The flash of insight

A lightning flash:

between the forest trees

I have seen water.

Shiki Masaoka – (1867-1902)

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“All spiritual teachings are about one thing – what it is to be fully and positively human – in the world, with others.

This we do in relation to that Whole – out of which we each are an infinitesimally small, temporary, wave-form.

We live in order to awake to that mysterious Whole, overcome ego and learn to serve better – ‘Awake; De-egotise; Serve’ – That’s it! But we need to start somewhere. And simplicity is better than complexity.

We can (re)start right now with Thích Nhất Hạnh Zen Buddhist master’s teaching on mindfulness; ‘Smile: Breathe and Go slowly/consciously’ – try it! Instant success is built in from the first smile. Its’ irresistible!

The rest is a matter of cultural clothing & historical accident of birth.

True religion helps, false religion hinders – in getting the realizations needed.” – RP

Share your questions or insights on these or any other issues via ‘comments’

Namaste – Roger

Dr Roger Prentice

PS The secret of life it seems to me is in the haiku above.

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Education is a mess – is there an integrative way to teach?

I have updated an introduction to the SunWALK model of human-centred studies;

SunWALK: Summary of the main meanings of the components represented in

the model and its ‘logo-diagram-mandala’ – providing a teacher’s process model

SunWALK: Summary of the main meanings of the components represented in

the model and its ‘logo-diagram-mandala’ – providing a teacher’s process model

Give me a brief introduction:

SunWALK grew out of reflection on many years of teaching children and adults and particularly a period of five years teaching in a RC middle school – theorizing my practice via a PhD and practising my theory day-to-day.

SunWALK simply says that the quality of all of our lives will be higher if we undertake all education within the framework of deepening our humanity.

Deepening our humanity is a matter of developing technical competencies within the chief dimensions of the human spirit; Caring (the Humanities), Creativity (the Arts) and Criticality (the Sciences & Philosophy) – all in local, national and world Communities. These are the ‘4Cs’ of the model – 3 intra-personal, 1 inter-personal.

We and our one planet will be better of if all of the technical stuff, from learning to read to Masters degrees in engineering, take place in the context of humanization/the 4Cs. This requires international, national, school & classroom commitment to deepening the best of being human as the context for learning the technical.

We can’t afford to have character and morality and compassion as hoped-for accidental outcomes. Moral Education, PSME, RE etc. don’t work as bolt-on extras. They need to be the general context in which competencies are developed.

It is a model based on the energy flow of the human spirit – that is the given. That is physical, mental and spiritual energy that flows through all living human beings.

That energy, the human spirit, is the true ’stuff of education’. With the best of the past teachers need to equip children to face tomorrow’s challenges which will always be a mixture of new problems combined with eternally recurrent problems. Building all education with will be the medium with which the teacher works to nurture and challenge balanced development.

Today we have lost the balance between specialization, and whole-systems thinking and acting – SunWALK model brings into harmony the best of ‘Western’ & ‘Eastern’ world-views.

OK – so what’s the ‘Sun’ and the ‘WALK in the model’?

The ‘Sun’ = the individual’s spiritual inspiration & values sources – accumulated and ongoing, as operating internally and as expressed in speech and behaviour.

WALK = Willing & Wise Action through Loving & Knowing – here seen as the general goal for education, and as the interiority, character and behaviour of the student.

The model/logo combines a range of sub-models including the following:

a) An ‘interior’ model of the human spirit – in relation to ‘the world’.

b) A model for re-positioning education within being & becoming human – in the world with others.

c) A general model of the curriculum – for primary, secondary and higher education.

d) A framework for the analysis and evaluation of teaching episodes or projects.

e) A model of education that makes non-faith-specific spiritual and moral education intrinsic to all learning.

THE MODEL AND THE PROCESS IN ONE (long) SENTENCE: –

The SunWALK model of spiritualizing pedagogy sees human education as the

storied

development of

meaning, which is

constructed, and de-constructed,

physically, mentally and spiritually, through

Wise & Willing

Action, via

Loving and Knowing – developed in

Community, through the

‘Dialectical Spiritualization [1]’of

Caring, Creativity & Criticality processes, all undertaken in the light of the

‘Sun’ of chosen higher-order

values and beliefs, using best available,appropriate

content.

These underlined concerns are central components and focuses of the practice and theory in the model.

