God (Part 3): As Self-evolution of Consciousness

[SIZE="4"]I've chosen these individuals to quote for their interest in a "self" quite different from the personality self, or the ego self, or the mind-body self. Not all the individuals quoted were union/samadhi practitioners, some I chose because they seemed to have an intuitive sense of the oneness realm. But it's accurate to say most of them did practice, and in fact, were devoted monastics as well.

Take note of the span of times and cultures represented, and the fact that people approach practice a variety of ways. Some prefer a more yogic approach, and so represent their experience non-theistically. Others (by far the favorite way) represent their experience devotionally, as though in a loving relationship with the vast mind they claim they are experiencing.

Some call it samadhi meditation, others (in the West) call it union prayer or prayer of the heart. Notice how often "heart" and "soul" and other such "inner" terms show up, everyone knows the way to union begins inside oneself.

Finally, notice how little of what is said makes any sense to our normal way of viewing reality, such as the great union practitioner Kabir's remark about God being the breath inside the breath. Maybe it will be easier to understand why the sense-mind translation refers to such utterances as "mystical." Yet from Kabir's perspective, it wasn't "mystical"; he was merely describing what he was experiencing first hand. It is only mystifying if one can't see and feel the realm he is observing.


Quotes

"Student, tell me, what is God? He is the breath inside the breath." Kabir, 1488-1512, India

" . . . all merge in No-Thing. This heaven is so vast no message can stain it. How may a snowflake exist in a raging fire?" Kakuan, 12th century A.D., China

"[the soul achieves] union with Him who is above all knowledge . . . . Our thought is restrained in proportion to the height of our ascent; but when our ascent is accomplished, thought will cease altogether and be absorbed into the ineffable." Dionysius the Areopagite, 5th century A.D., Syria

"Thou commands me to love my neighbor [but] . . . I [cannot] admit anything else to be mingled with Thee . . . . My me is God, nor do I know my selfhood, save in Him!" Catherine of Genoa, 1447-1510, Italy

"Farid, why wander from jungle to jungle, breaking the thorny branches in search of the Lord? In my heart and not in the jungle does my Lord reside." Sheikh Farid, 1173-1265, Pakistan

". . . between us and God this unity forever ceaselessly renews itself; for the spirit of God, outflowing and indrawing, touches and stirs our spirit . . ." Ruysbroeck, 1293-1381, Flanders

"Self of my Self, for Thou are but I, Self of my Self, for I am Thou, The two of us in one shall never die, What do they matter-the why and how?" Lalleswari, 14th century A.D., India

"And I say that if this prayer is the union of all the faculties, the soul is unable to communicate its joy even though it may desire to do so-I mean while being in the prayer. And if it were able, then this wouldn't be union. How this prayer they call union comes about and what it is . . . . we already know since it means that two separate things become one. . . . While the soul is seeking God in this way, it feels with the most marvelous and gentlest delight that everything is almost fading away through a kind of swoon in which breathing and all the bodily energies gradually fail." Teresa of Avila, Spain 16th century A.D., writing in Life.

"The eyes of my soul were opened, and I beheld the plenitude of God, whereby I did comprehend the whole world, both here and beyond the sea . . . so that through excess of marveling the soul cried with a loud voice, saying, 'This whole world is full of God!' Wherefore did I now comprehend that the world is but a small thing . . ." Angela of Foligno, 13th century A. D., Italy

"The Eternal Light indwells in the human mind, and the human mindis the emanation of that Light, and our five senses are the Light's disciples." Nanak, 1469-1539, India

"See purest Being itself, if you can . . . for it is no way composite, but is most simple . . . it has no diversity, for it is One in the highest degree." Bonaventura, 1221-1274, Italy

" . . . behold Him . . . with the infinite outstretched arms of thy soul . . . See how, by gazing on this mirror, there springs up speedily . . . an intense inward jubilee . . . . a joy . . . which pours itself with might through heart and soul." Suso, 1295-1365, Germany

"By this seed, grace . . . we understand a spiritual, heavenly, invisible principle . . . [that] is in all men as a seed which of its own nature draws, invites and inclines to God." Robert Barclay, 1648-1690, Scotland

