Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)
Contents
Nature of "ego" such that
it can "die"
Egolessness, Watts' comparative
theology
Egotism -- The Most Confusing Term
Today
Existential and nondualistic views
of ego
History of my egoic/transcendent
dualism
Objectivism: "all mysticism is
bunk"
Christopher
wrote:
>To
establish some ground rules here, for the benefit of a "new person"
on this list
Michael
wrote:
Ground
rules for discussion are indeed helpful to build up ideas and add value.
Christopher
wrote:
>Is
there a consensus definition that the list holds as to the nature of the
"ego" that dies? What are the
parameters for defining the "ego" in terms of "The ego that
dies"?
Michael
wrote:
I have
posted about this in another discussion group and could repost those here. Despite some debate, I think a range of
concepts about the "ego" was settled upon. I really don't consider it to be that hard.
First of
all, as in all such mental-model shifting, forget the simplistic kind of
thinking that would dumbly ask, "Does ego exist, yes or no?" That will take care of 90% of the fruitless
postings. Some people just want to
revel in the artificial paradox of getting rid of that which doesn't
exist. There is nothing vague about the
ego and the nature of its cessation; it's very simple and concrete compared to
a truly hard problem such as the nature consciousness. The first question, the key question, the
only question, is: "What is the *nature of* the ego such that we can talk
of it 'dying'?"
The ego is
the core framework around which the egoic mental worldmodel is
constructed. The ego exists as a
structure and a structuring principle or organizing scheme. The mind can hold an egoic or a transcendent
worldmodel. Egoic structures are
present in both, but *organized differently*.
In the
egoic worldmodel, the ego is considered to be a first cause, a sovereign
control agent, and the simple, unproblematic center of identity, the main
referent of the word "I". The
ego is considered to be the initiator of action, the controller of one's will,
and the creator of one's thoughts and actions.
In the transcendent worldmodel, the ego in some sense remains, as a
practical form of organizing cognition.
However,
as in the Bible-as-literature theory of the New Testament, which frames early
Jewish-Christianity as a major reinterpretation of what "victory",
"messiah", and "kingdom" are really all about, the ego is
*reinterpreted*, along with many other major components of the egoic
worldmodel. Ego death is an
apocalyptic, catestrophic global shift and reinterpretation of a huge *network*
of mental constructs.
"Ego"
can mean both the central component in the egoic worldmodel, and the entire
worldmodel (the egoic-structured mental model of the world, time, and control)
-- we can simply call these "the core ego" and "the overall
egoic worldmodel". What dies is
the firm assumption that ego is substantial and wields power in the way the
egoic worldmodel proposes. That way of
thinking still remains after ego death, but only as a practical conventional
illusion.
Aaron
wrote:
>I
recommend the following:
http://egodeath.com/egodeath.htm#xtocid2655
Michael
wrote:
That was
written years ago, but looks relevant.
>I have
read the egodeath.com site and some of the previous discussions here.
>When
you say that "the ego is the controller", what are the terms of
reference for the controller?
>1.
Unconscious personality archetypes at the root of reaction?
Animal
minds and uninitiated human minds have egoic cognitive structures, which can be
called archetypes. These are useful for
animal sorts of actions and reactions.
>2. The
logical reasoning of the thinking mind?
The
core-ego construct and the egoic worldmodel built around it are only
semi-logical. When this logic is
examined freely during loose cognition, as though put on trial, the logic is
condemned or even self-convicting. Is
the animal's sense of self as a self-moving agent "logical"? Logic is not very relevant; the animal
motion works more in a Zen way marked by practical immediate familiarity. Egoic thinking is thus an *instinct*, and
can be represented by the willful goat or donkey. Ego as a motion initiator is more practical than logical.
>3. The
conditioned belief structure imprinted into the linear brain?
Ego is a
set of assumptions instinctively innate in the animal brain. It's deeper than "conditioned";
it's instinctive, although not fully developed at birth. Ken Wilber's early treatment of
developmental levels, perhaps the book Up From Eden, is suitable here.
>4. The
conditioned beliefs imprinted into the unconscious mind?
See
above. I don't bother to distinguish
here between mind and brain; my basis is experiential and cognitive,
phenomenological. Egoic-shaped
cognition is a stage-appropriate instinct built into the brain/mind.
>5. A matrix of all of these?
Add the
above points 1-4.
