This site is currently under construction, so some the following links are inactive at this time. However, the Library is open, and new material is constantly added to the blog below.



 

A Philosopher's Blog

May the Gods kindle in our souls a love and an understanding for things divine and human, may they elevate our souls as we realise our holy nature, and may they assist us as we bring light and beauty to those in our presence.

8 March 2009: Philo-Sophy

Long for the Truth of Reality. Long for it with a longing most intense. Long for the One, reach out to that Fount of our Essence with a singular intent to embrace it and have it possess you.

Reach out with our mind into that unknowable darkness that lies beyond all being, that divine Light cloaked in utter transcendence. Open your being to it, and allow yourself to touch That which is always beyond reach.

25 February 2009: Commitment to Ourselves

Daily, we face choices that test our resolve, our conviction, to remain true to ourselves and to our commitment to personal truth and greatness. We constantly face opportunities to prove to ourselves that we are indeed sincere in our desire for authenticity and integrity, and that we are prepared to make sacrifices, however small, to prove our honesty and fidelity to our souls.

Many things may lead to our failure to remain true to ourselves: an assortment of fears, desires, passions, mixed goals, loss of concentration, etc. However, all these are simply different names for one problem: Compromise.

It is in those moments when we stand between two avenues of action that we know where our loyalties are. Whenever we face a situation in which we may either stand firm on our values and convictions, or bend to the fear that our actions will displease someone or cause us to miss out on some cheap pleasure, yes, it is in these moments where we learn whether we do indeed care about ourselves, or not.

29 January 2009: Spiritual Indigestion

There are many things that may hinder the fulfilment of spiritual goals. One which is most regrettable is the mental indigestion caused by consuming too many books on philosophy or spirituality.

Men may spend their lives reading about the sages, their wisdom and excellence. Men may spend their days pouring over the benefits and methods of prayer, dialectics, purification, philanthropy, theurgy, and other noble sciences.

But, after mastering the art of finding and collecting such books and reading them all with such devotion, what is left for such men except to retire in depression when, after a lifetime of such intense study, these souls fail to internalise such precepts, and never attain any real level of perfection in themselves and in their own lives.

The cure for this predictable catastrophe is simple. Stop reading and searching for information you already know. Put down your volumes, and instead lift your hands to the divinities. Walk away from your libraries, and raise your soul and enter the celestial temples of the Good. You must walk that bridge from theory towards practice.

18 January 2009: Authenticity

How do I know if I am a moral individual? How can I be certain that my sense of virtue is sure, and not just a phantom, a facade? Do I know that I am just, or am I really deluded by the absence of trials?

How would I fare against this challenge Glaucon gives me in the Republic (359c-361d)? What if I were tested by the Ring of Gyges? What if I possessed a ring that, with a twist of it, I would be rendered invisible, and able to do whatever I wished without fear of being discovered? Would it reveal how false my self-understanding is? Would I prove true to virtue?

Further, what if societies were arranged so that hypocrites were praised and rewarded as saints for their imitations of moral behaviour, while truly moral men were condemned as devils and loathsome scum; would I still choose the path of morality?

Would I still seek virtue if it was certain that doing so would condemn me forever in the annals of history as the most vile and pathetic of creatures? What if the gods themselves were to punish me for all eternity in the flames of Hell if I took that path of virtue and morality?

This is indeed a formidable challenge.

9 January 2009: Necessary Changes

A problem with some current spiritual programmes today is the incompatible idea that a seeker can possess spiritual depth and maintain his old habits of thought and behaviour. The sogan professed by such groups boils down to "You are divine; You are perfect just the way you are."

True, we have a divine nature. But no, if you are to realise that nature and manifest that divinity, you must make real attempts at bettering the way you think and act, and there are changes that must occur to your composite mind first.

You cannot be tranquil and, simultaneously, be disturbed by the temporal events around you. You are truly good in essence, but that essence is buried under a personality conditioned by a society devoted to pleasure seeking and social acceptance.

If you are serious about manifesting your divinity, you must take those spirtual exercises seriously which are designed to produce a "view from eternity" and a detachment from things transient. Only a soul who is genuinely free can truly choose and enjoy a just and full life.