A person, blind since birth, is unable to see the sun, the moon and the stars. That does not mean that they are not shining in the sky. Similarly, whether one believes or not, I say it with firm conviction that there is a Divine Light dwelling in the center of our heart . . . That very light is the soul-pure, changeless and eternal." Muktananda, 1908-1983, India

"A humble knowledge of thyself is a surer way to God than a deep search after learning . . . . [God's] words are spiritual and cannot be comprehended fully by man's intelligence . . . [they are] to be heard in silence, with great humility and reverence, with great inward affection of the heart and in great rest and quiet of body and soul." Thomas ? Kempis, 1380-1471, Germany

"He who knows one thing, knows all things; and he who knows all things, knows one thing." Mahavira, 599-527 B.C., India

"The heavenly Father utters a Word and utters it eternally; and in that Word he expends all his power, expressing his divine nature and all creatures. That Word lies hidden in the soul, so that man neither knows nor hears it-unless good tidings reach the center of hearing-otherwise it will not be heard of. To hear it, all voices and sounds must die away and there must be pure quiet-perfect stillness." Meister Eckhart, 1260-1328, Germany

"Whither need I go to seek holiness? I am happy here within myself at home. My heart is no longer a pilgrim; it has become tied down to itself." Ramananda, 1340-1430, India

"The soul learns that there is no necessity to look for her Beloved outside her own being, and that she can find Him within herself, as on His own throne and in His tabernacle." Mother Cabrini, 1850-1917, Italy

"I confess, then, to speak foolishly that the Word has visited me-indeed very often. But, though He has frequently come into my soul, I have never at any time been aware of the moment of His coming . . . You will ask then how, since His track is thus traceless, I could know that He is present? Because He is living and full of energy." Bernard, 1091-1153, England

There is not here, no there, infinity is before our eyes . . . . The infinitely small is as large as the infinitely great, for limits are non-existent." Sengtsan, ?-606 A.D., China

"So if man loves through and wants to guard his heart . . . [he] can pay heed to his heart, make progress towards the innermost, and draw nearer to God." Mark the Ascetic, 4th century A.D., Egypt

"This mind is not the Buddha-[intellectual] learning is not the Way." Nansen, 9th century A.D., China

". . . my soul has always beheld this Light; and in it my soul soars to the summit of the firmament and into a different air . . . the brightness which I see is not limited by space and is more brilliant than the radiance round the sun. . . . . sometimes when I see it . . . I seem a simple girl again, and an old woman no more!" Hildegarde, 1098-1179, Germany

"The soul gazes upon Truth without any veils of creatures [mentality and senses]-not in a mirror darkly, but in its pure simplicity." Hugh of St. Victor, 1096-1141, Flanders

"He who knows others is learned; He who knows himself is wise . . . . He who does not lose his center endures, He who dies yet remains has long life. Laotse, c. 6th century B.C, China

". . . to pray means to cling to God, and to cling to God means to loose oneself from all substance, as if the soul left the body. . . . A man's soul will teach him, there is no man who is not incessantly being taught by his soul . . ." Pinhas of Koretz, 18th Century, Poland

" . . . my mind is never detached from God." Brigit of Kildare, 453-525, Ireland

"The end of all our perfection is thus so to act that the soul, stripping itself daily of all earthly and carnal inclinations, lifts itself up without ceasing more and more towards spiritual things; that so all its works and thoughts, and all the movements of the heart, may become nothing else but a continuous act of prayer." Cassian, 4th century A.D., Egypt

"I realized very clearly that happiness has nothing to do with material things which surround us; it dwells in the very depths of the soul." Therese of Lisieux, 1873-1897, France

"So long as you pay attention only to bodily posture proper for prayer and your mind cares only for the external beauty of the tabernacle, know that you have not yet seen the place of prayer, and its blessed way is still far from you. When . . . you are above all other joy, know that you have truly attained prayer." Nilus of Sinai, c. 360-450, Sinai

"Yea! This is that celestial virtue whereby all earthly and transitory things are trodden under foot and whereby every hindrance is removed from the soul that she may be freely conjoined with the eternal god." Francis of Assisi, 1182-1226, Italy

"The [practice of] the presence of God is an application of our soul to God, or a remembrance of God present . . . in the depth and center of the soul . . . the soul speaks to God heart to heart, and always in a great and profound peace that the soul enjoys in God." Brother Lawrence, 1611-1691, France