>There
is a "death" metaphor associated with the release of each and every
one of these.
The most
electrifying form of ego death as *experience* is the short-circuiting of the
sense of self-control, of being in power to originate and control one's own
thoughts. The ripe egoic mind is fully
identified with ego as *controller*, firmly structured around the full
assumption that the ego has the power to command its own free will. We can say that egoic logic, such as it is,
reaches the end of its lifecycle as a convincing illusion.
The conditioned
and innate egoic belief structures are competitively tested for coherence
against the transcendent worldmodel, and fail the test; even if the mind in
some sense controls the thoughts, when seen in the light of the frozen-time
perspective, the mind is no longer seen as the ultimate origin of its own
thoughts -- the time axis stabs the will.
It is
challenging, but not at all impossible, to use words to accurately describe
these two different networks of meanings.
The transcendent mind can say "I walk, I create, I originate my
thoughts" but all the meanings are reorganized.
>Whatever
the thinking mind is aware of, it is a retrospect view of a perception of an
event through preconditioned belief filters.
I express
the "belief filters" idea as "mental models" or
"worldmodels", or dynamic mental construct association matrixes. A worldmodel, such as the egoic or
transcendent worldmodel about time, self, and control, is a large-scale dynamic
mental construct association matrix.
The glue holding a large-scale or small-scale dynamic mental construct
association matrix together, I call "indexing". Metanoia, mental transformation, is
"reindexing" -- or reorganizing one's conceptual system.
Ed wrote:
>I have
often wondered on the nature of Ego-Death on this list, especially as Michael
defines it.
>In my
definitions of Ego-Death, and what I am accustomed to in discussions, it would
be similar to the death of "the conditioned belief structure imprinted
into the linear brain" of your definitions (No. 3).
#1, 3, and
4 seem fine. I emphasize ego
transcendence as a tremendous increase in rationality, so I downplay the
logicalness of ego implied in option #2.
Egoic thinking is horribly illogical, a demonic abomination: an
unreasoning animal discovered to be lurking in the mind. When I discovered it, I was aghast and was
ready to disprove it to the death -- I rushed to sacrifice it in order to
permanently and fully get rid of it, at least as a deluded way of thinking. I wanted an unforgettable disproof of the
inner animal logic of egoic freewillist moral agency.
This does
not seem to be the focus of this forum though.
To see the
full intended focus of the forum, refer to the scope definition at the home
page of the discussion group, not my actual postings.
>Have
any of you experienced the destruction of the conditioned self?...I have
experienced small deaths of components, but not a complete destruction of
self...yet...
I advocate
learning the worldmodel of frozen-future block-universe determinism as opposed
to freewillist assumptions, in conjunction with studying entheogens. Nothing contradicts the power of egoic
control as well as the assumption of frozen-future block-universe
determinism. Whether true or not,
embracing such a worldmodel during vision-logic packs an apocalyptic wallop.
>And if
this was accomplished, how would you test to see if this occurred...aka, how do
you make sure you haven't deluded yourself with a blending of minor component
death, leading to a new resultant of self?
I'd say if
you still think you have the power to change your future (as opposed to just
playing it out or arriving at it), the deluded animal mind still reigns -- or,
putting aside truth and falsity, I'd say you haven't experienced the potential
experience we have of deterministic ego death.
>Hi,
>
>I
don't know if the stuff this group talks about relates to Buddhism
>in
any= way but www.google.com comes up
with lots to read if you
>enter
egolessness = and either anatta or sunyata (synonyms I think)
>
>Ciao,
>André
I take it
for granted that a good theory of ego death that fully connects with
Christianity and also with Zen has enormous potential for fully rationally
explaining other religions in contemporary terms as well, including Buddhism. I haven't written much about Buddhism
because I am deliberately setting a boundary, to concentrate on Christianity
first. It is fairly easy to connect the
core theory and its treatment of Christianity to some varieties or aspects of
Buddhism. It's also all-systems-go,
ready for takeoff as far as connecting the theory of ego death I've gathered
with esoteric Islam. The esoteric forms
of religion (and high philosophy) essentially agree; the differences between religions
are most pronounced when considering the popular, Literalist, devotional,
exoteric forms of religion.
