The new Aeon
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"True, but how did we get in a position where we are reascending the tree unless we are going through a rebirth process right now due to a previous death phase?"
We still have day and night. We just learn that the Sun continues shining and life doesn't stop because of these issues of "perspective".
We still have birth and death. But it doesn't mean that Life stops because of these issues of "perspective".Like in the movie "The Lion King" where children are taught that we are all a part of something called the "circle of life". That Life continues as an uninterrupted cycle.
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@kerlem93 said
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"3rd graders are taught that the sun "setting" is really the earth revolving, and that the seasons are from the tilt of the earth. They don't really partake of the "mystery" of the dying sunlight every night, or during the winter solstice, because it's not a mystery anymore."True, but how did we get in a position where we are reascending the tree unless we are going through a rebirth process right now due to a previous death phase?"
This might be a way for me to address the idea you asked me to elucidate. I'll try to do it quickly, and see where that gets us.
Here's the thing: "We" aren't ascending the Tree. Or, at least, it depends on what you mean by "we."
You have been using the traditional involution/evolution cyclical language. It's a really useful metaphor - I used it for years, and still might get caught dragging it out. But I now think it is flawed in the sense that a fairy tale is flawed, even if it extends a useful concept to us.
The involution/evolution idea is (more or less) that we descended into matter, and now we are turning around and heading back up the way we came, back to source.
I offer a different picture; but to understand it, you have to understand that what you truly are isn't the "you" that is doing the ascending. Rather, it's what that particular "you" calls (various things such as) The Light.
That's what you are.
OK, simple picture - I'm using far too many words, but it's a simple picture:
Imagine (to pick a term) the Light (Spirit, God, whatever) existing in the absence of formation or matter. The act of creation is one of stepping the infinite down a few planes to give first creation to physical substance - let's use a rock for our example.
Over millennia, the created circumstances cause this rock to undergo changes - to structurally change - to become some organic structure capable of first sustaining life. As soon as it becomes capable of this, Life flows in. And Life (being the Light), as it flows in, gains even more power to effect changes. Over further millennia, the structure of the living thing evolves, changes - one Life continues to flow through it, passing from generation to generation, as it evolves the structure of the living thing, continually improving the genetic patterns for the specific purpose of enabling greater and greater amounts of Light/Life to inhabit the reproduced structures.
This is all one continuous process of the Light endeavoring to pour itself into Assiah so as to create substance, and pour itself into the substance to vivify it - all with the goal, perhaps, of being One Thing existing "concurrently" on all planes.
In time, this process evolves into humanity, and it keeps on procreating in a way that results in more and more Light/Life incarnating in each generation of the biological structures.
In time, there are humans who are filled with sufficient Light/Life that they develop consciousness that can act as if it is making intentional decisions about participating in this continuous flooding of Light/Life into Assiah. That is, though simply constructs, these self-conscious human animals begin to execute programs that involve them in steps that increase the amount of Light and Life that can flow into them.
At this point, they look like (and experience themselves as) people involved in spiritual growth. But it's really just a more sophisticated version of the process whereby a rock was impacted the spirtual force of which it was already composed so that it structurally changed.
These self-conscious human animals mistake their behavior patterns for a personality, and for evidence that they exist as autonomous beings. In time, some of them undertake steps (or are naturally impacted) such that they become significant receptacles of so much Light that the Light itself becomes self-conscious in them.\
It looks like they were already "people" and that they had undertaken an evolutionary "path of return." But really, it has never stopped being involutionary. The Light is just managing to incarnate itself more thoroughly at each step.
The mechanism of personality that thinks it is a person experiences the influx of Light as something outside itself, with which to join. In fact, it is the same thing of which that 'person' is already composed. In fact, it is what they most truly are. And, as the bend is rounded and Adepthood is stabilized and matures, it is no longer a person who sees that the Angel (or whatever metaphor you prefer) is filling him or her; rather, one recognizes (probably unconsciously at first, the long-known idea taking its time to become a conscious thought) that one has always been the Angel endeavoring to deepen and further one's incarnation and insinuate ever more of oneself into incarnation.
One is ever-borning. There is no return. The process of creating a thing on ever deepening planes, and of inhabiting it ever more, is not two processes, but one - as most artists will tell you: What you make has always been yourself.
As I said - a lot of words - but the concept is simple. It's all one continuous and continuing process.
