TIDBIT: OH THE WONDERFUL YAHWISMS
September 13, 2012 / /
Well, just in case you thought power-and-religion-crazed ayotollahs in Tehran were about as nutty as you could get, there is always someone in one of the other two of the Three Great Yahwisms to remind us that they, too, can be equally nutty:
I am reminded of the words of Palpatine a.k.a. Darth Sidious in the first of the Star Wars movies, when he tells his minion, "Wipe them out.... all of them."
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The religion crazed clerics in Egypt have moved well beyond “nutty” in this story regarding Egyptian cleric Abd Al-Rahman who recently explained on Al-Nas television how a man is permitted to beat his wife.
“A good woman, even if beaten by her husband, puts her hand in his and says: ‘I will not rest until you are pleased with me.’ This is how the Prophet Muhammad taught his women to be. Islam instructs a man to beat his wife as a last resort before divorce, so that she will mend her ways, treat him with kindness and respect, and know that her husband has a higher status than her,” he said.
September 4, 2012,
http://www.timesofisrael.com/egyptian-cleric-advises-men-beat-your-wife-so-she-will-mend-her-ways/
Dogs that are treated like that will only learn how to
crawl over to you, belly and tail on the floor, ears
pressed all the way back with eyes hooded into a
squinting fold…an alpha thing.
Good thing most women know the whole alphabet
and dog trainers can spell.
Our family can attest to what you wrote is true. We finally ‘convinced’ a stray dog to trust us. She must have been horribly abused before showing up hungry and afraid. She is a Corgi, a wonderful dog who is very intelligent and is a much loved addition to the family.
Not fond of “dog & pony shows,” but I love dogs and horses.
They are both very special to humankind.
Thank you for that
Of course we can recognize Satan because it is some Other. Outside of our group– the ethnically, morally, religiously, and politically pure. We are the unapologetic members of the cowardly old world, content to send the offspring of the peasants to do our fighting for us. A world where our lessers know their place.
“Inverted spirituality” is a charged levelled at those who do not conform to the pyramid-shaped organizations of religious traditionalists. Free thinkers are by definition people who question claims of exclusive truths, who sometimes do attempt to resolve the dilemma by syncretism.
It is true that we outside approved traditional paths are trying to figure out how to link “the individual spiritual Path to the supposed spiritual evolution of the collective.” This neither ipso facto proof of any serpentine egoism nor of any denial of traditional religion. The hierarchies (bureaucrats) have had two millenia to demonstrate their transcendent prowess. The record is mixed at best; claiming moral authority for condemning those of us who’ve chosen other routes is laughable.
There is a history to this argument. It comes out of a deep suspicion of modernity, which IMHO has much to criticize. The problem often is resolved by falling into a deep relativism– giving equal weight to all truth claims, like many well-meaning liberals do. Taken far enough, then there are no ultimate values held in common or any way to decide among conflicts.
This phenomenon of severe discomfort with uncertainty and ambiguity continues. Thus others retreat to the seeming safety of ultraconservative religion. The latter was chosen by two well-known Perennialists: Julius Evola, although never a member of the Fascist Party, nevertheless found much in common with them. Rene Guenon finally became a Muslim.
The pattern is exemplified by the totally inflexible and One Way (his Orthodoxy) interpretations of Fr. Seraphim Rose. As if an approach already considered reactionary in the era of the tsars is at all applicable in the US or any other country that defends difference. Rather the same with the oft-repeated 19th century Roman Catholic idea that “error has no rights.”
Sorry. Meant to post this as an answer to the post immediately below. As a rebuttal to the Upton book blurb, with which I am Upset.
Evola was a renegade who broke with the perennialists and formed views opposed to them. He was much more a Romantic than a perennialist although he appropriated some of their ideas.
Syncretism is a hodge podge of elements put together–it is not a true synthesis. Madame Blavatsky is a good example of a syncretist.
Sprituality Inverted has nothing to do with bureaucracies or exoteric religious orgranizations . The confusion of the psychic with spiritual, however, has a lot to do with it. The Jung cult would be one example of it, or any of the plethora of New Age spiritualities. Any place where supra-human influences are replaced by infra-human influences would count. So Christmas becoming an ode to consumerism would also constitute an example on inverted Spirituality.
