Philosophy vs Teaching

Marko - who like me posts occaisonally on Open Integral, always from the perspective of gnosis - made an interesting observation that I think is highly relevant and worth repeating here:

I would propose the distinction between Integral philosophies and Integral teachings. I see that in the Integral community the two are not enough delineated while I think it helps to do so.

I found this little explanation of the difference between teachings and philosophies by a professor of the university of Virginia in an article on consciousness: http://www.faculty.virginia.edu/consciousness/

“A metaphysical philosophy is a purely conceptual structure that is presumed to be a logically self-consistent description of some aspect of reality. It does not necessarily include techniques for experiencing this reality. A philosophy is different from what we shall call a teaching. The purpose of a teaching is to help a student to know a reality, no matter whether it is phenomenal or noumenal. Since the emphasis is on knowledge rather than on logic, a teaching may use whatever concepts and techniques work in bringing the student to the desired knowledge. A teaching often will have a philosophical basis, but there is no particular equirement to adhere rigidly to it.”

I see Wilber etc. as creating an integral philosophy, meaning their purpose is to describe in a logical self-consistent way as many aspects of reality as possible.

Aurobindo, Almaas etc. have integral teachings, meaning their purpose is to help their students know (by experience) as many aspects of reality as possible.

Now I am not saying that one is better then the other, I find both of them interesting although I am more interested in the second. But I do see a confusion in the Integral community between the two that would help the discussions if there was more clarity.

And also I see Integral philosophers use concepts from teachings (like for instance Advaita) that are not meant to be used in the philosophical way, but in the teaching way, that is only as pointers for students to find the knowledge themselves through jnana or gnosis. I think you
can use these concepts for a philosophical system, but if you then afterwards refer back to the teaching you should not treat it like a philosophy but as a teaching.

Obviously, this is also where I differ from the Wilberian / Post Wilberian movement. Their intellectual and philosophical discussions are about taking authentic teachings out of their original very pragmatic spiritual and soteriological milieu, making them into something dry and mentally abstract. But while it is useful in adding to the store of human knowledge, and indeed serves an absolutely necessary purpose, in the end no amount of mental theorising can confer enlightenment. For me therefore what is interesting and useful is the Teaching, not the Philosophy!

Spiritual attitude

I've been getting some very good cxomments from my original suggestion for a gnostic community. Here are two that I would like to repeat.

From Tom:

Said Lao-tzu: "We should blunt our sharp points, and unravel the complications of things; we should attemper our brightness, and bring ourselves into agreement with the obscurity of others. How pure and still the Tao is, as if it would ever so continue!"

Lao-tzu seems to me to be an enlightened sage very much in the mould of Ramana Maharshi, and vice-versa. Both teach a form of quietism and non-striving that is very confronting to the egotist who seeks to elevate him or herself (for often him) above others.

This is where most pop gurus and teachings go wrong. They are full of egotism, full of what the Mother and Sri Aurobindo call "the vital" (the emotional/affective nature, corresponding in part to the "astral plane" of Theosophy); one contacts such a guru and is full of excitement. This excitement, tied up with egotism, is the result of "the vital" (or as my friend Steven Guth calls it, "The Double"). Almost all religion and (pseudo-)spirituality is based on this. So is the mass media, and if you look at a Hollywood blockbuster movie you will notice it is almost totally devoid of any mentality at all. In each case, the whole thing is just a way of pushing the buttons of the lower "vital". Likewise the Wilberian Integral movement, and much of the New Age movement in general.

From Ned:

A gnostic community would include a group of people who, as Sri Aurobindo and Mother indicate to us, have compassion and empathy for all beings no matter what stage of growth they are at, while having an ongoing sense of spiritual evolution -- in other words, even in the most ignorant, such people would see the Divine behind the veil and draw that out. For such a community to arise spontaneously, all we can do on a personal level is to surrender totally to the Grace of the Supreme.

