ANNOUNCEMENTS
[Walter Driscoll asked to interview me in order to preserve on video some of the latest modifications and evolutions in the versions of the message offered here since 1989. He would label the discussion, "Unlearning with Floyd Henderson."
Please note: For those who have a problem hearing what is being shared, the video offers a fairly accurate set of closed captions which some listeners might want to activate.
The interview is available for viewing by clicking on video "NUMBER THIRTEEN" in the column to the right.]
1. [See the offer in gold text following this post for details on how you can watch a retreat on video which includes a detailed discussion of all seven of the steps on the path as used by Maharaj]
2. Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "god," the "Son of god," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns. See the green text after today's post for the full meaning and implications of that.
3. A newer video ("Number Ten: Awakening Together Satsang, March 2018") has now been added in the far right column of this page, offering the opportunity to view a recent 2018 satsang session with Floyd being interviewed by Regina and Jacqueline of "The Awakening Together Group." (See the details in the blue text after this post.)
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HOW RELIGIOUS AND SPIRITUAL AND NON-DUAL MESSAGES HAVE BEEN WARPED BEYOND RECOGNITION
THE SUPPOSEDLY HOLY JEWISH WRITING: The Earliest Codification of Duality
Christians traditionally divide the Old Testament into four sections:
1. the first five books or Pentateuch (which corresponds to the Jewish Torah);
2. the history books telling the history of the Israelites supports their claim that they are The Chosen People of God, and the history sections cover their actions from their conquest of Canaan to their defeat and exile of Babylon.
Upon orders from their God, seven nations which were already living there prior to the arrival of the Israelites were defeated;
3. the so-called “Wisdom Books” deal with questions of good and evil in the world; and
4. the books of the biblical prophets, warning of the loss of rewards and the guarantee of punishment for any turning away from their God.
Talk about religion promoting the duality-based concepts of "good vs. bad," "different from" and "better than," war vs. peace," etc.
THE SUPPOSEDLY HOLY CHRISTIAN WRITING: Mostly a Repetition of Jewish Writings
The “Holy Bible” is divided into two parts: The Old Testament (which is a repetition of Jewish writings) and the New Testament. Nearly 80% of the Bible is a repetition of Jewish writings, so the Jews who claim that God chose them is reinforced along with the claim that God told them to invade the land occupied by seven other nations;
to go to war with those seven nations already abiding in what is called “The Hold Land”; and to defeat them and take over their lands. So invasion and slaughter and war is once more justified. Too, 80% of the writings directly or indirectly reinforce the duality of good vs. bad and reward vs. punishment.
Thus, the New Testament / Christian part of the Bible is less than 20% of the entire book. The parts usually in red are supposedly the words of Christ.
The writers of those parts were merely recording what had been passed down (for the most part, usually orally via The Telephone Game). “The Gospels” were written 80 to 100 after Christ had died, so none of those writers ever heard or saw Christ.
Here’s the timeline: the Oral Only period lasted from 40 to 50 years after the crucifixion; some written traditions took place 40-70 years after Christ died; the first written narratives in the New Testament part were penned 60-95 years after Christ died;
some of the four gospel canons were penned 150 years after he died; and the “final full canon” was written 370 years after he died. But much of all of that would be eliminated in the next steps of the writing the Christian Bible:
When Constantine organized The First Council of Nicaea, his intent was to resolve the controversy of Arianism, a doctrine that held that Christ was not divine but was a human being only.
As a result of removing all passages which made reference to Christ being human, not divine, 1000 pages were deleted from the content of the Bible as it previously existed.
Then, the council made it illegal for anyone to own a copy of the Bible with the penalty being death if they were caught with a Bible.
The council also established that the church - influenced for over 300 years by women - would be a males-only institutions. All female priests were replaced with unmarried men. (And how has that worked out?)
Such passages as the one in which god supposedly said, “I created mankind upright, but they have gone in search of many schemes” or “I have given you a simple life. Your problems are of your own making” were eliminated and the concepts of Satan (“enemy”) and Beelzebub (“the god of flies / insects”) were inserted and blamed for man’s downfall.
