CYCLE II Book One

METAPHYSICS

8[6] Dragon Womb

***

(‘Interview With a Mystic’)

From

THE NEPSIS FOUNDATION

CYCLE II

A. PRIEST

[Father Adam (Priest)]

SEE NEPSIS FOUNDATION CYCLE I- LETTER TO A BISHOP (in three parts)- FOR GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND COMPLETE TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART II of LETTER TO A BISHOP refers only to the contents of Cycle II here and can be found below.

PART III of LETTER TO A BISHOP can be found in the NEPSIS FOUNDATION APPENDICIES at the end of CYCLE I & III here and the UCB Site. These varied texts will be helpful to those who compare the actual experience of this path to the following fiction, essays, poems, images and other works in CYCLE II. The metaphysical search leads to this fiction because of the spiritual opportunities that arise in a fiction format. The reasons for this choice to recast Part I of Letter to a Bishop into a ‘fictional’ context in CYCLE II will become apparent as the fictions of history blend with the salvific intentions of this project. This of course comments upon important aspects of the nature of perception and the alchemies of its transformative powers.

Please see the first pages of CYCLE II for more about the efficacy of fiction in pursuit of the intentions of the NEPSIS FOUNDATION.

THE ORACLE OF XIBALBA

This work describes how to cast a spell… to save the world– or destroy it.

(How to Control One’s Dreams…)

…Bishop, now begins something that is for me very important, very interesting. During the year preceding the 2nd Yemen trip, I re-wrote the story that I have been telling you, but rearranged its various elements into a more fictional context. Over a long period of time, this process produced a new cluster of symbols, characters and insights necessary for a shamanistic consciousness to give rise to structure the “problem” into an other-world scenario wherein the issues at hand could be isolated, amplified and resolved in a way to effect the reality of this world. There is, at least, a mutual fecundation between worlds that takes place. In other words, the process produces a ‘gospel’, a ‘god or good word’, ‘a word of power’ sufficient to effect change, in the rhythm of Being itself or at least in the direction of the “human project.” Here is a shadow of an Oracle, because that sensibility must also be engaged (redeemed?) to face the diabolic challenge in this story! The personality of the main character, Father Adam, is broken up into several characters, but not schizophrenically as happens in the natural world, rather artfully in order to heal the diabolic, uncontrollable, actual schizophrenic rending of the integrity of creation. In some religions there are two ‘ways’, the way of Life, (Truth, Spirit, Wisdom) and the way of Death or Sin. The second way is characterized by the figure of the Prince of Lies, delusion, deceit and hubris. But there is another kind of lie. That is the lie that tells the truth–Art. Art creates something ‘artificial’ to deceive deception, (the Sin of ‘self alone’) and to survive ‘Satan’, the ‘test’ of the world. Thus I use art as a means in this battle of Being, of perception, of Self. Also, telling this story at the proper moments, ‘communicates me’ with the deeper Powers of this ritual and gives me the energy for its completion. …Given enough time, in both personal and cultural issues, not only is truth revealed, but even wisdom bobs to the surface of perception. Myths arise from the collective memories of generations and form into clusters of stories that reveal the psyche of a culture. Likewise, I have focused on a complex of cultural and personal issues that now produce a spectrum of critical, artistic and literary works. Over the past 30 years my project has developed interrelated clusters of essays, paintings and stories (with different versions of important fictions repeated from ‘different sources’). Certain themes within this series of literary and artistic cycles have gained for me a Masters degree from a Roman Catholic seminary, and then a Ph.D. at a major, secular university–this last evoked a sympathetic ‘response’ from one of the world’s greatest living philosophers and was nominated for publication by the American Academy of Religion by another. The final issue of this introduction, Bishop, regards the style or form of this presentation. What developed after four novels and several short fictions, was something more primordial than the clever, effective artifice of the novel. The final form combines a technical, metaphysical journal- a grimoire, with a picaresque reminiscence, or travel book. The Book, this bible, is a collection of reflections and clustered tales, some historical, some merely true. It describes a curve of perception until it becomes too dangerous or too esoteric to talk about. The patterns of the overall form are meant to emulate, support, perhaps replace, at least reflect, the Liturgy of Hours, the Divine Office–I’ve prayed this material since 1974–and yet have the same effect of holiness and salvation. The Church has not yet been able to express itself as fully, or freely as I have here about the Spirit in the world. One possible reason is that people still need to project their fears, rebellion and malice into an object outside ourselves. The Devil, for instance. That tendency must be absorbed/transformed into a whole before the world can be saved. Second, people naturally fall into a hierarchy; elite and common, that says little about the inherent efficacy of the ineffable Spirit in each and all. In order to approach a resolution for these and related topics, I have endeavored to treat such touchy topics as sexuality, or sexual identity, with the same engaged detachment as pure science, or a serious Tantric yogi. I use both the purity and impurity of the world to find its destiny, its real face, one with the Spirit. I have determined to engage the archetypes of, the psyche of, the gods of, all things- to affect the salvific intentions of my vocation since one cannot approach the Spirit without its creation.