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@Dar said
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@AvshalomBinyamin said
":o"
"(Not at you--responding to Jim's post with a similar sentiment to yours)
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@Dar said
"I've really enjoyed what you've written to this thread this evening Mr Eshelman. Thank you.
"Why, thank you, Dar'ling.
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I think it's kind of unsightly to be too overly appologetic about saying what you think, so I don't want to do too much of that, but I will say that I am always willing to put a 'maybe' on the tail end of all of this and to put it all back out on the table for reconsideration at any time. The way I look at it, if it is right, it will hold up, if not, then one, or both, or all of us will arrive at something better. I appreciate everyone that has contributed comments on this. It has helped me to think more deeply about these subjects. and I will continue to contemplate all the ideas. With that being said...
"...what you truly are isn't the "you" that is doing the ascending. Rather, it's what that particular "you" calls (various things such as) The Light.
That's what you are.""
The true self is not The Light. The True Self is the source of the light. It is gives the light, but it is not light. How does it give the light? By creating darkness so that the light may be revealed from within it.
"And, as the bend is rounded and Adepthood is stabilized and matures, it is no longer a person who sees that the Angel (or whatever metaphor you prefer) is filling him or her; rather, one recognizes (probably unconsciously at first, the long-known idea taking its time to become a conscious thought) that one has always been the Angel endeavoring to deepen and further one's incarnation and insinuate ever more of oneself into incarnation."
These terms like stability, maturity, seeing; the ability to uncover and reveal the truth about Self, ones true nature; these are all things that one receives. But, to be received, these things were given. How were they given? They were given by potential being created. How was potential created? Potential was created by the creator giving the light away, so that it no longer possessed it. This is how it can receive once again. We may receive these things and we may hold on to them for a long,long time. The Adept may gain the ability to hold on to a continuity of consciousness from lifetime to lifetime as he, or she holds on to the light and this is wonderful, it's not a bad thing. But as one progresses and becomes more and more like the Self once again, like the creator, they will gain more and more of a capacity to give more and more of the light, until, eventually, they give **all **of the light, and they become like a little babe in the womb of darkness again, to be reborn and resurrected and to receive the Light once more. So, maybe in that sense you could say that it is ever-borning because it always returns to be born again.
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@kerlem93 said
"The true self is not The Light. The True Self is the source of the light."
I have no need to disagree with that. In the process of word selection, I was endeavoring to avoid picking exact names / labels for something that has many names, etc. Better to describe what can actually be observed by most people in the situation, I thought, rather than make up something about it.
OTOH I also was using "Light" in the sense of "the only root thing," and not necessarily postulating that there was a "True Self" with some sort of point position etc. There may or may not be a "True Self" (though there are certainly phenomena that could be interpreted that way).
"It is gives the light, but it is not light. How does it give the light? By creating darkness so that the light may be revealed from within it."
I long ago tired of this sort of theoretical metaphysic, so readers are likely suffering a bit with my impatience with it.
In writing the tough topic above, I tried to limit myself to what can be directly observed, wrapped in a lot of metaphor to avoid making a hard doctrine about it - more of a travelogue than anything else, I suppose.
"These terms like stability, maturity, seeing; the ability to uncover and reveal the truth about Self, ones true nature; these are all things that one receives. But, to be received, these things were given."
Wait a minute, weren't you the guy being negative about Duality? (Personally, I have no issue with dualistic thinking, as long as one realizes what one is doing - but I'd gotten the idea that you were disparaging of the whole idea.)
Who, exactly (in your model), is doing the receiving? The "you" that would be receiving it is the fiction. It's like cupping your own hand to pour something into it: If the hand is sufficiently self-conscious, it might think that it is "receiving," but that would be a real misrepresentation of what's going on. (Spit into your palm: Did the palm "receive," was the spittle "given"? It's pretty much an exact match for what you've said above.)
"How were they given? They were given by potential being created. How was potential created? Potential was created by the creator giving the light away, so that it no longer possessed it. This is how it can receive once again."
If this is useful to you, then by all means keep it up! For myself, in looking at lines like this, I ask myself: "In a nuts-and-bolts way, how is this going to help someone attain to the Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel?" The answer is that it won't help them at all unless it's the particular thing that will help a particular person; and there is its gold.
I had enough spirtual/religious theory in Sunday school. Now, I'd rather just say, "Go have actual spiritual experience, then you won't have to wonder about this stuff and fret over all sorts of theories." (You'll still have to struggle over which bullshit to give voice to so that it will most likely help, and not mislead, the listener; but that's a different problem altogether.)
