Quote of the Week 249 - New Years Resolution for Added Perspective - Remember the Earth

Once a day remember that you live on a globe largely covered with blue water, slowly rotating.

--Sparrow, “Fifteen Ways to Survive the Coming Collapse of Civilization”, The Sun magazine, December 2012, Issue 444

Writings of the Dawn Now Available at Online Retailers, Including Amazon and Barnes and Noble

My newest book, Writings of the Dawn - The Spiritual Adventures of a Baby-Boomer, is now available at online retailers, including Amazon and Barnes and Noble, in addition to the publisher, Lulu.

Quote of the Week 248 - How Will The World End?

How will the world end? The world will end in joy, because it is a place of sorrow. When joy has come, the purpose of the world has gone. The world will end in peace, because it is a place of war. When peace has come, what is the purpose of the world? The world will end in laughter, because it is a place of tears. When there is laughter, who can longer weep? In blessing it departs; it will not end as it began.

--A Course in Miracles

Quote of the Week 247 - It Takes Some Diving

Men are not free when they are doing just what they like…Men are only free when they are doing what the deepest self likes. And there is getting down to the deepest self! It takes some diving.

--D.H. Lawrence

Quote of the Week 246 - Prayers That Don't Work, Prayers That Work

We can’t pray that He make our lives free of problems; this won’t happen, and it is probably just as well. We can’t ask Him to make us and those we love immune to disease, because He can’t do that. We can’t ask Him to weave a magic spell around us so that bad things will only happen to other people, and never to us. People who pray for miracles usually don’t get miracles, any more than children who pray for bicycles, good grades, or boyfriends get them as a result of praying. But people who pray for courage, for strength to bear the unbearable, for the grace to remember what they have left instead of what they have lost, very often find their prayer answered. They discover that they have more strength, more courage than they ever knew themselves to have. Where did they get it? I would like to think that their prayers helped them find that strength. Their prayers helped them tap hidden reserves of faith and courage which were not available to them before.

--from When Bad Things Happen to Good People by Rabbi Harold S. Kushner

Quote of the Week 245 - Falling Into the Cup of Wisdom

It seems as though I had not drunk from the cup of wisdom, but had fallen into it.

--Soren Kierkegaard

VIDEO ADDED: The One and Only Church of Universal Ice Cream

I am happy to announce that a video of my presentation on Universal Ice Cream is now available. It has been added to the links section at the right sidebar to this blog, and is also available here:
Universal Ice Cream - Vimeo
Universal Ice Cream - YouTube

Quote of the Week 244 - The Adventure of Life, the Superstition of Security

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature.

--Helen Keller

Quote of the Week 243 - A Definition of Sin

Sin is the refusal of humanity to become who we are.

--Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

Quote of the Week 242 - Teaching the Same Things

It seems that all my teachers teach the same things, and I continually fail to learn them:

1)   there is no limit to God;

2)   there is no limit to love; and

3)   there is no limit to how many times I can fail to realize there is no limit to God and love.

--Rabbi Rami Shapiro

Quote of the Week 241 - The Real Mystery

The real mystery is not destroyed by reason.

--Ursula K. LeGuin

Quote of the Week 240 - The Gulf Between Knowledge and Truth

The gulf between knowledge and truth is infinite.

-- Henry Miller

NEW BOOK PUBLICATION: Writings of the Dawn; The Spiritual Journey of a Baby-Boomer

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Announcing the publication of my latest book, just in time for holiday giving!. As you can see by the description below taken from the preface, it is not my “newest” book, but rather an old book that I decided it was time to dust off and formally publish. For now, it is available, at a discount, only at the publisher’s site, Lulu: www.lulu.com/spotlight/yajc. I will announce if and when it becomes available elsewhere. There is an extensive preview that is available at the Lulu site.

Writings of the Dawn

The Spiritual Journey of a Baby-Boomer

PREFACE TO LULU EDITION

“It is always darkest just before the Day dawneth.”  

(Earliest known printed version of this popular proverb, by English theologian and historian Thomas Fuller, in A Pisgah-Sight Of Palestine And The Confines Thereof, 1650)

This may be the closest thing that I will ever write that could be considered an autobiography, although it is largely not in narrative form. It covers the eleven-year period from 1967 through 1977 (age 16 through 26) that was a significant developmental period in my life, from junior year in high school through college and the ensuing young adult period. It describes these early years of my spiritual journey in pose, poetry, art and journal entries. There are a few later entries in a “Postscript” section at the end from the years 1978 through 1985.