This is an intense combination of theory and practice. It automatically requires the teacher to practice their theory and theorise their practice – dynamically as practice-based research. It automatically enables the classroom to be connected to the school & community as a whole and to e.g. a relevant department in a university.

It attempts to suffuse all teaching with the demands, challenges and joy of being human in the world with others. But it seeks to bring together the Whole and the parts, the ineffable and the concepts – not just concepts because as Heschel (1971:7) says, “Concepts are delicious snacks with which we try to alleviate our amazement.”

The diagram/logo/

The outer ring of the SunWALK logo combines two dimensions:

1 ‘Community i.e. the social,interpersonal dimension of interaction with other individuals or groups.

2 ‘Cultural sources’ including such dimensions as the traditions, the political & the legal.

The three major divisions of the arts,sciences and humanities are here thought of as the stored, yet potentially dynamic, accumulation of knowledge and beliefs and procedures – everything from galleries to written laws of physics that the individual can draw upon or be influenced by. This is the ‘stuff out there’ rather than the interiority of consciousness in which there is the perpetual flow and re-shaping, focusing de-focusing etc. of heart-mind.

In SunWALK everything within the inner circle = a representation of ‘interiority’, i.e. human consciousness – the human spirit.

The human spirit is presented intra-personally as 3 ‘voices’ – 3 modes of being & of engaging with reality & of knowing.

The three emanate from the singleness of ‘heart-mind’, consciousness.

They are presented (metaphorically) as the ‘primary colours’ of Creativity (the yellow of inspiration), Criticality (the blue of reason) & Caring (the red warmth of love).

Creativity is the ‘I’ voice of subjective engagement via an artistic medium – it is concerned with subjective knowing and is particularly related to the core virtue ‘beauty’ and its products are of course ‘the Arts’.

Criticality is the ‘IT’ voice of objective engagement which enables progress in the Sciences ( & Maths., Philosophy and ‘critical’ studies). It is concerned with objective knowing – and it is related particularly to the core virtue ‘truth’. The products of course are the sciences and technology – but also philosophy and critical studies.

Caring is the ‘WE’ voice which enables moral engagement – for progress in the moral domain and in service of others. It is concerned with social knowing – related particularly to the core virtue ‘goodness’ and to ‘the Humanities’.

All three of course need to be conditioned by the pre-eminent virtue of justice. All students need to have these ways of engaging with reality developed in a balanced way. High technical competence combined with moral dwarfism leads to ……

The physical dimension is seen as the instrument for the flow of spirit in all of its forms – e.g. via dance, drama & PE and sports.

Each individual develops her/his I, WE and IT voices, the 3Cs, via socialization, starting in the family, the local community and then later in formal education. A sense of justice is seen as paramount intrapersonally as well as inter-personally i.e. it enables us to engage with that which is beautiful, good or true with balance, clarity & due weight.

The essential process in all 4Cs is multi-level dialogue. In the case of the individual dialogue is seen as meditation, reflection and inner-talk. In the case of groups it is dialectical process via consultation.

The ‘Celtic’ knot that surrounds the central shield indicates that the 3Cs are simply aspects of the one human spirit– the flow of ‘heart-mind’.

The white shield at the centre represents the meditative state in which there is no ‘focused’ engagement via one of the 3Cs – and in which there is relatively little of the interference or chatter that we experience in the unquiet mind.

This can enable us to ‘go beyond ourselves’, i.e. transcend our normal knowing – any of the 3Cs (I, WE or IT modes), as gateways, can be a pathway to the transcendent and to subsequent improved insight into reality.

The black dot at the centre is the ‘well-spring’ of consciousness. For artists (and great scientists) it is the Muse. For religionists it is the voice of God within (albeit distorted by the dust of self). For non-religionists it is the inner source of spirit as energy & inspiration – the bits of realization and insight that come to us for which we don’t make an effort.

Educating the human spirit is seen as nurturing, and cultivating, the life-force which culminates in the developed human who, through higher-order consciousness, realizes abilities from within Caring, Creative or Critical engagements.

Teaching is seen as nurturing and cultivating what is normally present, almost from birth, & certainly by the time we go to school – namely the flow of spirit expressed in nascent forms of Caring, Creativity, and Criticality – in Community with others. Holistic Learning takes place when the learner uses Creativity, Criticality and Caring – in Community – inspired by higher-order values – in dynamic combinations such as Creativity providing texts for criticality – which then, via dialogue, produce/attract the spirit for more creativity.

