There is much in common between Sri Aurobindo’s vision and Christ’s Kingdom of God

This entry was posted on December 15, 2007 at 8:05 am and is filed under Christianity, interfaith dialogue. Tagged: Christianity, interfaith dialogue. trackback 6 Responses to “Orthodox/Interfaith”

ned Says: December 15, 2007 at 10:34 pm
Carl, I anxiously await your book. I think you have much in common with another friend of mine, Pastor Bob Buehler, from the blog, The Search for Integrity — http://godnix.wordpress.com. He also adheres to the Christian orthodoxy but articulates a nondual, evolutionary message.
I’d like to mention here that there is much in common between Sri Aurobindo’s vision and Christ’s Kingdom of God. In fact Sri Aurobindo himself explicitly states that they are one and the same, e.g.:

“The yoga we practice is not for ourselves alone, but for the Divine; its aim is to work out the will of the Divine in the world, to effect a spiritual transformation and to bring down a divine nature and a divine life into the mental, vital and physical nature and life of humanity. Its object is not personal Mukti, although Mukti is a necessary condition of the yoga, but the liberation and transformation of the human being. It is not personal Ananda, but the bringing down of the divine Ananda — Christ’s kingdom of heaven, our Satyayuga — upon the earth.”

It’s interesting for me that Sri Aurobindo’s vision of the redemption of matter incorporates numerous elements of Christianity that are not emphasized in traditional Hinduism, e.g. an emphasis on the personal evolving soul and the Divine Personality, not just the Impersonal Brahman. In fact Sri Aurobindo actually did not grow up a Hindu at all. He was raised an atheist by his Anglophiliac father, but sent to school in England where he was taught by nuns. Thus his earliest religious exposure was to the Bible and to Christianity, though he remained an agnostic until his return to India much later on in life where he started practicing yoga.
You mention Father Bede Griffiths. Father Griffiths was of course inspired by Sri Aurobindo, and in fact there is a book out called “A Follower of Christ and a Disciple of Sri Aurobindo” by Amal Kiran and Bede Griffiths:

http://www.vedicbooks.net/a-follower-of-christ-and-a-disciple-of-sri-aurobindo-p-12862.html
A commentary by Bede Griffiths on Sri Aurobindo’s vision:

http://www.monasticdialog.com/a.php?id=33
Although I most closely resonate with Sri Aurobindo’s vision, personally I have no problems expression my devotion to Christ as an Incarnation of the Divine. On a few occasions it has just happened spontaneously, often during conversations with Bob, leading him to suggest that I’m already Christian in an inner sense ;-). Outwardly however I have zero Christian credentials — I have never read the Bible fully, nor do I know much about the theological debates going on.
Most Hindu teachers actually have no problems affirming Christ’s divinity, but would assert that Christ was not the only incarnation of the Divine — that there have been others as well and may well be more in the future. I guess my question is: Is there any flexibility here for Christian contemplatives? Can a Christian contemplative also affirm the divinity (Christ-likeness?) of other spiritual guides, such as Krishna, Buddha, and indeed more recent figures like Sri Ramakrishna or the Mother or Sri Aurobindo?
Carl McColman Says: December 16, 2007 at 6:54 am
Thanks for your comment, Ned. While I haven’t yet read Sri Aurobindo (I’m only just now reading Ramana Maharshi), Ken Wilber speaks as higly of Aurobindo as he does of Maharshi, so I think I’d love to check him out. He’s written so voluminously, though — where do you suggest I start?
As for your question… certainly Christian dogma argues for what has been called “the scandal of particularity,” meaning the idea that Christ represents a unique incarnation of the second person of the Holy Trinity. Many observers of Christianity — including Wilber — see the great of tragedy of the church as precisely this: that Christ was fully realized, fully enlightened, and yet his followers quickly became mired in the radical monotheism and dualistic philosophy that was in the air in the world of Hellenism and the Roman Empire, and so could only make sense of Christ’s life and teaching by claiming he was one with God (doctrine of the Incarnation), that God, through three persons, remains one (doctrine of the Holy Trinity) and that all other human beings are mere creatures and thus existentially different from Christ, and furthermore, because of original sin (a nasty little doctrine that crept in around the time of St. Augustine) we mortals are incapable of full union with God, at least not on this side of death. In other words, Christianity as an institution effectively shut the door on the idea that anyone else (inside or outside the church) could be equal with Christ. Thus, the most common interpretation of Christian orthodoxy would hold that Buddha, Krishna, Aurobindo, Maharshi, etc. are no greater than the great Christian mystics like Teresa of Avila or Meister Eckhart: mere mortals who have experienced a profound sense of God’s presence.
So… while this may be the orthodox position, it is hardly the only way of understanding orthodoxy! In fact, it represents what I would call Christian orthodoxy as interpreted by non-mystics.
Many mystics have paid the price for daring to interpret Christian orthodoxy within an understanding engendered by their experience of Divine Union; I personally believe that such mystics were both fully orthodox and unfairly maligned by frightened religious bureaucrats who too often have wielded power within Christendom. What Christian mystics have almost universally witnessed to could be expressed as a simple syllogism:
1. Christ is one with God (John 10:30)

2. We are one with Christ (John 15:4; I Corinthians 12:27)

3. We are one in Christ (Galatians 3:28, Colossians 3:11)

4. Therefore, we are one with, and in, God.
It is a union that is both vertical (the human is one with God) and horizontal (we humans are one with and in each other). Thus, the “Body of Christ” (aka the Mystical Body) is the union of humanity as one person in relation to/union with the Father.
Now, your question speaks directly to the Orthodox/Interfaith issue I was chipping away at in this post: can Christian mystics acknowledge this nonduality even in non-Christians. For me, the answer is yes. I understand the scandal of particularity in mythological rather than ontological terms: the Christian path is a wisdom tradition that celebrates the uniqueness of Christ’s relation to God, and our relation to Christ, and Christ’s relation to the world. Whenever I love somebody, I am Christ to them. When someone manifests love, a Christian will recognize Christ in that person. This is why Christianity teaches that Christ is the Way, the Truth and the Life: because Christ is Love. Love is the Way, the Truth and the Life: no one can “come to the Father” (be enlightened, reach the highest levels of consciousness) except through Love.
So, from where I sit, I have no problem recognizing God in anyone who manifests Love. And to those who manifest Love nondually, God is nondually present. Frankly, I think it is all of our birthright — most of us just haven’t noticed it yet.
By now, conservative Christians will be whining that I have effectively gutted the heart of orthodoxy by privileging Love in this manner. But I don’t see my perspective as a repudiation of Christian orthodoxy at all. Christian orthodoxy really and truly is a different path than others; and its description of the goal — the end of human life — is particularly unique. Christianity sees union with God as communion; being with God as interbeing. Even within the Oneness of God is community. Is our final destiny to be God, or to be One with/in God in Love? At this point perhaps we’re just splitting hairs, but that’s the distinction that keeps me grooving on the uniquely Christian path of wisdom. Not that I’m saying I’m right and everyone else is wrong, mind you! After all, at that level of ecstasy, I suppose all of us will be struck dumb in a state of Holy Agnosis. And once that happens, all of our different mythologies won’t really matter anyway.

ned Says: December 16, 2007 at 7:49 pm
** After all, at that level of ecstasy, I suppose all of us will be struck dumb in a state of Holy Agnosis. And once that happens, all of our different mythologies won’t really matter anyway. **

Totally … I mean at that level it becomes irrelevant. These are all just limitations of the dualistic human mind. To tell you the truth the whole particularity/universality debate is also one that is full of paradox … because even a particular Incarnation opens us up to the Universal in the end … so whether you start off with Christ only or someone else … ultimately if you follow whichever path you are taking to its logical destination you simply can’t help going beyond the particularity of your path. But again, the dualistic mind can’t grasp this.
As for Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, I think you’d like them because their whole concept of “physical salvation” reminds me so much of the Christian idea of resurrection and “the victory of Life over death”. I put a summary of their ideas on my blog: http://naqsh.org/ned/?page_id=170

But if you have to read just one book on their vision, it should be Satprem’s “Sri Aurobindo, or the Adventure of Consciousness”, a book that has a good balance of head and heart, and is short enough but includes all the essentials of the Aurobindoan vision. I have to say that KW does not fully understand Sri Aurobindo — Sri Aurobindo was far more radical than KW is, he said that evolution is literally reversing physical entropy! I.e. he was predicting what Bede Griffiths later came to call the “new creation in Christ” — a redeemed creation in which there would be total unity and harmony in utter diversity.
Peter Says: December 16, 2007 at 8:21 pm
‘Evolution literally reversing physical entropy’–that sounds miraculously wonderful, a very powerful idea. If you pause to think if it scientifically for a moment, it will quickly be apparent that this HAS TO happen at some point if life (in any form) is going to continue.And if you pause to think of it Scripturally for a moment, it will be evident that this is the actual promise of the Gospel, when stripped of the shallowness of the egoic “go-to-heaven-gospel” that so many of my dear friends around here seem to be so unswervingly convinced of!I am totally for a new creation in Christ, lion lying down with the Lamb, etc. Let’s start now! Love, Peter
Carl McColman Says: December 16, 2007 at 9:29 pm
Ned, your comment about Wilber not fully understanding Aurobindo made me chuckle, as last February I had a conversation with Cynthia Bourgeault in which we both agreed that Wilber, for all his gifts, has a pretty poor understanding of Christianity!