"I take refuge in that One who is the adamantine Life of all beings, transcendental, immaculate, causeless, and infinite . . . . by removing the mist we see the Light: and we find the inexhaustible Treasury open to all to enjoy, shining forth ever more fresh day by day." Kukai (Kobo daishi), 774-835, Japan

"When [in inner prayer] both thy intellect and will are quiet and passive . . . [and when] the outward senses and the imagination [are] locked up by holy abstraction, then the eternal Hearing, Seeing, and Speaking will be revealed in thee." Jakob Boehme, 1575-1624, Germany

"A man whose mind cleaves to God with love holds as naught all visible things, even his own body, as though it were not his . . . When, urged by love, the mind sours to God, it has no sensation either of itself or of anything existing. Illumined by the limitless divine light, it is insensible to all the created . . . As the physical eye is attracted by the beauty of visible things, so is a pure mind by knowledge of the invisible." Maximus, -662 A.D., Constantinople

"In the breeze I sought the divine fragrance, in the blooming garden I looked for the vision. But only in the meditations of my heart was the Path revealed." Sarmad, 17th century A.D., India

"If you do not pray to God, what is that to Him? It is only your misfortune. . . .
Even the injunctions of destiny are canceled if one takes refuge in God. Destiny strikes off with her own hands what she has written about such a person." Sri Sarada Devi, 1853-1920, India

"And the divine light precipitates itself like a flood upon the soul, and it is blinded by its radiance." Philo Judaeus, c. 15 B.C.-50 A.D., Alexandria

"Concentration [in inner experience] is holding the mind within a center of spiritual consciousness . . . one achieves samadhi . . . Perfection is attained when the mind becomes as pure as the [soul] itself." Patanjali, 1st Century A.D. ?, India

" . . . my soul has dwelt in her [the soul's] center, which is God . . . and the soul never ceases to be united to God. Even the immensities of God in no way divert her; but without stopping at them, she remains attached to God in her simplicity." Marie Guyard (de l'Incarnation), 1599-1672, France

"Everyone can attain Knowledge. There are two entities: . . . the individual soul . . . and the Supreme Soul. Through prayer all individual souls can be united to the Supreme Soul." Ramakrishna, 1836-1886, India

". . . [all good and humble men can] commune with themselves in their inmost hearts [and thus] return to the Source from which we sprang." Tauler, c. 1300-1361, Germany

"When you turn back and look into your mind, meditate without wavering thoughts . . . and try to practice without practicing." Milarepa, 12th century A.D., Tibet

"When a man contemplates inwardly the eternal light, the mind is pure, and has in it no sensuous images, but, being wholly immersed in the contemplation of uncreated beauty, forgets everything sensuous and does not wish to see even itself." Seraphim, 1759-1833, Russia

"In the prison of form we still rejoice-watch what we do then in the world of essence . . . Our Friend resides in the cloister of our heart . . . we are drowned in the universal ocean, we do not seek water now." Shah Nimatullah Wali, 731-834, Persia

"When the mind's very being is gone . . . in a rapture divine and deep, itself in the Godhead lost . . . knowing not how it was crossed . . . drawn from its former state, to another [that is] measureless . . ." Jacopone Da Todi, 13th century A.D., Italy

"O Surdas, God has taken thy soul in his keeping and has blessed it with his Kingdom!" Surdas, 16th century A.D., India

"The mind which lives in a pure God-loving soul, truly sees God-non-begotten, invisible, ineffable-Him who alone is pure for pure hearts." Anthony the Great, c. 250-350, Egypt

"Blessed is the soul which, at the hour of its separation from the body, is sanctified from the vain imaginings of the peoples of the world. Such a soul lives and moves in accordance with the will of its creator . . ." Baha'ullah, 1817-1892, Persia

"I wish that you might win to the highest [degree of devotion] . . . which is called singular." Richard Rolle, 14th century, England

"The sojourn of the soul is a thrilling divine romance in which the lover-who in the beginning is conscious of nothing but emptiness, frustration, superficiality, and the abrasive chains of bondage-gradually attains an increasingly fuller and freer expression of love. Ultimately, this separate self disappears as it merges into the Divine Beloved. In this unity of the lover and the Beloved is realized the supreme and eternal fact of God as Infinite Love." Meher Baba, 1894-1969, India