In SunWALK spirituality is not a dimension; it is the model as a whole. In SunWALK moral education is not a dimension – it is intrinsic to all of its praxis.

The SunWALK logo can also be seen as a mandala, or even as a plan drawing for a fountain or an ‘arts centre of light’!

SunWALK is a major shift to a process view of the world, of being human and of educating our young people. It rejects a worldview that is limited to the mechanistic, the ‘human-as-computer, the fragmentary and the materialistic; seeking instead modelling that is based on flow/process, holism and the spiritual.

SunWALK is designed to enable teachers and students to become agents of change to transform a world that is still operated as atomistic, mechanistic and materialistic into one that is holistic, dialogic, and derived from the best processes and products of the human spirit.

The SunWALK logo and model of education Copyright Roger Prentice 1995 & 2009

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Love and the Poetic Heart – pathways to the same reality

There is a wonderful essay by Dr Hossein Elahi Ghomshei on the role of poetry to be found – where else – on the Buddhist SGI website.

The essay starts like this;

The Rose and the Nightingale: The role of poetry in Persian culture

by Dr. Hossein Elahi Ghomshei

Persia has been admired as a land where people walk on silk carpets and talk the language of poetry.

Poetry in Persian culture is not simply an art: rather it’s the very image of life, terrestrial and celestial; the perennial philosophy, the holy scripture, the minstrel, the music and the song, the feast and revelry, the garden, the Rose and the Nightingale, and a detailed agenda for daily life.

In the lyric poetry of Rumi, Sadi and Hafiz you can hardly find a sonnet that does not contain the wine, the bard and the beloved. In didactic and mystical poetry, commonly in rhyming couplets, the same theme of Love runs throughout like running brooks of milk and wine and honey of Paradise as described in the Koran.

The word saqi in Persian literature is the counterpart of the muse in Western culture and fulfills exactly the same service as the muse to inspire the poet, to illuminate what is dark, to raise what is low, that the poet may assert the eternal providence and justify the ways of God to man.

In Persian poetry, as in all good poetry of the world, Love is the greatest circle of attraction and affection, with no one left out of the circle. The story of David, the prophet of Love, who had 99 wives and still yearned after another one, according to religious traditions, is interpreted by Rumi as a reference to the 100-percent nature of Love: If there is a single person in the whole world whom you hate, you are not a lover.

Sadi, in one of his famous sonnets (ghazal), says:

I’m in Love with the whole world, for the whole world belongs to my beloved.

Love is at peace with all religions, all ethnic groups, and all colors, languages, races and tribes, as expressed in hundreds of sublime poems in Persian poetry:

O my Christian beloved,
O my Armenian friend,
Either you come and be a Muslim
Or I will take the girdle and become a Christian.

In the realm of Love, there is no difference between a mosque and a monastery.

You can behold the light of the eternal beloved wherever you turn your face.

–Hafiz

To read the full essay go HERE

The Buddhist SGI site is – HERE

Will we be happy in 2009? – two views of happiness

Is happiness a matter of knowing – or is ignorance bliss?

Are we happy through luck or genes or being good, truthful and celebrating beauty?

Here are two views;

The second is a Buddhist view;

Part 2 of the Buddhist view;

Happy new year -and may we all learn, without too much pain, the means to true happiness – for ourselves and the human family as a whole.

What’s the difference between spirituality and religion?

How do you answer the question above?

Below is how far I have got with this issue.

Spirituality is how we relate to the unknown and unknowable – to Ultimate reality – and the meaning and motivation we derive therefrom.

Our worldview, as a consequence, is how we ‘read’ the world. Our worldview includes that of which are conscious, plus that which derives from enculturation. Becoming more fully conscious of Oneness, and acting accordingly, is our purpose.

Religion is the agreed set of relationships, teachings and customs held in common with any religious group of which one has membership.

Progress in spirituality is measured by regularly bringing oneself to account – in relation to the standards of your spirituality, world-view and religious group/s (if any).

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Etymological issues:

The English word “religion” is derived from the Middle English “religioun” which came from the Old French “religion.” It may have been originally derived from the Latin word “religo” which means “good faith,” “ritual,” and other similar meanings. Or it may have come from the Latin “religãre” which means “to tie fast.”