I think his gift lies in synthesizing and drawing connections across cultural and disciplinary boundaries - but often he doesn’t seem to have an in-depth appreciation of all the topics he is integrating into his grand vision.

Dennett just wants religion is taught as a natural phenomenon similar to language or music

Daniel Dennett Doesn't Want to Exterminate Religions by ~C4Chaos

As I've been ranting lately on my blog, there's a spectrum of the New Atheists. Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens, and Dennett may have been labeled under the same banner but their views and approaches to religion vary. So to say that the New Atheists are fundamentalists, reductionists and are only talking about the mythic God are naive sweeping generalizations. Case in point: Here's a video of Daniel Dennett explaining his views on religion.

It's very different from Richard Dawkins's (anti-theist) approach and Sam Harris's contemplative science approach. Dennett is a proud and avowed atheist but he doesn't want to exterminate religions. He just wants to have the "toxic" versions expunged via comparative religious education--where religion is taught as a natural phenomenon similar to language or music.

For example, although Dennett might not agree with Michael Dowd's Evolutionary Christianity, the fact that Dowd is teaching the science of evolution to Christians in the Bible Belt, I don't think Dennett would have a big issue with it. It would be cool to hear a dialogue or friendly debate between Dennett and Dowd though. In the meantime, Michael Dowd is raving "Praise God for the New Atheists and Creationists!"

That said, IMHO, a more integral response to the New Atheists is to acknowledge their partial truths, recognize or constructively critique their proposals, set them on an integral framework and talk to them instead of dismissing them as reductionists and "first-tier" food fighters. In short, the New Atheists and Integral Camp should talk.

In the meantime, Michael Dowd seems to be filling in that "integral" dialogue by meeting people where they're at. Check out this quote from Dowd's blog:

"The New Atheists and Young-Earth creationists are both playing vital, necessary roles in furthering the evolution of religious perspectives. The New Atheists are assisting the evolution of religion by ridiculing trivial, uninspiring notions of God; the Young-Earth Creationists are doing their part by ridiculing trivial, uninspiring notions of evolution."

Very skillful and fluffy :) from ~C4Chaos

I prefer the comparative religion approach (as proposed by Daniel Dennett) and a more secular Integral Spirituality

In God We (Dis)Trust from ~C4Chaos by ~C4Chaos

There's an article in The Economist about Atheists and Mitt Romney's Faith in America speech. I'd like to quote some passages and link their context to my previous blog posts.

"Mr Romney recently gave a speech extolling religious liberty, decrying religious “tests” for office, and invoking the faith of some of America’s founding fathers. All this, naturally, was designed to help his quest for the presidency. The speech thrilled many religious conservatives, and plenty of pundits thought it served him well politically too. But members of one minority with virtually no political success in America were left sputtering with frustration. America’s atheists and agnostics felt excluded when Mr Romney said that “freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom…freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.”"

I'm one of those people who felt excluded by Romney. So I sputtered with frustration on my blog. Here's a link to my critique of Romney's speech. I'm kinda glad that Hitchens and Olbermann ripped Romney a new one.

The Economist continues:

"What accounts for the failure of atheists to organise and wield influence? One problem is that they are hardly a cohesive group. Another issue is simply branding. “Atheist” has an ugly ring in American ears and it merely defines what people are not. “Godless” is worse, its derogatory attachment to “communist” may never be broken. “Humanist” sounds too hippyish. A few have taken to calling themselves “Brights” for no good reason and to widespread mirth. And “secular” isn’t quite the word either; one can be a Christian secularist."

That's why Sam Harris doesn't want to be labeled as Atheist. But it's too late for that. Whether he likes it or not, he's already a poster boy for the New Atheists. Good thing that Harris, seems like the most open-minded among the neo-atheists, as far as "spirituality" is concerned.

"But another failing of the irreligious movement has been its tendency, frequently, to pick the wrong fights. Keeping the Ten Commandments out of an Alabama courthouse is one thing. But attacking a Christmas nativity scene on public property does more harm than good. Such secular crusades allow Christians—after all, the overwhelming majority of the country—to feel under attack, and even to declare that they are on the defensive in a “War on Christmas”."

This is another good point by The Economist. Attacking religious traditions head on while waving the flag of secularism and atheism is not very skillful. Atheists (or irreligious people) need to pick their fights wisely. The New Atheists have been relatively successful in this endeavor. By publishing books, attending conferences, welcoming debates, writing newspaper articles, conducting interviews, and using the power of social media (via blogging, youtube) they've elevated the discussion (and critique) of religion on mainstream media. The clash of religion and secularism/atheism/agnosticism is a clash of world views and ideas. It's not some petty quarrel about a piece of tablet with some commandments and holiday nativity scenes.

Another approach is through the back door of religious language. For example, some people like Michael Dowd, use the language of Christian evangelism to teach the story (and scientific facts) of evolution, while others focus on the negative perception of Christianity and attempt to repair its image by going back to its traditional Christian precepts (see unChristian). I see this a bottom-up approach. It provides a new translation mechanism so that people would accept scientific concepts, like evolution, in the context of their own religion, thereby transforming their mythic world view into a more rational one.

However, this approach would still probably be not good enough for devout atheists (or anti-theists like Dawkins) who want to have it all. Why teach evolution under the guise of Christianity when we don't teach math or physics under the guise of any religion? This is a topic for discussion or debate that I would like to see between Michael Dowd and The New Atheists.

Personally, I prefer the comparative religion approach (as proposed by Daniel Dennett) and a more secular Integral Spirituality. On the other hand, as far as getting Christians to buy into evolution, I think Dowd's approach is more promising than the New Atheists because Dowd meets people where they're at. Dowd's style is going to be more effective on places like the Bible belt, because he speaks in Christian tongue.

And my final quote from The Economist:

"If atheists, agnostics and secularists could polish their image they might prove powerful, and increasingly so. If the number of people declaring “no religion” can double over the ten years to 2001 who know how many more there are now or might be in years to come."

I guess we all just have to wait and see.

Self-serving lies and propaganda have been spread for two thousand years to exterminate Sophia

Jesus and the Lost Goddess [Sophia]
from Science, Culture and Integral Yoga™ by ronjon

I've taken the liberty of transcribing the following passages from the remarkable book Jesus and the Lost Goddess, by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy. I highly recommend purchasing and studying this book. Reading it is like a moist vivifying breeze in the scorched lifeless desert of deadly strife between cults of religious fanatics who each believe they alone worship the true God. It documents the horrifying behavior of the misogynous and patriarchal Roman Church and the self-serving lies and propaganda its repressed male leaders have been spreading for two thousand years in their attempt to exterminate Sophia, the divine Goddess of Wisdom and Gnosis. I've felt for years that the RC Church was more Roman than Christian, this book substantiates that intuition with an illuminating compendium of well-referenced scholarship. ~ ronjon

Taylor believes that Western liberal thought, beginning with Hobbes and Locke, Hume and Adam Smith, is on the wrong track

The Godless Delusion By JOHN PATRICK DIGGINS NYT SBR: December 16, 2007
"We haven’t yet solved the problem of God,” the Russian critic Belinsky once shouted across the table at Turgenev, “and you want to eat!”

A SECULAR AGE By Charles Taylor. 874 pp. Belknap Press/Harvard University Press. $39.95.

Charles Taylor would prefer that we feast upon the 874 pages of his new book “A Secular Age,” which offers musings and perceptions from every field of knowledge except knowledge of God, which he leaves off the menu. Taylor’s quarrel is with secularism — the idea that as modernity, science and democracy have advanced, concern with God and spirituality has retreated to the margins of life. Calling this thesis “very unconvincing,” Taylor seeks to prove that God is still very much present in the world, if only we look at the right places and allow the mind to open itself to moral inquiry and aesthetic sensibility rather than traditional theology as the gateway to religion.
Taylor, an emeritus professor of philosophy at McGill University, is the author of “Hegel” (1975) and “Sources of the Self” (1989) and the winner of this year’s prestigious Templeton Prize, awarded for advancement and research of spiritual matters. A Roman Catholic who is convinced that life lacks meaning without belief in God, Taylor is also a communitarian who questions the value of an individualism supposedly indifferent to the concerns of the larger society. He commands wide admiration for his ecumenical attitude toward world religions, his favorable view of identity politics and his commitment to the idea of human beings as contesting agents, always situated in conflict and thereby deserving of rights. He also appeals to postmodernist thinkers who trust less in the power of philosophy to prove the existence of truth than in the power of language to persuade us of the possibility of belief.
Some postmodernists speak of the “end of philosophy,” since it supposedly can no longer tell us anything about the world independent of its relation to us — about that which exists “out there” and derives, as Taylor puts it, “from a power which is beyond me.” At present, he writes, “we live in a condition” in which we suspect our own beliefs as having been influenced by sources other than the self and its reasons, with the human subject the mere effect of forces alien to our being. “We cannot help looking over our shoulder from time to time,” he writes, “looking sideways, living our faith also in a condition of doubt and uncertainty.” Has religion, then, come to end in doubts about ourselves?
In “A Secular Age,” Taylor answers with a resounding no. He argues for “the ‘deconstruction’ of the death of God view” proclaimed by Nietzsche. To see secularization as simply the separation of church and state, the alienation of truth from power, and the rise of skepticism and worldliness, he writes, is to miss the deeper and more enduring residues of religion and the spiritual life, the true “bulwarks of belief” that in his view have hardly eroded. Taylor argues against the “subtraction stories” of modernity, in which religious belief and other “confining horizons” are “sloughed off,” leaving the mind without faith of piety. Instead, he argues, “Western modernity, including its secularity, is the fruit of new inventions, newly constructed self-understandings and related practices, and can’t be explained in terms of perennial features of human life.” Even the old distinction between the sacred and the profane has taken on new meaning. Instead of disappearing, God is now “sanctifying us everywhere,” including “in ordinary life, our work, in marriage, and so on.”

