[The response to #1 continues from yesterday]:
1. I'm wondering about your explanations of the absolute and answers that you provide people to pace their way from whence they came and where they are going in the infinite cycle--don't you think it's a little confusing to put a tracking device on pools of energy or consciousness?
F.: Ultimately, though, there's one main reason that a seven-step “tracking device” is offered: if you review transcripts of talks between sages and protégés, or the content of Advaita sites such as this or others that offer a forum, or books that have gathered and printed pointers offered by jnanis over the ages, those all have one thing in common: the teachers are responding to what is asked. The questions (a) come in no particular order and (b) come from persons at any of the three different levels of understanding: the wet charcoal stage, the dry charcoal stage and the gunpowder stage. Their questions are always answered in the indiscriminate order in which they are received and at a specific level that is suited for that specific questioner only. An answer geared toward a protégé at one level is never relevant for those at all of the other levels represented in the audience. Too, the answers are never presented in the sequence in which the steps must be taken for Realization to happen. Thus, the answers can create more confusion than clarity among readers or listeners since the answer to one person at one level will be very different from what the same teacher will offer to another protégé at a different level.
For example, in transcripts of talks with one sage, it is observable that one day he’s talking about the Absolute. Another day, the talks go back to the "beginning" of the "path" as body identification is discussed. The next day, the leap is to child ignorance. Then non-beingness might be covered, and all along the way, the teacher is modifying answers, depending on the level of the seeker. The pointer the teacher offers today to a protégé at one level he might “contradict” tomorrow when talking to a protégé at a different level. With no sequencing or tracking, and with tremendous diversity and seeming contradictions in answers given, protégés generally never "get it."
Next, how could protégés possibly sift through all the pointers offered to different seekers at different levels and arrange them in a logical sequence where they make sense and provide a clear-cut method for understanding all of the varied parts of the teachings? They cannot. Since protégés can’t take all of the elements of the teachings and arrange them in a sequence that is logical, seldom do persons ever Realize. Even among the most dedicated Advaitan protégés, most will never find that exact sequence by which realization happens, and most teachers will never find the exact sequence in which pointers should be offered in order for Realization to happen with their protégés.
With a sequencing, persons can detach first from the body identification; only then can they detach from the mind identifications (the assumed roles or ego-states that persons play). Then, they can understand what the Advaitan teacher called “Christ” meant when he said, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace. I come with a sword for I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. A man's enemies will be the members of his own household.”
Was he suggesting familicide, or was he suggesting that persons detach from accepting culturally-assigned roles as identities? Was he suggesting that all should use a sword to eliminate specific people or to eliminate all of the personas that people play? Was he pointing out that misery comes from assuming roles and false personas and that a struggle is required to eliminate all of those and to detach from the false? To say, “When you speak of me, speak of me as I AM” simply means, “Do not say that ‘I am...a son,’ ‘I am...a virgin’s son,’ ‘I am...god’s son,’ ‘I am...a rabbi or teacher,’ ‘I am...a brother,’ etc. Speak of me only as the consciousnesss which temporarily I AM, not as anything else. Not as Jesus. Not as The Christ. Nothing but I AM.”
1. I'm wondering about your explanations of the absolute and answers that you provide people to pace their way from whence they came and where they are going in the infinite cycle--don't you think it's a little confusing to put a tracking device on pools of energy or consciousness?
F.: Ultimately, though, there's one main reason that a seven-step “tracking device” is offered: if you review transcripts of talks between sages and protégés, or the content of Advaita sites such as this or others that offer a forum, or books that have gathered and printed pointers offered by jnanis over the ages, those all have one thing in common: the teachers are responding to what is asked. The questions (a) come in no particular order and (b) come from persons at any of the three different levels of understanding: the wet charcoal stage, the dry charcoal stage and the gunpowder stage. Their questions are always answered in the indiscriminate order in which they are received and at a specific level that is suited for that specific questioner only. An answer geared toward a protégé at one level is never relevant for those at all of the other levels represented in the audience. Too, the answers are never presented in the sequence in which the steps must be taken for Realization to happen. Thus, the answers can create more confusion than clarity among readers or listeners since the answer to one person at one level will be very different from what the same teacher will offer to another protégé at a different level.
For example, in transcripts of talks with one sage, it is observable that one day he’s talking about the Absolute. Another day, the talks go back to the "beginning" of the "path" as body identification is discussed. The next day, the leap is to child ignorance. Then non-beingness might be covered, and all along the way, the teacher is modifying answers, depending on the level of the seeker. The pointer the teacher offers today to a protégé at one level he might “contradict” tomorrow when talking to a protégé at a different level. With no sequencing or tracking, and with tremendous diversity and seeming contradictions in answers given, protégés generally never "get it."
Next, how could protégés possibly sift through all the pointers offered to different seekers at different levels and arrange them in a logical sequence where they make sense and provide a clear-cut method for understanding all of the varied parts of the teachings? They cannot. Since protégés can’t take all of the elements of the teachings and arrange them in a sequence that is logical, seldom do persons ever Realize. Even among the most dedicated Advaitan protégés, most will never find that exact sequence by which realization happens, and most teachers will never find the exact sequence in which pointers should be offered in order for Realization to happen with their protégés.
With a sequencing, persons can detach first from the body identification; only then can they detach from the mind identifications (the assumed roles or ego-states that persons play). Then, they can understand what the Advaitan teacher called “Christ” meant when he said, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace. I come with a sword for I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. A man's enemies will be the members of his own household.”
Was he suggesting familicide, or was he suggesting that persons detach from accepting culturally-assigned roles as identities? Was he suggesting that all should use a sword to eliminate specific people or to eliminate all of the personas that people play? Was he pointing out that misery comes from assuming roles and false personas and that a struggle is required to eliminate all of those and to detach from the false? To say, “When you speak of me, speak of me as I AM” simply means, “Do not say that ‘I am...a son,’ ‘I am...a virgin’s son,’ ‘I am...god’s son,’ ‘I am...a rabbi or teacher,’ ‘I am...a brother,’ etc. Speak of me only as the consciousnesss which temporarily I AM, not as anything else. Not as Jesus. Not as The Christ. Nothing but I AM.”
Advaitans who would realize must use the sword of destruction to eliminate all roles being assumed as identities. So many have asked, "But how to move from body, past mind, past religious and spiritual roles, past all that must be passed to reach Realizartion?" Thus, it should be now be seen why a clear-cut sequence of directions are required in order to meet all protégés at whatever level they might be and move them “step-by-step” through each phase of the understandings that are required for the Full Realization to happen. Please enter the silence of contemplation. [Tomorrow: The response to part 2]