Doing your own research:

A very good starting point is provided by the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance. See HERE

The definitions I like best from this source are;

George Hegel: “the knowledge possessed by the finite mind of its nature as absolute mind.”

Paul Tillich: “Religious is the state of being grasped by an ultimate concern”

Others are;

The Religious Tolerance group tell us that David Carpenter has collected and published a list of definitions of religion, including:

Anthony Wallace: “a set of rituals, rationalized by myth, which mobilizes supernatural powers for the purpose of achieving or preventing transformations of state in man or nature.”

Hall, Pilgrim, and Cavanagh: “Religion is the varied, symbolic expression of, and appropriate response to that which people deliberately affirm as being of unrestricted value for them.”

Karl Marx: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”

Don Swenson defines religion in terms of the sacred: “Religion is the individual and social experience of the sacred that is manifested in mythologies, ritual, ethos, and integrated into a collective or organization.”

Paul Connelly also defines religion in terms of the sacred and the spiritual: “Religion originates in an attempt to represent and order beliefs, feelings, imaginings and actions that arise in response to direct experience of the sacred and the spiritual. As this attempt expands in its formulation and elaboration, it becomes a process that creates meaning for itself on a sustaining basis, in terms of both its originating experiences and its own continuing responses.”

He defines sacred as: “The sacred is a mysterious manifestation of power and presence that is experienced as both primordial & transformative, inspiring awe & rapt attention. This is usually an event that represents a break or discontinuity from the ordinary, forcing a re-establishment or recalibration of perspective on the part of the experiencer, but it may also be something seemingly ordinary, repeated exposure to which gradually produces a perception of mysteriously cumulative significance out of proportion to the significance originally invested in it.”

He further defines the spiritual as: “The spiritual is a perception of the commonality of mindfulness in the world that shifts the boundaries between self and other, producing a sense of the union of purposes of self and other in confronting the existential questions of life, and providing a mediation of the challenge-response interaction between self and other, one and many, that underlies existential questions.”

My final question – “Why are there so many religious intolerance groups?”

To read the full article by the Religious Tolerance group go HERE

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True achievement, success and happiness lie in being fully and positively human –

through our caring our creativity and our criticality –

developed via service to the communities to which we belong.

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

Art, Nature and realizing our own Beauty

To look upon beauty, in art or in nature, is to realize our own beauty.

Photo source

The relative context of perspective – or new perspective from re-contextualizing?

Art teaches. Nature teaches.

Buddhism is compassion. When we realize our own beauty the boundaries of our compassion expand.

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

Compassion is love shaped into an embrace.

BUDDHIST MEDITATION AND PERSONAL CONSTRUCT PSYCHOLOGY

Below is the introduction to a fascinating paper the whole of which can be reached HERE

The following is a contribution to Serendip by Phouttasone (Pilou) Thirakoul, who wrote it during her senior year (1996-1997) as a Psychology major and Neural and Behavioral Sciences concentrator at Bryn Mawr College. Pilou’s essay provides a useful introduction to both Buddhist thinking in relation to brain and behavior, and to a branch of western psychology which, with its stress on active generation and regeneration of self, is of considerable interest from a Serendip perspective. Pilou’s essay also represents an example of the benefits to be gained by looking at problems from multiple perspectives, and as encouragement to further thinking about the relations between psychological, neuroscientific, and spiritual approaches to problems of consciousness and self-hood.

BUDDHIST MEDITATION AND PERSONAL

CONSTRUCT PSYCHOLOGY

Introduction

This paper seeks to examine the phenomenon of Buddhist meditation within the context of a Western psychological personality theory called Personal Construct Psychology. Formulated nearly twenty-five hundred years apart (Buddhist meditation by the 5th century B.C. Indian teacher Siddhartha Gautama; the Psychology of Personal Constructs, by the 20th century A.D. American psychologist George Kelly), the doctrines expressed in each tradition inevitably reveal differences between one another. But what is most fascinating is that even despite their differences, striking and illuminating points of correspondence can be observed between the principles of meditation and the theory of human consciousness articulated by Kelly. In light of the growing Western interest in meditative practice as a potentially useful tool in clinical practice and research, and in light of the sustained popularity of George Kelly’s constructivist theory of personality in clinical application, it seems worthy to explore possible commonalities between them.