Philosophy, in Taylor’s estimate, also enjoys a certain sanctification of mind and will. He cites Descartes to suggest how we are rational beings demanding to be ruled by reason governed by will. Freud’s sense of the proud solitariness of the ego is also an example of the inner truth of the emotions asking to be controlled apart from formal religion, and William James’s “Varieties of Religious Experience” indicates how people everywhere have a need to believe that can be determined by the will.

Taylor’s case for the moral authority of “self-sufficient reason” may claim too much for mind and will. Descartes could scarcely break free from the Calvinist conviction that the will, rather than exercising sovereign control over the body, remained in bondage to the sins of the flesh. Freud saw religion as an illusion born of the need to deny death; and James gave us the right to believe, but not necessarily the reasons for it. The most Taylor succeeds in arguing is that secularization did not kill off religion, since the depths of humanism have survived as spiritual values.

Taylor’s deconstruction of the death-of-God thesis rests on his conviction that “the arguments from natural science to Godlessness are not all that convincing.” He has no patience with atheists like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett, who argue that science, particularly the theory of evolution, has consigned religion to the ash heap of history. Taylor, in contrast, sees science as reinforcing religion, since God is implicated in a social existence where the contemplation of meaning and order suggests “something divine in us.” For Taylor, belief is not what science finds but what religion hopes for. Yet, in the larger perspective of intellectual history, the validity of belief may turn less on the clash of science and religion than on a concept of a deity in all its paradoxes. “An omniscient and omnipotent God who does not even take care that his intentions shall be understood by his creatures,” Nietzsche wrote, “could he be a God of goodness?” But Taylor seems uninterested in explaining the ways of God, and he argues that religion needs no justification on the basis of its good works while secularization, which some thinkers argue is necessary for tolerance, endangers the religious values that may save us from the temptations of our selfish desires.
A word repeated in Taylor’s book is “disenchantment,” derived from Max Weber, who saw Enlightenment reason turning into modern rationalization as intelligence is used not to get to the bottom of things but to organize life from the top down, through structures of hierarchy, specialization, regulation and control. Taylor agrees that this “disenchantment of the world” leaves us with a universe that is dull, routine, flat, driven by rules rather than thoughts, a process that culminates in bureaucracy run by “specialists without spirit, hedonists without heart” — what Weber called the “iron cage” of modern life.

The Weberian outlook is bleak, and Taylor puts it aside to find a far more hopeful vision in the sociology of Emile Durkheim. In contrast to Weber, Durkheim saw the forms of society as containing not impersonal functions but deeply implanted sacred practices, and he saw religion rooted in the roles and rules of modern social systems resisting the chill of alienation. Whatever intellectuals may think, people value religion as providing a framework of meaning, a realm of unifying symbols and a sense of belonging. Some observers have been surprised by the resurgence of religion in recent years. “In a sense,” Taylor observes, “part of what drove the Moral Majority and motivates the Christian right in the U.S.A. is an aspiration to re-establish something of the fractured neo-Durkheimian understanding that used to define the nation, where being American would once more have a connection with theism, with being ‘one nation under God.’”
Contrary to Taylor, the American founders felt they had to deal with a young republic consisting not of one nation but of a series of contending factions. Religion, in their view, would do more to divide the country into zealous sects than to unify it under “God,” who, after several polite appearances in the Declaration of Independence, is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. Jefferson, in fact, subscribed to the “subtraction” theory of history that Taylor denies. “Priests,” wrote the author of the Declaration, “dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.”

“A Secular Age” is a work of stupendous breadth and erudition, even if repetitious. While Taylor’s main purpose is to salvage religion from the corrosive effects of modern secularism, he would also like to see the Anglo-American world reconsider its liberal legacy. The Federalist authors taught that government was about safeguarding life, liberty and land. “The transcendent law of nature and of nature’s God,” James Madison wrote, “declares that the safety and happiness of society are the objects at which all political institutions aim, and to which all such institutions must be sacrificed.”

Taylor believes that Western liberal thought, beginning with Hobbes and Locke, Hume and Adam Smith, is on the wrong track. For some Catholics in the intellectual tradition of Aristotle and Aquinas, the meaning of history is not the preservation of life but the salvation of the soul, not the right to labor and own property but the duty to abide by moral order, not the greed of the market but the grace of the cathedral. To resist the ubiquity of liberal individualism, Taylor draws on such dubious historical sources as classical republicanism, in which citizens subordinate private interest to public virtue, and the theory of public space, where citizens supposedly long gathered to discuss the issues of the day and render politics an act of conversation and dialogue. Taylor also draws upon the literature of Romanticism to demonstrate that spirit lives on in the imaginations of mind whatever the material forces of secularization. “A new poetic language can serve to find a way back to the God of Abraham,” he exhorts.

Some 19th-century New England Transcendentalists may have felt the presence of God in a blade of grass, but they sought to escape the Abraham who would have murdered his own son at God’s command, along with America’s own killer of innocence in the name of authority, Captain Ahab. Taylor’s effort to resurrect intellectual respect for religion is commendable without being credible. A new poetic language led Emerson to see American religion as “corpse-cold” as the sublime gave way to the mundane and the “thingification” of life. What threatened religion was not only secularization but society itself, with its anxieties about status and lack of self-reliance. Yet Taylor looks to society for religious redemption, one possibility being “to recover a sense of the link between erotic desire and the love of God, which lies deep in the biblical traditions.” Whatever our desires, we are drawn to God. “Our access to the will of God, through his design,” Taylor writes, “is crucial to the story of the modern moral order and to the new neo-Durkheimian understanding of God’s presence among us.” Taylor assumes that we can “find a way back” to God by re-enchanting society with the mysteries of spirit and even sensuality. Since we cannot get to God by means of philosophy, Taylor sees the Deity’s “design” in the social world as we experience it in its moral and erotic dimensions. Can the same faith be trusted to history as to society? To insist that the “will of God” can be seen in history, one would have to deal with thinkers from Thucydides to Tolstoy, who saw “design” as the domination of reason by power and freedom by fate.

Emerson called society “a conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members,” its material pleasures the very soil of secularism itself. Durkheim expected that such insatiable pleasures would be restrained by society, the role once assumed by religion. Taylor, for his part, promises an understanding of “God’s presence among us” in the fullness of ordinary life. But the belief that God inheres in life itself suggests Taylor’s Hegelianism and the dialectical fantasy that an indwelling “spirit” governs the material world. To see the sacred within the profane, to derive God from the sentiments of society, does little to relieve us of Weber’s secularized world where politics is no longer an ethical calling and religion no longer an ascetic ideal. Taylor may locate the drama of the soul in society, but the meaning and mystery of God remain as elusive as the enigma of existence and religious morality becomes little more than social convention. There are many reasons to read the profound meditations in “A Secular Age,” but waiting for God to show up is not one of them. « Previous Page 1 2 3 John Patrick Diggins teaches at the CUNY Graduate Center and is the author of the forthcoming “God Is Dead! Long Live Religion” and other books. Related Beliefs: Books on Atheism Are Raising Hackles in Unlikely Places

Religiosity now seems at least as important for public office as leadership qualities

Secular Europe’s Merits By ROGER COHEN Op-Ed Columnist NYT: December 13, 2007

But Bush is no transient phenomenon; he is the expression of a new American religiosity. Romney’s speech and the rapid emergence of the anti-Darwin Baptist minister Mike Huckabee as a rival suggest how estranged the American zeitgeist is from the European.
At a time when growing numbers of Americans identify themselves as born-again evangelicals, and creationism is no joke, Romney’s essentially pitted the faithful against the faithless while attempting to merge Mormonism in mainstream Christianity. Where Kennedy said he believed in a “president whose religious views are his own private affair,” Romney pledged not to “separate us from our religious heritage.”