The main entries are divided into chronological sections covering the periods identified for works composed during those times. However, at the end of each section is a narrative “Notes” section that was written in 1996, in retrospect, in which the preceding material is explained and tied together. I produced a home-made version at that time and had some run off with simple report-type binding at a local copy shop.

The production and font-selection is a bit crude, because I wanted to retain the flavor of the original home-spun version, including the drawings and artwork. Everything after this page is a faithful rendering of the original work. As with all of my work, my earnest hope is that the reader will find inspiration, stimulation, maybe some revelation, and hopefully, most precious of all, perhaps some transformation.

Steven J. Gold

September, 2012

Quote of the Week 239 - The Nature of the Void

The void is the creatrix, the matrix. It is not mere hollowness and anarchy.

--Adrienne Rich

Quote of the Week 238 - Sufferihg and Sacrifice

Nothing can be attained without suffering but at the same time one must begin by sacrificing suffering.

G.I. Gurdjieff

Quote of the Week 238 - You are the Shine of the Lord

You are composed of three selves, the mortal bodily self, composed of the body,  the breath, and the conscious mind, the semi-immortal self, composed of the unconscious mind, and the immortal self, composed of the Divinity/the Lord  of the Universe within…When you speak of yourself, which self are you speaking of? Your constant focus should be on the fact that you are the shine of the Lord.

--Swami Rama, from a lecture on Sri Vidya

Quote of the Week 237 - Aspects of the Underlying Unity

The mystic (and the transpersonal psychologist) seeks one aspect of God – That which is expressed as supreme meaning, love, compassion, justice, peace and consciousness. The esoteric scientist (and the quantum physicist, etc.) seeks another aspect of God – That which is expressed as supreme creative and evolutionary energy. Yet both these aspects are but manifestations of the same underlying unity.

--Bill Heilbronn, from The Courage of Uncertainty; A Jewish View of the Continuing Evolution of Faith in the Fields of Religion and Science

Quote of the Week 236 - Understanding Anger and the Aid of the Divine Mother

     We come to understand that like all other emotions, desire and anger are manifestations of Shakti, the power which brings us to life. Shakti is to be transformed, not subliminated. Shakti is to be harnessed, not suppressed. Negative emotions, including anger, are as much a part of life as their positive counterparts. No human being has only positive emotions. Even the great sages occasionally thunder with anger. The only difference between the sages and us is that they quickly regain a calm and tranquil state, whereas we remain embroiled for a long time.

     Thus we see that the problem is not with anger itself but with its lack of containment. Unprocessed, uncontrolled anger is disorienting. It commandeers our thought, speech, and action so completely that before it spreads outward, we ourselves are consumed by it. When we are unable to contain our anger, it explodes uncontrollably and spreads aimlessly…

     To get off this endless, destructive merry-go-round, we must recognize anger for what it is – the powerful roar of kama, the fundamental, primordial force of desire. It is impossible to suppress desire, for desire is the very fabric of life; it is equally futile to ignore anger. The power anger embodies must be identified and directed toward the goal set by kama – fulfillment. But how?

     We can begin by training ourselves to think differently. Anger is energy. Energy cannot be destroyed; it can only be transformed. Every form of energy, anger included, has a spiritual origin. That is why we call energy Shakti (Divine Mother). Those of us ignorant of anger’s spiritual origin find it negative and frightening, but those who know its source see anger as beneficent and beautiful. Anger is rooted in our unfulfilled desires. Desire is what brought us here and desire keeps us here. Thus anger, which has its source in our desire, demands a spiritual solution.

     The presence of anger is not a sign that we are bad. It is a sign that we are in urgent need of experiencing our own inherent fullness. We are – at the core of our being – beyond good and bad. Our personalities – our unique qualities, characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses – are the result of the interplay of various energies. We are a product of this interplay. Although we cannot destroy this energy field we call “anger,” each of us has the power to transform it. The key to this is the development of self-mastery…

     The Sri Vidya tradition [contemplating on Sri Chakra, the essence of the Divine Mother] teaches us how to recognize that Divine Force and receive guidance and assistance from Her so that we eventually gain mastery over all the different forms of our emotions.

-- Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, from an article in Yoga International Magazine, “Conquering Anger & Violence”, Fall 2012 Edition

Quote of the Week 235 - Prayer and Responsibility

We cannot merely pray to You, O God, to end war;

For we know that You have made the world in a way

That man must find his own path to peace

Within himself and with his neighbor.

We cannot merely pray to You, O God, to end starvation;

For you have already given us the resources

With which to feed the entire world

If we would only use them wisely.

We cannot merely pray to You, O God,

To root out prejudice,

For You have already given us eyes

With which to see the good in all men

If we would only use them rightly.

We cannot merely pray to You, O God, to end despair,

For You have already given us the power

To clear away slums and to give hope

If we would only use our power justly.

We cannot merely pray to You, O God, to end disease,

For you have already given us great minds with which

To search out cures and healing,

If we would only use them constructively.

Therefore we pray to You instead, O God,

For strength, determination, and willpower,

To do instead of just to pray,

To become instead of merely to wish.

--Rabbi Jack Riemer, quoted in When Bad Things Happen to Good People by Rabbi Harold S. Kushner

Quote of the Week 234 - The Heart as Cremation Ground

Of course, it hurts to become yourself.

Birth hurts, death hurts.

But this struggle is God,

whose temple is the cremation ground.

Constant struggle – that is your offering,

what is sacred, what is God’s.

Constant defeat doesn’t mean anything.

Light your little name and its hopes on fire,

make of your heart a cremation ground,

and let Mother dance there.

--from a free translation and interpretation of Swami Vivekananda’s poem “And Let Shyama Dance There” by Peter Schneidre (Hiranyagarbha)

Quote of the Week 233 - The Demands of Judaism

Judaism demands that man should love both God and mankind. This is the way of compassion, and it not only regulates our encounter with our fellow beings, created in the image of God, but it also defines our attitude to God.

--Bill Heilbronn, from The Courage of Uncertainty; A Jewish View of the Continuing Evolution of Faith in the Fields of Religion and Science

Jewish Raja Yoga, Torah Yoga, Jewish Meditation and Hebrew Chanting/Kirtan This Labor Day Weekend at Limmud Atlanta/Southeast

Limmud Atlanta/Southeast This Labor Day Weekend

 

This coming Labor Day Weekend, at the Limmud Southeast weekend retreat in the North Georgia Mountains, I will be teaching a session on Jewish Raja Yoga, and I will be collaborating with Mitch Cohen to conduct a Shabbat morning series starting with Torah Yoga, followed by Jewish Yoga Meditation, and ending with Hebrew Chanting/Kirtan.

 

Limmud is a great experience. This will be my third. Check it out. It is not too late to register.

 

For more information, go to http://www.limmudse.org

Quote of the Week 232 - The Current of Life

And so, for the first time in my life perhaps, I took the lamp and, leaving the zone of everyday occupations and relationships where everything seems clear, I went down into my inmost self, to the deep abyss whence I feel dimly that my power of action emanates. But as I moved further and further away from the conventional certainties by which social life is superficially illuminated, I became aware that I was losing contact with myself. At each step of the descent a new person was disclosed within me of whose name I was no longer sure, and who no longer obeyed me. And when I had to stop my exploration because the path faded from beneath my steps, I found a bottomless abyss at my feet, and out of it came – arising I know not from where – the current which I dare to call my life.

--Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Quote of the Week 231 - Explosions of Myth

New images of man do not spring from Policy Research reports. All cultures begin in explosions of myth in the minds of prophets, mystics, visionary scientists, artists, and crazies.

--William Irwin Thompson

Quote of the Week 230 - The Value of Solitude

This much is certain, that, without absolute solitude, I cannot produce the smallest thing.

-- Johan Wolfgang von Goethe

Quote of the Week 229 - Love and the Intense Interior Life

Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it and no limit is set. Everyone can reach this love through meditation, spirit of prayer, and sacrifice, by an intense interior life.