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

Buddhist Chanting – online (reposted)

I was delighted to find that a Buddhist monastery in California – Abhayagiri – is reaching out globally by making some chanting and talks available on the web HERE.

You can also listen to the Bhagavad Gita chanted in English HERE.

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All postings to this site relate to the central SunWALK model in the PhD.

Summaries are HERE

Illusion, Reality, Oneness and Duality

The message about the necessity to strive to let go the hell of attachment via the ego, and realize that Whole of which we are an infinitesimal manifestation, comes in various forms. Here is one;

You live in illusions

and the appearance of things.

There is Reality,

you are that Reality.

When you recognize this

you will realize that you are no thing and being no thing are everything.

Kalu Rinpoche – 20thC Tibetan Buddhist p. 201 in the excellent Essential Spirituality by Roger Walsh

PS from RP – But for an educational, developmental perspective duality is as vital as achieving experience of singleness. The two are like a pair of scissors – not just for cutting into reality but to understand how we grow and develop.

We don’t so much come back to earth with a bump, we re-enter duality with a jolt so as to enable the impulse from oneness to take us a bit further.

We need duality as well as oneness just as we need form as well as spirit.

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All postings to this site relate to the central SunWALK model in the PhD.

Summaries are HERE

A video-lecture by Bill Viola – via the Tate Modern

Tate Modern video presentations are HERE

Go HERE to see a video-lecture by Bill Viola.

Bill Viola has been making video tapes, architectural installations, sound environments, electronic music performances and works for television for over 30 years. His video installations such as Nantes Triptych 1992 and Five Angels for the Millennium 2001, which are both in the Tate Collection, are total environments that envelop the viewer in image and sound.

On the eve of a major new exhibition, LOVE/DEATH: The Tristan Project, at Haunch of Venison in London, Viola talks about his career and recent work.

In collaboration with Haunch of Venison

“All works of art though visible represent invisible things,” (by or about Bill Viola)

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NB All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD.

Summaries are HERE

Perennial Philosophy or Primordial Tradition?: Huston Smith, Aldous Huxley and Ken Wilber – a view by James Baquet

James Baquet has a very interesting site – Take a look at Baquet’s site HERE It has a lot to say about Perennial Philosophy an the Primordial Tradition;

The modern popularity of the term can probably be attributed to the work of Aldous Huxley (1894-1963), who used the three words “The Perennial Philosophy” as the title of his erudite anthology of religious ideas. (See the Table of Contents here.) In defining the Perennial Philosophy in this book, Huxley doesn’t lay out the same four steps I described above; rather, he (fittingly) gives a more “esoteric” definition:

the metaphysic that recognizes a divine Reality substantial to the world of things and lives and minds; the psychology that finds in the soul something similar to, or even identical with, divine Reality; [and] the ethic that places man’s final end in the knowledge of the immanent and transcendent Ground of all being (vii)

(I discuss this definition, and the following one, more thoroughly in my article “This World and That“, in the section subtitled “Two Definitions of the Perennial Philosophy.”)

Closer to my formulation, but still not identical with it, is the definition he gives in his Introduction to the Bhagavad-Gita (as translated by Prabhavananda and Isherwood):

At the core of the Perennial Philosophy we find four fundamental doctrines.

First: the phenomenal world of matter and of individualized consciousness–the world of things and animals and men and even gods–is the manifestation of a Divine Ground within which all partial realities have their being, and apart from which they would be non-existent.

Second: human beings are capable not merely of knowing about the Divine Ground by inference; they can also realize its existence by a direct intuition, superior to discursive reasoning. This immediate knowledge unites the knower with that which is known.

Third: man possesses a double nature, a phenomenal ego and an eternal Self, which is the inner man, the spirit, the spark of divinity within the soul. It is possible for a man, if he so desires, to identify himself with the spirit and therefore with the Divine Ground, which is of the same or like nature with the spirit.

Fourth: man’s life on earth has only one end and purpose: to identify himself with his eternal Self and so to come to unitive knowledge of the Divine Ground.

(bullets added)

My four points are implicit in his, but I spell them out differently. As described here, they are quite similar, but Huxley’s 2 and 3 are reversed in comparison to mine.