The main problem I see with this whole Wilberian business of labeling and color-coding stages and what not is that it's very prejudicial and mental. It requires that you judge people externally and basically stumble around blindly inside their souls. Truly spiritual people rise above all of this, see people's pain and attachments, and try to address their *needs*, not impose personal agendas on them. They participate from a totally different level and manifest a presence that draws out from people what they themselves were not aware of. This is why surrendering to the presence of a true sage is so empowering. It is the difference between the spiritual authoritarianism of the past and the divine anarchy of the future.

The Divine, and the consciousness of the Enlightened Being (as opposed to the "intermediate zone" guru with only a partial realisation) doesn't discriminate. The mental and egotistic position however organises things in terms of a hierarchy, with those most disagreeable to one's own pov, or alternatively those deemed the most "primitive", placed at the bottom, and those most similar to one's own pov, near the top, but still below one's own position, as a sort of earlier version or prelude to what one is saying. Some religious classifications do this, they classify the other religions or philosophies in an ascending order. Ditto 19th/early 20th century western colonialism, with other cultures and races. And of course Wilberian and Spiral Dynamics versions of the "Great Chain of Being" (as opposed to the authentic, metapohysical "Great Chain of Being". Ultimately, the whole thing is narcissistic, the universe revolving around one's own religion, culture, race, philosophy, or ideology.

A gnostic or geneuine spiritual community's "outreach" would be very different to that of the conventional (Wilberian) integral movement, since it would be on the level of the mental pointing to the spiritual, whereas the latter is based on the mental inspired and powered by the affective ("vital", astral) level. How such a thing would work, without ego getting involved, I don't know. The best thing would be to strive for mindful awareness of one's own reactions, watching out for movements of the lower nature which are ever waiting toi hijack the genuine spiritual impulse. And in that way, to always follow one's own inner spiritual guidance.

Towards an Integral Gnostic Community

I'm double posting this on Zaadz as well..

Having participated in and checked out a number of "integral" forums and on-line communities, I am intrigued by the fact that there is one thing that seems to be missing. Gnosis.
By Gnosis I mean an inner certainty and spiritual knowing that goes beyond the endless futile turnings of rational argument.

These words - when divorced from the content of their experience - appear shallow and new agey and thus can be misinterpreted by those who lack Gnosis and coming only from the sceptical rational mind. Because, as with all things, they have meaning through experience. You need to have Gnosis to understand Gnosis. Elitism? Perhaps. But if that's how it is, that's how it is. You cannot say that the state of gnosis is the same as the state of lacking gnosis. When there is an lack of gnosis, all that understanding has to rely on are endless intellectual theories, abstractions, dogmas, of which one is chosen as the mental truth, and the others denied or subordinated to that. Sure there are degrees of gnosis too; it's not like anyone who has Insight is the same or in agreement or lacks ego. This is only the very first step.

And this, I contend, is where the current Integral movement totally fails. The latter is based on academic and quasi-academic thinking, and heavily influenced by the intellectualising of the Wilberian/Post-Wilberian paradigm, an intellectualising that seeks with great good will to understand. But which cannot understand the transcendent, because the transcendent by its very nature is beyond such intellectualising. All that the best intellectualising can do is point to the infinitely manifold Supreme. In the words of the old cliche, the map is not the territory. And philosophy and academia fails when it remains fixated on the map, and ignores - or still worse in the case of radical agnosticism, materialism, or religious fundamentalism, denies - the territory.

This is not to denigrate the many wonderful people I have met in the Integral community, or to deny the influence Wilber's work has had on my own way of thinking. However for me Wilber's influence has been more along the lines of a catalyst - the immensely inspirational idea of bringing everything and everyone on the cutting edge of human and collective evolution together. Unfortunately I consider Wilber's own philosophy - his integral theory - an intellectual dead end. His theory, with all its lines and levels and quadrants and stages and states, is much too tiny and much too inflexible for this vision. And his ego, sorry to say this Ken, is much too big. Without humility, nothing can be achieved.

This is why I advocate not a mental integral theory, and not egotistic pomposity, but a spiritual gnosis, an integral insight that goes beyond all such limitations. I have yet to see anyone do a better job at pointing the way than Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. What Wilber fails to do, philosophically, spiritually, esoterically and occultly, they succeed in doing.