: 126[31] Artificer

NEPSIS FOUNDATION

CYCLE II

116[45] Back Through

***

ORACLE

Table of Contents

THE XIBALBA BIBLE:

Book I of the Xibalba Bible introduces the themes, characters and designs of this book. Book I brings us all to the same page, so to speak, before we dare to approach the Jin in Book II. Book II develops these elements from Book I in a way potentially vital to the reader who chooses to use the Oracle as instructed, and brings us to the edge of CYCLE III.

120 [49] Out There

***

BOOK II

INTRODUCTION

BOOKS I and II OF THE XILBALBA BIBLE/ORACLE, and CYCLE III OF THE NEPSIS FOUNDATION, ARE ARCHETYPALLY CONSTRUCTED TO REVEAL A PATH THROUGH A SERIOUS CONSIDERATION OF THE READER’S CHOICES. Too often one approaches an oracle to discover one’s future for only personal or even selfish reasons. But a real oracle reveals the inner structure or substance of the whole of being, and one’s part in it–in time and out–or a preferred path through. That revealed, one knows what to do, or not, what to hope for or not. What to be. Even the great oracles, tried and true, I CHING, Delphi, Siwa, depend upon the wisdom of the interpretation…

One may use various oracular methods for choosing the selections in Book II. However, one may simply allow the book to fall open randomly to find your texts, as St. Francis did with the Bible. DO NOT JUST READ THOUGH ALL OF THE TEXTS OF BOOKS I, II or CYCLE III. That will only provide a more superficial, critical exposure. In that case, one might as well read a novel for the usual reasons of enlarging moral awareness and/or entertainment. Rather, choose three chapters in Book II at random for a first reading, then seven texts for a deeper revelation. Choose twenty-oneselections in Book I, II and/or CYCLE III here for a more thorough presentation of what is sought. Read the whole selection as needed.

If the reader does not discover something helpful here, or in the full www.nepsis.com Oracle–should that be available to you–I refer you to the I CHING, a great master, for a second opinion. Though vast in helpful wisdom, the I CHING was devised before the tragic split between Spirit and Matter, psyche and Spirit in our perception was so violently rift. This FALL has gotten worse and might require a more powerful, or at least a different therapy than one finds in such ancient tomes.

SELECTIONS

Selections in this Book II are numbered, but not listed in this table in order to aid in the mystery of their oracular effect. That is, to give them some elbow room to do their work without the confines of immediate, though convenient organization in this table of contents.

How you come up with your numbers and how random you allow your choice to be will tell about your condition as much as the selections.

NEPSIS FOUNDATION AND THE ORACLE OF XIBALBA

CYCLE II

THE XIBALBA BIBLE

Introduction

Spread between works such as the Da Vinci Code and the Jouney to Ixlan or Tales of Power, between the I CHING and say– St. Aelred’s 13th Century books about ‘Spiritual Friendship,’ is a territory composed by our capacity for fiction and non-fiction re-composed in a way so as to resemble history, i.e. reality. Trouble is, reality has pretensions bigger than history and a truly artistic process reveals unexpected mysteries beyond the possibilities of history or even one’s personal perception of reality. This book, the XIBALBA BIBLE started in the way that novels often begin, but it never seemed satisfied with that form and ultimately became something else. It insisted on becoming a collection of episodes, interrelated stories–a cycle of personal myths. Then, it seemed to satisfy itself by revealing its own archetypal patterns that coalesce finally with “Resolution” in CYCLE III, and revelation about the interaction between this world and the ‘other’ one. An ‘other’ world called by some ‘Spiritual’ or ‘Divine’ or ‘Enlightenment’–or, MAGIC. This Book is an unusual literary experience, promises much and functions as follows:

First, an INSTRUCTION, then an explanation about how the ORACLE in the XIBALBA BIBLE works: The simplest method to consult the Oracle about an issue of importance to you is, read BOOK I to become familiar with characters, plotlines, and themes in this book. Then, set this Xibalba Bible on its spine and hold it tightly closed. Let the book fall open to any random page. Read that selection. Repeat this process 3, 7 or 21 times for varying degrees of depth in answer to what you seek. Suspend disbelief long enough to consider the value to your life of what you find for the sake of the answer you seek.

I recommend now for the reader to proceed directly to Book I and continue as instructed above. You will find the stories of the XIBALBA BIBLE both clear and simple. I strongly recommend against just reading straight through the texts of Books I, II and CYCLE III–I cannot be held responsible if you do. Some of the material contained therein can be dangerous. But one is protected by the purity of one’s need to know. That is the power of an oracle. It cannot be forced. If you want more EXPLANATION, continue here below a while longer.

Carl Jung provides a useful explanation of a similar function in one of the world’s most helpful documents, the I CHING. For the sake of this introduction, allow me to limit the use of his insights to just a few important, simplified elements. One holds that the Unconscious–like God, knows everything and that there are both natural and artificial means to access this knowledge. An I CHING ‘casting’ is one such means of great suggestive depth and significance. Modern, Abstract Expressionist art theory is another. Shamanistic fetish is perhaps the oldest example here of an intentional interaction between ‘this world’ and the ‘other’ one. (The power of symbols and metaphors, are of great importance here. The five major schools of Yoga and Ascetical Mysticism systematically chart the course between worlds.) Tibetan Mandalas (specifically for initiations to higher and higher states of consciousness) and Christian Icons likewise operate within the vales of this communion. Though all of these forms express themselves within certain more or less rigid, ritual patterns, there are always occasions for spontaneous and random choice. Somehow, according to Jung, the Unconscious makes choices in a seemingly random chaos and describes reality for the one seeking knowledge. In the case of the I CHING, a throw of three marked coins, or a collection of yarrow stalks, provides the opportunity for unconscious choice and revelation. This spontaneous and/or artificially evoked capacity to access an ‘otherworld’ agency suggests everything about every other religious phenomenon. A relationship with the ineffable Spirit is like any other true friendship. Ultimately, it cannot be forced or owned but seems open to, eager for, love.

Your random choices will not only reveal something of the presentation made in the Xibalba Bible–as it happened to me, in order randomly–but the spontaneous order of your choices will, I believe, tell you something important about your own life or the way you should go! Might reveal the deeper spell… (St. Francis approached the Christian Bible as such an oracle in the same way that I recommend to use this book. There are many others. They all depend upon an inherent accessibility between this world that the ‘other’ one.) As above, I suggest at first three choices. Then, for greater depth, seven choices. Then, twenty-one selections. I won’t say how many choices there actually are. Perhaps 333 million! In this, I specifically avoid most ‘dark side’ aspects of reality for our mutual safety. Especially, I avoid the most ravenous of our fellow creatures. But I warn you to be careful and to withdraw if there are terrors within that you feel you cannot face. There is sufficient access to beauty and shadow-less light here for the benefit of most–though sometimes one must proceed with great courage and high dedication, alone or with others. The point is to open the doors between opposite realities–epithalamia. Should the reader not be satisfied with the suggestions of this process, try the I CHING. It and its commentaries are refined, tried and true. Though, the split between culture, nature, psyche, and spirit is rent more and more violently now and might require a stronger therapy.

Father Adam Priest Ph.D.

“The true author of this work claims to be a “golem.” (A frightening creature! I’ve only glimpsed him up close a few times. We communicate online mostly. He is swarthy, but ruggedly handsome, quick and intelligent. A strong being of danger and purpose! But what purpose?)