Huston Smith

Huxley died (on the same day as JFK) in 1963. While he was still alive, another, younger, scholar was already making his mark on the “world religions” scene. Huston Smith, now in his late 80s (born 1919), has been both expounding and living the Perennial Philosophy for all of his adult life. (I had the pleasure of hearing Dr. Smith speak in 1997, before I went to Japan; someday I’ll post my notes from that afternoon.)

Dr. Smith uses the term “The Primordial Tradition” to discuss what I have been calling the Perennial Philosophy. He believes that, since “perennial” means “at all times,” it neglects the “everywhere” aspect of this philosophy. You can read more about this in this interview. In a nutshell, Dr. Smith says that the Primordial Tradition is both timeless and spaceless as well, “because it was not only always, but everywhere”–echoing Vincent of Lerins. The universe, he says, “fits into the primordial tradition but does not exhaust it. There are reaches beyond the physical.” He says that science is doing a fine job of learning about “the physical reaches of reality,” but that we are in danger of losing sight of the “other regions of reality which continue to exist whether we attend to them or not”–in other words, the “something bigger.”

He also noted that in writing his book The Religions of Man (now published as The World’s Religions), which focuses on what is different in the individual religions, he “became more and more struck by recurrent themes which seemed to surface just time and again like echoes.” Later, in another book entitled Forgotten Truth, he explored these “common denominators that ran through them all.”

Forgotten Truth examines our place in the various levels of the world around us. The modern view, Dr. Smith says, reflects the primordial, in that humans are in the center between a “world above” and a “world below.” Look at this chart, from page 4:

Dr. Smith’s footnote points out these parallels:

Modern=Scientific=Secular

Primordial=Humanistic=Sacred

In the Modern/Scientific/Secular view, humans occupy the “Meso-world,” between the larger (in simple terms, “galactic”) world above and the smaller (“microscopic”) world below. The Modern hierarchy is based on both size and the strength of the binding forces; these are measures of Quantity.

Both of the Primordial models, on the other hand, look to measures of Quality: in the popular notion, happiness or “Euphoria” is highest at the Heavenly level, and lowest in Hell; we on Earth are in between. The more sophisticated, “Reflective” Primordial view sees Being as the source of this hierarchy: the Higher Planes participate in Being in greater amounts; the Lower, in lesser. Again, Euphoria and Being are measures of the Quality, not Quantity, of things, and this emphasis on quality unites the Popular and Reflective worldviews.

This kind of connective thinking, seeing that worldviews have changed but that they are still based on hierarchies of Things Above and Below, will be returned to in the discussion of Neo-Perennialism below. But I offer them here as evidence of Dr. Smith’s deep thinking about how the Elementary idea (in Campbell/Bastian’s term) of Hierarchy has manifested itself various times, and even in different forms to the popular and reflective minds of the same era.

Ken Wilber

Reluctantly leaving Dr. Smith for now, we turn to an even more contemporary thinker, Ken Wilber (born 1949). Best known for his Buddhist and psychological writings, Wilber is also a proponent of Perennial themes. In the heart-rending story of his wife Treya’s battle with cancer, Grace and Grit, Wilber presents a long interview on his “Seven Points of Timeless Wisdom,” conducted by Treya before her death. You can read the full interview here; I will present only the Seven Points themselves:

Spirit exists

Spirit is found within

Most of us don’t realize this Spirit within

There is a way out

The way leads to direct experience of Spirit

This experience marks the end of sin and suffering

Social action and compassion result

Looking again at my Four Points, we see these parallels:

Neo-Perennialism	Wilber
1. There is something bigger than us	1. Spirit* exists 2. Spirit is found within
2. We either are (West) or seem to be (East) separated from it	3. Most of us don’t realize this Spirit within
3. Through various means we can become reunited with it (or realize that we already are)	4. There is a way out 5. The way leads to direct experience of Spirit
4. Once the separation is overcome, we will lead larger, richer, fuller lives	6. This experience marks the end of sin and suffering 7. Social action and compassion result
*Wilber’s use of the word “spirit” leaps ahead and assigns a value to the “something bigger” in a way that my Point 1 does not. Needless to say, that this quality “is found within” is a further elaboration of something I am not yet willing to concede. This will become clearer in my discussion of Neo-Perennialism below.

Again, a reading of the full interview will give you a better idea of Wilber’s thinking.

