Religion as character development

[Al Today]

[...]
Gurdjieff also spoke in terms of "laws" to which beings at different levels of development are subject. So we could depersonalize this and say that "aim" is a purely subjective concept that doesn't really exist in the sense that anyone can pick whatever "aim" they like and go for it. Rather, we could say that the "aim" for each being at each level of development is to remove itself from all or some of the "laws" to which it is subject and move on to the next level of development where less "laws" are in force and therefore more freedom is obtained.

Perceval, thank you for trying to explain this to me. Obviously I only speak from ignorance because I have not read all that. What I can try to reason is where you stated

[...] laws" to which beings at different levels of development are subject [...]

and then

[...] is to remove itself from all or some of the "laws" [...]

Here is where ignorance may show...
Here, where we are, laws are placed on the books to be followed by the group. If one "removes" itself from those laws, then they are outside of the law. I would say going rogue, not of the norm, opposite and outside of the law. Being within a closed system and going rogue, methinks some sort of "watchers", policing system would "see" this rogue activity and attempt to remove that being from the system. It would then become outcast. This is beyond my knowledge to even consider the ramifications of such activity.
See my ignorance...
Thanks again...

edit: I do not want to divert attention from this thread. Although I would appreciate a few quick pointers for me to chase down.

 

[Laura]

To follow up with this idea, Ibn Al Arabi talks about God having two commands for each created thing: the engendering command and the proscriptive command. All things, by virtue of being created by God, are acting through the will of his essence (7D). This is the engendering command. STS and STO alike obey this command to act as they are or have potential to act. The proscriptive command, which manifests through the input of cosmic information, is different. We are capable of heeding or ignoring this command. Obedience to the proscriptive command leads to felicity and alignment with the beneficent faces of God. Disobedience to this command leads to wretchedness and the maleficent faces of God. Of course, Arabi characterizes following this command as obeying the koran, which I doubt is the case. Obviously STO beings do not "command". So it's up to those whose engendered command compels them to search for the proscriptive command to clean their reading instruments.

Well put.

And obviously, there are those whose engendered command compels the opposite. The All blinks neither at the light nor at the darkness.

 

[Joe]

Here is where ignorance may show...
Here, where we are, laws are placed on the books to be followed by the group. If one "removes" itself from those laws, then they are outside of the law. I would say going rogue, not of the norm, opposite and outside of the law. Being within a closed system and going rogue, methinks some sort of "watchers", policing system would "see" this rogue activity and attempt to remove that being from the system. It would then become outcast. This is beyond my knowledge to even consider the ramifications of such activity.
See my ignorance...
Thanks again...

What you describe there is what Gurdjieff calls the "general law", which he says is 'activated' in earnest against someone who tries to remove themselves from it. In short, when you try to remove yourself from those "laws" they have a tendency to 'coincidentally' reassert themselves with force in your life to try and get you 'back in line'.

A major point of this forum is to help members, through networking, navigate the trials of this general law with a little more ease.

 

[Joe]

The All blinks neither at the light nor at the darkness.

Very important point to remember. There is no one out there, no supreme power or god, who is in our corner or cheer leading for you, or me, or anyone else. It's all about choice. You can choose to join one 'group', adhere to one ideology, or the other. Or you can opt to make no choice, in which case you are tacitly accepting the default which is rule by the powers that rule this realm. When you figure out who they are, by observing what has been going on in the world for the last few millennia, you might decide that going with default option is not the wisest choice. Unfortunately, it seems hardly anyone is inclined to try to make an objective assessment of the nature of the ptb in this world.

 

[Buddy]

The All blinks neither at the light nor at the darkness.

Very important point to remember. There is no one out there, no supreme power or god, who is in our corner or cheer leading for you, or me, or anyone else. It's all about choice.

Even though I don't always live up to my own ideals, I do often remind myself that "there are no excuses; there is no forgiveness." By that, I mean there is no "ALL" that's going to open up a subjective, self-referencing mind-space so (s)he can look at me and say "I accept your excuses Buddy", or "I forgive you, Buddy, you are now released from consequences."

I suppose that's pretty much in line with what y'all are saying.

Unfortunately, it seems hardly anyone is inclined to try to make an objective assessment of the nature of the ptb in this world.

Change is certainly slow. It may be that I will see no positive impact of this Work in my lifetime, but I dare to say that if there is anything to this ecology of mind idea (in the sense of Cosmic Mind being an information field encompassing the totality of all individual minds and, of course, everything else which is Mind), then I suspect your words will live on in the minds of the current and future generations and beneficial changes will eventually follow as surely as "condition B prefers precondition A" where "A" represents you guys and all you DO.