"[The Light is] the Word of life, the Word of peace, the Word of reconciliation which makes of twain one new man if ye do abide there, there is no division but unity in the life . . . . Therefore, in the Light wait where the unity is, where the peace is, where the Oneness with the Father and son is, where there is not rent nor division." George Fox, 1624-1691, England

"The difference [between conditional and unconditional truth] is that between non-truth and the Truth." Padma Sambhava, 8th century A.D., India

"The creation of heaven and earth is the unfolding of something out of nothing, the descent from above to below. But the [devout] who in their work disengage themselves from what is bodily, and do nothing but contemplate God, actually see and understand and imagine the universe as it was in the state of nothingness before creation. They change the something back into the nothing." Dov Baer (the Great Maggid), 18th century, Poland

"All-pervading One, I am dyed in Your color. When other women's sweethearts live in foreign lands, they write letter after letter. But my Beloved lives in my heart, so I sing day and night." Mira Bai, 1498-1550, India

"The rational soul is conjoined with the animal body, which has its being from the earth and which gravitates valleywards. It is fused with this body in such a manner that these two-soul and body- totally opposed to one another, form one creature, without these parts becoming transformed into one another or mixed with one another-may this never be!-but in such a way that the two, each containing what is appropriate to it by nature, compose one person with two complete natures." Blessed Theodore, c. 7th century A.D., Edessa?

"The Divine Music is incessantly going on within ourselves; but the loud senses drown the delicate Music which is unlike and infinitely superior to any we can perceive or hear with our senses." Mahatma Gandhi, 1869-1948, India

"Men become better as they come nearer to God . . . Evil is not an actual substance, but absence of good just as darkness is nothing but absence of light . . . . a soul pure in God is God . . . . strive to have in your heart a secret unceasing prayer . . ." Abba Evagrius, ? -399 A.D., Egypt

"A boy gets paper, makes a kite, and flies it high in the air; and though he is still talking in a lively way with his playmates, he keeps his mind on the string. Pierced with God's Name, I keep my mind on it as a goldsmith does on his craft!" Namdev, 1269-1344, India

"Let us love silence till the world is made to die in our hearts. Let us always remember death, and in this thought draw near to God in our heart-and the pleasures of the world will have our scorn. . . . And if the body says to you, 'It is a great sin to kill oneself' [i.e., deny oneself ego and passion], answer it: 'I am killing myself because I cannot lead an unclean life.'" Isaac of Syria, 6th century A.D., Nineveh

"The basis for understanding talk about Zen . . . is to take the mind which thinks it already knows, and revise it step by step in accordance with the words of the teacher. . . . if the teacher should say that 'Buddha' is a frog or a worm, you should believe that frogs and worms are Buddha, and should abandon your former understanding. . . . [some] students cling to their own emotive views and base themselves on their own opinions, thinking that Buddhahood must indeed be such and such a way, [and] if it is something different from what they themselves think, they say it can't be that way; as long as they are wandering in delusion seeking something which resembles their own emotional judgments, most of them make no progress on the Buddha Way." Dogen, 1200-1253, Japan

"Plato located the soul of man in the head; Christ located it in the heart." Jerome, 331-420, Dalmatia?

"But only he (will prosper) that brings to Allah a sound heart." Muhammad, 570-632, Arabia

"The heart governs the whole organism, and when grace occupies all the divisions of the heart, it rules over all thoughts and members, for therein is the mind and all thoughts of the soul." Macarius the Great, 4th century A.D. ?, Egypt ?

"Some may say that God is high up in the heavens . . . but I will say that He who is the Lord of wisdom . . . is the dweller in my heart." Karaikkal Ammaiyar, between 5th and 7th centuries A.D., India

"How glorious . . . is that soul which has indeed been able to pass from the stormy ocean to Me, the sea pacific . . . to fill the pitcher of [one's] heart." Catherine of Siena, 1347-1370, Italy

"O my God, the best of Thy gifts within my heart is the hope of Thee, and the sweetest word upon my tongue is Thy praise, and the hours which I love best are those in which I meet with Thee." Rabia, 717-801, Iraq

" . . . as we progress in faith, our hearts shall be enlarged, and we shall pursue our course with unspeakable sweetness of love . . ." St. Benedict, 470-547, Italy