--Mother Teresa

Quote of the Week 228 - Explorations of Consciousness

Materialist science can neither understand nor explore human consciousness adequately, for it regards consciousness as no more than the product of biological processes in the body. The spiritual sciences start from utterly different premises, regarding consciousness as the primary phenomenon and the biological processes as secondary. They offer keys to understanding consciousness through direct experience by using techniques of meditation. When one explores the unknown regions and contents of one’s own consciousness, using meditation as a tool and practicing its disciplines, the use of an effective map can be of great help, providing that it is recognized for what it is.

--Bill Heilbronn, from The Courage of Uncertainty; A Jewish View of the Continuing Evolution of Faith in the Fields of Religion and Science

Quote of the Week 227 - The Search for Truth and Love

The search for truth is but the honest searching out of everything that interferes with truth. Truth is. It can neither be lost nor sought nor found. It is there, wherever you are, being within you. Yet it can be recognized or unrecognized.

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all of the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

--A Course in Miracles

Quote of the Week 226 - Veneration of the Inexplicable

Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that, behind all the discernible concatenations, there remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion. To that extent I am, in point of fact, religious.

--Albert Einstein

Global Spiritual Gathering

I will be attending/participating in the following event which is free and open to the public:

Unity through Diversity: A Global Spiritual Gathering
June 24, 2012
3 PM
Program will include unique vocal and insturmental music, durmming, dance, meditative practices, and prayers which reflect different worship traditions and cultures.
FREE and Open to the Public

Hillside International Truth Center, Inc.
2450 Cascade Road, SW
Atlanta, GA 30311
404-758-6811 www.hillsidechapel.org

Quote of the Week 225 - What to Do Until the Eternal Silence

Say “I love you” to those you love. The eternal silence is long enough to be silent in, and that awaits us all.

--George Eliot

Quote of the Week 224 - There

When you get there, there’s no there there.

--Gertrude Stein

Wisdom Tradition of Torah Presentation Recording

Following is a link for a recording of my presentation on the Wisdom Tradition of Torah at the Vedanta Center of Atlanta. This presentation was in the form of a dialogue with the resident minister of the Center Brother Shankara, who is the other voice on the recording:

Wisdom Tradition of Torah

Jnana and Bhakti Yoga Presentation Recording

Following is a link for a recording of my presentation on Jnana and Bhakti Yoga at the Vedanta Center of Atlanta:

Jnana and Bhakti Yoga

Quote of the Week 223- The Effort to Be Normal

Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.

--Albert Camus

"Open Minds, Open Hearts" blogtalk radio interview

I have been reluctant in the past to do any kind of recordings or You Tube things and put them on the web. I believe Presence is an important aspect to what a teacher brings, and it is harder to bring such Presence without the mechanism of physical presence. But, in the spirit of things evolving and being reconsidered, I am providing the below link that contains an interview recently conducted on blogtalk radio on an interfaith program called “Open Minds, Open Hearts”. Enjoy.

Interview on Open Minds, Open Hearts

Quote of the Week 222 - The Never-failing Primal Mother

The valley spirit never dies;

She is woman, primal mother.

Her gateway is the root of heaven and earth.

She is like a sheer veil, translucent, almost transparent.

Use Her; She will never fail.

--Tao Te Ching, as quoted in The Divine Feminine in Biblical Wisdom Literature, by Rabbi Rami Shapiro

Quote of the Week 221 - Coming Undone Under a Gentle Moon

As you try to feel your way to a world beyond sorrow

Tell me if you’d trade moonlight

For the fatal gaze of noon.

I didn’t think so.

Even the fool with a heart hot as the sun

Wants, at night, to come undone

Under a gentle moon.

--from a free translation and interpretation of Swami Vivekananda’s poem “And Let Shyama Dance There” by Peter Schneidre (Hiranyagarbha)

Rambling Thoughts on Advaita Vedanta, Resurrection, Transfiguration, Materialization, Cosmology, Infinity, Eternity, End-Times and Other Stuff