Aside: a certain reader scanning over the sentiments expressed here may begin to wonder about the point of going through any trouble or struggle to be "virtuous" if the old goals involving "God's" approval no longer apply. It would be difficult for me to fully address that in this post, but I strongly believe that working towards any such purpose or goal would be to have unrealistic expectations - to be living in a projected future, disassociated, prone to panic and anxiety, and unconnected to the present where a profoundly felt connection with some aspect of the ALL may be possible, even if only temporarily.

 

[Approaching Infinity]

Very important point to remember. There is no one out there, no supreme power or god, who is in our corner or cheer leading for you, or me, or anyone else. It's all about choice.

I don't think the latter rules out the former, in some form at least. Even if it isn't necessarily cheer leading, I don't rule out the idea that at the highest level there is something like hope, that at least some WILL make an objective assessment and a wise choice. And that it's that bit of force that provides the impetus and drive for those who DO wish to make a wise choice. Without such a universal standard (e.g., of objectivity or truth itself), and without some way of grasping or 'perceiving' it as such, we wouldn't even be able to make such a choice. There has to be some 'pull' to attract certain individuals toward that end, similar to what Nagel describes as immanent teleology 'pulling' the cosmos to an end as improbable as life (DNA, 2nd density) or human consciousness (3rd density) and beyond. I wonder if that 'pull', towards ever-increasing order, objectivity, information is cosmic Love.

 

[Renaissance]

[quote author=Renaissance]
While these aspects are manipulated to maintain lower levels of being and/or destroy consciousness, these same parts also appear to have the seeds for the possibilities of development for higher levels, for those who have those possibilities. Disintegration can be positive or negative and dissociation can be positive or negative.

If you read accounts of Poincare, Kekule and other people who have had instances of brilliant insight, they had driven themselves to intellectual exhaustion pursuing the questions they were after. It was in such a state that their breakthroughs came.
In accounts of people working closely with G, they too were driven to exhaustion of the body and mind through the demands G made of them. Then they would do some exercise which would bring in a completely fresh impression. [/quote]

I agree with this and the remainder of your post, and I'm not sure where or how our points differ. But perhaps I can explore the topic a bit more.

Poincare, Kekule, etc are good examples for this issue, I think. I don't know if they relate specifically to the development of the Personality in the way Dabrwoski described, but there may be a certain universal law here that is applicable to the creative process. It might even be seen in our biological activity of being wakeful and then sleeping / stress and rest. I'm speculating that this mechanism may also be found in the destructive process as well, although it's expression is of a different nature.

On the creative side there is conscious work where one intentionally puts some stress on various internal structures, some of which may be artificial/conditioned and others may come with being human and could relate to biological or genetic factors. This stress seems to loosen the strength of the structures, which may allow for a receptivity or access to parts of the information field that was previously blocked. But there does seem to also be the need for rest/dissociation in order to access or internalize the receptivity that we can't do on a conscious level. I'm not relating this to the use of hypnosis, just the natural mechanism for dissociation that we all need.

On the destructive side (or just the purely mechanical state) there often seems to be some external stressor that acts against our internal structures, and if there is no will of our own involved then we become receptive to whatever information is in our immediate environment. Stress may bring on a dissociative state or it may be brought on externally by some pathological type and this too seems to internalize the new information. But those who are engaged with work and active clearing wont be so susceptible. I don't think external stressors or unwillful ones always mean that we're doomed to fall into a destructive pattern either, but we do need to introduce our own will in order to face them.

So, perhaps this also relates to the quote brought up earlier from the C's session:

A: Divine will manifests through humanity. Giving rise to many manifestations of your reality.

Q: (L) What is divine will?

A: Energy of information configurations of infinite permutations.

Our internal structures might be one definition of 'information configurations', except the individual level may relate more to human will. If we move beyond the individual toward the group and society levels, perhaps this is where divine will has the potential to manifest.

 

[Buddy]

Very important point to remember. There is no one out there, no supreme power or god, who is in our corner or cheer leading for you, or me, or anyone else. It's all about choice.