A golem is a created being- But not by God. The golem is created from the imagination of a powerful mystic. Both Kabbala and Tantric metaphysics have such creatures. Often they become so real that they strain for liberation from their creator. As any creature growing up, a golem can be mischievous, even dangerous… ”

“A golem or a tolpa is a being created from the imagination of a powerful mystic. Some of these creatures become so real as to comment upon the nature of identity itself and sometimes display troublesome, mischievous traits. On a more poetic plane, the golem can be a symbol of the alchemist’s higher aspirations. Upon such a creature the mystic may fly to the stars or visit the inner reaches of a molecule! …Though this creature is described as black, this is neither skin tone nor moral attribute. Here, this crystalline black color describes the vast emptiness of the universe in which all our star encrusted worlds make their rounds and where we invent–no, charge our lives on the account of—what? Perhaps, the one who gives us breath.’” (From HOW DIONYSIUS SAVED HIS MOTHER FROM HELL, a work once published but withdrawn because of a rather dangerous response…)

THE ‘EDITOR’

The Christian Bible is an example in modern religion (the last six or seven thousand years) that can be an Idol. A false God. People imbue it with all emotion, sacredness and value as if it were the ‘the way, the truth and the light’ itself. Here’s a couple of examples of one such abuse: The possible descendents of the people who wrote or ‘borrowed’ parts of the older sections of the Bible thousands of years ago have used it as a justification to steal a whole country in the mid 20th Century! It is a potent Idol indeed. Any compassionate person familiar with the history of the Jewish people in Europe must feel that they need a safe home. But so does everyone else! So do the Palestinians. And the Gypsies, and dissidents, and homosexuals, slaves and every other disenfranchised population… Latter day evangelists have used their own (mis-) interpretations of some very allegorical, New Testament texts to justify the theft of a country like Palestine from the people who have lived there for generations. These doom-dayers hope to bring on the end of the world and force the Second Coming of Christ. This without concern for the inconvenient fact that people already lived there before the people of David took Jerusalem and after they were expelled- People who deserve full consideration of justice and compassion. Excuse me if I begin to rant. But we no longer live in an era when the rights of conquest hold sway morally.

So, the Bible, which generally operates as a real Icon, a window into the other world, is also an example of an Idol of great power. It’s something that takes the place of God, when one is not ready for the real thing as our primal ancestors had it! “The Church” would be another example. Both Bible and Church are artificial constructions of great genius and power. Evangelical Christians (and evangelical Buddhists!) have begun to splice together a new corporation that has all the same characteristics of greed and abuse as the old systems. Secular institutions of justice and fair-play shiver and quake now as they realize that they are vulnerable to ‘some of the people being fooled all of the time!’

But who can take the real thing? Who can look upon the face of God and live? That, none-the-less, is what we are made for–to walk with God in the garden of his delight. That is what we are made of! Some will say that these inventions like the Bible, or the Church, religious forms in general all the way back to the Stone Age, are justified as valid means to an end. But they also can take on a ‘life’ of their own like a Tibetan tolpa or a Jewish golem and other such dangerous beings. Such as myself! Like the capitalist technocracy that now wants to rule the world.

That all being said, such artifice as the Bible or Religious Orders, Sacred Scriptures and Icons, Mandalas and Oracles such as this book, have all the power and means of art and symbol to engage the ‘really real,’ the divine core of our existing. So, here The XIBALBA BIBLE–like its precedent namesake is also an evocative composition of non-fiction and fiction, mythic symbol and historic action, engaged through ‘other world’ encounters that describe a worldview: A model of human perception that denies nothing essential in the Christian Gospel. A series of interrelated vignettes that lead to certain conclusions, that drift as floral bouquets up the Nile and wander their way through loves and loss, disaster and triumph–constant currents rip and massage primordial waters, raise the mountain of creation above itself and (re-)vitalize the Tree of Life … And reveal our story.

