quote:

Originally posted by pop-pop: And you’ve mentioned that you are a Peircean? What does that mean? Can you Dick & Jane me a few lines so I don’t have to wade through all his writings?

I probably shouldn't refer to myself that way because it is ambiguous. I should say, instead, that I found his work re: epistemology very engaging. Basically, he said that human knowledge really does advance, despite what some radical skeptics might suggest. But it only advances through trial and error, despite what some rather self-assured people might insist.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
Theology and spirituality go hand in hand. What my antennae are attuned to are questions like:
- does this teaching lead one to a deeper love of God, creation and others?
- does it lead to a flowering of the gifts of the Spirit?
- does the embracing of this teaching give rise to the fruits of the Spirit?
- does it support development unto authenticity, especially concerning Ego-Self integration?
- how does it resonate with Christianity's dogmatic teachings -- e.g., creation, the fall, redemption, resurrection, and Lordship of Jesus?
- does it affirm the Church as Christ's mystical body?
- how does it resonate with a theotic view of transformation?

[JB truncated this post here]

C'est bon?

C'est bon! As far as dogmatic teachings -- e.g., creation, the fall, redemption, resurrection, and Lordship of Jesus?, good luck articulating "Christianity's" consensus view re: those.

Derek, I like Phil's distinctions in his dissertation God, Self and Ego. I also like Merton's approach to the False Self , best I could interpret it, which is that it merely refers to our socialized self, which ain't a bad self only not an account of our complete self. It is an unfortunate term.

I like how you take the time to define your terms before articulating your arguments. Because your Keating quote contains a reference to the False Self and, apparently, equivocates it with ego, it seems that further disambiguation will be required.

Further, Keating's reference (whatever it entails) does not exhaust the meaning(s) of the concept nondual.

Also, to the extent one is employing the concept in an epistemological, ontological, metaphysical, phenomenological, anthropological, psychological (phenomenal experience, a state of awareness, a type of consciousness) or other-than-theological sense, one would properly gather no one would be investigating what Jesus would or would not have to say about it?

This is not to say that some do not employ it theologically, such as in a pantheism or a materialist monism ( atheo logical), but I haven't seen many self-described Christians doing that type of onto-theology. Some embrace a panentheism, but that is a theology of nature and not a matter of dogmatic theology, although it is somewhat constrained by it. Whatever the case, the fact remains that, as Fr Keating said, God is beyond all that exists and beyond all categories of being and non-being, as well as in all that exists. At any rate, I can't really relate to what seems to be a Biblical proof-texting of what are otherwise some rather esoteric phenomenal aspects of ascetical and mystical theology.

Finally, one might imaginatively consider what the beatific vision is like, both vis a vis primary (our experience of the Trinity) and secondary (our enjoyment of creatures) beatitude and what it might be like to enjoy such a beatitude as would not be constrained by those aspects of self that are either no longer functioning, no longer needed or no longer dysfunctional, or, in other words, have died, been extinguished or diminished, in a state beyond that experience of bridal mysticism or transforming union? Maybe some have glimpsed this experience but, inside an active life of immersion in the ups and downs of ordinary experience ... ???

This message has been edited. Last edited by: johnboy.philothea,

I am deeply sympathetic with the overall thrust of so many in the East-West dialogue movement and feel they are very close to some significant breakthroughs but often held back by mistakes in epistemology which then cascade into metaphysical over-reaches. The correction is simple: change aq | al to aq | al |at = all quadrants| all levels| all the time . By all the time , I speak not of chronos but kairos , that moment wherein a value is most fully realized.

To wit:

quote:

The nondual unitive value to be realized in ecstatic lovemaking with one's bride cannot be fully realized without the simultaneous dualistic recognition that she is not, instead, her twin sister ... and so it goes with gods and Godde.

Ask anyone whether (or not) all is, may, can, will or shall be well and how they 'know' that or why they believe that (or trust that or practice that) and this particular answer will reveal much more re: their religious stance that will be of interest to me and that will better help me to locate my own resonance or dissonance with it.

More concretely, the Gospel verse: You, alone, have the words of eternal life; to whom can we go? expresses a great consolation that many Christians draw from the Good News. It might summarize many people's answer to why they believe all will be well? This news, though, is conveyed via special revelation.

However, how could an experience of absolute unitary being , in and of itself, similarly console anyone regarding so-called last things ?

The mere experience of an ineffable oneness with ultimate reality, whether conceived using a root metaphor like consciousness or being or whatever, would not, in and of itself, establish whether or not that reality is, in a word, friendly?

No cosmological, ontological, epistemological, axiological, teleological or any-old-logical principle can, alone, sufficiently inform the basic human experience of a reality that remains incredibly ambiguous for us and terribly ambivalent toward us?