"I have fallen in love . . . with the beautiful One, who knows no death, knows no decay and has no form . . ." Mahadevi, 12th century A.D., India

"The house of my soul is narrow-O enlarge it, that Thou may enter in!" St. Augustine, 354-430, Algeria

"Oh, then, soul, most beautiful among all the creatures, so anxious to know the dwelling place of your Beloved that you may go in quest of Him and be united with Him, now we are telling you that you yourself are His dwelling and His secret chamber and hiding place . . . that you cannot be without Him. . . . Come, then, O beautiful soul! Since you know that your desired Beloved lives hidden within your heart, strive to be really hidden with Him, and you will embrace Him within you and experience Him . . ." John of the Cross, 1542-1591, Spain

"Because what the soul seeks is the One . . . It must rise to the principle within itself; from the multiplicity that it was it must again become one. Only thus can it contemplate the supreme principle, the One." Plotinus, 204 270, Egypt

"And he attains to the purest knowledge who . . . has got rid, as far as he can, of eyes and ears and, so to speak, of the whole body, these being in his opinion distracting elements which when they infect the soul hinder her from acquiring truth and knowledge . . . . [so that] he is in a manner purified . . . and what is purification but the . . . habit of the soul gathering and collecting herself into herself from all sides out of the body; then dwelling in her own place alone, as in another life . . ." Socrates, 469-399 B.C., Greece

"I don't like to dance unless You lead me. If You want me to dance, You must sing Yourself. Then I will jump into love, from love into devotion, from devotion into realization, and from realization into all human hearts." Mechthild of Magdeburg, 1098-1179, Germany

"I centered my mind on the Lord in deep absorption, it entered into my heart that he is One. Embracing His love and service, I knew comfort; I was satisfied, I was sated, I was set free." Dhanna, 15th century A.D., India

"You cannot tell by observation when the Kingdom of God comes . . . for in fact it is within you. . . . God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit. . . . When you pray, go into a room by yourself, shut the door, and pray to your Father who is there in the secret place. . . . I and my Father are One." Jesus, 1st century A.D., Palestine[/SIZE]

Can you argue for this idea a little bit more? Yes, emotions involve feeling (and so forth), but 1) why do you say that sensitivity is not an emotion as prescribed above, and 2) why do you say that sensitivity is one of the foundational structures of consciousness? I feel this is the crux of your terminology and you're being a little bit fuzzy here...

Thanks for a very generous, informative, and thought-provoking series.

The thing about discussing feeling in humans is that it is almost always interpreted as emotions, so it is difficult to talk about without the discussion going off course. But I am saying feeling itself is a neutral quality which is incorporated into various operations of consciousness. Emotion is just one way feeling is incorporated (the worst way IMO). What I really am trying to talk about is feeling before it becomes part of any conscious function, and what potential for conscious development learning to work with feeling on that level that holds.

To explain more, how does a microphone detect our voice, or a Geiger counter detect radiation, or a motion sensor detect movement? They all maintain a field of sensitivity that you could say "feel" respective vibrations.

We too detect by feeling . . . the eyes "feel" light waves, the ears feel air vibrating, etc. We detect by feeling literally everything we can. The fields for maintaining sensitivity to our environment is accomplished by optical, auditor, etc. nerves.

However, unlike a motion sensor or microphone, we also know we feel/detect. That's what makes us conscious; without that knowing part, we be as dumb as a microphone.

Instead of saying we know that we feel, we could say we feel what we sense. Think about it. How do you know you hurt? How do you know you see? I am not talking about interpreting here; before your mind can interpret what it is you see, consciousness must first be aware of seeing in general. I'm saying that we achieve that knowledge of sensing things by a type of sensitivity at the very core or heart of consciousness.

To keep from getting confused, let's say the way we detect our environment (including our body) is through "sensing," and let's say the way the part of us that knows we are sensing is through "feeling." Okay, so environmental detection is done through sensing, the knower is aware through feeling.

Now here's the interesting part: it's the sensitivity of the "knower" that union practitioners have found so interesting. What they found is, it is possible to increase the sensitivity of the knower, the core.