The full version of this presentation of an ‘Oracle for the New World,’ the Oracle of Xibalba, is an Internet site. This site has many more files and images to help the seer with its own devices to make its telling choices. This version is not available to the public at this time–(It might be too helpful, or, too dangerous for some, like another spin-off from its core process– How Dionysius Saved His Mother From Hell.) But here the Xibalba Bible, ‘The Book’ provides the essential texts for our oracular purposes, much redacted. The Book has been edited again and again for thirty years to distil its vital energies. The following passage describes the original ‘temple of origin’ but after this I advise the reader to dive right into Books I, II and III here, the Oracle itself, wasting no more time on trying to plumb an experience that hasn’t happened yet. Instructions for the experience, the use of Oracle, are repeated at the beginning of Book I and Book II below. Read BOOK I through so that we may begin together our journey into the unconscious, the underworld, with a common set of references, characters, plot lines and themes. And then we may hope to come to real consciousness of the really real in full union and knowledge.

The Golem, (Tolpa)

The Christ embraces the entirety of creation in its salvific intent. However, Christianity has shunned pagans and philosophers, fallen angels and demons–all the competition, among others. Some not at all evil. Competition, radical brutal competition, is the sin, not religion. Domination, Pride, Egotism. Winning! Christianity only considers some qualities of ‘the good.’ Its own vision of ‘the good.’ But our virtues are not the problem in the human condition. Most people want to be thought good. (At least to be well thought of…) Even if we assume here an honest preference for wisdom and compassion, KALI must also be considered since she is the one who brought us to the dance. She provides the energy and is the process(es) through which the world functions: Life and death, generation, decay and resurrection. Religion exists to address the problems or fragmentation of knowledge and identity in the world and ourselves. The real problem is a problem of identity. What is the real nature of our identity, personhood in general? And as a result, why are we doing what we do? Concerning some unusual elements of style in these texts:

REPETITION: A general warning about the repetition of certain themes and passages in this work: As with the ingenious Tai Chi Chuan Long Form, certain postures, gestures and energies are repeated to emphasize and establish their importance—to catch their energy. Or these display an evolution of understanding as they change slightly with each repetition. Or, like viewing the facets of a wonderful gem, each facet catches the light a little differently. How we catch the light is a topic here. Finally repetition of phrases or whole passages is also pedagogical. These passages are what I want you to consider more carefully. So you’ll know…

FICTION: ‘If you follow the story lines of this fiction in connection to the whole, you will, no doubt, find your heart’s true desire. …a more thorough excavation of themes essential to this project is progressed by these works and some unusually colorful anecdotes are told in the process.

Some grammatical irregularities are maintained: Tense switching sometimes approximates the experience of a shifting state of consciousness that transports one to ‘other’ perceptual or non-temporal contexts. … Or, maybe I just couldn’t get it quite right. This is a gospel after all. Exact date or style is not the point. Iconic breakthrough is. Besides the usual topics of heaven and earth, there is explored here a fascination in our era with the sensational, the dark, the competitive, the violent– sex and money! As well, the opposite: health, security and comfort. My interest is otherwise, though not exclusively so. I seek an appropriate relationship between the various operative elements of being–temporal and non-temporal. …And if prayer indicates stillness as an important value, then action, even violence must also be dissected to determine what essential energies move within.

Though, I completely affirm the Church’s pastoral teaching about the importance of Chastity—at one with the ‘clear light’ of Charity, i.e. the shadow-less love of God–what is treated here are psychological and cultural forms in process, i.e., short of the ideal of perfect love… We live in the presence of soaring beauty and vaulting splendor.

Internal exercise of instinct, imagination and external input seem to comprise our field of perception in the face of rational discernment. Nothing can be left out of our consideration. Everything shall find its order in the larger body, but you might be surprised where and how you fit in. You too, might even resist…’

POETRY here tells the same tale as the prose, more succinctly. This poetry tells the story from a different vantage and thus provides an essential counterpoint in our presentation that suggests a larger ambience of value and meaning.

SEXUALITY, why investigate such a troublesome and already treated topic?

As the claims of the American free speech movements in the second half of the 20^th Century would have it, polite society with all its military backup and international commercial presumption, does much worse things… than what the use colorful gutter language in one’s rebellion, or, what the liberation of one’s ‘natural urges’ from cultural repression might accomplish. In fact, the repression of natural urges can indeed be unhealthy. That is not to say that sexuality cannot be considered as sacred, mysterious, powerful or culturally volatile such that our participation in biology does not benefit from the guides, parameters and largess of religious insight. To discipline or subliminate such urges is intended to help effect a health ‘that passes understanding.’ Both such influences are important aspects for these Nepsis considerations.
There are certain comparable qualities in Western ideas about chastity as a spiritual context and Asian metaphysics concerning the place of sexuality in a larger world view, that are necessary to examine as we take the pulse of human identity and search out its spiritual core.
To know better what all the fuss is about for both personal and pastoral reasons. The fiction is only graphic in this regard when the characters demand it.
The theory and praxis of magic reigned spiritually in human perception for tens of thousands of years. It is important to be able to compare such worldviews with contemporary approaches. The notion that ‘all that is just superstition’ is not accurate. The ‘energies’ and generative function are central to this consideration.