It's a
better strategy for me to pick one religion and do a thorough, good job of
connecting the core theory to it, rather than making weak connections from the
core to many religions. I would like
some thinkers to publish the explanation of how the core theory connects with
Buddhism. I see no great reason why I,
as the exponent of the core theory, need to take responsibility for connecting
the core theory to Buddhism. I can
probably contribute more by focusing on Christianity, which I know is a complex
and challenging religion to make sense of.
Christianity is a higher priority and I feel that a successful
explanation of Christianity will make it easy to connect the theory to Buddhism,
which has less of a baffling "secret mystery" aspect. Like Ramesh Balsekar's advaita vedanta,
Buddhism is openly explainable. The
mystery religions, and Christianity in relation to them, are baffling,
impenetrable, hidden, veiled.
Alan
Watts' book Beyond Theology is a startlingly insightful comparative theology
book relating Christianity to Hinduism.
"An approach to comparative theology which is mutually enriching in
the fullest way must therefore deal with religions on the mythic level as well
as the metaphysical and philosophical. ... He must be a poet ... a master of
images -- a parabolist, allegorist, analogist, and imaginator."
I am
overcoming my distrust of his son, who is putting all of Alan Watts' books out
of print and publishing a bewildering and arbitrary flood of random
compilations instead. I'm very glad I
bought the Watts library before his son started messing with it. I suspect he should have kept the original
books in print and added a few anthologies.
The Watts library is overwhelming, though I have managed to make a lot
of progress reading the books I've bought so far. My work is more of an extension of Watts than of Wilber.
http://www.alanwatts.com/library1.html
-- "Alan Watts was born on January 6, 1915 in Kent, England. During his
formative years Alan's mother taught children of Christian missionaries in
China, and as a result he became fascinated with Oriental art. In training to become an Anglican priest, he
attended King's School next door to Canterbury Cathedral. There he learned to
write skillfully, and was trained in public speaking in preparation for a
lifetime on the pulpit. During this
period he discovered an esoteric Bookstores in London, where he found books on
the Far East. He also discovered The Buddhist Lodge, where he met Christmas
Humphries and D.T. Suzuki. Alan Watts became editor of the Buddhist Lodge
quarterly, The Middle Way. In 1941,
Watts decided to reconcile his interest in Eastern mysticism with his Christian
training, and enrolled in the Seabury Western Theological Seminary in Evanston,
Illinois. In 1944 he was ordained as an Episcopalian priest. In 1950, Alan Watts left the Church and his
first wife to begin a new life in Millbrook, new York with Dorothy Dewitt. After
a memorable New Year's Eve dinner at their small farmhouse with Joseph
Campbell, Jean Erdman, and Luisa Coomaraswami, Alan Watts left for California
in early 1941 with his new wife to accept a teaching position at the Academy of
Asian Studies in San Francisco."
Some books
I want to read, for a mythic reading of Christianity:
o Easter: Its Story and Meaning.
Abelard-Schuman, New York, 1950.
o Myth and Ritual in Christianity. Thames and
Hudson, London, and Vanguard, New York, 1950.
o Myth and Religion. Ed. Mark Watts, Tuttle,
Boston, 1996
>One
day, during his usual visit, the Prime Minister asked the master, "Your
>Reverence,
what is egotism according to Buddhism?" The master's face turned
>red,
and in a very condescending and insulting tone of voice, he shot back,
>"What
kind of stupid question is that!?"
>
>This
unexpected response so shocked the Prime Minister that he became sullen
>and
angry. The Zen master then smiled and said, "THIS, Your Excellency, is
>egotism."
When
people say things with "attitude", for some reason I know this is
communication filled with ego. I need
to theoretically reflect on why this is so.
I talk straight and consider such straight talking to be egoless, even
if I am saying "I am good at X".
But when people talk in a strangled tone of voice, implying things not
directly said, I consider that to be manipulative, egoic communication.
Ego death
has nothing to do with conducting oneself in a humble, self-deprecating way as
ordinarily conceived. You can act
self-deprecating and humble until you turn blue, but enlightenment does not
result. Stomping on the ego delusion
only reinforces it. Only when you see
the way in which the ego doesn't exist, can you truly be humble and self
deprecating. If a man says he is low, I
say he is full of himself, filled with prideful delusion. If a man says he doesn't even exist at all
as an egoic agent, so there is no one who could be low and humble, that is
enlightenment.