Idolatry in general fits here whether it be idolatry of the ego, or a particular ideological idea that is worshipped. Marxism is inverted spirituality. It’s an idolatry of the proletariat.
Meaningless ambiguity replaces meaningful mystery–that’s an example of inverted spirituality.
I agree with much of what you say– there IS a great deal of confusion regarding the differences. And I find much of New Age syncretism to be sentimental, undisciplined, and poorly thought out. But the lack of clarity is not a modern or postmodern or New Age phenomenon. Western Christianity neglected an adequate theology of the Holy Spirit, thus never produced a clear definition of “spiritual’ practices.
Following this, it was all too easy over the last century for misunderstandings to multiply. What is at the level of the soul/psyche or psychological categories IS something quite different from Spiritus/Pneuma sensu strictu– the realm of the Transcendent. Add to that a traditional suspicion among Protestants regarding mysticism, which they see as escapist or too personal. Now also the conservative evangelicals, who consider liturgical practices to be superstitious rites, and who dismiss Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions as irrelevant to their version of Biblical truths.
I disagree totally about Jung. Over 45+ years as an adult, I’ve managed to read just about everything he wrote. As well as the mythology, alchemy, and Hermeticism on which he drew. Sure, he wasn’t always consistant. But he was trying to present in scientific form the deepest aspects of the human mind. He was very clear that he was dealing with psyche/psychological. Instead of the facile charge that he “psychologized religion,” I think the reverse is true. That in the end he served to spiritualize psychology; in the center of human experience he found an orientation towards deity. Late in life, when asked if he believed in God, he replied that he didn’t just “believe,’ he KNEW.
As for “meaningless’ ambiguity… there is no escape from uncertainty and ambiguity unless absolute conformity to doctrine is required. Which simply keeps any uncertainy from being expressed, but does not end it. Arguing from revelation may satisfy those within a religious denomination, but those outside are under no obligation to believe a source that is self-referential. Even from within, say Catholic or Orthodox, there is a greal deal of variation. And not just in the contemporary world, but throughout history. That leaves only the practitioner’s own life as evidence of something extraordinary and exemplary.
I have to respectfully disagree about your assessment of Jung. Jung’s primacy of the Unconscious wherein consciousness arises out of the unconscious inverts the traditional relationship between the conscious and unconscious.
In Jung’s theory, the Collective Unconscious in its mass subjectivity stands in for the objectivity of the metaphysical order. As Jung himself said “The object of psychology is the psychic; unfortunately it is also its subject.”
The above amounts to the denial of the transcendent. As Charles Upton has stated “Thus Jungianism, or all its metaphysical or mythopoetic quality, ultimately ends in simple atheism, just as Freud’s psychology did. God is not a supreme being but merely a universal story…”
It’s hard to determine exactly what Jung believed as he contradicted himself many times over his lifetime; and the legacy has been much incoherence in his theory–which many have observed.
That’s ‘psyche’ Greg.
“Contradiction” is also known as ….
Changing your mind……….
and SHOULD happen a lot as one
gets older and wiser through
learning. education and experience.
Aside;
It is consciousness subconsciousness and
unconciousness….
conscious, subconcious and unconcious
Any capitalization should be part of
personal identification.
[for clarification and number preservation]
Just because some apparenly rather conservative theist like Upton (whom I believe I’ve refuted anyhow) asserts Freud and Jung end in atheism doesn’t mean they do. For one thing, read the Jungian analysts and check out those of us who actually read Jung in detail. God-terms abound. If the objection is, like Upton’s, that Jung’s approach leads not to “God… but a universal story,” that’s deliberate distortion. Or simply rejection of any interpretation of God that isn’t exactly like the author’s. Which would explain the quotation of someone like Fr. Seraphim Rose.
Besides, the Collective Unconscious is neither the same as the individual psyche nor the same as transcendent deity. It can be thought of as a level between them. It is archetypal; the level of Mind , consciousness. Personified by humans as the old mythological symbols. Which would be in Christian terminology something like the ranks of angels and possibly the the functions of the saints. In the philosophical language of neo-Platonists, Pythagoreans, and Eastern Orthodox Christians, it is the level of Nous. The Orthodox, noting the biblical phrase “born in the likeless and image of God,” differentiate between between them. Someone is born with image, but acquires likeness. Has soul, develops mind; the full process ends in theosis (deification.)
