I hear you, and I respect that. But it's my understanding that Christianity largely shaped the notion of the individual as sacred and free. Protestantism completed this. We work out our own optionally-mediated salvation. True, this freedom is a rope we can hang ourselves with. But there will always be a tension between freedom and security. There is death in sex as well as life, but that may be the point. I think Plato is right, though. We learn to seek higher pleasures, without ever ceasing, however, to find particular bodies desirable. Would I want to lose this desire? Not unless it was really screwing up my life. It lights up the world, bodily beauty. But I at least was never satisfied with it, except of course in the moment. There is indeed an intellectual love. I would never deny that. That's why I'm here.

Who was it who said 'do what you will shall be the whole of the law', again?

The problem with Nietszche's depiction is that it doesn't take into account all of the admonishments and guidance that Jesus was forever telling his audiences. He had plenty of advice for anyone who listened. Seek this, do that, be like so and so. He was a tough master. Jesus himself spent 40 days in the wilderness in a severe ascetic trial, after which was tempted by Satan who said that with his powers, he could rule the world - same prophecy was made for the Buddha at birth - but instead said 'get thee behind me Satan'.

That understanding of the individual as a free being is certainly something that Protestantism engendered. I'm actually reading a deep historical study of that very point at the moment, The Unintended Revolution, by Brad Gregory, about how the so-called 'unmediated' attitude of Protestantism gave rise to hundreds or thousands of competing truth-claims.

Mysticism has a price, it isn't simply a matter of feeling, or even a concept, it is going beyond ego. I don't think Nietschze would have the slightest interest in, or knowledge of, that.

Actually the classical description of mysticism is 'unmediated access to reality'. Of course to most people that sounds entirely ludicrous, as for them 'the mystic' is some wizened sage chanting nonsense over an incense burner or some ancient manuscript. Indeed there is an entire genre of pop mysticism which fulfils that description. But the genuine article is a completely different type of person - one who is indeed fully and completely present and deeply aware. The classic texts of religious mysticism are about the Christian and Hindu mystics and they're generally very profound individuals. But their territory has to be negotiated, and one of the main facts about it is, leave your ego at the door.

Who was it who said 'do what you will shall be the whole of the law', again? — Wayfarer

Exactly! Jesus is the Devil. That's why he had to be publicly executed. But of course I'm talking in symbols here. And you're right that there are all sorts of ways to build a Jesus from the texts. IMV, the pieces do not fit together. I don't know (or care much) if there was a historical Jesus. We know that there was a Socrates, but that too isn't central. If some mad genius dreamed up the whole thing, it might be no less valuable.

I have to disagree with you about the ego issue, or make a distinction so that we can agree. Surely you'll agree that there is (at least) the hopeless game of priding one's self on having transcended the ego. I really wrestled intensely with this non-ego ideal, along with altruism as a duty. But (in my view) this is just an endless hall of mirrors, this very self-consciously trying to get beyond self-consciousness and self-importance and selfishness. That's why I take the Hegelian notion, instead, of the evolution of narcissism into something magnanimous, precisely because it eventually feels free and authentic. So a healthy egoism that is willing to face its mortality is also able to love authentically or un-self-consciously. Or just more able, because we are always able to slip (at least occasionally) into genuine play, genuine affection,in which self dissolves. It's like the lovers in the opening quote. That's how I read "already in Buddha" or "ordinary mind." But on the "Hegelian" route, anyway, narcissism learns to laugh at itself without condemning itself, since we'd have to curse the entire world for this omnipresent "sin." It's just a matter of elevating narcissism as we elevate lust. Or that's how I see my own journey (which continues even here and now...

Death is central here. Personal immortality is the last refuge of the ego. To accept death is to be forced to find one's best self in one's universal guts, the "primordial images" of early Jung, elaborated intellectually. The player dies, but the play continues. Plato's Forms might come in here. We participate in the Forms so that death loses much of its sting. But the proper name is a toe tag that must to the fire of life which is also the rose.

In mysticism there is a process and realisation that one becomes God. What this means and refers to is a state of repose(on multiple levels) in the aspirant whereby one realises one's role in the world as a creative agent, one's alignment in terms goals or motivations with what one estimates is the will of God, and ones' independence, or freedom from the animal, or egotistical desires and conceit. This could also be described in terms of the person reaching a state of purification, in which one is prepared, or ready for a union with God, or a bride of God.

There are many differing schools, routes and interetations of this process, but essentially it is the same process with the same goal. Also I have greatly simplified(perhaps over simplified) it in my description.