>>Can
you comment on the existential view of ego?
http://www.google.com/search?q=existentialism+ego
Metaphysical
freedom is false, practical existential conventional freedom is true, and
socio-political freedom is good. So
far, I didn't find it valuable to read further on the existential view of ego,
because it seems wholly restricted to the ordinary state of consciousness, and
generally uninspired floundering in the dark, like so much of 20th Century
psychology-philosophy. I will consider
reviewing and commenting on that topic/perspective.
>>Can
you comment on the nondualistic concept of ego?
http://www.nonduality.com/faq.htm
As I
recall, I have never put much emphasis on the concept of "nonduality"
even though I'm very familiar with it from Watts and Wilber. This is partly because everyone knows so
well the idea of spatial no-separate-self, that I have instead found more
unresolved problems in the related area of no-free-will, which Watts only
implicitly covered and Wilber didn't cover at all. My explanation and view of nonduality would be very similar to
what all the books say, though I suppose my portrayal of the idea would be
uniquely flavored by my style of description and my vocabulary set. Watts tried hard to describe this, so he has
it covered fairly well already.
I mention
"no-separate-self" in passing all the time as something everyone
knows, and I instead worked to define the "virtual ego" concept.
http://www.egodeath.com/intro.htm
- The Virtual Ego and the Illusory Aspect of its Control Power
http://www.egodeath.com/virtualego.htm
For a
cybernetic self-control paradigm of ego death and transcendent knowledge, I
didn't find the word "nonduality" helpful, even though it fully
accords with my conceptual system.
Surprisingly, the word seems both relevant and irrelevant. I have no problem with it, and people ought
to know it, but I don't natively use it.
The Primal
Polarity principle of dualism in religious metaphor is that every twofold
contrast, typically the most shocking, crazy and misleading metaphor of good
guys and bad guys, is actually a metaphor for the egoic-thinking vs.
transcendent-thinking contrast.
I would
like to know when I first thought of this absolute dualist thinking. The present posting is key, but is an echo
of 11/14/01 ("kingdom of God" deciphering, no-free-will angels
breakthrough). On that day, I realized
that all two-fold distinctions pivoted on freewill, or on the
egoic/transcendent distinction; I finally *recognized* the mapping between all
scriptural key dichotomies and my *own* late-80s radical dichotomy I called
"egoic thinking vs. transcendent thinking".
My own
biographical experience is an essential data point for assessing the validity
of dualist thinking. I am
"pure" in a certain way because I rediscovered religious principles
essentially in isolation from religious thinking. I approached and discovered enlightenment and mystery-religion
"salvation" from a purely technical, engineering-oriented, personal
self-control cybernetics perspective.
If you look
at my notebooks of 1986-1987, you will not see religious thinking, but rather,
analysis of personal self-control. I
had no interest in understanding Christianity or even knowing what it is; my
whole obsessive focus was on securing personal self-control and self mastery,
self-determination -- driven *not* by injunctions from religious teachers, but
instead, by self-help seminars like EST -- what Maslow calls
"self-realization" or the human potential movement.
*That*,
not religion, was what prodded me to get my head together and get a grip on
myself: encounter groups and goal-setting self-realization seminars that adults
sent me to. They taught me "you
are responsible for your enjoyment of life and your achievements", yet I
had no self-control and sympathize with the Pauline problem (or poor
driven-to-despair Zen student problem, when he is told "take full control
over your mind and thoughts").
However, there *is* some religion prior to my late 87/ early 88
breakthrough-pair. I intently studied
and wrestled with Alan Watts' book The Way of Zen, particularly his section on
the problem of cybernetic self-control.
This is
why my real origin of my theory is not Christianity, but Zen as presented by
Alan Watts: cyberzen, cyber-Zen, cyberZen, or cybernetic Zen, which is
actually, in agreement with Watts, an oxymoron. Zen is correctly understood as cybernetics, and Way of Zen also
gave me key ideas about meta-perception and the self timeslices arrayed along
the time dimension. Thus I discovered
the core theory of cybernetic self-control enlightenment or cybernetic
enlightenment on the basis of Zen as provided by Alan Watts' book The Way of
Zen (that's the only Watts book I was even aware of).
I could
not have recognized that mapping before because I didn't know anything about
Christianity until my visions of Christ as self-control savior prompted me to
explain Christianity in terms of my core philosophy theory of timeless
block-universe determinism, transcendent worldmodel, and loose cognitive
binding of mental constructs.