Since the Christian part makes up less than 20% of the Bible with Jewish writings making up about 80% of the Christian Bible, the result is this: of the supposedly 783,137 words in the Christian Bible, one much read over 600,000 words of the Christian Bible before Christ is even mentioned;
moreover, since much of the words attributed to Christ are repetitions, less than 10% of the Christian Bible has anything to do with what Christ supposedly said.
The result: his non-dual pointers became a fraction of the final draft and are still ignored in almost all Christian institutions.
THE EARLY NON-DUAL “TEACHINGS” AND THE WARPED CODIFICATIONS OF THE MESSAGE
Tracing the confused and confusing codifications from early on, consider this information available on the web:
“Nondualism is a philosophical concept that can be found in many spiritual traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, and Western Christianity.” Consider the duality implied in that statement. Next:
Some of the earliest nondual writings include:
1. The Indian Upanishads: Ancient Hindu texts that are a fundamental part of the Vedanta philosophies Advait (not two) Vedanta (end of knowledge) theory.”
Some take the term “the end of knowledge” to be less about “the final word on nonduality” and more about realizing and then ending the seeking and accumulation of more knowledge, that is, the seeking and accumulation of (learned) ignorance and beliefs.”
That “not two” part inspired the Transcendentalists who discussed regularly their key pointer that there is a “unity beyond the multiplicity.”
2. The Commentary on the Mandulya Upanishad by Gaudapada, a Hindu Nondualism tradition that began around the seventh century CE.
3. The Works of Shankara: From the ninth century CE, these works are also associated with the Indian philosophical system of nondualism.
One can study all of those sources and find copious examples of contradictions as all of the sources for those writing came from hand-me-down, Telephone Game sourcing.
It has been said that “Nonduality, or advaita, is a concept that emphasizes unity in diversity and is found in various forms across many cultures and religious and philosophical traditions, including Hinduism.
“In Hinduism, the school of philosophy Advaita Vedanta focuses on the non-dual nature of reality and the unity between ‘the individual Self / Atman’ and the ultimate reality.” That take establishes a duality-based notion and endorses the duality-based notion of identification. The same happens in this explanation:
“Advaita Vedanta is a school of Hindu philosophy that emphasizes the non-dual nature of reality. It teaches that Brahman (‘the ultimate reality or absolute’) is the only true existence, and individual souls Atman) are ultimately identical to Brahman.”
See? From the early days, duality was at the core of some non-dual “teachings.”
“The oldest traces of nondualism in Indian thought may be found in the Chandogya Upanishad, which pre-dates Buddhism. Buddhism may also have been responding to the teachings of the Chandogya Upanishad, rejecting some of its Atman-Brahman metaphysics.”
What we can understand:
Some 2600 years ago, trades routes between the Far East and the Middle East allowed the Far Eastern summative statement of non-duality (“I AM THAT; I AM”) to reach the Mideast and to be included in Jewish writings as a burning bush supposedly allowed the Jewish God of Abraham to identify himself using that phrase.
(The semicolon was eliminated, probably because the writer had only heard the statement orally and never seen it in written form. The absence has generated considerable confusion among Christians and nondualists.)
Some 2000 years ago, a Middle Eastern “holy man” named Yeshu’a (erroneously identified as “Jesus” by billions on the planet and by trillions from early on to the present) is reported to have said, “A dual-minded person is unstable in all ways.”
He is quoted scores of times citing non-dual pointers, so there might be some validity to reports which have surfaced in India suggesting that Yeshu’a uncle - who ran an active and successful trade business between the Middle East allowed the Far Eastern - may have allowed his nephew Yeshu’a to accompany him on one or more journeys.
At any rate, Yeshu’a in the end was offering non-dual messages which he picked up during his “Lost Years” after he abandoned the organized religion he had been active in during his first twelve years. In his final sermons and talks which he conducted prior to being crucified, he was sharing non-dual pointers.