“Religiosity now seems at least as important for public office as leadership qualities,” said Karl Kaiser, a German political scientist. “The entrance condition for the American presidential race is being religious. If you’re not, you have no chance, which troubles Europeans.”
Of course, the religious heritage of which Romney spoke is real. The Puritans’ vision of America as “a city upon a hill” was based on a covenant with God. As the Bill of Rights was formulated, George Washington alluded in his Thanksgiving Proclamation to “that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.”
Religion informed America’s birth. But its distancing from politics was decisive to the republic’s success. Indeed, the devastating European experience of religious war influenced the founders’ thinking. That is why I find Romney’s speech and the society it reflects far more troubling than Europe’s vacant cathedrals.

Romney allows no place in the United States for atheists. He opines that, “Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom.” Yet secular Sweden is free while religious Iran is not. Buddhism, among other great Oriental religions, is forgotten.
He shows a Wikipedia-level appreciation of other religions, admiring “the commitment to frequent prayer of the Muslims” and “the ancient traditions of the Jews.” These vapid nostrums suggest his innermost conviction of America’s true faith. A devout Christian vision emerges of a U.S. society that is in fact increasingly diverse.
Romney rejects the “religion of secularism,” of which Europe tends to be proud. But he should consider that Washington is well worth a Mass. The fires of the Reformation that reduced St. Andrews Cathedral to ruin are fires of faith that endure in different, but no less explosive, forms. Jefferson’s “wall of separation” must be restored if those who would destroy the West’s Enlightenment values are to be defeated.

•
Correction: I wrote last week of the Tudor-Stuart alternation; I meant succession.
Blog: www.iht.com/passages. Nicholas D. Kristof is on book leave.
Next Article in Opinion (6 of 18) » Past Coverage
FEAR AND FAITH; A Mormon’s Ultimate Doorbell (December 9, 2007)
Romney, Eye on Evangelicals, Defends His Faith (December 7, 2007)
THE LONG RUN; Pulpit Was the Springboard for Huckabee's Rise (December 6, 2007)
Crucial Test for Romney in Speech on His Religion (December 6, 2007)

Peter Heehs is writing a biography of Sri Aurobindo due to be published next year

A couple of weeks ago, our Savitri study group in Manhattan had the privilege of meeting Peter Heehs, a historian who is writing a biography of Sri Aurobindo due to be published next year. Peter Heehs is also the author of a paper entitled The uses of Sri Aurobindo: mascot, whipping boy, or what?, and a wonderful little book called Nationalism, Terrorism, Communalism.

In both the paper and the book, he thoroughly investigates all the allegations of Sri Aurobindo having been an “extremist” or a “Hindu supremacist” and shows that they simply do not hold water.

Peter was quiet and unassuming, and I really enjoyed meeting him... Meeting Peter Heehs from The Stumbling Mystic by ned Matagiri

An immense, many-sided and many staged provision for a spiritual self-building and self-finding

Mera Bharat Mahan Dreaming of a great India Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Sri Aurobindo on Hinduism Found through Hindu Press International:

Hinduism gave itself no name, because it set itself no sectarian limits; it claimed no universal adhesion, asserted no sole infallible dogma, set up no single narrow path or gate of salvation; it was less a creed or cult than a continuously enlarging tradition of the Godward endeavor of the human spirit. An immense, many-sided and many staged provision for a spiritual self-building and self-finding, it had some right to speak of itself by the only name it knew, the eternal religion, Sanatana Dharma. Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950) Posted by Bahu of Bengal at 11:19 AM Labels: Hinduism, Sanatana Dharma, Sri Aurobindo

About this blog
India is not a mere jumble of peoples of different languages, ethnic groups, religions, and castes. She is a nation whose nationhood is rooted in Hindu culture.
Emerging issues on this blog include humanitarian efforts; arts of India; protection of India's heritage, natural and cultural, tangible and intangible; and terrorism.

Random books from my library
A Greater Psychology : An Introduction to the Psychological Thought of Sri Aurobindo by Sri Aurobindo
Father India: How Encounters With an Ancient Culture Transformed the Modern West by Jeffery Paine
Integral Yoga: Sri Aurobindo's Teaching & Method of Practice by Aurobindo
Lord Krishna's Cuisine: The Art of Indian Vegetarian Cooking by Yamuna Devi
Monster of God by David Quammen
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The same problems of greed, corruption and decay are happening within both the political structure of Auroville and the daily lives of its people

freedom, chains, apathy and corruption...Auroville, Tamil Nadu, India Tuesday, Dec 04, 2007 01:32 Entry 13 of 13 show all about Olivebranch

I’ve been in Auroville for a month now, and have just over another week to go...I have been slowly finding out about, and participating in, all sorts of things which I would have never had the chance, or motivation, to do at home. I’ll try and remember some the things I’ve been getting up to…- Most of my time, of course has been spent at the Udavi school, teaching my lovely class of 11-12 year-olds...The school is kind of run like a Steiner school, in that the subjects aren’t rigidly separated and instead they are taught through broad projects, which the children have a role in choosing.

So, apart from that, what have I been up to?- To be honest, mostly I’ve been having great fun exploring the island (although its not actually an island it feels like one – a piece of land that seems to be its own country… completely different to the rest India, or anywhere for that matter). I love it! Total freedom…. Scary at times though, like when I got lost on my own along these dodgy jungle tracks that just seemed to be getting smaller and smaller, with bigger puddles and more insects and with only a couple of inches of petrol left!... I wont be doing that again! Luckily I met some old aussie man who directed me back to a proper road. Driving around to find the perfect sunset spot is fun too.- Being part of an Om… choir! Amazing, uplifting stuff! The most beautiful sound!

- Yoga

- Shopping, but mainly for christmas presents

- Watching the most bizarre modern dance performance by this group of French dancers… if you could call it dance… reminded me of the film The Idiots quite a lot. Snuck off quite soon after the ending so I could avoid being asked (by the French dander who had invited me after I picked here up when she was stupidly hitch

-hiking across town in the dark) what I thought… I’ve never enjoyed such far-out/ ‘modern’…whatever you could call it performance… in the same way I just don’t get experimental jazz… it was cringy!

- Trying to rebuild my tan on the beach, after having to cover up everywhere else (Aurovillians and their guests have their own private part of the beach, where no outside Indians are allowed… there are guards enforcing this rule which makes beach life so much easier for girls, as without them you are constantly harassed, photographed or just stared at in a horrible way by local men or male Bangalore holiday-makers… the down side is, it feels a bit like a beach in Cape Town might have felt like in the 70s.... and just beyond the boundary they all flock, trying to get a distant glimpse of bare thigh or cleavage, making the women cluster together in the centre)… very strange, but still, it’s a nice, hot sandy beach in December.

- Meeting lots of cool people: Aurovilllians, New-comers, guests, villagers, non-aurovillian business people.

- Playing, stroking and secretly feeding my dog, Blackie…. And for your reference (especially Juliet), he’s not diseased, or at least he doesn’t look it!

I haven’t really been reading too much literature about or written by The Mother, to be honest… I basically agree with her broad principles but I think to base a town and its future, so dependently on the worship of an idol, especially a deceased idol /hero (or even the teachings of a deceased idol) is basically backward-looking and closed to change.

I think the most interesting thing I have been doing is talking to the Aurovillians about their town and the politics and problems within it… its rather depressing to see that just like everywhere else it seems on the planet, the same problems of greed, corruption and decay are happening within both the political structure of Auroville and the daily lives of its people. I haven’t even started to understand it really. The Aurovillians themselves speak of corruption, election-rigging, economic exploitation, power-hungry private business people, the fakes, the apathetic second generation, the spattering of acid-casualties in the first generation, the classic moral panic about the odd party (now, officially all parties in Auroville are banned!... the only bar has also been closed because of a few underage people getting too drunk).

That’s one example of how things seem to be fucking up here as they do in any religion or society – someone has a good idea… creating a basis for the likes of Christianity, Islam, Communism etc and then, as the years go by, and the original prophets die, the followers left behind in the world of the living and ( in their bid to preserve the tradition) become more and more fundamentalist. They think they are preserving its purity and doing what the original prophets would have wanted but what they end up doing is creating something rigid and oppressive, something brittle that will then break as it cannot adapt to movement and progress. Its just one small example but The Mother never said alcohol was evil and should be banned, she just said over-consumption was detrimental to the individual and those around them – fair enough, but that’s no reason to ban the ONE party they people of Auroville are allowed at new year!

Who is Zizek's Spiritual Master?

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Nietzsche, Badiou, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Hegel,...":

• The real question is what lineage Tradition of Spiritual Practice and Realization does the much lauded Zizek Practice in?
• Who is his Spiritual Master?
• And hence, what is the origin and source of his "authority" to talk with any profundity about religion, Spirituality and culture?
• And 2000 years after the event (which never happened) what could "turning to 'paul'" possibly mean?
• "Paul" is the key figure in a much over rated, and mis-understood work of imaginative religious story-telling (fiction) which was common in the ancient world---namely the Bible. What do we really know about "paul"?