In other
words, I did *not* begin as a Christian scholar -- I did not read any books
about Christianity, or care about understanding Christianity, until after my
core theory was essentially finished as a closed system. The closest I got to reading anything about
Christianity by the time I closed my core theory at the start of 1988 was
incidental yet profound reading of religious theory, including Christianity, by
Ken Wilber.
I would
have to research my notes and photographs of my book collections. If people photograph what is of concern to
them, instead of people I mostly photographed my book collections in
approximately 4-month periods during that era, 1986-1995. So I happen to have documentation showing
when I first read books about Christianity.
I have
adhered to this kind of radical dualist distinction from the moment (Dec. 12,
1987) I realized that Alan Watts' book Way of Zen finally made sense if you
assume no-free-will. That was my first
breakthrough, my first insight. I would
have to look through my notes to see when I first cast this as a twofold
dichotomy.
I
distinctly recall differentiating between "practical rationality" and
"pure rationality" -- I strongly suspect I coined those expressions
after 12/12/87 (no-free-will breakthrough) and 1/11/88 (timeless block-universe
determinism breakthrough), when I was still grappling with personal
self-management.
Here is my
formula, the history I went through.
The main point I am tracking, the reason I wrote this tonight, is to
trace hard dualism through my own history of theorizing, to determine how I was
able to crack the puzzle and discover the mystery-religion principle of
"The Primal Polarity" or "The Master Dualism", or "The
Master Polarity".
The
following is the history of my development of the cybernetic theory of ego
transcendence, with special attention to the eventual discovery of The Primal
Polarity principle of dualism in religious metaphor.
1976: drug
education (accurate, nonjudgmental, informative, substantial, and actually
pretty enlightened). First albums:
Beatles, Rush, Hendrix.
1981:
attended a full seminar about goal setting and personal achievement --
essentially, taught me material on the level Abraham Maslow calls
"self-realization" (as opposed to "self-transcendence")
Fall 1983:
short seminar about studying techniques
Spring
1985: participated in encounter group, human potential movement,
self-realization training, self-help
October
1985: first visitation of the Holy Spirit -- experienced as a tremendous sense
of awakening. Completely vague vision
of Christ -- incidental, without emphasis, content or focus. Just a tremendous sense of discovering a
*huge* realm of profundity to explore.
Especially came away exclaiming "Whoa! Why didn't anyone *tell* me about this!" Immediately started a working diary to
increase my self-control and personal management.
Immediately
started reading the only religious/philosophy book I had, The Way of Zen by
Alan Watts, given to me in the past Spring by my father involved in the
human-potential movement -- I had such total lack of interest in philosophy and
religion prior to October 1985, that I literally tried to give the book back to
my father, saying I'm not interested in such things (same attitude as many
people have toward reading New Age books: I don't need that stupid silly
philosophical musing crap; I have *practical* needs.
Spring
1986: severe depression as control completely eluded me, in direct
contradiction of human-potential teachings.
1986-1987:
wrestled with all my intellectual might to understand and attain personal
posi-control of my actions and self-management. Focused on my self-management techniques. Viewed the use of loose cognition and the
attainment of enlightenment as portrayed in Way of Zen as practical tools to
give me what I passionately desired more than gold: posi-control, full
self-management as promised by Human Potential and Self-Help philosophy.
Here is
where I picked up the key idea, so unusually emphasized by Watts in this book,
of a sharp, sudden, radical, *dualist* dichotomy and divide between some
inferior and superior way of thinking.
Watts called the goal "enlightenment", which implies a state
of unenlightenment as well. This was
two solid years of torment, manic depression, frustration, and hard work of
studying and trying to make sense of Way of Zen.
As part of
Atomic Physics, studied 4-dimensional spacetime diagrams (time as a spacelike
dimension).
I was
being a theorist in this period, ever since late 86-early 87 I hoped to bring a
new theory of self-management and personal self-control into the world. Yet I was a hypocrite because all my efforts
were failures. However, I did feel, and
it's largely true, that I was doing novel research. I was sure, though almost unread, that the problem I was working
on had not been solved or even really addressed, the problem of securing
personal posi-control and self-management.