So okay, if the Wilberian/Postwilberian movement isn't the way (at least not for me; there are many for whom it is the way, and it is good and right that they are there, because they are exactly where they should be), what about the Integral Yoga community? Wouldn't they constitute the sort of thing I am talking about?

Well, much as I am grateful to share this planet with others inspired by the same twin avatars as I, and very glad that they are carrying on the message, there is also a danger here. It is exactly the same danger the Wilberians face; the danger of becoming fixated on a single teaching. And sure in this case it is a genuine teaching, not an intellectual dead end. But there is still the fact that if you follow those two great teachers literally, you'll be stuck yet again in another limited religion. And you'll only be able to approach the Supreme through a limited perspective, that is, through the mental filter of a literal reading of only one set of teachings, rather than an unlimited one through the experience of all teachings and all teachers. Also, just because someone follows Sri Aurobindo and the Mother doesn't mean they ave gnosis! It may simply be an intellectual attraction, or an emotional affiliation, or a combination of factors that have nothing to do with spiritual insight.

Now, I'm not saying that following Sri Aurobindo and the Mother to the exclusion of all other teachers is no good. First, esotericism has always worked that way. You attain enlightenment through a fundamentalist approach to Vedanta, a fundamentalist approach to Sufism, a fundamentalist approach to Kabbalah. The rigid and inflexible Thoughtform leads beyond itself to the Supreme. And those who are fundamentalist Aurobindonians are following the path that is exactly right for them, and honouring that path and that teaching, and I would be the last one to try to dissuade them. Also, there are those Aurobindonians who are aware of the danger of literalism. So I am not saying everyone in Integral Yoga only follows the one thing, absolutely not.

And second, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother truly did bring something new, the Yoga of Descent, the Yoga of the Divinisation of the Body and of Matter, which marks a complete break with old spiritualities and yogas, which were only concerned with the attainment of a nirvana or enlightenment that renounces the world (or in the case of the bodhisattva ideal defers liberation until everyone else has been enlightened and entered nirvana and disappeared from the world). In this regard, Wilber, for all his claims to be the most advanced, the most integral, etc etc, is totally stuck in the old idea of the highest state (what he calls nondual, Spirit, One Taste, etc) as one of transcendence of the world.

But even so, for me, and for many others, there is the need to go beyond the reliance on one teacher or teaching only. Sure you may still honour that teaching, and that teacher. It may be your primary orientation to spirituality and gnosis and the Supreme. For me Sri Aurobindo and the Mother always will be. But it is not the only one. Your spiritual conscious is wide enough to take in many authentic teachings and teachers, and see the Supreme in each. For example, I see Ramana Maharshi as equal, that's right, equal, to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. This is a paradox since mentally I consider Sri Aurobindo and the Mother's teachings superior. And I am always open and receptive to further teachers and teachings, who would likewise be equal in status, because all partake of the Supreme through their complete Enlightenment. You may have similar experiences with different teachers and teachings, or with the same ones, it doesn't matter. What matters is the Gnosis that goes beyond words. And beyond focus on a single external form.

Nor does this mean that everyone has the same gnosis, the same experience, and will attain the same enlightenment. We are all different, unique, and so are experiences and our gnosis are too. It is not a bland uniformity. It is the exact opposite.

I do envisage a very new type of spiritual community emerging, a community of gnostics, not bound by religious or philosophical limitations. There have always been such esoteric groups, but in the past they were limited to a particular tradition, no matter how authentic that tradition was or is. The Supreme however encompasses all traditions, and infinitely more besides. And a community of gnostics connected over the Internet would indeed be something new. The work of transformation is still done in one's own self first and foremost. But the synergy of spiritual exchange between gnostics all over the world may lead to a totally new emergent phenomena, new spiritual evolution, quite different to the current mentally-based noosphere. And this would aid in the work of global transformation, a community of Gnostic Lightworkers.

Such are my thoughts. I look forward to your feedback on this :-)