What does it mean to increase core sensitivity? Imagine a pan of water sitting on a running lawnmower. The surface will be a plane of rapid vibrations. If you wanted to use the water in the pan as a mirror, how accurately would it reflect your image while the lawnmower is running? But turn the mower off so the pan is now sitting still, and the surface becomes much more reflective.

Similarly, inner practitioners found that a perfectly still mind reflects perfectly. A mind subject to incessant thinking, imagining, dreaming, disliking, wanting, and so on not only reflects a distorted view of the world, but past mental activity leaves behind a sort of after image.

I call this after image "semi-dream" because although the mind is still receiving information from sensing, it is fed into a semi-dream condition of mind and together this mix is viewed by the core knower as actual reflected reality. (If you have any doubts about this, think about all the times you've driven somewhere while absorbed in thought and barely can recall the trip.) This is why someone can react to situations quite different than what is called for.

So, if it were possible to bring the mind to a complete rest, it would reflect reality more accurately, and we could also use the mind more precisely because it doesn't have will of its own.

Finally, the really big deal in terms of union experience is how the mind is brought to peace. It turns out that that "core" of consciousness I spoke of above is already still, it can be no other way. So union practice involves a 180? turn of attention, finding the core, learning to hang with that core attention-wise until mind and core match up vibrationally, and then waiting for "merging" of the two to occur. When they merge, the mind is brought to rest by the power of the core.

After practice, does one return to old habits? You betcha, and that is why it takes years of dedicated practice to learn how to stay with your core until it eventually absorbs one permanently.

You might wonder why today some brain theorists claim there is no core knower (usually in an anti-homuncular argument), but hypothesize consciousness is only a collection of sensations and thoughts which somehow produce the mere illusion of a core knower. Well, how many of them have actually looked inside their own consciousnesses?

None I've read or talked to know the slightest thing about what union practitioners have discovered. Just how empirical is it to speculate about the nature of one's own consciousness without ever having looked deeply into its nature? But even if a researcher passes on learning union for oneself, I don't see how consciousness studies can ignore this nearly three millennia old epistemology and still claim to be in search of objective truth (i.e., when allowing only evidence that supports physicalist models).[/SIZE]

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Thanks, I'm glad someone has appreciated it. Actually, I decided to write it (I know it's long) after reading WithoutReason's sincere opening post of his thread "Do any atheists/agnostics want to believe?"

I started to do just the first part on reasoning blunders, but some time back Didymos Thomas (I think it was) mentioned wanting to hear more about the history of union. Because I think a lot of people are atheists or agnostic due to some of the foolishness of religion, I thought it might help to show how openness to the possibility of a conscious universe shouldn't be decided by what some religious do or believe.

I also felt that people don't look at the best evidence when it comes time to investigate the conscious universe idea. If experience is the basis of knowing (as we seem to have settled on for human epistemology), then why refer to the huge conceptual, unverified body of thought of religion for evidence?

The really serious investigators were experientialists, and I say that is where we should look to see if anything was really being discovered.[/SIZE]

I'm curious about your interpretation of Jesus as a mystic. I'm aware of some passages in the gospels that are consistent with that, but I think most who follow some form of Christianity focus on Jesus as moralist, god-incarnation, or a cosmic sacrifice.

I think the gospel record implies that he was originally a disciple of John the Baptist, but by the time he was about 30 yrs old had developed his own perspective, which, although it was probably never inconsistent with John's, apparently took on a more profound character.

Thanks for your clarification. The way I think I see it you're saying that since what we think we know about the world we learn from sensing what is about is, and thus this faculty for sensitivity is what you're talking about; mastering it allows one to achieve communion with the Union...?

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Using the term "mystic" makes it more difficult to answer the question. I wish the term had never been applied because it conveys no understanding about what was going on with Jesus or anybody else supposedly within the "mystical" experience. So what I'll do is talk about what I think was going on with Jesus.

But first, although it's been speculated that Jesus and John the Baptist were linked (beyond being cousins), the more accepted view is that John was sort of a wandering prophet, but when Jesus returned to the area (from wherever he'd been - India?) John seemed to acknowledge Jesus was onto something John wasn't, even though Jesus humbled himself by requesting baptism.

You are correct, the religious interpretation has Jesus as a supernatural moralist, cosmic whatever.