I figured
that if such a theory had been found, it would have been taught in the
encounter groups and Human Potential movement, and I still believe I
essentially figured correctly. I *was*
essentially working on a newly defined problem with respect to the contemporary
state of knowledge, working in a new paradigm defining new problems and new
methods.
December
12, 1987 -- breakthrough. Given a
primary interest of attaining self-control, Way of Zen entirely makes full
rational sense if you simply assume no-free-will. This insight -- no-free-will and collapse of the naive assumption
of the possibility of securing firm self-control -- always towered far above
the related mystic-state ideas of chain-of-experiencing timeslices (illusory
nature of movement through time), metaperception of mental constructs, and
no-separate-self or cosmic unity. So
here I made primary the dualistic distinction between free will and determinism
-- or rather, at this time, between "freewill" and
"no-free-will".
My
thinking if anything, on determinism, was causal-chain determinism, but
especially the idea of an unstoppable or forcefully injected sequence of mental
constructs with respect to the time axis.
Started thinking about movement through time, with respect to
no-free-will, using perhaps a "movie-frames in a reel on shelf"
model. (Still a very in-time, temporal
model of time.)
January
11, 1988 -- breakthrough. No-free-will
implies timeless block-universe determinism.
Fortunately, I was not indoctrinated with the standard poor, dead-end
model of determinism as "causal-chain determinism". Weeks before, I rejected freewill; now I
conceptualized determinism not in a vague way or as causal-chain determinism,
but as block-universe determinism, not causal-chain determinism though only
recently have I nailed down the latter distinction between my concept of
determinism and the standard one).
1988:
immediately started summarizing my theory, still largely considered as a theory
of attaining personal posi-control, including "transcendent
self-control" but I still didn't realize the kind of impotence and failure
that wish for posi-control would conclude.
Coined
key, radical dualistic distinctions such as "practical rationality vs.
pure rationality" and "egoic mental construct processing vs.
transcendent mental construct processing".
This is
the time I started working on explaining Christianity and started studying what
Christianity is. I took uninformed,
liberal Christianity for granted, as I had been taught in the Human Potential
movement. I was completely confident that
Jesus knew the theory about self-control and no-free-will and block-universe
determinism I was coming up with, and that entheogens were present at the start
of Christianity.
I still
had read only a few serious books at this time -- Watts and some Wilber books
-- so I started reading voraciously, such as all Ken Wilber books and all
philosophy, psychology, and religion and quantum mechanics books, then
postmodernism and social studies, in order to communicate my theory of
transcendent knowledge to the intellectual world. I have notebooks, printouts, and photos of notebooks and books
from this era.
August
1988: my first serious draft of the theory of transcendent knowledge. I have this still. Tries to explain Christianity in terms of block-universe
determinism and loose cognition and entheogens. I treated this explanation as I still do: as a domain that the
core principles of transcendent knowledge can explain. I proposed that what Jesus knew was this
transcendent knowledge as explained by these principles as I explain them. For example, the devil is a metaphor for
egoic deluded thinking.
Mid 90s:
Holy Spirit teaches that Ought can only come from a transcendent source; that
is, there is no possible worldly basis for morality or even more generally and
existentially, for any answer to "what shall I do and what shall I not
do". Some full-on existentialist
manic depression here.
Read lots
of fundamentalist Christianity books here -- dubious -- ignorant. Main goal was still to discover the presence
of my cybernetic theory of transcendent knowledge hidden in the scriptures,
amongst all the strangeness. It was
only at this point that I started studying Christianity in any kind of
deliberate way. I only had Human
Potential philosophy and Zen under my belt, along with my core philosophy model
of enlightenment, first summarized and uploaded around 1996 at Principia
Cybernetica website.
Still knew
only very shallow, pop Christianity; therefore my application of my core
principles of enlightenment to explain Christianity was weak and
unsatisfying. "The devil is egoic
thinking" just seemed limited. The
mapping between my (by now closed, complete) core technical theory of
enlightenment and Christianity was only a very partial mapping.
Discovered
and fully systematized mystic-state double-entendre encoding/decoding in acid
rock lyrics, including Rush, Metallica, Beatles, and Queen. This whole theory of acid rock lyrics took
place seemingly instantly; the moment I recognized the allusions in the first
song -- probably on the Ride the Lightning album or Caress of Steel... oh,
which I now recognize as the guillotine of ego death per the song Bastille Day!