And I mean this in exactly the same way that I might say, "Go take a look at the Grand Canyon, then you won't have to wonder about whether you can see the bottom and how green the foliage is in October."
"So, maybe in that sense you could say that it is ever-borning because it always returns to be born again."
Ah, there we get back to the "return" idea. But you never went anywhere, so there's no place to come back from.
But if the metaphors are useful - or even if they're just fun! - then they justify themselves.
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@AvshalomBinyamin said
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@Dar said
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@AvshalomBinyamin said
":o""(Not at you--responding to Jim's post with a similar sentiment to yours)
"I'll have to agree with you guys on that one; That was one of the most lucid explanations I have come across in years.
Many thanks Jim.
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Between Mr Eshelman's posts here and his original post about the Aeons, I have never seen the path of initiation elucidated so clearly. It's nice to know exactly where I aim to go.
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"Wait a minute, weren't you the guy being negative about Duality? (Personally, I have no issue with dualistic thinking, as long as one realizes what one is doing - but I'd gotten the idea that you were disparaging of the whole idea.)
Who, exactly (in your model), is doing the receiving? The "you" that would be receiving it is the fiction. It's like cupping your own hand to pour something into it: If the hand is sufficiently self-conscious, it might think that it is "receiving," but that would be a real misrepresentation of what's going on. (Spit into your palm: Did the palm "receive," was the spittle "given"? It's pretty much an exact match for what you've said above.)"
It's not duality. You are understanding me correctly with your second statement. Yes, the give and receive is with the self, although the analogy you give may be somewhat crude. We could talk about the divine union of opposites making love, for example, or we could just say, "stickin the hotdog in the bun." Not that that couldn't be funny, or even fun. lol
"But you never went anywhere, so there's no place to come back from."
Exactly, you would never go anywhere, never progress, never awaken, never attain to anything, including the Knowledge and Conversation of the HGA, never cross the Abyss, never reach the supernal realm, nothing, unless, at some point, you gave all of the light. Who else gave up all these things so that they may be regained? Who else "...divided for love's sake, for the chance of union."? Was it some other creator (or creator couple) separate from the self? If so, then we would be back to thinking that duality is reality.
"If this is useful to you, then by all means keep it up! For myself, in looking at lines like this, I ask myself: "In a nuts-and-bolts way, how is this going to help someone attain to the Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel?" The answer is that it won't help them at all unless it's the particular thing that will help a particular person; and there is its gold.
I had enough spirtual/religious theory in Sunday school. Now, I'd rather just say, "Go have actual spiritual experience, then you won't have to wonder about this stuff and fret over all sorts of theories." (You'll still have to struggle over which bullshit to give voice to so that it will most likely help, and not mislead, the listener; but that's a different problem altogether.)
And I mean this in exactly the same way that I might say, "Go take a look at the Grand Canyon, then you won't have to wonder about whether you can see the bottom and how green the foliage is in October.""
Then what is all this talk of the new Aeon if we weren't supposed to try to understand it? Why didn't Liber AL just have one page with four words on it that said, "Go meditate. The End."? There are intellectual ideas behind these concepts. Crowley and others had a picture in mind of how everything works and what is really the case, so to speak, of how the whole body of the universe, the divine, consciousness etc., functions. He worked out an entire symbol of his understanding of this in his construction of the Gnostic Mass. The whole Tree of Life is a massive symbol that is trying to tell us something. There are ideas behind these things. What is wrong with discussing them and trying to understand what they are? If my ideas are incorrect, well, then I'm asking for a better answer. I agree that having an intellectual understanding of the concepts isn't the end all and be all, but it's a nice foundation to have an understanding of the what the symbolism is supposed to mean.
Well anyway, I won't take up any more time on this. I appreciate the responses. I will think about all of it and I hope it didn't become too exacerbating.
Thanks
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@kerlem93 said
"Then what is all this talk of the new Aeon if we weren't supposed to try to understand it?"
I think (intellectual) understanding is the booby prize. I'm not sure which "all this talk" you mean, but there are those (far more fanatical than myself) who sincerely hold that nobody should ever talk about The Book of the Law and it's contents at all - but, rather, just hand someone a copy and move on.]