So then in the inadequate English, the words are: body, soul, mind and spirit. In western theology, as I said, the terms are not clear, which is how “spiritual” becomes confused with soul. Mind isn’t considered much at all by western theologians. In kabbalah, these levels are the 4 worlds, each with its own Tree if Life. Assiyah, Yetzirah, Briah, Atziluth. The Greek terms are: Soma, Psyche, Nous, and Pneuma.
Upton’s argument seems to boil down to an attempt to locate all the traditional theisms, the conservative Perennialists, and anyone with objections to modernity on the same side. Thus an alliance against whatever they don’t consider passes their blue blood litmus test. But plenty of people who are within traditional religions will not agree. Nor will they refuse to engage with those in other belief systems. Let alone use the ugly tactic of shutting down all communication by accusing those they don’t like of being either in the camp of the Anti-Christ or of Satan.
The final irony is that all the shrill denunciations of modernity are about something now a century past. As European historians note, the optimistic belief that rationality and science would solve all human problems died in the trenches of WWI. The Enlightenment and its assumptions is over. What followed after WWII is postmodernity. The first of which was deconstruction, which demolished the idea of objectivity, which turned out to be the assumptions about “truth”by upper class European men. Since Einstein, we live in a world of relativity, where the observer is part of whatever is being observed. Theologians are well aware that arguments by assertion no longer work. That learning to handle the feelings of ambiguity and uncertainty are part of engaging the world. Rather than abandoning it becase it doesn’t fit your own pre-determined categories.
Mind is contained within the body
and is a distraction from the three.
Just like:
Which of these words doesn’t belong?
a) solid
b) liquid
c) gas
d) plasma
The answer is “plasma.”
It is subatomic, charged particles,
while the first three are the states & statis of
ordinary matter. [a dtstraction]
RaPhi, I very much agree with you regarding Jung. That quote was from Memories Dreams Reflections, a book I loved. After that I bought as many of his books as I could get and read through a lot. His small book on Job was brilliant. I also could not resist his Red Book with his writings And amazing mandalas. For me this man was brilliant in his field.
my question: is satanism just another yahwehist religion?
Grasshoppers,
Two swans, the lower and higher self, swim in the lake of the mind filled with the ever-blooming lotus, from which they drink nectar. Wen the two swans are in communication, then all forms of arts and sciences within the realm of imagination and possibility manifest. Depending on the capacity of the lower self, a fraction of that knowledge is known; the rest is in the vast field of the Kundalini shakti. The two swans are always together. When the lower self comes to know this, it gains discrimination and can understand its mind and how it is colored by prejudices and preoccupations, how it is entangled by self-generated likes and dislikes, and how it can free itself.
btw, has anyone seen the new 3 Stooges movie? I laughed so hard I had tears coming out of my eyes. Try to watch it with some young kids who are unfamiliar with the 3 stooges of old. You’ll die laughing.
I thought you couldn’t think [free]
while I was actively posting (?)
See that?
You’re like the little engine that could
This idea was sparked by Hal Hichler’s comment:
“my question: is satanism just another yahwehist religion?”
Would it not be something if Yahweh turned out to actually be Satan?
According to the bible, there are parallels: both were here on earth (supposedly); both were/are able to command large numbers of people; both used tools of many kinds to manipulate people, with particular emphasis on the unpleasant variety; both deputized followers who were hung up on power over others (and were therefore easy to manipulate themselves); both apparently showed a propensity for reinventing themselves (disguises), both were hell-bent(!) on ruling the earth; both brooked no competition for the position of top dog and usurped as much power as they could; both loved murder and mayhem and saw them as the road to power; both were called the ‘God of this Earth’.
Would it not be remarkable if the whole concept of religion as we know it has been stage-managed throughout the past few millenia by this one individual?
Very good Diana.
Very good indeed.
BUT
Why would it be so remarkable?
Not only does it make a lot of sense
based on the facts, but Anne Rice
wrote a novel in which Lucifer
recounts his rebellion because of the
cruelty of ‘god.’
The only one of hers I ever read as I don’t
like vampire tales because those that
rule the world love blood and have steered the
public to such horror as there are too many secrets
outed in good SciFi.