[I have recently engaged in email correspondence with a Trappist monk. The dialogue began with my response to his sharing an insight about the difference between “resurrection” and “transfiguration”. Resurrection involves a process whereby a physical body that has died comes back to physical life. Transfiguration involves a process whereby a physical body totally transforms into a form on a higher level of energy frequency that is no longer physical as we know it. Transfigured beings have the ability to “materialize” in the physical world and interact on the physical level, although they ultimately are not subject to physical laws, as this appearance is only a “materialization”, and they remain beyond the laws of physicality as we know them. His insight was contrary to the general Christian view that after Jesus’ physical death, his corpse went through a physical resurrection and after that physical resurrection, it went through a transfiguration. His insight was that there was no physical resurrection, but rather that the corpse transfigured without the intermediate step of a physical resurrection, that what witnesses described as a physical resurrection was rather a materialization of the already transfigured body. He therefore concluded that the holiday of Easter should not focus on resurrection, but rather on transfiguration and materialization. Following are revised excerpts from my dialogue with him that I would like to share on this blog].

I bring to this discussion the perspective of a Jewish yogi. I won’t bother you with the details of my background, but rather refer you to my website for more information along those lines if you are interested. I am, however, attaching a file, “Nice Jewish Boy Meets Rabbi Jesus” [available on this blog in the “Articles” section]

Your presentation evokes many thoughts on the subject. One strain of traditional Jewish thought is that upon the coming of Messiah, all of the dead corpses existing (or at least the Jewish corpses) will literally become regenerated and reanimated, to live out their lives again in the Messianic Age. This is more akin to the Lazarus process of a dead corpse being brought back to life, than a transfiguration as you describe. But then there is the Talmudic take on Enoch (which I imagine you are familiar with, but let me know if you are not). It is said that Enoch did not die a normal physical death, but rather literally bodily ascended to heaven, similar to the traditional story of Jesus’ ascension and Mother Mary’s Assumption. I always questioned these versions, as you have, due to what you call the “old spatial cosmology”. After all, when we are talking about heaven, we are talking about a different dimension than common earthly existence. How could an earthly physical body move into a dimension that is not earthly without somehow substantially transforming? I agree that the examples of Enoch and Jesus were illustrations of a total transformation of the physical body to something not physical at all, what you call “transfiguration”.

In the yoga traditions of India, these concepts are generally accepted, although the terminology is different. One strain of yoga refers to spiritual development ultimately leading to the transformation of the earthly physical body into a “Divine Body”. As far as I can tell, this is the same process as what you call “transfiguration”. Strains of yoga also refer to beings that exist in dimensions beyond our physical world who nevertheless can appear to materialize in this dimension for the sake of guiding us mere mortals, as you describe about Jesus.

There are also strains of yoga that maintain that the soul of a true master can leave a physical body and come back to it, or come back to another physical body, reanimating a newly deceased body.

So these are all variations on resurrection and transfiguration as found in the yoga tradition of India.

I also wonder about a possible conception that Jesus was an incarnation from the start, that he chose to incarnate or “materialize” as the infant Jesus. From this perspective, what you call a transfiguration upon his death was just a “dematerialization” after his work was done, at least for the time being, in an apparent physical materialized body. The physical death of a mortal body was just an “apparent” physical death from this perspective, as he basically was immortal all along. Just some more food for thought.

As for me personally, I’m not even attempting to strive for a Divine Body. I’m merely working on being able to consciously exit the body at the time of death. If I’m drawn back to earthly existence another time, I’ll have another opportunity to keep on developing spiritually (I believe in reincarnation, so that is my perspective). I may be drawn back involuntarily, due to lingering karma, or voluntarily, impelled by an urge to serve, similar to the Bodhisattva concept in Buddhism. So I am hopeful of reaching a level of spiritual development where I am able to consciously exit and consciously enter again, whether to this dimension or some other, as I am so called or moved to do.

Well, that’s it for me now. I welcome your thoughts.

* * *

It is the weekend, so it is a good time for me to continue with this dialogue. I am so happy you mentioned Ramana Maharshi, as I have had an affinity for him for many years. When I went to India a few years ago, I made a point to visit his ashram, where I stayed for several days. It was one of the highlights of my trip. I am in close affinity with his teachings of Advaita Vedanta, and I basically consider myself a Vedantist. I will provide you with my perspective on the general gist of things you have said, which perspective I believe is in keeping with the teachings of Advaita Vedanta.