There is also the approach in which God is taken out of the equation, again the goal is the same, but simply lacks the component of reverence. The goal is the same in that the constructive or benevolent role of humanity in the biosphere is equivalent in terms of one's actions in the physical world.

Exactly! Jesus is the Devil — Hoo

Actually, I remember now - Aleister Crowley. But he's only stating the obvious - that is what everyone believes nowadays, question it and woe betide unto you.

I have to disagree with you about the ego issue, or make a distinction so that we can agree. Surely you'll agree that there is (at least) the hopeless game of priding one's self on having transcended the ego. I really wrestled intensely with this non-ego ideal, along with altruism as a duty. But (in my view) this is just an endless hall of mirrors, this very self-consciously trying to get beyond self-consciousness and self-importance and selfishness. — Hoo

Not if you actually do learn to be less ego-centred as a consequence. Of course there's the obvious trap of 'trying to be less egotistical' (like when Trump said that some reporter had no idea how humble he was.) But there really is a way of learning to be less reflexively self-centered through meditation. My basic text book has been Zen Mind Beginner's Mind which is by the founder of the San Francisco Zen Centre, and that is one of the main ideas in it.

Forgive my interjection here. I want to point out that there is an important process which is necessary to undertake before one can make significant progress in mysticism. It is at the forefront in all mystical schools in some form or other and there is an important reason for it and many casualties along the road of people who have not performed it successfully in their quest. It is the subjugation of the ego.

Now I agree it can theoretically be achieved in the heroic sense, but this is a high wire act while wearing a blindfold and I am not aware that it has been achieved by anyone. I have tread this wire on ocassion, but only in controlled circumstances. The romantic cannot go forth without taking their body with them and the body is a precisely developed instrument, unless the ego respects this the ego is working against the processes the body is engaged in.

Normally the aspirant goes through a period of purification and the exercising and development of humility in order to tame the ego. Once it is tamed and in a sense wearing the correct harness, it can again exercise its passions. Without the metaphorical harness, it is blindfolded, disfunctional, without sight and will injure itself, it's goal and its environment.

But he's only stating the obvious - that is what everyone believes nowadays, question it and woe betide unto you. — Hoo

No, I don't think so. People love their political self-righteousness if not their religious self-righteousness.

Not if you actually do learn to be less ego-centred as a consequence. Of course there's the obvious trap of 'trying to be less egotistical' (like when Trump said that some reporter had no idea how humble he was.) But there really is a way of learning to be less reflexively self-centered through meditation. — Wayfarer

I didn't mean to imply otherwise. Yes, Trump is a perfect example...of all sorts of things..But his success demonstrates the limits of liberalism in the US. There really is a culture war, even if the progressives are slightly dominant. If you look into the dark side of the internet, you'll find incredible hate, incredible racism especially. But there are crazies on the left, too, dripping with resentment and revenge, equally conspiratorial in their worldview. To me this is all bad "concept religion." It narrows the heart. As a citizen, I may have to dirty my hands, come down to the business of life, cast a vote. But I still insist that any religion that isn't beyond politics is only more politics.

Yes I agree.
Also the western society glibly rushes over the cliff of climate change and destruction of the ecosystem like lemmings.

Although this issue was always going to be faced somewhere down the line, it could have been tackled in a less reckless way.

Hoo and Punshhh love both of your thaughts

As well as agreeing with much of what you both say, there lies in my belief that both have some serious defaults in serious logic, and logic is what controls all of our thinking

hi Kenhinds, thankyou and please do contribute, I am always interested in logical approaches in mysticism.

We probably have a different meaning in mind for the word "mysticism." There may indeed be heights that I never have and never will attain. But I write with a glowing image in my mind. It's an intellectually elaborated (dialectically evolved) "mask" on what I'd call a primordial image.

Jung first used the term primordial images to refer to what he would later term "archetypes". Jung's idea of archetypes was based on Immanuel Kant's categories, Plato's Ideas, and Arthur Schopenhauer's prototypes.[3] For Jung, "the archetype is the introspectively recognizable form of a priori psychic orderedness".[4] "These images must be thought of as lacking in solid content, hence as unconscious. They only acquire solidity, influence, and eventual consciousness in the encounter with empirical facts." — wiki

I can't speak for anyone else on this thread, but the mysticism that matters to me currently is something I understand as "just" or "only" concepts and images along with, most crucially, a feeling about or toward them. Now maybe I can fit everything you've mentioned into the "dialectic" above, but I won't pretend a false humility and pretend to be more of a seeker than a finder. I write from what feels like the end of a process. Life continues, of course, and I continue to learn. But I've been riding this enjoyable "system" or "worldview" in its basic form for quite a while now. I'm 40. I may open new doors as I move into a new phase of life, but I doubt I'll change much while I'm still ambitious and carving out a place in the world.