This is not to say that humans can not hope against all hope and trust beyond all trust regarding ultimate reality's final disposition toward them. It is only to recognize that some may have a more explicit apologetic to ground such faith, hope, love, trust and unity?

Where, then, do other traditions get their own confident assurance in the things they hope for? How integral (holistic) is that experience? What have you heard or read?



[special note: this is the techno-jargon version for reference purposes:
The sophiology angle that Cynthia Bourgeault explicates is very helpful & insightful. Still, how different folks approach soteriology/theodicy can also be very revealing. I pretty much get how different folks (across & within traditions) arrive both at their evaluative dispositions re: solidarity & compassion and their propositions & practices re: interiority/authenticity, but I, personally, have been much more curious re: the whys, wherefores & hows of their affective attunements vis a vis both/either their propositional apologetics and/or existential grounding for their disposition that ALL IS (somehow and for some 'reason') WELL. ]

JB,

Regarding your post of 3 Jan 2012 @ 12:25 where you quoted concerning:

“The nondual unitive value to be realized in ecstatic lovemaking with one's bride...”

I had actually had an experience of that with my ex on my first honeymoon! It was Taboric.

I remember remarking to her that we should build three booths there.

Unfortunately, she said we had to head back down the mountain. (Downhill, kinda).

After that every thing seemed to move from nondual to duel.

Happy New Year
Pop-pop

p.s. I feel a bit better now. I had worried that you would be moving a wagon train up the Pannikar Pass. Been there. It’s a box canyon on the other side.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil: I know JB to be a lifelong Catholic ...

true enough but I no longer use a capital c

quote:

C'est bon! As far as dogmatic teachings -- e.g., creation, the fall, redemption, resurrection, and Lordship of Jesus?, good luck articulating "Christianity's" consensus view re: those. Wink

Ha. Well, I don't need all of Christianity to agree on everything, but it does seem there is strong consensus among Catholics, Orthodox, and mainline Protestants on these matters. For me, Roman Catholic teaching is my point of reference, and there is a clearly articulated teaching on these issues.

quote:

The sophiology angle that Cynthia Bourgeault explicates is very helpful & insightful.

I'm reading her book about wisdom Jesus now and agree that she's doing a good job regarding the sophiological dimensions of his ministry. Where I strongly disagree with her is that this was his primary ministry, and that it ought to have primacy over the soteriological implications. She needlessly pits these against each other, imo. (More later, when I finish the book and write up a review on this board.)

I can see that, on top of the definitions I've already given, I'd need to add one for "ego"!

I've become aware of a larger problem. I wanted to base my thinking on the words of the historical Jesus. But determining what those are is a never-ending task. No matter how much work you put into it, you discover only speculation and never consensus.

Derek, we had a discussion on Ego and Self sometime back, with implications for non-dual awareness.
- see https://shalomplace.org/eve/for...?r=10910695#10910695

In short, I consider the Ego to be the consciously intentional and reflective aspect of Self and what we call the False Self to be more of a conditioning that biases the Ego. So the problem is not that we have an Ego, but that it has been wounded so that it is not functioning as the "agent" of Self, which is is proper function.

- -

Re. the words of the historical Jesus: I'm confident that even if we don't have the direct quotes, the Scriptures do give us an approximation in the service of faith, which is actually more relevant to the present discussion.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
I'm reading her book about wisdom Jesus now and agree that she's doing a good job regarding the sophiological dimensions of his ministry. Where I strongly disagree with her is that this was his primary ministry, and that it ought to have primacy over the soteriological implications. She needlessly pits these against each other, imo. (More later, when I finish the book and write up a review on this board.)

It's possible that she buys into the "wisdom sage" school of thought on the historical Jesus question.

I found this handy page that groups the best-known historical Jesus writers of recent decades into nine categories, of which "wisdom sage" is one:

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

I wanted to look into the historical Jesus question with having to read dozens of books and spend yet more money on loading up my Kindle. After two days' research, the single volume I decided to purchase was Maurice Casey's Jesus of Nazareth: An independent historian's account of his life and teaching (London: T&T Clark, 2010). He is a British scholar, not as well known as many of the American ones, and his specialty is his knowledge of Aramaic as well as Greek. I've just bought it now and will begin reading right away.

Great web resource, Derek. Methinks Jesus was "all of the above" and so it rankles me a bit when an author tries to situate him primarily in one of these roles.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
it rankles me a bit when an author tries to situate him primarily in one of these roles.

I'm reading chapter 1 of Maurice Casey's book, where he summarizes the history of the quest for the historical Jesus. (Casey's book is dated 2010, so the history is pretty up to date.)

One of his points is that even highly qualified scholars approach the texts from the mindset of their own "hermeneutical circle" or "cultural circle."

