incarnation

I fail to understand why some Christians insist that Jesus is the only incarnation of God. What is the rest of the universe but God incarnate?

unknown and known

Meister Eckhart clears up some of the confusion when we say God cannot be known and God can be intimately known. The God that cannot be known is called the Godhead, that which births the Wellspring which births all. The God that is intimately known is called God. In more Whiteheadian terminology, all is one process which reverberates as us -- a "stepping down" of energies producing and maintaining our being. Of course, one may not wish to use God language in the first place if one considers oneself a post-modern realist wishing to avoid such difficulties. But God language is here and is meaningful to many, including myself. I appreciate Eckhart's distinction.

current current

Naked apes with goat-like genitalia priding ourselves upon our immense capability while growing fat on fructose as a precursor to our more extreme genetic modification.

Like monks and nuns, we wear our habits, pray in our cells for release. Called into this form by genetic will, moving with it to go beyond it. Creative rebellion. Nitro with a slow-mo explosion.

God help us!

the razor's edge

Occam's razor, the cutting edge for all science, reminds us to postulate no more than what is necessary. The razor shaves differently, however, depending upon one's definition and understanding of what is necessary. Necessary for the head or for the heart? The heart's necessity requires meaning beyond stark logarithms and blind chance. The heart's necessity requires soul.

revelation

In a cosmos that is alive, aware, and energetic, revelation and disclosure is not "supernatural" but is a natural process. One simply has to be quiet and receptive with open heart. Of course, if one has dialed it down to "only matter," little is disclosed. One does not hear a mate who is only a piece of meat.

God

To those whose intellectual purity is upset and who respond to the word "God" with cold fury and heated aggravation: Get over it. It is a short and useful word for that-which-exists-prior-to-the-big-bang-or-slow-mo-orgasm-and-births-all-that-is-and-continues-to-exert-influence-through-its-streaming-on-your-unfolding-and-cannot-be-known-by-the-intellect-mind. God. Get used to it.

a visionary map of christianity

In map art, one paints the canvas with visionary scenes rather than lines of highways and numbered miles.

If I were to paint a visionary map of christianity, I would include a scene of the god colluding with the devil, the forces of creation conspiring with the forces of destruction, to tempt a third party into turning against, renouncing the creative forces. I think I would paint god as a whirlwind and the devil as coyote, the trickster. The third party would be a tiny figure in the distance upon whom they would advance.

A second scene would be an angry war god of dark cloud and lightning eye urging world domination of his followers, small beings who are replicas of himself with sword and shield -- killing "all that piss against the wall" of those outsiders who will not accept this god. Out of them are emerging christian missionaries.

Yet another scene would show a god who had advanced beyond his tempestuous adolescent years and able to say someone has to die so it will be me. He offers himself in sacrifice and disappears. He is no longer cross. A rainbow arcs across a darkly radiant sky.

A fourth scene would be a man awakening as if from a dream, walking across the canvas and beyond the frame. If sound could be painted, heartfelt laughter would be heard.

A fifth scene is a blank canvas upon which new vision can be painted and is being painted eternally anew.

re-juice

"The founder of any branch of Chinese gung fu must be more ingenious than the common man. If his achievement is not carried on by disciples of the same ingenuity, than things will only become formalized and get stuck in a cul-de-sac; whereby breakthrough and progress will be almost impossible." Bruce Lee, Jeet Kune Do

I see Bruce Lee's insight as applying also to religions. Christianity is my birth religion so I use it as an example, though the same line of thought applies to all religions and philosophies, including the philosophy of no philosophy.

In my opinion and experience, the teachings of Jesus have "become formalized" and "stuck in a cul-de-sac." Christians chase their own tale round and round every Sunday and at every meeting. No progress or breakthrough is expected or desired. To even think of doing so may be regarded as approaching blasphemy. This is a sure sign of stagnation.

Relinquishment of this closed system comes from stepping out into the air of the cosmos,living neither in fear nor in arrogance, but as the particular Jesus that you are: a cosmic being born of the Source, the Great Mystery, the Wellspring. This is the true Church.

Jesus was no Christian. The invitation is to go beyond all rigid form and creed to a living experience of the Tao, the Interflow, the Holy Spirit, the Juice. (Rejoicing comes with re-Juicing and rejoicing is what It's all about.)

In martial arts lingo, getting stuck in doing the same old katas (forms) over and over was not the intent of the founder of one's particular martial art. What do you think the founder was doing, but learning the old forms then coloring outside all the lines? We recognize his genius; now we must claim our own.

on heaven and hell

Early thought was that hell existed below (beneath the earth) and heaven existed above (in the sky). That gave way to a belief that both heaven and hell are inside of us. Now we open to the understanding that we are embodyings of the cosmos. We are the universe universing. Where does that put heaven and hell? Hell is when we continue to encapsulate ourselves in our seed husks while being pulled to open and flower. Heaven is when we open to the flowering of the universe that we are and move beyond the shuffling zombie existence of a seed refusing to die and be born.

becoming an angel

becoming an angel

“the Active Imagination is not a theory, it is an initiation to vision"

theosis

"Another characteristic was his (Suhrawardi's) view of the inseparability of philosophical study from spiritual experience, namely the mystical experience designated as ta'ullah, the Arabic equivalent of the Greek theosis. For him, a philosophy which does not lead to a personal spiritual realization is a vanity and a waste of time, yet mystical experience which is not founded upon sound philosophical training is exposed to all the dangers of going astray which we now call schizophrenia." -- Henry Corbin, A Theory of Visionary Knowledge

True philosophy is the love of (philo) sophia (wisdom).

Wisdom is personified, is a spiritual energy, a person.

When one has a love of Wisdom, Wisdom does not lead one astray.

a case of the grip

If, as David Miller proclaims, "Religion means being gripped by a story," then all of us, every mother's child of us, is religious. Every one of us has our story about who we are, from whence we came, and where we may or may not be headed.

The story by which you are gripped is your religion!

It is foolish to rail against religions, O proud bearers of the scientific flag, when you yourself are religious and filled with zeal for the grip your story has upon you.

It is foolish to say you have the only true religion, O Christ-ian and O Pagan! It is equivalent to saying that the story that grips you is the only true grip. What inbred arrogance!

Religion means being gripped by a story. Just because I am enchanted by a story (and I am) does not mean that you will or should be enchanted by that story. I enjoy the enchantment of my story and as I open to the richness of your story and the stories of others, I see the interweaving of our stories.

So let's stop our belly-aching about other people's stories and our belly-swelling about our own story. We need to get past that. There's work to be done.