From the perspective of Advaita Vedanta, your use of the word “permanent” is a little too loose, because there is only one True Reality that is permanent, and that is what is called Brahman, Non-dual Reality without a second. This concept is consistent with the Buddhist concept of Shunyata, and the Kabalist concept of Ein/Ein Soph (Ein = Nothingness, Ein Soph = the paradoxical state of nothingness/everythingness, world without end). Although the Buddhists speak of The Void or Emptiness, they have clarified that these terms are really referring to the same type of non-dual reality referred to by the Vedantists. It is the dimension of the impersonal, the unmanifest, the absolute, of pure potentiality that is the underlying substratum and origination of all that exists in the dimension of the personal, the manifest, the relative, the actual, what Paul Tillich has referred to as the “Ground” of existence. So “emptiness” is actually brim full of potentiality, but because it is in a state of unmanifest potentiality, it is called “emptiness”. This is the perspective of what is also called “monism”, that there is no real distinction between God and God’s creation, just as there is no real distinction between the ocean and its waves. Traditional monotheists usually make a distinction between God and God’s creation, between the waves and the ocean. But where exactly does the wave begin as distinct from the ocean? However, even from the monotheist point of view, God is all that is permanent, while everything in God’s creation is impermanent. There can be nothing that is permanent that is separate from God in any fashion.

So I guess I have some issue with you saying that Jesus and Mary “permanently” transfigured. From my perspective, nothing that can be identified as separate and distinct in any fashion is permanent. They may have risen to a higher dimension never to return to the earthly dimension in the manner in which they previously existed. So in that sense, I guess you can say they “permanently” transfigured, but that does not mean that their new state in which you can still distinguish Jesus from Mary in any way is permanent.

The monistic definition of God that I have come up with, encompassing the totality of creation and beyond is, “God is everything that exists, both known and unknown, and all activity and inactivity related to everything that exists”. The “inactivity” refers to what lies beyond creation in the non-dual Reality. So with this definition in mind, certainly everyone and everything at every level of perceived existence is already and has always been a part of the body of God, and totally dependent on God for its perceived existence, just as waves are totally dependent upon the ocean for their existence. The ocean can exist without waves, but waves cannot exist without the ocean, because their entire substance is the substance of the ocean. No ocean, no waves. No God, no us. So it all starts to become problematic from this perspective when we start talking about resurrection and transfiguration and the distinction between the two terms. Those distinctions only have any meaning in our grappling with semantic exercises in the state of the impermanent relative. If everything already is God or a part of the body of God, then what is being resurrected, what is being transfigured? Waves come, waves go, but it is all within the context of their always being a part of the ocean.

So getting back to the world of seeming separation and impermanence, we make all of these distinctions. Yes, it is possible for those rare beings that have what we call a physical, mortal body of flesh and bones to spiritually transform their bodies while still alive (or, perhaps more accurately, to have their bodies transformed by an act of Grace) into “divine” or “spiritual” bodies that are no longer of the substance of mortal physical bodies. But that alone does not mean that they cease all sense of separative existence, but rather that their perceived separative existence has attained a higher level of functioning in a dimension beyond physicality but still with some separative identity. The ocean manifests many waves in many different dimensions in addition to what we call the physical dimension. And yes, it is possible for other beings that their mortal physical bodies will die and decay, but their souls will leave those bodies upon death and enter into another dimension. How different is their other-worldly existence from those whose bodies were transformed before they died is problematic.

From the yoga point of view, those souls who have unfinished business on the earthly plane will reincarnate. Perhaps others that have unfinished business will enter a separative existence in another, non-earthly dimension. There is no end to the dimensions of existence in the phenomenal cosmos besides earthly existence. It is hard for me to accept the notion that you seem to express, like many monotheists, that upon physical earthly death, no souls ever return to earth, but rather either earn the merit of enjoying a continued separative existence in some pleasant celestial realm, or the demerit of suffering in some horrible lower realm for all of eternity without any continuing evolution and opportunity for further spiritual development in those other dimensions. For me, the universe is all about constant, ongoing evolution on every conceivable and inconceivable level, until it all dissolves back into total nothingness.