"Paul" never ever met "jesus", so how could he possibly be regarded as an "authority" on "jesus". Paul invented a "religion" ABOUT "jesus" which effectively undermined the Way of Spiritual Baptism taught and demonstrated by Saint Jesus of Galilee while he was ALIVE or before he was brutally murdered by the pharasaical ecclesiastical "authorities" of his time. The same anti-Spiritual "authorities" that built the power seeking worldly fortress now called christianity.

• Has anyone now alive ever met "paul" or "jesus", and asked them to explain the ins and outs of what they were trying to communicate?

If not, they are just writing and talking about their own uninspected, culturally inculcated, presumptions---they are describing themselves and their own doubts about the Divine Conscious Light. Apart from Christians and Moslems, and (perhaps) Jews with their (false) linear view of his-story, hardly anyone from the other Traditions take the heroes and heroines from their imaginative religious and Spiritual story-tellings as having any kind of binding hold on understanding and acting in the always present moment of existence-being.

Such heroes and heroines are righfully understood as archetypal teaching devices about Humankind and the Human drama altogether, which can to one degree or another, inspire us to understand ourselves and thereby transcend our inherited religious PROVINCIALISM.

For Derrida, metaphysical and ontological questions and choices boil down to a question of how we will come to value being and the movement of being

6 Responses to “Defining Derrida accurately: It makes a differance”

Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 10:16 am Gregory Desilet Posted: Tue Dec 04, 2007 12:34 am
Hello Michael–this post attempts a response to some of the questions you posed about Derrida in your post of Nov. 20th.
[Regarding question 1] Derrida did not like the word “indeterminacy” nor the kind of relativism it suggests. For example, he says, “I do not believe I have ever spoken of ‘indeterminacy,’ whether in regard to ‘meaning’ or anything else. Undecidability is something else again” (Limited Inc, p. 148). His distinction between indeterminacy and undecidability is an issue I discuss in detail in an afterword to John Macksoud’s Other Illusions–a book to be published next year by Purdue University Press (a version of it is also available in my book Cult of the Kill as chapter five). I know this probably seems like self-promotion but your question is a good one and the issue is difficult to sort out in a short space. In Derrida’s own explanations of the distinction he appears at times to contradict things he has said in other contexts. So commentary is useful in providing interpretation of the issue. As merely a suggestion of the line of reasoning Derrida offers–see the distinction as turning on the difference between what is indeterminate as vague and ill-defined and thereby an approximation (like an inkblot invoking different meanings) versus undecidability between (at least two) options (ways of reading, say, the “same” text) which are highly determined through provisionally defined contexts.
[regarding question2] Another very good question and a difficult issue to handle without lengthy give and take. One way I’ve found to think about this issue that helps me is to form an analogy between texts and images. Think of a text as like one of those Magic Eye stereo images where, looked at in one way, we see a two dimensional image and, looked at in another way, the “same” image transforms into a three dimensional image (sometimes revealing a different object). The “same” colors and lines or the “same” facts or words on a page are organized in different ways to reveal very different images or meanings. Derrida argues that every text has within it the capacity to generate such alternating, viable, and persuasive meanings. But this tension of alternatives does not reduce to an “anything goes” situation where any interpretation is as good as another (this because of the role of context–all of the give and take of which would be too complex to convincingly present here–but I do so in the above mentioned works). So, for Derrida, the pervasiveness of these “slidings” is all-inclusive (like a law)–no text escapes it. If, in a particular case, no “sliding” appears, Derrida would argue that the univocal quality of the text is due to the force of habitual ways of seeing (or trained incapacities). Our particular training as individuals predisposes us to see some texts as so monolithic in their meaning that we cannot easily see alternative readings. This is why Derrida produced so many “deconstructions” of classic texts to illustrate how to open them up to a latent alternative reading.
[regarding question 3] This is another interesting question and (sorry) also dealt with extensively in my above mentioned works. But to summarize, Derrida argues that the capacity for a text to be read in alternative (and convincing) ways is an essential aspect of every text. Every text, as part of its ability to even be a text within a language, necessarily contains a fault line (or lines) that divide it (and it’s “identity”) at the core. This division is not simply a possibility that falls on some texts and not others due to issues of ambiguity, bad construction, or happenstance in wording. Therefore, the criticism that Derrida conflates possibility with probability is, without, question a poor criticism involving a significant misunderstanding of deconstruction. One could perhaps argue that Derrida simply imagines that all texts are divided in the way he describes and that such division is not a “law” of texts. But this would require producing at least one instance that violates the law. Derrida would no doubt invite you to provide such an instance. So far, all who have proposed such “instances” have been turned back because the examples they have provided have failed the test. One particularly famous illustration of this occurred in the exchange in Glyph in the 1970s between Derrida and Searle.
I’ve attempted to address some of the issues you raise in your 4, 5, and 6 questions in another thread (”Wherein Bonnie Asks a Question”, I believe). But I grant that what I’ve said may seem very inadequate. These are complex questions and great issues to explore!
Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 10:26 am Gregory Desilet Posted: Wed Nov 21, 2007 8:41 am Post subject:
This post along with Michael Schwartz’s post bring me to think again about what Derrida offers that would recommend him to integral speculations. Answering that, I think, brings us to the issue of ethics that Michael raises. Why bother with Derrida? What is so crucial in what he offers or in the direction he takes? Here my intention is not so much to defend Derrida as to put what he is doing up to scrutiny and attempt to see with new eyes how the value in it may stand up (or not).
The quickest way to proceed here, I think, is to look at Derrida’s explanation for why he invented the term “differance.”
Quote:
“Could not this (active) movement of (the production of) differance without origin be called simply, and without neographism, differentiation? Such a word, among other confusions, would have left open the possibility of an organic, original, and homogeneous unity that eventually would come to be divided, to receive difference as an event (Derrida, Margins of Philosophy, p. 13).”
Such an “event,” Derrida argues, would be of the nature of an “intrusion” into an already pre-existing “whole”; he did not want to invite the possibility of this interpretation because he believed it to be at the root of all previous metaphysical schemes and their corresponding ontologies (or cosmologies). These schemes implicitly or explicitly advance the notion of an original purity that “falls” into differentiation, creating a dualism of “origin” and “derivation” in which the purity of the origin (and nostalgia for the origin) dominates (as a value) in this oppositional tension. This sets up a fixed hierarchy of valuation in which the lesser term is permanently subordinated and, by comparison, permanently devalued. As a foundational image, this way of seeing oppositional tension becomes the model for all oppositions (and dialectic). It also becomes the primary model for conflict and initiates a way of structuring conflict that promotes an exclusionary form of violence (because of the presumed “naturalness” and fixity of the hierarchy). History has shown the kind of actual violence this view can promote in human culture (as Derrida would argue).
For Derrida, the “one” must already be “two” in order to preclude the radical kind of metaphysical dualism that arises from the belief in an undifferentiated origin (and a subsequent intrusion or division into differences that then become “less than” and “other than” the origin). For Derrida, metaphysical and ontological questions and choices boil down to a question of how we will come to value being and the movement of being. Any “given” or fixed devaluation of a portion of or manifestation of being (as in the opposition pure/impure) strikes him as arbitrary and in that sense perhaps “unethical”–or certainly unjustified (and unjustifiable). This is a quick gloss that I must leave at this point and will try to expand upon later.
Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 10:33 am Gregory Desilet Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2007 9:49 pm Post subject:
Above Bonnie says:
“That is why I try to focus on view as degrees of freedom, and not any particular direction of action, behavior, judgment, or outcome or transcendental ideal like the Good.”
Does that make sense?
Yes it does. Ontological positions such as those I’ve called “transcendent” (in the “Wherein Bonnie asks a Question” thread) place “freedom” above “justice” in a hierarchy of values. “Direction of action, behavior, judgment” becomes more important in ontologies, such as that underlying deconstruction, wherein another value, Derrida calls it “justice,” is privileged.
In the early years of deconstruction Derrida was accused of devising a philosophical position that could not be separated from the radical relativism leading to the notion that “one interpretation is as good as another.” On the ethical plane this reads as “one action is as good as another.” But Derrida did not believe deconstruction entailed any such view. In his later years he expended considerable energy illustrating why deconstruction does not devolve into authorizing the radical “freedom” of an endless “play of signifiers” without direction or concern for direction. For Derrida, the equi-primordial balance between the oppositional pair “sameness/difference” entailed an essential position for the “other” of difference such that respect for the “other” is ontologically grounded and thereby also ethically grounded.
Previous ontologies, such as those corresponding to traditional metaphysics of presence, provided no ontological grounding for an ethic that included valuation of the “other.” The restoration of balance in acknowledging the essential role of both sameness and difference, self and other, at the ontological level, at the level of being, provided an exceptional new ground for an ethic according value and respect to the “other.” Derrida calls the value which grounds this ontological choice “justice.” And, as a grounding value, it is “rock bottom” or “undeconstructible”–which is Derrida’s way of saying that to “deconstruct” this justice would be to choose, privilege, or place at the top, another value in the hierarchy of values.
To value freedom over justice involves us in complications regarding the quality of human community with respect to the role of “violence” in that community. Placing justice at the top of the hierarchy helps to apply the kind of brake to freedom that is needed in order to maintain more cooperative, less violent, community (by altering the “logic” that authorizes tendencies toward “anything goes” and also tendencies to alienate and scapegoat the “other”).