So this Perennial Philosophy (despite its immense implications) is a fairly simply idea to grasp. It reflects humankind’s universal impulse toward union with something bigger, which has been exercised in myriad ways throughout human existence. With that, I conclude my comments on the Perennial Philosophy itself.

Take a look at a range of materials on Baquet’s site HERE

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NB All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD.

Summaries are HERE

Confidential Iran memo exposes policy to deny Baha’i students university education

NEW YORK
27 August 2007 (BWNS)

The Baha’i International Community has received a copy of a confidential 2006 letter from Iran’s Ministry of Science, Research and Technology instructing Iranian universities to expel any student who is discovered to be a Baha’i.

The letter refutes recent statements by Iranian officials, who say Baha’i students in Iran face no discrimination – despite the fact that more than half of the Baha’i university students enrolled last autumn were gradually expelled over the course of the 2006-2007 academic year.

“This latest document, which flatly states that Baha’i students should be expelled from universities once they are discovered, proves unequivocally that Iranian authorities remain intent on utterly blocking the development of Iranian Baha’is, despite what they say to the outside world,” said Bani Dugal, the principal representative of the Baha’i International Community to the United Nations.

“Along with other recently received reports and documents, the letter exposes a duplicitous campaign by Iran to pretend that it does not violate the internationally recognized right to education while, in fact, the government is actually continuing to implement its secret, long-term plan to prevent Baha’i students from obtaining a university education.

“Coupled with ongoing reports of physical and economic harassment directed against Baha’is of all ages and in all regions of the country, this latest development should serve to remind those who care about human rights that Iran’s 300,000-member Baha’i community remains gravely threatened,” she said.

“Not only Baha’is, but also others – students expelled under directives that target them on absolutely baseless grounds; women whose human rights are grossly violated through the enactment or perpetuation of discriminatory laws; and other victims of injustice in that land – need international defense,” she added.

For more information go HERE

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD. Summaries are HERE

40 Meditation Practices – the Chris Corrigan collection

Source Wiki on Meditation

A certain Chris Corrigan has assembled 40 meditation practices (a few links need re-newing)

Forty meditation practices

40 meditation practices in 4 positions

Walking Meditation

Standing Meditation

Standing Chi Kung: Taoist standing practice
Kyudo (standing zazen) archery
Million dollar qi gong practice: more on the benefits of standing meditation
Wu Ji posture: instructions for standing and guiding awareness
Hapkido breathing exercises for standing meditation
Zhan Zhuang: Instructions for Tai Chi standing meditation
Triple Burner Standing Meditation: More exercises for circulating qi
Zen standing meditation: also with breathing and vocalization methods
Ku meditation club handbook: practices from many spiritual traditions
Standing meditation with a tree

Sitting meditation

Lying meditation

Be sure to visit Chris Corrigan’s amazing collection of stuff HERE

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD. Summaries are HERE

The Golden Rule as one aspect of the world-view shared by most holistic educators

The Golden Rule

Two aspects of the world-view shared by most holistic educators are Perennial Philosophy (see separate post) and the Golden Rule.

One measure of the challenge facing us is in the following. In looking for short definitions that might be useful I was struck by the fact that several (many?) Western encyclopedias actually refer to the Golden Rule as a Christian doctrine! Ethnocentricity rules! The point is also well pinned down in an interesting article from Arab News by Iman Kurdi

Below are some of the most interesting sites that present and explore the Golden Rule along with some suggestions for lessons and all ages.

http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler/goldrule.htm

http://www.goldenruleradical.org/

Home

SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR LESSONS/Discussion

1 In what sense is the Golden Rule the same as or different to acting justly?

2 Collect some examples, via interviews, of where the Golden Rule was applied with good effect?

3 Choose several of the problems that exist in the world and see how far you can a) analyze the problem and b) obtain inspiration for steps toward a solution.

Source – for your poster Golden Rule info and much more

A TOUCH OF IRONY: The Wiki entry on the Golden Rule currently shows the price of democracy in that it is hung up in disputes! Re-named as the Ethic of Reciprocity – has it been hijacked or up-lifted by philosophers! I’m sure it will settle eventually – in the mean time there is a lot of good stuff alread on the site – including additional sources.

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NB All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD.