For example, certain kinds of academics, who like to see themselves as wiser than the population at large, gravitate toward seeing Jesus as a wisdom-philosopher. All their research and arguments then work toward confirming the bias of their own circle.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
the Scriptures do give us an approximation in the service of faith, which is actually more relevant to the present discussion.

It depends on what the focus of the discussion is.

I suppose the original title of the thread referred to the Christian tradition as a whole, and JB wanted to look at all senses in which writers use the word "nondualism."

In my blog entry, I was interested in narrowing the focus to one particular meaning of "nondualism" and to Jesus himself.

But then I had to ask myself which Jesus I meant. To define Jesus as the Christ of faith raises yet more unanswered questions as to the relationship between the Christ of faith and the historical Jesus.

Derek, my point about the "Jesus of faith" was that the way the community presented Jesus' life and teaching in its oral/written tradition doesn't indicate much interest in pursuing nondual mystical experience other than the kind of inter-subjective union we've talked about on this thread. Of course, if one is inclined to believe that the apostolic tradition that emerged was a distortion of Jesus' teaching and the meaning of his life, then that's a whole other issue. That seems to be one of the points Cynthia Bourgeault is making, along with Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code.

Btw, have you seen Jim Arraj's fine reflection on the Jesus of faith and the Jesus of history? He makes a strong case that these are not as different as many scholars make them out to be.
- see http://innerexplorations.com/c...mortext/original.htm

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
the way the community presented Jesus' life and teaching in its oral/written tradition doesn't indicate much interest in pursuing nondual mystical experience other than the kind of inter-subjective union we've talked about on this thread.

Yes, and that is a very good point.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
Of course, if one is inclined to believe that the apostolic tradition that emerged was a distortion of Jesus' teaching and the meaning of his life, then that's a whole other issue.

Agreed. That would be the other possibility.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
That seems to be one of the points Cynthia Bourgeault is making

I take it you don't find her arguments convincing LOL.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
have you seen Jim Arraj's fine reflection on the Jesus of faith and the Jesus of history?

I haven't seen it, but I assume he is covering similar ground to another book I was reading recently, Opening up the Scriptures.

quote:

Originally posted by Derek:
I found this handy page that groups the best-known historical Jesus writers of recent decades into nine categories, of which "wisdom sage" is one:

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

That's an interesting page, Derek. Thanks for sharing and for further explaining your project, which I encourage you to further pursue. I resonate most with Luke Timothy Johnson and N.T. Wright but would not so narrowly categorize them as Jesus the Savior theorists. I think they both very well articulate a much more robustly integral Christology, as I tried to articulate, myself:

quote:

In my opening post, I offered a Fivefold Christology/Pneumatology: If we look through a Lukan prism, we might see a fivefold Christology, which recognizes that Christ came to orient, sanctify, empower, heal and save us. As Luke’s narrative continues in Acts, we see the Spirit continuing this divine work.

For Bourgeault, both gnosis and sophia imply an integral, participational knowledge carried in one's entire being toward the end of transformation of one's entire being. She points out that the Oneness that Jesus talks about is --- NOT that oneness often implied in the Eastern sense regarding an equivalency of being (a robust intra-objective identity) but, rather --- that of mutual indwelling. Once more, the thrust is epistemic and not ontological as she teases out the distinctions between those aspects of our consciousness that do or do not differentiate.

As long as one engages transformation (which I broadly conceive in terms of theology, Christology, pneumatology and human anthropology) integrally and holistically (along with soteriology, ecclesiology & eschatology), as did Lonergan, for example, that makes good sense to me. Discussions regarding over- and under-emphases can also be useful. It even helps to discuss matters of primacy but we must take care to point out whether we mean it in an ordinal or cardinal sense, in other words, does it indicate merely the first in a series or in time or first in importance or in value?

There is likely a case that can always be made against this or that approach to Christianity vis a vis matters of relative emphasis. To the extent that sophiology, as inherently integral and holistic, would include soteriology, it would make little sense to me to ask which is more important. While a case CAN be made against many who've overemphasized both the soteriological and epistemically dualistic, Bourgeault's question, Savior or Life-Giver? and juxtaposition, soteriology or sophiology?, DO present false dichotomies, in my view.