For deep metaphysical and theological analyses of how this rapidly dissolving world has come to be, I recommend two recently published books, each in itself a tour de force:
1. Charles Upton’s “Vectors of the Counter-Initiation: The Course and Destiny of Inverted Spirituality.”
2. Brad S Gregory’s “The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society.”
An excerpt from the Amazon description of Upton’s book is worth quoting:
“…The author expands on this concept, recognizing the action of the Counter-Initiation in such areas as the politicizing of the interfaith movement, the anti-human tendencies in the environmental movement, the growing interest in magic and sorcery, the involvement of the intelligence communities in the fields of UFO investigation and psychedelic research, the history of Templarism and Freemasonry, and the de-Islamicization of the famous Sufi poet, Jalaluddin Rumi. Vectors of the Counter-Initiation is conceived of as a sequel to The System of Antichrist: Truth and Falsehood in Postmodernism and the New Age [Sophia Perennis, 2001]. The Counter-Initiation has six main features: syncretism; inverted hierarchy; deviated esoterism; the granting of the temporal transmission of spiritual lore precedence over the vertical descent of Revelation; the reduction of religion to utilitarianism (magic) and esoterism to a purely technical knowledge (Promethean spirituality); and the mis-application of the norms of the individual spiritual Path to the supposed spiritual evolution of the collective. The Counter-Initiation is the ego’s idea of spirituality. It appears in the Old Testament as the Serpent in the garden, Cain’s murder of Abel, the “sons of God who looked upon the daughters of men and found them fair,” the Tower of Babel, the degeneration of Sodom, and the magicians of Pharaoh whom Moses defeated. In the New Testament it is personified by Judas, and in the Qur’an by the figure of as-Samiri, who forged the Golden Calf, and the angels Harut and Marut-testers of man by God’s design-who taught magic to the human race in Babylon. For both traditions, it is destined to culminate in Antichrist. This book brings together two schools of thought: the Traditionalists or Perennialists (writers on comparative religion and traditional metaphysics) and the conspiracy theorists who are investigating the origin, nature, and plans of the New World Order. The NWO researchers can throw a penetrating light on the social and political dangers presently threatening the Perennialists, while the Perennialists can provide these researchers with a deeper and wider spiritual context for their vision of human evil. In Guénon’s time the Counter-Initiation appeared in terms of this or that secret society operating in the shadowy underworld of European occultism; it has now come up into the open, and moved inexorably toward the centers of global power. In the words of American Eastern Orthodox priest Seraphim Rose, “in our time Satan has walked naked into human history.”
The comment section is equally scary. these Yahweists are crazed and suicidal.
Boy, that picture of the Rabbi in the article looks an awful like lot the picture my mother keeps on her mantle and claims to be my father. I’ve never met him. My mother was an airline stewardess on the NY to Tel Aviv flight for Continental many years ago.
I agree with your observations regarding the comments section! I was about to post something similar yesterday before my comp crashed 🙁
I was raised a Christian but saw through it long, long before I ever discovered the works of Dr Farrell et al. I can’t help but think why these people cannot see what I see – surely if I can they can. Their devotion to these systems beggars belief in my opinion!
The eye is the mechanism whereby the brain
perceives and ‘you’ “see.”
All are different even at birth,
from many factors and variables.
I too, have often forgotten that.
True, Hal
I too constantly need to keep reminding myself of such Psychological phenomenon lol..
Perhaps we are just smarter than they all are 😉
Well, insanity may be somewhat cunning,
but eventually shows itself as very stoopid.
And we have to remember that this is part
of anatomy, not just of the psyche….
and that the eye sees upside down and the
brain ‘flips’ it.
on a side note, Carl Munck recently claimed aliens abducted him, showed him the code, wiped his memory of it and his grand daughters who witnessed it were afraid to speak of it.
Its over on red ice radio.
🙁
I just think that when war-drums are beaten to a pulp one must first read General Smedly Butler’s “War is a Racket” for the definitive source/cause of war-
“if my sons didn’t want war there wouldn’t be any”- attributed to Gutle Schnaper, wife and mother of the 4 sons of Amschel Mayer Bauer, a.k.a Rothschild
they be serving up some evil from the tree……Gestapos little wooden Pinocchio’s’.
So brazen because
THEY are finally coming to terms
with the fact that THEY have nothing to lose
……because THEY know
[have known all along]
that NO / THING was ever THEIRS
to lose in the FIRST place.