My personal belief is that beings like Jesus Christ, Ramana Maharshi and others continue to exist in other-worldly dimensions that can access our worldly dimension to continue to provide guidance and inspiration to us. (Of course, Ramana Maharshi died a physical death, and his body was buried, and nobody claims that his body was resurrected or transfigured, but rather that it remains buried. However, his followers do claim that his soul was totally liberated upon his death, so that it no longer had to return to an earthly existence. Actually, many would claim that his soul entered his body already totally liberated, and that he lived a bodily existence and played out the drama of his early life of spiritual struggle and searching by pure Grace just for the sake of providing guidance and inspiration for others on the physical plane. Others go even further and claim that he was an Avatar, an incarnation of Shiva, one expression of the unlimited God appearing in apparent physical earthly form for the sake of mankind). So when people report visions of such beings, they are not mere imaginings, but true visitations and revelations of these beings dedicated to continuing to provide guidance. Or put in another way, it is possible for beings in our worldly existence who have spiritual sensitivities to access the dimension of these beings in order to be provided guidance and inspiration. It can also work the other way, that the beings from another dimension can “tone down their frequency” and appear in our earthly dimension to those here with spiritual sensitivity.

As far as the end-time goes, I am not a believer in the various happily-ever-after scenarios as is commonly presented by Jewish, Christian and Muslim theologies. The Vedantic/Hindu conception of ages and cycles of creation and dissolution makes more “sense” to me. Instead of one “big bang”, I call it the “bang-bang” theory. Creation followed by dissolution, over and over again. I believe that major shifts do occur, and that is what the end-time notions are misinterpreting, major shifts individually and collectively. But not any be-all-and-end-all scenario. From the kabalistic conception, which to me is consistent with the Vedic conception, the process of creation involves eternity and infinity contracting in their respective dimensions to allow for time and space and creation as we know it, flowing out of a “big bang” that is impelled out of that contraction. Consistent with this description, our scientists tell us that this universe as we know it is expanding from this “big bang” that they have posited. My sense is that it will continue to expand back to the pre-creation phase of eternity and infinity on all dimensions, allowing for nothing else at all to exist except eternity and infinity (perhaps this is the same as a cosmos composed solely of black holes and dark matter). And then there will be another dimensional contraction to allow for another round of creation. I believe that the scientific model also provides for the expansion to eventually stop and be followed by a contraction. So when there is the end of time, there will also be the end of space, and there will be nobody around in any separative sense of any separative existence to be left to experience anything. Not necessarily something to look forward to, unless you just want to exit out of this worldly existence at all costs.

However, on an individual level, timelessness and spacelessness, eternity and infinity, continue to paradoxically exist in another dimension while we simultaneously have a sense of mundane separate existence in the dimensions of time and space. Spiritual exercises, such as meditation, provide us a process whereby we can temporarily access eternity and infinity through connecting with the Fifth Dimension of pure consciousness, beyond time and space. You could say that those who spiritually advance to another dimension have even more easy and ready access to eternity and infinity, to pure consciousness, but nothing separate can exist in pure, unadulterated eternity and infinity. That is why at some places, the Torah states that nobody can see the face of God and live/exist, because it is only possible to encounter the face of God at that level through abandonment of any sense of separation. This is what Kabala refers to as bittul or yichud, merging, union with the Absolute, what yoga calls nirvikalpa samadhi. However, at other places, the Torah paradoxically refers to Moses as having seen God face-to-face. This is an encounter with God at the highest level possible while still retaining a state of separative self, what Kabala refers to as devekut, clinging, cleaving to God, what yoga calls savikalpa samadhi. Yoga even posits that highly advanced spiritual beings can remain connected with infinity and eternity while still appearing and functioning to us in the physical world with what is termed a “vestigial” body. These beings have no sense of egoic separation at all, yet paradoxically appear to function as though they are aware of distinctions. As one such master put it, “I do not feel full or fulfilled. I am lost in the Fullness.”

To be honest with you, it does not matter much to me how we define, distinguish and conceptualize all of these processes. There are all kinds of levels of concentrations and magnifications of divinity, but then again, what is not God if God is Omniscient, Omnipresent and Omnipotent?

I leave you for now with this:

I am Hashem and there is no other: other than Me there is no God; I will gird you, though you did not know Me, in order that those from east and west would know that there is nothing besides Me; I am Hashem, and there is no other. [I am the One] Who forms light and creates darkness; Who makes peace and creates evil; I am Hashem, Maker of all these.

Isaiah 45:5 – 45:7 (Stone Artscroll Tanach translation)