Summaries are HERE

PERENNIAL PHILOSOPHY – TWO VIEWS A) BY KEN WILBER AND B) BY DEB PLATT

Even a cursory glance at the ideological and physical conflicts of today will indicate the desperate need for understanding that enables a ‘clearing in the forest’ of beliefs – one that will enable harmony in diversity.

On this site I argue that the deepest recognition has to lie in our humanity which we hold in common with all others – I am human, you are human, they are human – we all are human. However since religion exists in many and powerful manifestations the most important of all questions is, “In what ways is there a common light at the centre of of all of the great world religions?” The answer is presented in Perennial Philosophy. Perennial Philosophy is not a particularly good title – something like ‘core mystical reality’ or ‘the great chain of being’ are more accurate, albeit much clumsier titles.

In many ways the appeal to recognize sameness in others, harmony in diversity, is also a call to a kind of federalism. That is to say such a recognition will enable the people of the world to hold an allegiance to the whole as well as to the particular – much as most Americans or Germans hold an allegiance to their national government as well as to their state governments.

HERE IS HOW KEN WILBER SUMMARIZES THE SEVEN MAJOR POINTS OF THE PERENNIAL PHILOSOPHY, IN HIS BOOK GRACE AND GRIT:

1. Spirit exists.
2. Spirit is found within.
3. Most of us don’t realize this Spirit within, however, because we are living in a world of sin,
separation, and duality–that is, we are living in a fallen or illusory state.
4. There is a way out of this fallen state of sin and illusion, there is a Path to our liberation.
5. If we follow this path to its conclusion, the result is a Rebirth or Enlightenment, a direct experience
of Spirit within, a Supreme Liberation, which–
6 marks the end of sin and suffering, and
which
7 issues in social action of mercy and compassion on behalf of all sentient beings.

THIS IS HOW DEB PLATT PRESENTED HER LATE LAMENTED SITE ON WHICH SHE BROUGHT TOGETHER A VAST AND BEAUTIFUL SELECTION OF QUOTATIONS FROM WORLD RELIGIONS

If anyone knows what happened to her site please tell me. Her site was a truly great contribution toward religious understanding and its disappearance a great loss. Equally if you managed to copy her site before it was taken down please let me know (onesummit ATgmail.com replace AT with @).

This is the ‘universal’, mystic heart of all of the great wisdom traditions as Deb Platt presented it;

• There’s a reality beyond the material world:
• Which is uncreated.
• It pervades everything,
• but remains beyond the reach of human knowledge and understanding.
• You approach that reality by:
• Distinguishing ego from true self
• Understanding the nature of desire
• Becoming unattached
• Forgetting about preferences
• Not working for personal gain
• Letting go of thoughts
• Redirecting your attention
• Being devoted
• Being humble
• Invoking that reality
• Surrendering
• That reality approaches you through:
• Grace
• The teacher
• You’re transformed so that you embody that reality by:
• Dying and being reborn

Holistic Education doesn’t have allegiance to any one religion or philosophy, but Perennial Philosophy is very important for many and is the position of this site. It is motivated by recognition of the essential oneness of the great wisdom traditions

(SEE also Aldous Huxley’s Perennial Philosophy or Chap 2 of Jack Miller’s Educating for Wisdom & Compassion)

Juxtaposition: Buddhist sand art and s…

Juxtaposition: Buddhist sand art and street paintings

Source

From time to time juxtapositions come along i.e the placing of two or more views the dynamics of which create a rich text for philosophical inquiry and creative response.

I saw on TV a piece about Buddhist sand art. It was fascinating – a sense of the sacred – its destruction at the end of the celebration, the placing of some of the sand into running water so that the good might be more widely disperse, the giving all who attending the ceremony a small bag of the now mixed sand grains. Very powerful, very moving, very spiritual.

I also came across 3D street art as in these examples here

There are many examples of the Buddhist art. Here is one interesting application.

Suggested task: Explore these two forms of art and see how they inform each other within their cultural contexts. What questions arise? What creative expression opportunities arise? What is the dialogue between the philosophical questions and the creative expressions produced?

Am I right there is no subjectivity in the Buddhist’s monks art and in the 2D/3D street art it is highly (?) subjective? Is the first simply symbolic decoration? Is the latter highly disciplined or self-indulgent? What can we say about the fact that both forms have only a short life span before destruction? Des the pavement art get ‘dispersed’?

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the PhD. Summaries are HERE

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