What I can't be sure of is whether my experience is going to be valuable to others.

Hi Punshh how are you. Not sure if you are an admin or any form of such. Im fairly new to this whole topic, yet have had many idealogical thoughts. Also i must remind u that my grammar is terrible. i apologize in advance

Thank you, friend, and welcome to an exciting conversation.

I love the idea of welcomeness i guess if thats even a word
i do apologize in advance for my terrible grammar

Not sure if this is the pace that I am searching for but, it kinda looks as such at first glance

I was exposed to this theory about 20 years ago. Jung was a key figure for me, though I don't vouch for everything he said, of course. But this is the kind of thing I have in mind when I speak of "hero myths" at the foundations of philosophies.

Thus, while archetypes themselves may be conceived as a relative few innate nebulous forms, from these may arise innumerable images, symbols and patterns of behavior. While the emerging images and forms are apprehended consciously, the archetypes which inform them are elementary structures which are unconscious and impossible to apprehend.

Jung was fond of comparing the form of the archetype to the axial system of a crystal, which preforms the crystalline structure of the mother liquid, although it has no material existence of its own. — Wiki

The "Self" archetype is relevant here.

In Jung's words, "the Self...embraces ego-consciousness, shadow, anima, and collective unconscious in indeterminable extension. As a totality, the self is a coincidentia oppositorum; it is therefore bright and dark and yet neither".[15] Alternatively, he stated that "the Self is the total, timeless man...who stands for the mutual integration of conscious and unconscious".[16] Jung recognized many dream images as representing the self, including a stone, the world tree, an elephant, and the Christ.[17] — Jung

Yes we are probably using mysticism in different ways. I was going to make this distinction at the beginning of the thread, but have had a busy weekend. There are two kinds of mysticism to point out here, there are the folk who are creatively embracing mysticism as a concept like yourself. I am with you as creativity is one of my great passions. Also there is mysticism as a spiritual way of life. Which is a technical exercise like yoga or something.

This distinction should clear up the differing points presented.

As I say, I am with you in your approach, for me I have followed a Grail quest in the field of art and aesthetics(I have no formal training in philosophical aesthetics), creativity. Along with heroic efforts in the development of creative conceptual architecture.

Ha ha, that's a nice story, but I think it just comes down to disposition; people who prefer not to think too much are attracted to Zen instead of Hua Yen, Tibetan Buddhism, Madhyamaka, Kabbalah, Hermeticism, Sri Aurobindo's, Osho's or Rudolf Steiner's teaching, and so on. Some Zen people are very philosophical, though. Dogen and D T Suzuki come to mind.

I think it's time for the handy Integral Philosophy graphic:

There are two kinds of mysticism to point out here, there are the folk who are creatively embracing mysticism as a concept like yourself. I am with you as creativity is one of my great passions. Also there is mysticism as a spiritual way of life. — Punshhh

Thank you for elaborating, first.

The words aren't that important, but I view the spiritual in terms of concept and feeling. I don't think it has to be unworldly. I realize that 'spirituality' is often associated with deities, but even here I have my 'deity.' So really it's a "theological" issue, isn't it? But the labels are secondary...

As I say, I am with you in your approach, for me I have followed a Grail quest in the field of art and aesthetics(I have no formal training in philosophical aesthetics), creativity. Along with heroic efforts in the development of creative conceptual architecture. — Punshhh

That sounds fascinating. If you want to share anything, ...

It's a good forum. I find great conversation here.

The words aren't that important, but I view the spiritual in terms of concept and feeling — Hoo

I really hate to pick nits, but it's not about 'feeling'. Mystical insight might be accompanied by feeling but it is first and foremost noetic.

//edit// having pasted that in, I googled the web definition of noetic, and it comes up with

"the noetic quality of a mystical experience refers to the sense of revelation".

Please, pick nits, share as you see fit.

I'm not terribly attached to the term "mysticism" ("heresy" might work), but I mentioned "concept" also. I highlighted "feeling" in that context because Punshh seemed to understand what I was getting at to be merely conceptual. I know that you know that Hegel presents God's self-revelation. I understand this in conceptual terms, but desire drives the system. I really can't make sense of non-conceptual revelation.

I don't take this authoritative (imagine that!) but it's beautiful and it certainly influenced me.