Restoring value to the other (while not raising the other to highest value–as Derrida thinks Levinas did) deconstruction, in its balanced ontology, does not lead to endorsing the degree of communitarianism that underlies the pressure toward conformism found in many Asian cultures. The value of “justice” in respect for the play of sameness and difference in self and other instills a balance that also precludes undue pressure toward conformity while preserving “play” in the tension between individual and community.
Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 10:38 am bonnittaroy Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2007 12:16 pm Post subject: Question of Derrida
I am going to pose my question in a sort of reductive way to get the ball rolling (or else I will project my own solutions into the question!) —
I am wondering if Derrida considers that same/difference to be
** an aspect of “reality” — a kind of ground of existence, as it were (however lightly held notion) or
** an aspect of being - our existential condition as it emerges from the substrate of “reality” which includes but exceeds that condition/aspect or
** an aspect of the cognizing (perspective-making, interpreting) mind.
If you could answer the relative merits of these three with respect to your(derrida)’s position, and then go on to clarify outside of the more reductive(constrained) scenario I have outlined, that would be great.
Gregory DesiletPosted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 9:24 pm Post subject:
The question Bonnie raises here, as I’m sure she’s aware, is a VERY thorny philosophical question. It could perhaps be rephrased as: Is Derrida a Realist or an Idealist (or Nominalist)–or somewhere in between? What does he think about “the real”?
Some things I try to keep in mind when thinking about Derrida in relation to such questions:
1) he believes that something(s) is undeconstructible (in particular he has named “justice”–in some very broad understanding of the term)
2) alterity (the “other”) is irreducible
3) all oppositional tensions may be seen as a consequence of differance (differing and differal); separated by difference but not discrete, separate essences.
Like a Buddha, Derrida does not submit to the “logic” of oppositions as “either/or”; instead he approaches them more like “both/and” as well as “neither/nor.” Therefore, as might be expected, when it comes to the issue of dichotomies like Realism/Idealism, self/other, interior/exterior, real/construct, real/being, Derrida displaces the opposition and puts it in the space of an additional “logic,” a supplemental logic. This supplemental logic resembles the exasperating difficulty of the both/and, particle/wave difficulty in physics. For Derrida, the “real” and the “construct” penetrate each other all the way down. There is no instance of an apprehension of the “real” that is not tainted by the “construct.” And vice versa. And we can never sort out with certainty the degree of the mix of the real or the construct. At given points in time and through well-defined contexts we can form judgments about the nature of the mix, but we can never achieve certainty at any point in time in “measuring” the mix of the two in order to factor out what is genuinely “real.”
Therefore, it could not be said that Derrida subscribes to a version of basic Realism. It would appear that for Derrida “differance” is co-originary with any notion of “the real,” “being,” “the construct,” or anything whatever that might be apprehended in any way. In this sense, differance is not a “concept” of something for which it is relevant to decide what its ontological status may be.
That’s the long answer (and a guess at what Derrida would say–and thus far I agree with him). But following this citation of your question is a short answer.
Quote:I am wondering if Derrida considers that same/difference to be
** an aspect of “reality” — a kind of ground of existence, as it were (however lightly held notion) or
** an aspect of being - our existential condition as it emerges from the substrate of “reality” which includes but exceeds that condition/aspect or
** an aspect of the cognizing (perspective-making, interpreting) mind.
Yes.
Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 10:47 am bonnittaroy Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2007 11:16 am Post subject: Question of States
Here is a question. With respect to the distinctions that can be made between Wilberian cognitive stages and states of consiousness– how would that distinction be made from a post-modern (a la Derrida) view?
Gregory DesiletPosted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 8:21 pm
In response to this question I could only venture a guess. Let’s begin with levels or stages of consciousness. I feel fairly certain that Derrida would have trouble with the way in which Wilber views the rainbow of consciousness. Contrary to what some have argued, Derrida is not opposed to applications of heirarchical organization. For Derrida, hierarchy is everywhere a natural phenomenon of life. So he would not oppose the rainbow or “evolution” of consciousness on hierarchical grounds. But Derrida always wants to understand hierarchy in more complex ways. In this sense he does not advocate viewing hierarchies as universally stable–life (and also deconstruction) is always in the process of destablizing hierarchies. All hierarchies are natural and all hierarchies are temporary and contingent and their current organization is always relative to current contextualizations (and what is meant by “current” could be one year, one decade, one century and so on).
So I believe Derrida would not want to buy into the notion of a rainbow of consciousness whereby some levels are intrinsically and universally “higher” (in the sense of “transcending and including”) than others. What appears “higher” and more inclusive in one context may not appear so in another–or might move down an “evolutionary” line that will ultimately be judged less fruitful than another.
For Derrida, we would need to remain more flexible in our evaluations than is implied in the idea of a rainbow of consciousness with its “built in” scale of evaluations based on some notion of evolutionary progress. For example, if that notion is from egocentric to ethnocentric to worldcentric there may be a sense in which this entire progression is still too “ethnocentric” from a vantage point that has simply escaped “our” awareness to date; or it may be that the progression is not ethnocentric enough (i.e., not well calibrated to the variety of human existence on this planet). While Wilber does make some concessions to temporality and contingency, he seems to backtrack from the consequences of these admissions to promote a notion of enlightenment whereby at any given point in time we can be certain that we have attained the “highest” levels of awareness (enlightenment). I think Derrida would argue that we 1) ought never to be so presumptuous and 2) that if we were to be so presumptuous it would only impose a false destination standing in the way of the journey (which is perhaps more like the “true” destination).
Given this possible “deconstruction” of “stages” or levels, it follows that Derrida would also be very cautious and skeptical about the classification and evaluation of certain “states” of consciousness. For someone who critiqued every expression of the “metaphysics of presence” as also the “metaphysics of consciousness” I would think he would see every form of presence and/or consciousness as thoroughly divided and thereby always open to the task of deconstruction and problematics of undecidability (inviting serial recontextualizations). In sum, systems of classification, and Wilber is enamored with developmental classification schemes, are always a prime target for deconstructive analysis. However, that should not cause us to abandon them completely. We just need to look at them with more contingent and contextualized flexibility.
This flexibility referred to above should not be confused with Wilber’s flexibility evident in the admission that it does not matter how many stages we number or what we name them. Wilber’s developmental progression itself (the way in which this particular way of seeing progression is understood and valued) should remain open to recontextualization along with its particular understanding of “enlightenment.” Recontextualization differs from the process of “transcending and including” in that it is less transcendental and “essentialist.” As you transcend and include, you move toward greater “essentialization.” “Transcend and include” is a formula for creating versions of “essentialism” (or appropriation). Derrida would argue that as you “transcend” you also, necessarily, exclude (the same applies to “evolution”). And thereby transcendence is always “partial” (a “quasi-transcendence”). While this “exclusion” is a practical entailment of life (in Derrida’s view), it does not thereby need to be negatively “idealized” (negative dialectics) in the sense that whatever is excluded in any given “awareness” is thereby worthy of exclusion.
Edward Berge Says: December 9th, 2007 at 2:38 pm Gregory DesiletPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 8:32 pm Post subject: Destructive Deconstruction
In response to Gary’s question here:
Quote:
“Destructive deconstruction
“Would anyone care example a text which identifies itself as undertaking deconstruction—but which partakes in, shall we say, undue destruction, rather than engaging in Derridean delicacy?”
The list here could be quite long, but here are three that come readily to mind for me at the moment.
1) Julia Kristeva in Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection
2) Michael Ryan in Marxism and Deconstruction: A Critical Articulation
3) Pierre Schlag in Laying Down the Law (and assorted law review essays)
In the preface of Of Grammatology Spivak describes deconstruction this way:
Quote:
“The method is “reversal and displacement. It is not enough simply to neutralize the binary oppositions of metaphysics. We must recognize that, within the familiar philosophical oppositions, there is always a violent hierarchy… To deconstruct the opposition is first… to overthrow the hierarchy… But in the next phase of deconstruction, this reversal must be displaced, the winning term put under erasure. The critic must make room for the irruptive emergence of a new concept, a concept that no longer allows itself to be understood in terms of the previous regime [or system of oppositions].”
In the texts above (IMO) the deconstruction goes only as far as the reversal. In the first case Kristeva gives too much weight (and a negative weight at that) to death and all the symbols and words associated with death and decay (abjection). She does not displace the opposition life/death in any way that brings about a new regime of the tension such that death, decay, and abjection can also be understood as “life,” as life-giving.
In the second case, Ryan reverses the tension hierarchy/equality to accomplish what he views as a thorough deconstruction of hierarchy, claiming that by extrapolating from Derrida’s work “difference without hierarchy” would be an important ingredient of a “good Marxist society.” Derrida said that he could not understand how anyone could arrive at such a conclusion from his work or from a “deconstructive” process. Again, Ryan does little more than reverse an oppositional weighting.
In the third case, Schlag deconstructs the “self” as the “relatively autonomous self” as constructed by legal theorists and lawmakers. Again he reverses the weighting on self in the self/other tension, stripping the self (or the subject) of all practical agency. In my view, the net effect of his deconstructions-run-amok are destructive in the context of legal textual studies, primarily because he focuses almost exclusively on the “reversal” at the expense of the “displacement” part of the process. And this may be how deconstruction appears to become “nihilistic.” 7:17 AM

A kid has to mug up Science and its formulae the way he mugs up Sanskrit Poems

Can Indians Distinguish Between Religion and Science? from Desicritics by Sujai
When one follows discussions or debates with Indians, it appears that many educated Indians believe Religion and Science to be the same. According to them, Religion and Science are two sides of the same coin...