I don't think the latter rules out the former, in some form at least. Even if it isn't necessarily cheer leading, I don't rule out the idea that at the highest level there is something like hope, that at least some WILL make an objective assessment and a wise choice. And that it's that bit of force that provides the impetus and drive for those who DO wish to make a wise choice. Without such a universal standard (e.g., of objectivity or truth itself), and without some way of grasping or 'perceiving' it as such, we wouldn't even be able to make such a choice. There has to be some 'pull' to attract certain individuals toward that end, similar to what Nagel describes as immanent teleology 'pulling' the cosmos to an end as improbable as life (DNA, 2nd density) or human consciousness (3rd density) and beyond. I wonder if that 'pull', towards ever-increasing order, objectivity, information is cosmic Love.

I suppose that's one way of looking at how a person might be led to the desired 'objective assessment of the ptb', but there are other ways as well, I think.

I know lots of folks who understand pathology and can recognize it in various contexts - from interactions between members of a family unit to pathology in politics and certain politicians. None of these folks would say that they were pulled to this by perceiving a universal standard. Most of them are just mad as hell at what things have come to.

In all these cases, we would describe the nature of this pathology similarly: The starting point is that we already understand we are parts of a larger system. Somebody draws a line cutting across the systemic structure which creates a deadly game of opposition (us against them, or whatever). Those pathological individuals will deny that they did this and will even deny that they are even denying anything. Within those who had a semblance of humanity, this double denial effectively hides their knowledge of their "sin" from themselves so that they can then proceed to do all the crap they do and still sleep at night.

If Paul knew all this, he would have been trying to take on one helluva job if he were to try and teach everything he knew to a mass of people. Perhaps what you seem to be sensing as "something more" is simply those things he could have been including in his communications, but he knew he had to help people with the small steps first?

If there's anything out of line in my post please let me know. :)

 

[obyvatel]

Very important point to remember. There is no one out there, no supreme power or god, who is in our corner or cheer leading for you, or me, or anyone else. It's all about choice.

I don't think the latter rules out the former, in some form at least. Even if it isn't necessarily cheer leading, I don't rule out the idea that at the highest level there is something like hope, that at least some WILL make an objective assessment and a wise choice. And that it's that bit of force that provides the impetus and drive for those who DO wish to make a wise choice. Without such a universal standard (e.g., of objectivity or truth itself), and without some way of grasping or 'perceiving' it as such, we wouldn't even be able to make such a choice. There has to be some 'pull' to attract certain individuals toward that end, similar to what Nagel describes as immanent teleology 'pulling' the cosmos to an end as improbable as life (DNA, 2nd density) or human consciousness (3rd density) and beyond. I wonder if that 'pull', towards ever-increasing order, objectivity, information is cosmic Love.

I do not know if there is such a pull, which implies a weighting of choice, at the highest level, i.e the level of the "All which blinks neither at light or darkness". If however we admit to man having a spiritual nature - which I interpret as man having a part that exists in the spiritual domain - then the pull can very well come from the pattern contained in that spiritual part.

To clarify the above, the "natural" part of man, which I take as his physical body + psyche including both conscious and unconscious parts, has a certain pattern of possibilities. In 4th Way terminology, this would be the essence pattern or "fate". It may perhaps also be expressed roughly as the pattern of the genetic body.

If there is a part of man that extends into the spiritual domain, then a corresponding pattern of possibilities can be called a spiritual essence pattern, or "destiny".

The connection of man with his spiritual pattern is dependent on the degree of organization and development of the soul, which is the intermediate between body and spirit ( Jacob Needleman in Lost Christianity ). Without soul growth, the spiritual destiny does not have a strong bridge that will connect to the body-mind, and hence any pull it has is weak and erratic. Yet the pull exists - and it is perhaps the same thing whose manifestation Dabrowski tried to capture as the "self-perfection instinct". And this is what, to my understanding, pulls one towards practicing virtues even though

[quote author=Buddy]
....the old goals involving "God's" approval no longer apply.
[/quote]

I will try to state my present understanding of a very small part of the spiritual domain. Our language is biased towards describing material things. So an effort to talk about spiritual stuff is necessarily limited and error-prone. Yet, as AI said earlier, people do try - so .....

According to one view, what we call qualities exist in spiritual realm as "concretely" as the universe that we can perceive with our external sense organs/instruments exist in the material realm. (This is similar to Platonism I believe, but I have not directly studied it to know the nuances.)

The virtues we talk about developing are such spiritual qualities. Hope can be considered as one example. We experience hope as a possibility for better things and we act in and with hope. Of course how hope or some other quality is experienced/actualized by any particular individual depends on his/her level of development - like Dabrowski illustrated vividly in his writings . However, the point is that hope (or any other spiritual quality) exists irrespective of whether it is being actualized in the material realm.