Father Adam Priest

165 [94] “Who Told You You Were Naked”

XIBALBA BIBLE

BOOK I

Pratityasamutpada

refers to the primordial law or essence of how things work, from the Buddha’s point of view.

ONE: Memo to a Bishop from Father Adam

TWO: Narrator/Editor

THREE: St. Agnes Hotel

FOUR: Satisfaction

FIVE: Stephanie Agnes Katherine Mara

SIX: Simon Dreams

SEVEN: Father Adam, Pilgrim/ Back to St. Agnes Hotel

119[48] Saint Spell (Holy Word)

ONE: MEMORANDUM

Holy Week, 1997

To: The Bishop

From: Father Adam

Re: Physiology, Cosmology and Ecclesiology

Dear Bishop:

Over the past few weeks a number of issues that I have been deeply concerned about for many years have become clear in a poignant way. I think this complex of issues might be important to share with you.

Let’s start with the seemingly more benign of these issues–perhaps I’ve already broached this with you? But it is an open door to many important anthropological findings supportive of the religious insight that I have pursued. When Cardinal Bellermine contested with Galileo about cosmology, they were both right according to their own lights. Galileo was right because, as it was later proved, the earth does go around the sun physically. The Church was also right in that it maintained the older, even primordial, understanding that the perceiver is at the center of the perceived. And given that the cult of the individual that now holds sway had not yet developed, persons regarded themselves as part of a group, psychologically and politically tied to terra firma, or some part of it. Or, what they could perceive of it! As far as they need be concerned at the time, they were the ‘center of the universe.’ (What could be perceived had not yet been determined, for sure, to be round.) That is of course ego-centric, but then we all still are!

(No one knows the boundaries of the physical universe, nor its ultimate character nor what it seems to be expanding into—God, perhaps! Absolute nothing, paradoxically, the nothing that is the origin of everything.)

At least psychologically, it is still true that the perceiver is the center of the perceived. This, of course, does not excuse any of the dirty politics of the Renaissance. Cosmology is the issue here, as it is in what follows. Everyone talks a good game about being a ‘merest speck’ on the back side of creation in all humility, but we still act like we are so very important, vital–usually its about wounded egos competing for security, money and/or status.

My next topic of coalescence involves an old concern that is not so positive. In fact, it has been an issue of troubling fascination. But it also concerns important changes in our cosmological point of view. What generated particular interest in these questions is that a priest friend, Father Chris, was accused of molestation. I was shocked not only by his experience but by the degree of hysteria and opportunism in the public response. That commenced a ten-year investigation that has led to the surprising conclusions here. Though my studies have been concerned with larger academic areas–i.e. the character of personal identity formatted in the constructs of culture and religions–a small but important aspect of this study is sexual identity. This includes hetero- and homo-eroticism as well as some anthropologically verified complexes that might now be illegal, but in some cases at least, might be something quite other than abuse.

My suspicion is that some people involved in what could be determined to be “molestation” legally might be operating in response to an irresistible anthropological imperative left over from primordial attempts to integrate all levels of perceived reality–Originally ingenious and successful, now warped and dangerous. It’s not that there are not real sex offenders. But, in the tragic readjustment of nature beneath the overwhelming construct of technocracy, certain natural psycho/physical actions and symbols in human nature long thought necessary for human personality and society, now are considered to be illegal, even abusive.

I’m not advocating a campaign here. Nor, am I refuting current moral systems. I’m simply directing you towards mitigating anthropological data you might not know about regarding a topic of wide concern.

