Today's Considerations
Consider these parallels:
*** Maharaj: "There is no chaos in the world except the
chaos which your mind creates."
+++ (About 1,950 years earlier) Yeshu'a / “Jesus”: “A
dual-minded person is unstable in all ways."
*** Maharaj: Grew up in a highly-religious culture; heard and studied
and considered the dogma spread via Hinduism; abandoned organized
religion for the most part (though he did offer Hindu / non-dual combination sessions in his loft
in the early days of his teaching); and then abandoned the use of religion and
dogma completely and eventually focused on the non-dual / Nisargan message only, for the most part.
+++ (About 1,950 years earlier) Yeshu'a / “Jesus”: Grew up in a
highly-religious culture; heard and studied and considered the dogma spread via
Judaism; abandoned organized religion for the most part (though he did offer a
combination of religious and / or non-dual pointers in his
teachings (depending on his audience); and then abandoned the use of religion
and dogma completely and focused on the non-duality message only, for the most part.
*** Maharaj: When Westerners began showing up in the loft and
Maharaj stopped offering bhajans and turned his back on organized religion and advised
people to toss the pictures of their gods into the sea and shared spiritual /
non-dual combination pointers instead, the religious Hindus criticized him.
+++ (About 1,950 years earlier) Yeshu'a / “Jesus”: Yeshu’a at
the age of 12 was teaching Jewish dogma in the temple. Eighteen years later, he
had turned his back on organized religion and was sharing spiritual / non-dual
combination pointers, and the religious Jews criticized him and left him to the
Romans to get rid of.
+++ How ironic that an organized religion was founded in the
name of Yeshu'a / “Jesus” when he modeled abandoning organized religion completely.
How ironic that Christians today criticize anyone who worships with them for
a time but then abandons organized religion, just as their Christ did. How ironic that the non-duality pointers
offered by their so-called “Savior” are ignored by them while the content of the Jewish texts (which
Christians call their “Old Testament”) is more influential on them than Christ’s
teachings (in what they call “The New Testament”).
*** How ironic, too, that a cult has been founded around Maharaj
with persons who pay a fee to visit the loft and drop to their knees in order to bow and pray and worship him therein; how ironic that persons go to sites Maharaj visited - and which are now deemed to be "holy" - and bow and pray and clap and chant there;
and how ironic that persons go to
another room thought to be "special" and "holy" where some of the ashes from Maharaj's funeral pyre were collected and where those ashes are now on display and where those persons join others
in bowing there to a handful of the remaining, burnt plant food elements of a body
which Maharaj did not identify with at all.
Again, "There is no chaos in the world except the chaos
which your mind creates” and “A dual-minded person is unstable in all
ways." The latter is an accurate pointer which can be expanded to
include:
"Dual-minded persons in a 'relationship' will be unstable in all ways"
and
"Dual-minded owners of multi-billion-dollar corporations will be unstable in all ways"
and
"Dual-minded citizens of a nation will be unstable in all ways"
and
"Dual-minded 'leaders' of a nation will be unstable in all ways"
and
"Dual-minded, xenophobic 'Super Patriots' will be unstable in all ways"
and
"Dual-minded citizens of a nation, or citizens of nations in conflict, will be unstable in all ways."
Can any sane and objective witness possibly claim that the
key traits of the lives of most persons all around the globe are anything other
than “chaotic” and “unstable”? And at the root of all of the chaos and instability? Duality. Dualistic thoughts. Dualistic talk. Duality-driven actions.
Today, many nations are split right down the middle with
their populations divided along duality-based identifiers:
Iraq and Syria are divided along dualistic, religious, sectarian
lines, for example.
The U.S. is presently divided by these dualistic identifiers:
“conservative” vs. “liberal";
“highly religious” vs. “less religious” or “not religious"; and
“northern” vs. “southern” geographic lines rooted in “progressive types”
vs. “opponents of all change and innovation.”
History offers many lessons of what can happen when duality
rules a nation:
1. Abraham Lincoln, speaking of the U.S. in the mid-1800's,
observed in a non-dual fashion that "a house divided against itself cannot
stand," a non-dual message that adumbrated a pointer also offered by the
Advaitin Yeshu'a many centuries earlier and by Maharaj later.
2. An even earlier example of a case where a national house was
divided against itself
happened when a city-state known as Florence (Italy) had a formerly-united
populace that became divided 50 / 50 along religious and social and political
lines.
Those differing political and social and religious-based beliefs split Florence right down the middle after the monk Girolamo "The Bonfires of the Vanities" Savonarola entered the city of Florence. With a hidden agenda to overthrow the government and create a theocracy in its place, he attacked the ruling Medicis as "humanists" and "non-Christians" and chastised them for supporting science.
Like many current counterparts in the U.S., Savonarola was a demagogue of the highest order, able to incite half of the population with emotionally-intoxicating, evangelical-preacher-like-rhetoric while spreading ignorance and fanaticism. Eventually, he was able to foster enough discontentment that the city-state became split 50 / 50 by the divisiveness of their political and social and religious-based, dualistic concepts.
Savonarola inspired a puritanical fervor, declaring passionately that Florence would become "the world center of Christianity" and "more powerful, more glorious than ever" once Christians gained total control of the city-state. During the four years that he was the religious / political ruler of Florence, the city-state sank into utter chaos as he converted it from a self-governed, independent state into a theocracy.
