judgement. The only being who is going to suffer from it is you, and we have sincere love and compassion for you. We will be patiently waiting and hoping for your return to the Divine unity, there is plenty of time ahead.

[lorenzop]

It's interesting how there are accusations of 'being dualistic' tossed around, back and forth, as if 'being dualistic' is an insult or perhaps a curse.
Truth is - in spiritual growth, duality is not squashed, reduced or destroyed. We simply add a second element, we add Unboundedness\Transcendant\Oneness\God's Love\Christ or whatever word or phrase we like at the moment.
Incorperating this Oneness, naturally living this Oneness, reduces the errors and unpleasantness that living as a seperate self incurs. There will always be a tasty patina of duality, and supporting this duality, is a permeating Oneness, naturally lived not as a feeling but as an identity.
So, when is the best time to add this second element, when do we become eligible? Right now. You have been given everything you need to get this done.