Her explication of sophiology was helpful. To the extent that foils can be useful, the proper foil for her, as I see it, would have been this or that overemphasis on soteriology and not, rather, soteriology per se. Also, in citing such an overemphasis, it does seem that her indictment of the West was much too broad. Within Western Christianity, there has existed a constant tradition of sophiological teaching, in the early fathers & mothers, in medieval doctors, mystics & mendicants, in esoteric and minority reports, in our religious orders and consecrated vocations, in our saints and unheralded lay anawim, in our contemplative and apostolic, cenobitic, monastic, eremitic and prophetic traditions. So, the core teaching has always been there as have practical supports and approaches to robustly transformative realizations. So, the indictment doesn't stick in that regard. On the other hand, as Merton observed and lamented, our churches have been much more about the mere tasks of socialization (part of the journey to authenticity, to be sure) and much less effective, it seems, in fostering transformation (coming closer to completing the journey vis a vis True Self realization and moving beyond the moral, social and practical to the robustly relational & intimate). In that regard, the indictment sticks fairly well? Witness the political polarization of our Christian country as so often grounded in shallow, fundamentalistic religious apologetics.

quote:

Originally posted by Derek:
I can see that, on top of the definitions I've already given, I'd need to add one for "ego"!

I've become aware of a larger problem. I wanted to base my thinking on the words of the historical Jesus. But determining what those are is a never-ending task. No matter how much work you put into it, you discover only speculation and never consensus.

What I was hoping to accomplish in this thread was the introduction of some categories and vocabulary that would be more descriptive and less ambiguous than much of that employed in these particular aspects of formative spirituality. Toward that end, after explaining these concepts and teasing out the associated meanings and insights, I next had in mind introducing Phil's approach to God, self and ego and trying to merge his definitions and descriptions with my own. We started to do some of this in correspondence awhile back but I haven't followed through yet. I thought it might be more helpful in an open forum where we could negotiate their meaning together. So, I am gratified at this new angle that you have introduced, Derek, regarding the ego.

Let me say, also, in the context of discussing this descriptive exercise. It was my original intent to stay away from the normative angles regarding what is or is not helpful vis a vis formative spirituality and this or that nondual approach, but it is only natural that that type of discussion will ensue. To the extent that it has, this has helped to tease out nuances and clarify definitions.

Also, regarding the use of foils and over against approaches, while these can be helpful both in our deepening our own self-understanding and in better understanding others, we do not want to miss the opportunity to define our approaches, positively, on their own terms as we seek to clarify what it is we are for and what it is we believe. Further, others with whom we may differ or disagree are foremost persons and not foils, fellow sojourners and not sparring partners!

quote:

Originally posted by pop-pop: the Pannikar Pass

Phil and I once corresponded a little re: Pannikar and I recall parsing and faulting some aspect of his epistemology. Maybe I can find it and offer it here.

quote:

Originally posted by Derek: But then I had to ask myself which Jesus I meant. To define Jesus as the Christ of faith raises yet more unanswered questions as to the relationship between the Christ of faith and the historical Jesus.

Again, I appreciate this type of nuance and care with definitions, Derek. You are a man of distinction

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
Derek, my point about the "Jesus of faith" was that the way the community presented Jesus' life and teaching in its oral/written tradition doesn't indicate much interest in pursuing nondual mystical experience other than the kind of inter-subjective union we've talked about on this thread.

Good point. And it helps to be clear when we say nondual whether we mean, as you said, nondual mystical experience or nondual epistemic approach. Keating says that, when Christians hear identity they best translate that as intimacy, consistent with what Bourgeault meant in her distinction between an equivalency of being and an indwelling. Also, as Arraj pointed out, it is a mistake to impose Western metaphysical concepts on Eastern phenomenal experiences because the East isn't really doing ontology; it's more vague than all that.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil: Of course, if one is inclined to believe that the apostolic tradition that emerged was a distortion of Jesus' teaching and the meaning of his life, then that's a whole other issue. That seems to be one of the points Cynthia Bourgeault is making, along with Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code.

There is a difference in suggesting that from the start Christianity has gotten the Jesus path slightly wrong and in believing that the apostolic tradition that emerged was a distortion of Jesus' teaching and the meaning of his life? that celibacy is an essential requirement of the ascetic path but not the kenotic path? As far as Jesus' physical celibacy is concerned, Bourgeault is correct, we just don't know. I would add that I just don't care!

Back to intra-objective identity, from an onto-theological and metaphysical perspective, the problem of the One and the Many perdures (although Neville approaches it by drawing a distinction between God's indeterminate reality and determinate being as Creator vis a vis creatio ex nihilo ). Our inter-subjective value-realizations are indispensable. Still, how it is that physical reality might interact causally with a God, Whom we can only affirmatively describe via metaphor (the weakest of analogies), remains puzzling. What stuff or matrix mediates divine causation in our physical milieu? What Unknown Causes are proper to those effects for which there are otherwise no known causes? The Hesychasts introduce an intriguing distinction between God's essential nature and the Divine energies. Lots to muse over. As John of the Cross pointed out, at some level, even a person in mortal sin is still held in existence (such as by a creatio continua ); THAT this is true is more important than HOW ; good thing!