6 January 2009: Hyperignorance: pure Socratic Irony

The humourous yet profoundly successful method of Socrates is his famous admission of ignorance on whatever subject he happens to be discussing. This allows him the freedom to pursue the truth wherever it leds him. It is a path of inquiry which is both fruitful, honest, and delightful.

In relations to this, Damascius, the last head of the Platonic Academy in Athens, coined the term "hyperignorance" (huperagnoia) to refer to our most truest method of understanding the Divine. He wrote that "the Ineffable should be honoured by complete silence, and above all, even with complete unknowing, itself deeming all knowledge unworthy." The spiritual path of "Unknowning" is essentially this Socratic method of admitting ignorance applied to knowledge of the Good.

But there still a kind of knowledge, however contradictory, to be gotten from this line of inquiry. In most of the dialogues, Socrates goes back and forth between propositions and their conclusions until he reaches a point where reason fails him. But yet the path is fruitful.

For instance, in the Lysis, he tries to define "friendship" but fails. However, at the very end, he tells Lysis that he is glad to have him as a friend, even though he does not quite know what that means now. Plato is hinting at the fact that, though we may not be able to know things definitively, we still have a sense about them. It is a knowledge written in the soul that transcends language and all attempts at definition.

The Divine is not understood by reason or demonstration, but by a sense of unknowing that the mysterious principle rises in the souls of those who seek it. It can be the most joyfully tormenting side of Socratic irony. Damascius nails it when he says that "perhaps the Ineffable is so completely ineffable that one cannot even establish that it is ineffable."

(These quotes of Damascius were translated by Rosemary Griffith, "Pseudo-Dionysus and Damascus" in Neoplatonism and Christianity (ISNS).

2 January 2009: Avoiding an Endocrine Spirituality

The spiritual exercises of the Platonist are aimed at perfecting the vision of the soul. The essential practice, though performed in a multitude of ways, is simply this: (1) to rationally and intuitively study the nature of the universe, at all its levels, both at the corporeal and divine levels, (2) then, after this rational study, to contemplate and actually witness these truths being played out around you, as actually present to oneself, all the time, and (3) to live in accordance with these truths, through the practice of noble virtue and with a reverence for the Divine and its creation.

This is different from many of the spiritual exercises which one may encounter elsewhere, in which one induces "states" by altering one's natural breathing and stimulating the parts of the body (the chakras, the kundalini, etc.) by intense concentration or posturing.

The reason that the Platonist avoids these is that when such states are produced, how are we to know whether the results are a true enlightenment, a geniune understanding and union with reality, or a physiological sensation produced by a saturation of oxygen and an over-stimulation of the endocrine system.

This is not to say that mystics who use such techniques are not enlightened; it is simply that, for the Platonist, such practices, though they may be used for deification, invite the real risk for self-deception and falling from the path of Wisdom into pleasure seeking behaviour.

The methods of our school are primarily noetic. By taming the body through a simple diet, healthy exercise and modest living, and training the mind in the art of dialectics, contemplation, and virtuous activity, the risk of falling into a spirituality that is biological in essence is reduced and the soul is serene and clear enough to witness the divine realities as they are.

The aim of all this is to understand better, not feel better.

1 January 2009: Pray

The solace and joy the soul finds in prayer, in turning her self towards the sources of her light and being, in drawing her self into the activity and warmth of divinity, is wondrous and revitalising.

Mastering the art of prayer, perfecting the ritual of offering the motion of one's thoughts and actions to the gods, is something that occurs only after much practice and a great deal of experience.

One of the most important skills the soul must develop is learning when she is falling off course during her prayer. How well and how quickly she can distinguish between true experiential gifts from the divine and her own projected imaginations and bodily sensations, determines if she will succeed in her quest for the highest knowledge and virtue.

Does she spend her time imagining how great it would feel to witness and commune with God, or does she actually engage in prayer and contemplation? Does she speak of owning divine virtues, and yet hasn't mastered the human ones?

The joy and splendour of divine illumination cannot come until the soul has chosen to put aside dreaming and begin engaging in practice, until she has given up wasting her time on social trivialities and dedicate serious time towards her eternal homecoming.

The pleasure of prayer is beyong description, but not for a soul that is afraid to exchange thinking philosophically for Philosophy itself.