An individual spiritual destiny in this scheme would be a complex pattern of qualities which exists irrespective of whether it is actualized by the individual in any given time. I would speculate that if this pattern is lived (actualized), maybe through multiple incarnations, then man moves on. How the pattern is lived depends on the man and the conditions of the environment. Seeking and expounding truth would take on different manifestations depending on the age and society one lives in for example.

Does this make sense?

 

[Joe]

I don't think the latter rules out the former, in some form at least. Even if it isn't necessarily cheer leading, I don't rule out the idea that at the highest level there is something like hope, that at least some WILL make an objective assessment and a wise choice. And that it's that bit of force that provides the impetus and drive for those who DO wish to make a wise choice. Without such a universal standard (e.g., of objectivity or truth itself), and without some way of grasping or 'perceiving' it as such, we wouldn't even be able to make such a choice. There has to be some 'pull' to attract certain individuals toward that end, similar to what Nagel describes as immanent teleology 'pulling' the cosmos to an end as improbable as life (DNA, 2nd density) or human consciousness (3rd density) and beyond. I wonder if that 'pull', towards ever-increasing order, objectivity, information is cosmic Love.

At this level, I think it can be described as suffering. Suffering that leads to deep questioning, that leads to gathering of knowledge that leads to a certain amount of freedom through the 'awful grace of God'.

"He who learns must suffer
And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget
Falls drop by drop upon the heart,
And in our own despair, against our will,
Comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God."
Agamemnon, Aeschylus

 

[SeekinTruth]

In human history, communities have been the norm rather than an exception. People have always banded together and still do in most places for the many obvious advantages that numbers provide - especially in the domain of getting things done. The question is not whether a community is good or necessary imo. The challenge for communities is to figure out methods and create conditions in which members of a variety of essence qualities can achieve qualitative development. Only then can a community overall continue growing qualitatively instead of just increasing its numbers.

As far as the level of character development required to join a community, I feel it is preferable to have a degree of humility which would enable one to take on board and seriously consider the community view when that view conflicts with one's own. Without this, all other talents a person may have or develop may not be of benefit to him/herself or the community in the long run - osit.

Yeah, I think you're right. What I was wondering about (though I didn't word it well) is what you said particularly in the part I put in bold above. A successful example of such a community would both advance the continuing development of its members and the possibilities of other such communities coming together and growing. Something like what Gurdjieff described about a conscious nucleus of humanity forming being the most important thing, without which nothing else can change.

I don't think the latter rules out the former, in some form at least. Even if it isn't necessarily cheer leading, I don't rule out the idea that at the highest level there is something like hope, that at least some WILL make an objective assessment and a wise choice. And that it's that bit of force that provides the impetus and drive for those who DO wish to make a wise choice. Without such a universal standard (e.g., of objectivity or truth itself), and without some way of grasping or 'perceiving' it as such, we wouldn't even be able to make such a choice. There has to be some 'pull' to attract certain individuals toward that end, similar to what Nagel describes as immanent teleology 'pulling' the cosmos to an end as improbable as life (DNA, 2nd density) or human consciousness (3rd density) and beyond. I wonder if that 'pull', towards ever-increasing order, objectivity, information is cosmic Love.

At this level, I think it can be described as suffering. Suffering that leads to deep questioning, that leads to gathering of knowledge that leads to a certain amount of freedom through the 'awful grace of God'.

"He who learns must suffer
And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget
Falls drop by drop upon the heart,
And in our own despair, against our will,
Comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God."
Agamemnon, Aeschylus

At this level, that's how it definitely works. Suffering can't be avoided - the choice is, as Gurdjieff said, conscious/intentional suffering with the aim/result of more freedom, or the default mechanical suffering that keeps us going around in circles....

 

[luke wilson]

Supremely interesting and complex discussion. :)

 

[riclapaz]

Supremely interesting and complex discussion. :)

Totally agree, I feel privileged here, I missed these discussions.

 

[Approaching Infinity]

We split off the side discussion on Christianity and the Bible into their own thread here: http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,39225.0.html

 

[Laura]

Indeed, I would like to commend AI and Obyvatel for engaging in this discussion. However, I would like to suggest that the intellectual wise-acreing stop and ya'll bring it down into practical terms and make it easy for everyone to understand. I have to admit that my head goes all woozy when trying to sort through ya'll's convoluted sentences.