Various
religious experiences. Forced to pray,
trembling; insight into savior as substitute, or sacrificing conventional moral
thinking -- transcendence of morality and egoic moral agency.
Around
2000 -- the Great Branching experience.
Holy Spirit presented with two great alternatives. This was a major insight and is related to
discovering The Primal Polarity. The
scriptures present you with two distinct sets of notions. *Either* you believe in magic, miracles,
supernatural, spirits, heaven and hell, *and free will*, or, you believe in no
magic, no supernatural, no spirits, no heaven and hell, *and no-free-will* --
because freewill moral thinking is of the same type as supernaturalist thinking
which really is the common character of spirits, heaven and hell, and so on.
Nov. 14,
2001 -- Finally, complete breakthrough of mapping my core theory of
enlightenment to Christian myth.
Pivotal concept: "kingdom of Heaven" as "kingdom of
Determinism/no-free-will."
Included the fully dualistic-polarity idea "angels = no-free-will,
devils = free-will". Around this
time I started asserting more and more forcefully that the ego, and egoic
thinking, *is* the free will delusion, and that transcendent thinking is the
rejection of the freewill assumption, and that the mind always moves, in normal
psychospiritual development, from the initial default state of naive freewill
assumption to the cultivated, reflective, abstract, analytical rejection of the
freewill way of thinking.
I read
Schopenhauer's book Prize Essay on the Freedom of the Will somewhere in this
period, with a scathing description of how the defenders of freewill haven't
even figured out that there is a distinction that can be made between our
ability to make decisions, versus the metaphysical *free-ness* of our ability
to will something. They say "I can
will; this proves freewill" but should ask "I can will something, but
when I do so, do I do so *freely*?"
He
portrayed freewillists as childishly ignorant and unreflective, like Richard
Double who portrayed them as being fully and exclusively obsessed with
defending conventional morality rather than frankly, objectively,
"scientifically" assessing whether such moral thinking is in fact
metaphysically logical or not. These
philosophers helped me make these hard-dualism distinctions:
child/unreflective/freewill, adult/abstract-reflection/no-free-will.
April 20,
2002 -- substantial insights or even breakthroughs in learning mystery-religion
metaphor as a game that was taken to deliberately ridiculous extremes in
Christian miracle metaphors for primary religious experiencing -- ended that
day with some insight on reading offensive-sounding distinctions (true Israel,
the saved/damned) as clever metaphors for The Great Divide of egoic thinking
vs. transcendent thinking.
April 21,
2002 -- discovered full formalized principle of The Primal Polarity, able to
explain the most shocking Essene condemnations of a disparaged group and brazen
glorification of one's own group.
Wondered why my own thinking was always so absolutely dualist/polar
(egoic/transcendent), and traced this back to Alan Watts' book The Way of Zen,
which portrays a sudden essentially complete satori, instant and full
enlightenment (implying a polar opposite, "unenlightenment"), in a
sudden homeostatic catastrophic state-shift.
Egodeath.com
"
Scientology
Jesus-Freaks
aka Jesus People
Mormons
Shroomers
aka Entheogenists
Jews
Moslems
Each
approach or framework of enlightenment has some political dimension, some
exoteric ritual dross dimension, and some mystic esoteric dimension. We should be aware of the politics-of-power
dimension of each of the above approaches.
The gravest mistake is reductionism, reducing religion to nothing but
the politics of power or the strategic blinding of people to the politics of
power. Transcendent knowledge exists
independently from the politics of power.
The right
way to frame transcendent knowledge is to explicitly treat the politics of
power, but keep it differentiated from transendent knowledge proper. In some Jewish-Christian and Persian
apocalyptic writing, there is a deliberate play where politics allegorically
expresses mystic state insight and mysticism allegorically expresses
mysticism. The mystic and political
domains thus are used to comment upon each other, but they remain distinct,
though interpentrating.
Objectivism
is functionally a religion, though it denies any validity to any mystic,
transcendent, or transpersonal insight.
It's understandable how Ayn Rand was so inclined. I disparage religion-as-we-know-it as much
as she. It's an understandable
misunderstanding, but an unwarranted extremist assumption that all religion is
nothing but a malformation that is part of the politics of power, and has no
potential to be anything more.
Let's hear
what Ayn Rand has to say about religion *after* she has had the mixed wine of
the ancients. She is merely ignorant
and inexperienced, like most religionists themselves.
Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)