There is a fundamental reason why most Indians think Religion and Science are the same and that there is not much difference between the two. I think the answers lies in the way Science is taught in India.Indians are taught their lessons not through discourse, not through investigation, not through empiricism, but as a dogma, where a set of beliefs are shoved down your throat, unquestioned, just like the way a religion is taught. Indians learn their subjects by rote, by heart, and then reproduce them verbatim in their exams - word to word. It is as important to reproduce their texts in Indian education as it is in Religion.

Just look at the way History is taught in India. It is always a collection of facts, dates, and names. Nobody knows why it is important to know that the Battle of Panipat happened in 1526. There is no background, no premise, no context, and no analysis. Nobody discusses the events or writes about significance of those events. Science is taught the same way. Nobody knows why F=ma. It is so, because Newton said so. Why do we have volcanoes? It is so because the textbook said so. Why do planets revolve around the sun? The teacher says, ‘Because I said so’. Not very different from how religions treat such curious questions, saying ‘Because Bible says so’. No discussion, no debate, no explanation, no reasoning, no construction of argument, Period.

A kid has to mug up Science and its formulae the way he mugs up Sanskrit Poems. He doesn’t understand either of them. Such mugging up activities is done to pass the exam, go to the next level, and win the fist rank. A parent whose kid scores first rank is happy – he doesn’t care or bother to know if the kid really understands the subject. As far Indian education is concerned it is happy as long as the kid is a good Xerox copy machine with Terabytes of memory. They don’t need an intelligent and thinking machine.

Given such education for fifty years in this country, what you get is globetrotting, suit-wearing, English speaking, elite-educated Indians who have not imbibed the scientific or rational temperament but who can spew forth all the words and sentences useful to give one a successful job, career and lot of money.

Education in India is not to impart rational thinking or induce scientific temperament or to induce universal laws or inculcate a mature discussion capability. It is not to make law-abiding citizens or better humans. It is treated as a cumbersome but necessary exercise that one has to go through to earn more in life, get material goods, buy homes, get a good career, buy cars, travel world (nowadays), show off and feel happy about.

No wonder Indians completely lack scientific temperament, even those who attend top colleges in the world, even those who do their PhD in Physics, even those who launch rockets into space, even those who do research in medicine.

When they go back home, after finishing their ‘job’, which is done only to go the next level in social and economic hierarchy, they go back to their gods, their blind beliefs and their superstitions. They go back to the safe abode of secure irrationality where once again Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter become real. The Hanuman and the monkeys who build bridges become real. Where Shri Ram is not just real, but is hyper-real. Where Physics is not just enough, one needs meta-physics to explain things. That’s where Indians continue to find their Hinduism superior to Modern Science.

Naya at Navakriti, hope about Indian education

homeland insecurities Sunday, December 9, 2007 School Daze

We went to an orientation at Naya's school today. It is the Navakriti school, founded by the people from the famous Mirambika school, next to the also-famous IIT (which has shared research on preschool education) and NCERT, which is trying tto change Indian schools from rigid to creative. The sessions started off with meditation and a flower offering to The Mother and Aurobindo. I will confess that my first thought was that this wasn't necessarily the type of place for me or my kid and that maybe we should have stuck with a more commercial school. But then the parents were asked to line up for circle time and we had to clap our hands and sing songs like kids. I warmed up fast. When we were led down a marigold-strewn path that was decorated along the sides with children's artwork and led into the outdoor amphitheatre, I was feeling like I had bought in.

Thankfully, I relaxed and nodded in approval as educators detailed the philosophy of "integrated education", combining the child-centered learning I like about Montessori with the freedom movement of Aurobindo Society schools with the focus on nature as a way to nurture of the hippie movement with quantifiable research on how these are the most important years for a human being's intellect formation. It is hard to practice not saying "DON'T" all the time to a child but I certainly would rather embrace the "DO" and "GET DIRTY" philosophy than what I see in so much of child-rearing...

Nitin spent one day at Navkriti, while we both observed another Montessori near our house. I don't think we were really familiar with Aurobindo method at this point but we loved all the space to play (it is about an acre, which is really really rare in Delhi) and the fact that they encourage kids to play in water and get dirty. I also liked that there weren't expat parents there (sorry, I know I am one) and that I saw a little girl with a motorcycle racing t-shirt on and I gathered one of two things a) it was a hand me down from an elder brother or b) she was very firm on what she wants to wear and her mother lets it be. I liked that. (So many of these Delhi playschools have Prada on the kids AND the parents.)

Anyway after three hours of orientation today where I heard from the most articulate teachers I have ever encountered in India about why they do this, what they learn (NOT what they teach) I felt hope about Indian education for the first time since I got here. One of the parents even stood up and asked about efforts to integrate classrooms so poor children and rich children could be educated side by side -- and that the learning methods would extend to the less fortunate. Charity by volition in Delhi!! There also is a lot of art and creativity with natural substances like twigs and stones and dyes and flowers. They teach the alphabet not through drill like A is for apple but more through stories. We were just about to start looking for another school for Naya but alas she misses the cutoff yet again this year. After today, I think another year here -- if all goes as they preach -- is a blessing. Posted by S. Mitra Kalita at 10:17 PM Also: Wider Angle S.Mitra Kalita The princess predicament

Peirce’s evolutionism is the same as that of the Vedas and of Sri Aurobindo

Sri Aurobindo and Western Thought Recent Publications, SABDA NOV 2003

This comparative article written from a refreshingly unique perspective raises intriguing possibilities of a synthesis of Eastern and Western thought based on their common roots. The views expressed are the anonymous author’s own.

