[Continued from yesterday]
F.: The posting today continues with quotations from "Native Americans" whose words transmitted the non-duality teachings of Advaita:
ON SILENCE / MEDITATION / QUIET TIME
[NOTE: According to the earliest Native Teachings, that which is "true" is only the space between exhalation and inhalation. Advaita teachers agree that truth cannot be spoken. Because inhaling and exhaling is a meaningless occurrence involving a temporary combination of earth elements, it is in the silence between those actions that "truth" can be understood in the moment of non-action. Quiet meditation, therefore, was intended not to still the "mind" but to focus on the nothingness, just like the nothingness during that breathless span of freedom from body and "mind" activity, whereby truth could be realized during that empty moment.]
“When you are in doubt, be still, and wait. So long as mists envelop you, be still; be still until the sunlight pours through and dispels the mists—as it surely will.” White Eagle
F.: The posting today continues with quotations from "Native Americans" whose words transmitted the non-duality teachings of Advaita:
ON SILENCE / MEDITATION / QUIET TIME
[NOTE: According to the earliest Native Teachings, that which is "true" is only the space between exhalation and inhalation. Advaita teachers agree that truth cannot be spoken. Because inhaling and exhaling is a meaningless occurrence involving a temporary combination of earth elements, it is in the silence between those actions that "truth" can be understood in the moment of non-action. Quiet meditation, therefore, was intended not to still the "mind" but to focus on the nothingness, just like the nothingness during that breathless span of freedom from body and "mind" activity, whereby truth could be realized during that empty moment.]
“When you are in doubt, be still, and wait. So long as mists envelop you, be still; be still until the sunlight pours through and dispels the mists—as it surely will.” White Eagle
”Earth, teach me quiet—as the grasses are still with new light.” Ute Teaching
“Remember the peace that may be found in silence.” Cherokee Teaching
“There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities, no place to hear the leaves of spring or the rustle of insects’ wings. Perhaps it is because I am a savage and do not understand, but the clatter only seems to insult the ears.” Chief Seattle
“I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.” Oriah Mountain Dreamer
ON NATURAL LIVING / FREEDOM FROM CONCEPTS
“I prefer to their dogma my excursions into the natural.” Zitkala-Sa
“Your religion was written on tablets of stone, ours on our hearts.” Chief Seattle
ON CYCLES
“Earth, teach me renewal—as the seed that rises in the spring.” Ute Teaching
“You have noticed that everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round.” Black Elk
“Tribe follows tribe and nations follow nations, like the tides of the sea. It is the order of nature, and regret is useless.” Chief Seattle
“We are part of the earth and the earth is part of us.” Chief Seattle
“Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.” Black Elk
“There is no death.” Chief Seattle
THE HISTORY OF THE SPREADING OF THE ADVAITA TEACHINGS: The Message of Non-Duality Moves Beyond the Far East
While the Original Understanding is timeless, there is some evidence that the Advaita (but, obviously, not the “Advaita Vedanta”) Teachings were circulating in the India-Asia region as much as 40,000 years ago. Moses plagiarized “I AM THAT; I AM” 4,000 years ago when he most likely heard the summative expression of the Advaita teachings from persons traveling through the Middle East. Caravans that hauled goods between the Middle East and Asia exposed many in the Middle East to elements of Far Eastern cultures, Advaita Teachings included. Some 2,000 years ago, Christ taught the Advaita Teachings that he had obviously learned during his “Lost Years” when he studied with certain “radicals” in the desert or when he traveled to the Far East, as some evidence suggests, on some of the caravans being operated by a relative.
So the Teachings were being spread from the Far East to various parts of the world, but when did they reach the “Americas”? It seems that the first wave of Asians migrated to what would later be named “the Americas” between 25,000 and 40,000 years ago…mainly as hunters. The second wave came when their lands were invaded by Aryans.
[A note of irony: Those Asiatic people ran eastward to escape the invading Aryans. Eventually, those Aryans would plunder that region but would move westward and would settle as Angles and Saxons in what is now called "Germany," would move farther west and would invade and settle what they would call "Angleland" (England today), and would move even farther west and invade the “New World,” which the more logical native population would point out was actually the same age as the rest of the earth. After thousands of years, the descendants of the Aryans who ran the Asians from their lands would invade the lands that those Asians had moved to in an effort to escape the Aryan invaders thousands of years earlier. Eventually, 98% of those native inhabitants would be killed, 99% of their land would be confiscated, and the remaining 2% of the indigenous peoples would be separated from the new Aryan population and confined to the 1% of the lands that was “reserved” for Indians.]
The discussion of the ways in which those indigenous peoples shared the Advaita teaching in the "Americas" will continue tomorrow. For today, you are invited to pause, to re-read the quotes above, to find the message of non-duality contained in the quotations, and to reflect upon the meaning of those teachings that were shared among the first people to inhabit the lands now called “North, Central, and South America.” Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
So the Teachings were being spread from the Far East to various parts of the world, but when did they reach the “Americas”? It seems that the first wave of Asians migrated to what would later be named “the Americas” between 25,000 and 40,000 years ago…mainly as hunters. The second wave came when their lands were invaded by Aryans.
[A note of irony: Those Asiatic people ran eastward to escape the invading Aryans. Eventually, those Aryans would plunder that region but would move westward and would settle as Angles and Saxons in what is now called "Germany," would move farther west and would invade and settle what they would call "Angleland" (England today), and would move even farther west and invade the “New World,” which the more logical native population would point out was actually the same age as the rest of the earth. After thousands of years, the descendants of the Aryans who ran the Asians from their lands would invade the lands that those Asians had moved to in an effort to escape the Aryan invaders thousands of years earlier. Eventually, 98% of those native inhabitants would be killed, 99% of their land would be confiscated, and the remaining 2% of the indigenous peoples would be separated from the new Aryan population and confined to the 1% of the lands that was “reserved” for Indians.]
The discussion of the ways in which those indigenous peoples shared the Advaita teaching in the "Americas" will continue tomorrow. For today, you are invited to pause, to re-read the quotes above, to find the message of non-duality contained in the quotations, and to reflect upon the meaning of those teachings that were shared among the first people to inhabit the lands now called “North, Central, and South America.” Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