It is by following this “dialectical movement” of the Real that Knowledge is present at its own birth and contemplates its own evolution. And thus it finally attains its end, which is the adequate and complete understanding of itself — i.e., of the progressive revelation of the Real and of Being by Speech — of the Real and Being which engender, in and by their “dialectical movement,” the Speech that reveals them. And it is thus that a total revelation of real Being or an entirely revealed Totality (an “undivided Whole”) is finally constituted... — Kojeve

We also find the affirmation theme:

When all is said and done, the “method” of the Hegelian Scientist consists in having no method or way of thinking peculiar to his Science. The naive man, the vulgar scientist, even the pre-Hegelian philosopher — each in his way opposes himself to the Real and deforms it by opposing his own means of action and methods of thought to it. The Wise Man, on the contrary, is fully and definitively reconciled with everything that is: he entrusts himself without reserve to Being and opens himself entirely to the Real without resisting it. — Kojeve

Once or twice before I've had a really clear realisation that all these religions and philosophies that hold a higher state of mind or consciousness as an ideal are all getting at the same experience, but described and attained in different ways. Living in perfect accordance with nature as a sage in stoicism, delimiting your sense of self, entering the kingdom of heaven and being with God again (undoing the fall that separated us from nature), Buddhist enlightenment, discovering that The Real You is the whole universe (Watts), ego death or death of the self (seen in rare types of brain damage), reversing nature's creation of an aspect of nature separate from itself (Cohle/Zappfe); they're all the same state of mind - I'm sure there's more examples from other systems of thought. The first time I realised this was when I was reading The Inner Citadel and Plotinus, or The Simplicity of Vision by Pierre Hadot. When this became crystal clear to me I had a pretty moving experience to say the least, and I laughed. Which is funny, because Alan Watts said once you realise this you'll laugh yourself silly. I think he was onto something. I mean, how could all these each translate differently from one another when experienced?

I imagine the end point of such mysticism as the mind being in perfect harmony with the whole universe, losing your sense of self and being 'at one' with it, for want of a better phrase (even the hippies got it).

No doubt there can be found some textual arguments or differences as to why these are not alike in theory, but there is a mysticism that cannot be conveyed with words, only experienced. I suspect a lot of these thinkers got the core right, but strayed ever further from that the more they tried to expand a system around that core (for example, Christians claiming this experience only comes in the next life).

This is great, too. Not an authority, but definitely an influence.

Hence Christianity is first of all a particularistic, family, and
slavish reaction against the pagan universalism of the Citizen-Mas-
ters. But it is more than that. It also implies the idea of a synthesis
of the Particular and the Universal — that is, of Mastery and Slavery
too: the idea of Individuality — i.e., of that realization of universal
values and realities in and by the Particular and of that universal
recognition of the value of the Particular, which alone can give
Man Befriedigung, the supreme and definitive "Satisfaction."
...
The whole problem, now, is to realize the Christian idea of
Individuality. And the history of the Christian World is nothing
but the history of this realization.

Now, according to Hegel, one can realize the Christian an-
thropological ideal (which he accepts in full) only by "overcom-
ing" the Christian theology: Christian Man can really become what
he would like to be only by becoming a man without God — or,
if you will, a God-Man. He must realize in himself what at first
he thought was realized in his God. To be really Christian, he
himself must become Christ.

According to the Christian Religion, Individuality, the syn-
thesis of the Particular and the Universal, is effected only in and
by the Beyond, after man's death.

This conception is meaningful only if Man is presupposed to be
immortal. Now, according to Hegel, immortality is incompatible
with the very essence of human being and, consequently, with
Christian anthropology itself.

Therefore, the human ideal can be realized only if it is such that
it can be realized by a mortal Man who knows he is such. In other
words, the Christian synthesis must be effected not in the Beyond,
after death, but on earth, during man's life. And this means that
the transcendent Universal (God), who recognizes the Particular,
must be replaced by a Universal that is immanent in the World. — Kojeve

Thanks for jumping in. I like your mention of laughter. I'm guessing individual experiences vary, even if they are similar. I really can't know. I'm wondering (in my own case) whether there's much of a point in using the word. I have this conception/image of Christ that "shines" emotionally. I've also had a few "peak" experiences, but I can fit them under "concept/image" and emotion (love, joy, at-home-ness).

I really can't make sense of non-conceptual revelation. — Hoo

Non-conceptual is what 'the direct path' is about, and of course we can't 'make sense' of it, because to make sense of it, is to try and process it in the verbal-symbolic part of the mind. It takes doing.

Q. 'There is something you learn from zazen that you can't learn by any other means.

A. Oh yes? What's that.

Q. :s

Once or twice before I've had a really clear realisation that all these religions and philosophies that hold a higher state of mind or consciousness as an ideal are all getting at the same experience, but described and attained in different ways... — WhiskyWhiskers

There's a lot of truth in that, which is the insight behind the idea of the perennial philosophy.