One of those pointers (“A dual-minded person is unstable in all ways”) adumbrated the earlier takes by the non-dualists who were suggesting that persons should give up their learned ignorance and beliefs by giving up their duality-based thoughts and beliefs and words.
In psychology, unstable is defined as “a tendency toward a lack of self-control, a tendency toward erratic behavior, a tendency toward shifting attitudes and beliefs, and toward rapidly changing or excessive emotions (and, therefore, being emotionally intoxicated).”
And that is how religious and spiritual and non-dual messages have all been warped beyond recognition.
Thus, Maharaj offered the following as part of his final version of the Ultimate Medicine to use to treat the ignorance and insanity of the Ultimate Sickness,” the curse of humankinds’ relative existence.
He said, “All illness begins in the mind”; thus, he advised:
“There is no such thing as a mind.”
“I have no mind . . . .”
Want to be free of the mind? Maharaj advised:
“Reach a state of zero-concepts.”
“As to my mind, I have no such thing. There is consciousness in which
everything happens.”
“I am double dead: not only am I dead to my body, but to my mind, too.”
“I find I have lost the mind irretrievably.”
It is the mind which is a storehouse for body and mind and personality identifications.
It is the mind which is a storehouse for dualistic and, therefore, bogus ideas and concepts and notions and misperceptions (a.k.a., “beliefs”) which generate instability and chaos and misery and suffering.
It is the mind which is a storehouse of the ignorant and insane beliefs which were planted therein by ignorant and insane programming, conditioning, domestication, acculturation, brainwashing and indoctrination.
It is the mind which is a storehouse of all which imprisons persons.
[John Milton said, “The mind . . . in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven” and Richard Lovelace said, “Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage.” So what did he identify as that which does make a prison? The mind, packed chock full of false identifications and false beliefs.]
It is the mind which is a storehouse to all which results in a false sense of different-from-ment which - in turn - always leads to a subsequent sense of better-than-ment.
It is the mind, being the storehouse of beliefs about different-from-ment and better-than-ment, which leads to a false sense of separation which then sets the stage for arguments, nonsensical disagreements, fighting, conflict, killing, wars, chaos, pain, misery, and suffering.
It is the mind which is a storehouse of learned ignorance, personality disorders, and the neuroses and psychoses which can follow as personality disorders disintegrate into a state of severe psychic unhealthiness.
At every step, the long and arduous “path” which was followed here for decades involved dealing with persons who were all determined to use their dogma or exercises or beliefs or methods to add more to the mind, touting the need for more dogma, more spiritual exercises, more philosophy, more ideology, more (but different) beliefs, ad infinitum.
The long and arduous search ended when it became clear that (1) all of the stuff in the mind was the actual source of every problem, the mind being the origin of every problem; and
that (2) the solution did indeed call for de-accumulation . . . that is, called for entering into a process of being un-taught all of it . . . called for entering into a process of un-learning it all;
and called for casting aside all of the nonsense which had been added to and stored in a part of the brain which would be called “the mind” and which would lead to decades of ignorant and nonsensical and insane actions which led to massive levels of misery and suffering that did not end until the mind came to an end.
How to end the mind, the entire content of which can all be summarized with the term, “one’s beliefs”?
Abandon all beliefs. No beliefs? No mind. No mind? No stone walls. No stone walls? Freedom.Why?
Because beliefs come with attachments and attachments to beliefs generate conflict. Understandings - which are merely witnessed - produce no such limitations and no conflict.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
A talk and Q&A session on Walter Driscoll's non-dual site provided an opportunity to see some totally artificial ego-states fighting for their (imagined) lives.
To watch that talk and Q&A, click:
Walter Driscoll and Floyd Henderson
To watch the interview when Walter and Floyd discussed the fact that the Ultimate Sickness is a mental / mind sickness
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THE EXPLANATION
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places
"There is no hell."
teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