This sort of theorizing is useful to the extent that it motivates someone to get and stay on the Path, doing the work. Notice, though, that the one G.D. grade title dropped in the A.'.A.'. formulation was Theoricus. There is no place in the A.'.A.'. model where "occult or metaphysical theory" is a subject of study. The closest is the 3=8 practice of Gnana Yoga, and that is a meditative practice.
All of this theorizing is fun. I think one of the biggest shifts in focus of the New Aeon, though, is the move from "learn theory, think and talk about it" to "just do the work - get the results - see the actuality of this state or condition - then there is no need to theorize."
"Why didn't Liber AL just have one page with four words on it that said, "Go meditate. The End."?"
Reading Liber L. has an effect on one. It's a practice.
"There are ideas behind these things. What is wrong with discussing them and trying to understand what they are?"
Nothing at all. (I didn't say there was anything wrong with it, I said I tire of them easily and think they're on the wrong track.) It's just a red flag when one starts building to elaborate a metaphysic around simple things.
"If my ideas are incorrect, well, then I'm asking for a better answer."
That's the main problem, I think: It's impossible to say that ideas are correct or incorrect about such things. Since anything that can be thought is incapable of describing transcendant actuality, then it's just a shell game. I struggle with every sentence not to throw out a line of shells that is likely to mislead somebody, when I have the choice to toss a different line of shells that could have them trip over the truth.
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"All of this theorizing is fun. I think one of the biggest shifts in focus of the New Aeon, though, is the move from "learn theory, think and talk about it" to "just do the work - get the results - see the actuality of this state or condition - then there is no need to theorize.""
Fair enough. I see where you are coming from and I will go with that and respect that position. It's just that when I ask myself if I am behind the concepts of The Book of The Law, or Thelema in general, I have to understand what those concepts are in order to answer that. And though I feel that it resonates with me a great deal, and I am very much in harmony with the ideas presented, I am, to the greatest degree, basing that on what I "think" I understand about what it is trying to say (aren't we all?). If my interpretation of what it is trying to say is incorrect, or if I never take the time to try to understand what it is trying to say in the first place, then I really have nothing on which to formulate an opinion. Hence, my endeavor has been to try to understand it the best that I can and to seek knowledgeable input from others.
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Kerlem 93, 93,
"If my interpretation of what it is trying to say is incorrect, or if I never take the time to try to understand what it is trying to say in the first place, then I really have nothing on which to formulate an opinion."
You're trying to pin something down. Understood. I've wasted immense amounts of time doing the same thing.
" It's just that when I ask myself if I am behind the concepts of The Book of The Law, or Thelema in general, I have to understand what those concepts are in order to answer that."
After two or three years of practical study, I had a passable grasp of the concepts in the Book of the Law. Then a year or two later, I had a passable grasp of a different bunch of concepts, or if you like, a different level of concepts. Then I began to realize my perspective had shifted again, especially as I struggled to memorize a chapter (the first one) of the Book. Then one day I started reciting that, but it recited itself through me.
What do I mean by that? I can't explain it in words, because the experience took me beyond words. Not, perhaps, beyond concepts as such, but certainly beyond concepts for which I had words to describe the condition I entered, however briefly.
"Okay," methought, "I'm finally, really, truly, getting it." I had another new concept.
Now, most of the time, I'm not arrogant enough to think that idea now. But only most of the time...
Perhaps all of us need to go through this "pinning down" what the Book "means." If we can't have an intellectual conception of it, then what's it all about, anyway? Where the heck do we start? There are obviously phrases and verses that have clear, transparent meaning... right?
But it isn't that simple. If it was, the Book and the Thelemic tradition stemming from it wouldn't be worth studying.93 93/93,
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@Edward Mason said
"You're trying to pin something down."
Somewhere in his autobiography In My Own Way, Alan Watts tells that his father (or grandfather?) used to collect butterflies. The butterflies pinned to their displays were beautiful -- but they were dead. Watts found that you can sit perfectly still in a field and the butterflies will come to you and you can observe them in their living state.
Trying to grasp answers to deep questions with the intellect is like pinning butterflies to a display. With a great deal of effort and cunning, you can do it, and the result may be delightful -- but it will be dead. The trick is to sit perfectly still and let the answer you seek come to you. Then you can see it as it truly is, though you won't "possess" it, and it will flit away after a while.