Post-Savonarola's influence, fifty percent of the population longed to return to being a self-governing, independent state; fifty percent preferred his plan: to live in a theocracy - a religious state where God is considered the head of the government and where a human ruler is deemed to be God's spokesperson on earth. Rather than a written constitution serving as a guide, scriptures deemed to be "holy" are the written guide for a theocratic nation.
As in the days of Lincoln, the U.S. is again providing an example for the entire planet as opposing forces - totally trapped in dual-mindedness - are playing out in a real time drama and in their Theater of the Lie exactly what it looks like when duality runs amuck with a present populace that is once again divided 50 / 50 along religious, social, political (and yes, racial) lines.
The 1860's version of a dual-minded "United" States is alive and active, the divisiveness never really having ended in many parts of the nation.
Today, what is happening in the States provides an example for all seekers of the non-dual understanding of what happens when dual-mindedness prevails. In the U.S., the trappings of duality in national politics is at play with demagoguery and hyperbole and histrionics and ignorance and stupidity and insanity (Maharaj) and duality-inspired destruction having become exceedingly popular among the fifty precent or more who prefer those. Their zeal to build a Biblical-based government is all-consuming, inspiring their full-blown monomania.
Those differing political and social and religious-based beliefs split Florence right down the middle after the monk Girolamo "The Bonfires of the Vanities" Savonarola entered the city of Florence. With a hidden agenda to overthrow the government and create a theocracy in its place, he attacked the ruling Medicis as "humanists" and "non-Christians" and chastised them for supporting science.
Like many current counterparts in the U.S., Savonarola was a demagogue of the highest order, able to incite half of the population with emotionally-intoxicating, evangelical-preacher-like-rhetoric while spreading ignorance and fanaticism. Eventually, he was able to foster enough discontentment that the city-state became split 50 / 50 by the divisiveness of their political and social and religious-based, dualistic concepts.
Savonarola inspired a puritanical fervor, declaring passionately that Florence would become "the world center of Christianity" and "more powerful, more glorious than ever" once Christians gained total control of the city-state. During the four years that he was the religious / political ruler of Florence, the city-state sank into utter chaos as he converted it from a self-governed, independent state into a theocracy.
Post-Savonarola's influence, fifty percent of the population longed to return to being a self-governing, independent state; fifty percent preferred his plan: to live in a theocracy - a religious state where God is considered the head of the government and where a human ruler is deemed to be God's spokesperson on earth. Rather than a written constitution serving as a guide, scriptures deemed to be "holy" are the written guide for a theocratic nation.
As in the days of Lincoln, the U.S. is again providing an example for the entire planet as opposing forces - totally trapped in dual-mindedness - are playing out in a real time drama and in their Theater of the Lie exactly what it looks like when duality runs amuck with a present populace that is once again divided 50 / 50 along religious, social, political (and yes, racial) lines.
The 1860's version of a dual-minded "United" States is alive and active, the divisiveness never really having ended in many parts of the nation.
Today, what is happening in the States provides an example for all seekers of the non-dual understanding of what happens when dual-mindedness prevails. In the U.S., the trappings of duality in national politics is at play with demagoguery and hyperbole and histrionics and ignorance and stupidity and insanity (Maharaj) and duality-inspired destruction having become exceedingly popular among the fifty precent or more who prefer those. Their zeal to build a Biblical-based government is all-consuming, inspiring their full-blown monomania.
As far as the non-dual understanding is concerned, Florence in the late 1500's, the U.S. in the mid-1800's, and the U.S. currently can provide examples of what happens when "dual-minded persons become unstable in all ways" and then seek power and control in order to assure that their dualistic beliefs are forced upon an entire population.
Of course, the histories of most nations provide similar examples: the U.K. when Henry VIII broke from the Catholic Church and formed a state religion that to this day functions alongside the government; South Africa under apartheid; other African nations that have been torn by regional wars;
the present-day theocracies that are at war with all who do not belong to their particular religion and sect; and a history of other religious wars that are rooted in the opposing agendas of Judaism, Christianity, Islam and other religions that would have a "faith-based, God-fearing government" in order to guarantee that their nations have a "faith-based, God-fearing populace."
None of that could ever even be conceived except for the fact that dual-minded persons assume false roles which then drive their every thought and word and deed (rendering them unstable in all ways after having assumed the roles of "Super Political Leaders," "Super Proud Xenophobes," "Super Religious Knowers," "Super Patriots" and - most arrogantly and delusionally and divisively - "Those Who Believe That They Are Living in 'The Greatest Nation on Earth'.") All of that is dualistic, arrogance-based, hierarchy-inspiring, separatist nonsense.
Such is the relative existence when it is being controlled
by duality, that is, by dualistic thoughts, dualistic talk, and duality-driven
actions; by religious fanatics fomenting a false sense of separation and different-from-ment and better-than-ment; by political fanatics fomenting a false sense of
separation and different-from-ment and better-than-ment; and by a few big business fanatics who are co-opting control of elections and using their billions to foment a
false sense of separation and different-from-ment and better-than-ment.
And so the cycles go, for over 500 years in some of the examples offered. Is it not indeed clear that "There is no chaos in the world except the chaos which your mind creates” and that “A dual-minded person is unstable in all ways"?
And so the cycles go, for over 500 years in some of the examples offered. Is it not indeed clear that "There is no chaos in the world except the chaos which your mind creates” and that “A dual-minded person is unstable in all ways"?
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
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