Sri Aurobindo is not only a leader of East Indian spirituality, but he is also a very important figure in Western thought, especially in Western Heathenism/Paganism. His mystical, or "esoteric," interpretation of the Rig Veda and ancillary writings, which considers the essence of these to be the evolution of consciousness, places him at the center of Western spirituality and thought and therefore at the center of the great tripartite supersystem formed by Vedism, Zarathushti Din (Zoroastrianism), and Western Heathenism. In old Anglo Saxon, "heathen" refers to the people of the heath, of the countryside, who were nature-worshipping folk; in Latin, "pagoni" means people of the hills, the unurbanized, nature-connected folk. Today, the authentic heathen movement is called "Odinism" (after Odin, the Norse-Germanic God) or "Asatru" (true, or loyal, to the Aesir, the collective Norse-Germanic gods).
The geographic origin of the Indo-European people is unknown, but it is known that they divided into three main migratory groups: one went into India and produced the Vedic literature, another went to what became Persia and elaborated Zarathushti Din, and the third ventured westward and diversified into the various European ethnic groups (Slavs, Scandinavians, Germans, Kelts, Mediterraneans, etc.). Interestingly, recent molecular genetic studies have shown that East Indian Brahmins have significant genetic similarity with the European folk, and this finding substantiates the intimate connection among the Indo-European
religions. Indo-European spirituality developed in parallel in all three geographic areas, and was based upon the same Idea of Evolution: the evolution of Universal Consciousness, biological evolution of life, and personal development towards the realization of one’s soul, of the divine within. The progress of Indo-European spirituality was temporarily interrupted by the interjection of an alien and antithetical creed, Judeo-Christianity, but Heathenism is the essence of the souls and the minds of the Indo-European folk, and today it is recovering and resurgent. This event is making Sri Aurobindo ever more relevant and important, since a study of his thought reveals that his philosophy has strong similarities to Western Heathen philosophy: This is because both systems are based upon the Vedas, upon the Vedic Idea that the evolution of consciousness is the main universal, cosmic, and human dynamic. Consideration of a few common ideas and themes demonstrates this identity.
First, the basis of Sri Aurobindo’s thought (which was partly derived from the Rig Veda) is Evolution: The Universal Self is Consciousness itself, and this Oneness, this "spirit-energy," realizes itself or evolves itself through the evolution of the cosmic or physical order and through the human order wherein individuals strive to raise their consciousness to the supernal within their souls - to the Godhead, to the Universal Self.
To Sri Aurobindo, Involution (descent) and Evolution (ascent) occur simultaneously and cooperatively; generally, this action produces an upward spiral as there is steady improvement and increasing complexity resulting from the spiritualization and divinization of the cosmos and of life. To Sri Aurobindo, Reality is the evolution of consciousness; at the human level, this involves the ascension of consciousness from the "self" (the isolated, individual ego) to the "Self" (the Universal Self) in a process of ensoulment. In this process, aspirants (Agni) try their utmost to Become, to know and to participate in the spiritual Being, i.e., to attain true Being. Heathenism teaches the same system. In Norse mythology, the initial state is Ginnungagap, an emptiness, a void (non-Being), a potential from which spontaneously come Fire and Ice (cosmic complementary opposites, heat and cold, energy-action and matter-substance), and from the interplay of these, comes the world, the Midgard of the Vikings. The existence of this cosmos is punctuated by a series of cataclysms called "Ragnarok," or the Sri Aurobindo and Western Thought Recent molecular genetic studies have shown that East Indian Brahmins have significant genetic similarity with the European folk.
The resurgence of Heathenism is making Sri Aurobindo ever more relevant in the West. Twilight of the Gods; these are evolutionary nodes since they mark the end of one cycle or era of upward development and the beginning of a new, improved, higher phase. This, the key myth in Heathenism, depicts the death of one group of gods (which signify the ideas and ways that support a given level of civilization) and the end of their world, and the birth of a succeeding group of gods, of a new, better world. One order of gods dies, but it is replaced by its progeny gods on the Field of Gimli, and evolution proceeds: death is ever followed by rebirth, or regeneration, and this is the action of evolution.
This point is discussed by Hans F.K. Gunther in Religious Attitudes of the Indo-Europeans (reprint, London: Craig Press: 1968).
Second, mysticism is the essential factor, or mode in both Vedic and Western Heathen practice and experience and in Sri Aurobindo’s praxis. Briefly, mysticism is the direct, unmediated, intimate knowing and experiencing of the Godhead, the Universal Self, the Universal Truth. For Vedism and for Heathenism, it is the means by which the aspirant develops and transforms his consciousness so as to attain the final step to the Supermind which is the mystic state in which the Godhead is apprehended and entered, in which "mystic union" is realized.
According to both Sri Aurobindo and to Heathen thinkers, this mystical process occurs because the divine is transcendent (Involution) and immanent (Evolution); because the divine is immanent it is within, it is at the core of one’s self – the self has within it the Self (in its soul).
In the Vedic terms used by Sri Aurobindo, "Atman is Brahman," the self is the Self (and vice-versa), and likewise in Heathen terms, "God is within." In its slow revival beginning just before the Middle Ages in Europe, Heathenism expressed itself through mysticism: In the Judeo-Christian Church, cryptoheathens acted as mystics, and in the modern era, heathens have appeared as nature mystics, such as JohnRichard Jefferies.
An informed reading of the Western Mystics’ writings discloses that their soul-impulsions and ideas were the same as those of the Vedic rishis who later so inspired Sri Aurobindo. For example, Heathen Mystic MeisterEckhart (1260-1328?) wrote: "The Father [Sat] looked at the Son [Chit] and laughed [Ananda], the Son looked at the Father and laughed, and together their laughter was the Holy Spirit." This expresses the Vedic idea of the joy in and of Being, of Ananda as the main cause and true character of Becoming [Chit] and of Being [Sat], as the essence of the world.
In the last 50 years, a number of books have appeared which trace and document the connection - the identity - between Vedic spiritualism and Western Mysticism; thus, there is an increasing awareness of the great continuity of Indo-European spirituality which extends from Vedic India to the modern age – and to the future. One such book is Hindu Thought and Carmelite Mysticism by Swami Siddheswarananda [Translated by William Buchanan (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Pvt. Ltd., 1998, 172 pp.)].
Third, the Vedic sacrifice is reiterated in Indo-European mythology. The sacrifice involves the giving up of all of the smaller self (the lesser consciousness, ignorance) to earn the greater Self (true knowledge, the higher consciousness, divine realization). In effect, it is the giving of self to Self, of the One giving Itself to Itself. The Indo-European version tells of Odin, the god of intelligence (of consciousness), hanging from a tree for nine days and nights in a giving of "Myself to Myself" to win the knowledge of the Runes (the mystic symbols/diagrams knowledge of which enables, or empowers, the aspirant to know ity, the Truth, the Godhead, or in Vedic words, the Universal Self).

Fourth, Sri Aurobindo has commented extensively on the Purusha-Prakriti duality whose interaction sustains the cosmos. In the One, Purusha is the male, the soul aspect, and Prakriti is the female, the nature aspect: Purusha realizes or embodies itself through Prakriti, and this action, this dynamic unity of Soul and Nature, is the world in the process of evolving. The Norse pantheon reflects this idea because all the chief male gods have a female counterpart, that is, male and female are considered to be two different aspects of the same action/entity: Odin/Frigga [Chit], Thor/Sif [Sat], and Frey/Freya [Ananda]. The first pair are man and wife and the last are brother and sister, and thus fully represent the malefemale relationships.
A number of books have appeared which trace and document the connection between Vedic spiritualism and Western Mysticism; thus, there is an increasing awareness of the great continuity of Indo-European spirituality which extends from Vedic India to the modern age.
Fifth, the tripartite scheme so prominent in the Vedas and in Sri Aurobindo’s system, is equally prominent in Heathenism. This point is demonstrated by the Frenchman, Georges Dumezil, who wrote a number of major studies showing that the same tripartite idea is the basis of Vedism, Zarathushti Din, and Western Heathenism.
Dumezil’s work may be the first to suggest that Vedism, Zarathushti Din, and Western Heathenism form a huge unified spiritual supersystem.

Sixth, modern Western philosophy, all of whose worthwhile thinkers were or are Heathens, with exactitude recreates and restates Vedic philosophy, as does the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo. One example is Max Stirner (Caspar Schmidt) whose classic, The Ego [the self] and Its Own [the Self], is a Vedic paraphrase: Its theme is that true and progressive living (which promotes general cosmic evolution) requires one to discover and act according to his inner self, and this is a repeat of the Vedic theme that to satisfy dharma, the outer person (self) must act in accordance with the inner person (Self). Some other Western philosophers who share the evolutionist viewpoint of the Vedas and of Sri Aurobindo are F.W. Nietzsche, Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced "purse"), Duren J.H. Ward, and Martin Heidegger.
Peirce, a practising experimental scientist and a philosopher of logic and science, restated and extended Vedic evolutionary ideas in modern rational scientific terms. Consider this synopsis by scientist Francis Abbott: Peirce begins with absolute or pure potentiality [the One, Brahman], with absolute Chance, or negation of all law, even logical, to evolve at last Absolute Being [Atman] and Absolute Law... [Francis Abbott Diary, February 13, 1886, quoted in Charles Sanders Peirce: A Life by Joseph Brent (Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1993, 1998, p.177)].
Writing in The Monist, January, 1893, Peirce elaborated: Like some of the most ancient and some of the most recent speculations it would be a Cosmogenic Philosophy. It would suppose that in the beginning, – infinitely remote, – there was a chaos of unpersonalized feeling [impersonal Brahman], which being without connection or regularity would properly be without existence [non-Being].

This feeling, sporting here and there in pure arbitrariness, would have started the germ of a generalizing tendency. Its other sportings would be evanescent, but this would have a growing virtue [evolution]. Thus, the tendency to habit would be started; and from this with the other principles of evolution all the regularities of the universe would be evolved [Brent, ibid., p.207, brackets added].

Peirce’s evolutionism is the same as that of the Vedas and of Sri Aurobindo: I have begun by showing that tychism [from astronomer Tycho Brahe] must give birth to an evolutionary cosmology, in which all the regularities of nature and of mind are regarded as products of growth, and to a [Frederich von] Schelling-fashioned idealism which holds matter to be a mere specialized and partially deadened mind [condensed Consciousness] [Brent, ibid., p.209, first and third brackets added, second original].
Peirce’s tripartite scheme of Reality, explained in the issue of The Monist cited above, is that of the Vedas, too: First is the conception of being or existing independent of anything else [Sat]. Second is the conception of being relative to, the conception of reaction with, something else [Chit, active consciousness].

Third is the conception of mediation, whereby a first and a second are brought into relation [Ananda, the joyful realization of Being]...[Brent, ibid., p. 207, brackets added].
Lastly, Sri Aurobindo’s integral approach is echoed in the "holistic" approach of the more advanced forms of Heathenism: the transcendent is immanent, the spirit-energy is innate, inherent, in everything, Consciousness is the source and the essence of All, hence all of Reality is
integrated.
It is evident that in principle Sri Aurobindo’s Vedic-derived system has strong parallels to the other major Indo- European spiritual and philosophical systems – Zarathushti Din and Western Heathenism/Paganism. Sri Aurobindo is gaining in importance because Western Heathenism, for centuries suppressed by Judeo-Christianity, has recovered and is growing and enriching itself once again, and is destined to exercise dominant power among Indo-Europeans. Western Heathens are increasingly cognizant of Sri Aurobindo, and thus he is a central factor in the development and in the success of this great movement and in the emergence of the tripartite spiritual supersystem – Vedism/Zarathushti Din/Western Heathenism. — anonymous