There is a story (I don't remember where I read this) of a Roman Catholic priest living in a Middle Eastern country. He was in his room meditating when he heard from far off the voice of the muezzin calling Moslems to prayer. When the priest directed his attention to the voice to listen to it, it disappeared. It was too faint to be heard over the noise of the streets. But when he returned to his meditation, the sound of the voice returned.
It's like that sometimes -- the effort to find the answer chases it away.
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Wonderful metaphor. (Watts was fantastic for that sort of thing. Way back when, he was the one who finally got me to understand Tao.)
I remember Case (speaking in 1930s era technology terms) remarking that scientists hadn't found consciousness yet because you can only dissect a dead brain.
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Thanks Ultimate. I love the story. Actually, that's how I come up with most of my ideas; by asking for help in understanding and listening quietly. Maybe an idea would come, or something from an outside source would show up etc. Over the course of many years I gradually began to find some answers to things that I always wanted to know about. Then it got to a point where I new that I was done with that phase, for the most part, and that I was ready to begin working on direct experience. Around that time, Thelema started making a big appearance in my life, through friends that I met etc. While I do know that grasping these concepts intellectually is not the main goal, it still makes sense to have a working understanding of the concepts and symbols, I think. I'm not particularly fond of systems that believe that our main goal is to get out of here and to go to a heaven, or nirvana forever and never return, or various other beliefs that may not involve getting out of here per say, but promote the idea that we just wake up one day and we realize the truth and we go on from there being awake forever after and yada, yada, yada. Not that that might not be nice, don't get me wrong, but I just don't buy it. That's like saying that the penis only goes in one direction, inwards. Well that doesn't make for good sex now does it? Where's the in AND out? Where's the "as above, so below"? Where's the inhale breath? Where's the other half of the current? Not only that, but say that the forever involuting idea is correct; why only wake up to that realization now, assuming that there has already been an infinite past and an infinite future lies ahead. Christians would say something like, "Well it's simple as pie, you are a finite being that was only created a little while ago by the creator god and your just now growing up enough. Now be good and you go to heaven and never come back here." Ok, so that means that there are two separate things, the finite being and the creator god. Now we're back to duality and we just drew an imaginary line in the sand and deluded ourselves into thinking that the All can really be divided. On the other hand, if my true, inner nature is infinite, then it must have been covered up and now it reemerges from within me. Even if I go on from there, through many lifetimes, and never fall asleep again, it doesn't explain why I haven't **always **been awake, unless there are many smaller life/death/rebirth events that form an evolution which leads to a point of being able to wake up and remain awake. But those subsets of reincarnation events must fit into a larger cycle of life/death/rebirth; the death phase of which would be the beginning of the smaller subset of reincarnations which leads to the eventual reawakening. In that case, I don't think it is that stupid to liken the larger, overall picture to a life, death, rebirth, formula. Anyway, I'm not trying to get you started again Jim, if your hovering around out there. Like I said, I respect your position and I understand what you are saying about going ahead with practices and deepening spiritual experience.
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Something from a high-school physics class:
Imagine a spinning disk with a peg near the edge, sticking out perpendicular to the surface of the circle. It describes a circle on the edge of the disk like a kid on a merry-go-round.
Now imagine that you shift your perspective so that you are looking at the profile of the circle. Now the peg appears to be bobbing up-and-down: effectively two opposite directions.
But from face on, we see that it's just one continuous motion.
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@AvshalomBinyamin said
"Something from a high-school physics class:
Imagine a spinning disk with a peg near the edge, sticking out perpendicular to the surface of the circle. It describes a circle on the edge of the disk like a kid on a merry-go-round.
Now imagine that you shift your perspective so that you are looking at the profile of the circle. Now the peg appears to be bobbing up-and-down: effectively two opposite directions.
But from face on, we see that it's just one continuous motion."
I am 100% with you on that!! That's a great analogy. Now the thing is, why didn't I always see it from face on, and know the truth, that it is just one continuous motion? The issue is not that it hasn't always been a continuous motion, it's that I awaken to this truth. Bringing the analogy back to the discussion at hand, I reawaken to my true nature. There is no ever changing, and ever evolving of any sort. There is just the reawakening to what has always been the case. If I have reawakened, I must have fallen asleep, or gone through a death phase. Not that the death is true, or real, but this phase made death appear to be true. When the reawakening is complete, then there is no longer any appearance of division. You know yourself again. You know that you are the creator. So, the whole journey from the awareness and experience of the Self as God, to the covering up of this truth, and to it's reemergence, is a death and rebirth cycle.