If you've read what I wrote about "union experience" in Part 2 of this series, then you might understand I'm proposing what attracted people to not only Jesus, but all the great teachers like the Buddha, Mohammad, Nanak, Moses, etc., was that they were absorbed into full union.

This full condition is different from those who attain it periodically but are drawn back to a lesser condition by the activities of life. I understand it is hard to understand what union is if you have not had the experience (or known someone in the "full" experience), but the utter stillness of the mind, the depth of love felt, the ability to see a far bigger picture than anyone else tends to "mystify" people.

It also causes what I called "sense-mind translation." A perfect example is Jesus' use of the phrase "kingdom of heaven." Without union experience to guide one's understanding, our tendency is to translate everything Jesus says into something that relates to our typical external view of things, or to turn it into a principle for living life.

But to the experienced, the "kingdom of heaven" is very easy to understand. When one attains union, it gives one the perspective that one has joined a large mind, as if one mind has become part of the entire universe. When Jesus said, "I and my Father are One," he was referring the vast mind as the "Father," and saying he was one with that shows the depth and permanence of his union. We, as "children of God," have the same potential for conscious development awaiting us.

So the "kingdom of heaven" is well known in union experience, and anyone hearing it would instantly understand Jesus was talking about an experience, not a place. People so the same thing with the Buddha's term "nirvana," thinking it is a place rather than the exact experience that Jesus was describing.

Even the idea of Jesus or the Buddha being primarily a teacher of morality or a way of life is a sense-mind translation. All fully-merged individuals I've studied taught union to individuals willing to withdraw from normal life and submit to the teaching (as in the 72 following Jesus, or the Sangha of the Buddha).

If you practice union with the goal of permanently merging, your biggest enemy is the habits you acquired before you began practicing. The so-called morals and life prescriptions Jesus and the Buddha are known for are actually part of the method of staying closer, consciousness-wise, to how you must be to practice union. It is extremely hard to be wicked all day and then try to practice union.

Even if you accept that's what Jesus was doing when I spoke of being good, I still think most people wonder how Jesus could have been so good when it seems so hard for the rest of us. Once I was having a conversation about that with some Christians who were discussing how humanity could be so good as Jesus recommended (and seemed to be), and therefore if it was even possible to be a true Christian.

A couple of them gave the time-honored Christian answer that humanity is born into sin but Jesus, as the son of God, was born "perfect" and therefore only he could gracefully live the Christian ideal. I disagreed and said, "I think Jesus was having an experience where 'goodness' naturally results." They asked me to elaborate.

I said, "If, for instance, you didn't know there was such an experience as happiness, you'd wonder why someone who was happy smiled so much; and not knowing about happiness, to get a smile for yourself you might train your lips to turn upward or in some other way focus on facial expressions. But if you knew how to be happy you wouldn't focus on smiling, just on being happy. In the same way, what if there is an experience where goodness isn't the goal, but simply results from being within a certain conscious experience?"

Of course, they wanted to know what the experience was, and so like now, I tried to explain what it is like to experience union.
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Well, I mean learning to turn that faculty 180? around from it's normal orientation toward the world (i.e., through the senses) to discover a deeper part of consciousness. When those two consciousness aspects become "one" then it is called union.

I was also trying to say that since both aspects are types of sensitivity, making progress in union is actually done through an advanced use and development of our most foundational feeling nature (that is why I suggested it is a type of self evolution).[/SIZE]

Can you try to develop this argument in formal logic? I think one of your problems is that language is actually too weak for it. Don't forget, my friend, what you're proposing is somewhat radical in many circles and so what you're going to need is the clearest, best, most logical and cogent argument possible to articulate it...

I don't see how. The process has always been the same, turn your own attention around, withdraw from sense perception to feel the "heart" of your own consciousness, stay quietly with that until you attain union . . . experience and know, that's it.

To make any kind of logic out of it requires segmenting so it can be thought about; you know, if A and B then C, and so on.

But union is a ONENESS experience, not a segmented experience, so the instant you segment it for thought you've lost all potential for knowing it. That is why I have focused on how its practiced, who practiced it, and what practitioners report who are actually experiencing it.

It is impossible to understand without your own personal experience. I reserved my "formal logic" arguments for those who argue against the possibility of a conscious universe based on the beliefs and practices of religion, instead of studying the devoted inner practitioners who, rather than focusing on theorizing, focused on experiencing.