What I have discovered is that outside the consideration of real psychosis, this dynamic of adult males initiating adolescent males into manhood sexually, ritually, culturally, and spiritually, is common in the history of cultures and religion: Common not only long ago in primordial cultures but up through classical eras, in Greco/Roman times; then on and off, here and there, to our own period. This issue in such cosmologies typically reflects a bisexual origin in the non-temporal source of all things, godhead itself.

It was readings from Taoist Chi-gung energy manuals coupled with a secondary Greek myth about Dionysius* having to “submit like a woman to a phallus made from a fig tree, in order to free his mother from Hades.” That is perhaps, to liberate or subliminate masculine and feminine creative energies. This further combined with a long held awareness about Shamanistic practices of initiation that insist on some degree of trans-sexual ordeal; and then with the fact that many Animistic cultures include homo-erotic interludes for all young men coming of age. This coalesces for me finally in such a clear and positive way. Some examples of the homo-erotic experience in males might be a natural, spiritual aspect of initiation to full realization or at least adulthood. (I don’t know about young women. Nature perhaps enforces the change to adulthood in them physically when they start to menstruate! Though there are many studies of female initiation rites. One such that I have observed would be the beautiful ceremonies and asceticism associated with a female’s physical coming of age among the Apaches of the American Southwest. Males require a rite of passage with different cultural and natural components. Unlike females, the presence of both “x” and “y” chromosomes in males might be suggestive of a form necessary in real rites of passage for young males.)

In the Taoist source, it was made clear that orgasm starts near the prostate gland in both hetero- and homosexual experiences. According to Tantric (Tibetan Buddhist and Hindu) sources, it is yogic stimulation of these areas that awakens the Goddess* who resides psychically just above the perineum and who, in her universal persona, is in command of all creative light, energy, and power in the universe. Shakti Kundalini! In other words, through these process one returns to a more primal state before sexual differentiation in fetal development and realizes a larger more complete degree of self. This is reputed to release certain useful ‘powers’ or understandings. If these psychic/spiritual physiologies are accurate at all, and there is considerable positive evidence in that regard, then it is no wonder that so many creative and religious people are often subject to this urge or ‘calling,’ ala poor Dionysius. No wonder Gay people enjoy anal sex so much. Besides the intimacy, it seems to evoke light filled energy, visionary, poetic, artistic or other transformative sensibilities. The above-mentioned cultures all value such sensibilities highly.

Now the poignant political and spiritual question remains: Why does this issue evoke such a hysterical response now? It is beyond all reason. Why is this “abomination” cited from the Old Testament Book of Leviticus and the rest of that book often ignored? This issue in St. Paul’s “Letters” is exploited as authoritative, while the fact that the great saint was completely wrong about the much more important, most important Second Coming of Christ tends to be over looked. Christ, it seems, did not say anything about the topic, or very much about sex generally, according to the Gospels. I wonder why the crisis now?

This is, of course, besides the vast amounts of money some people have made off the Church from molestation cases, pressuring conformity to more positivist and commercial values.

Does money heal anyone? Before the advent of popular psychology, these cases were considered by everyone as moral issues rather than psychological. I’m not saying that there are not real sex offenders who should be “outed” –but for the career advancement for journalists, district attorneys and sheriffs whose public careers depend on or profit from media attention? These cases are heavily prejudiced by such elements. I think that within the sexual revolution of our era is an over-reaction that is nothing less than hatred–or at least a repression–of Christ’s own metaphysical practice of celibacy, and therefore ours. It amounts to a curtailment of religious freedom…

Well, why beat a dead horse. The image of Spartan soldiers and Roman legions come to mind from societies in which the homo-erotic experience was common, as a disclaimer to any ‘kinder, gentler’ rule that might claim homo-eroticism as a guarantee to the moderation of aggression. The scientific discernment of psychology seems permanently divided on the topic. Too bad scientific detachment is not further extended into cultural norms. The only identity we are willing to accept generally is the current norm. As if there were nothing else worthwhile and never has been. Where is the freedom in that? Especially, this is the case as our perception is limited more and more by materialistic marginalization of any form of metaphysical practice or cosmological sensibility such as represented by celibacy–and along with it compassion for the elderly, the unborn, the poor, the weak, any marginalized group not economically or politically strong enough to protect itself!

When I asked a psychologist friend once long ago if homosexuals are sick in this regard, he responded “some are, some aren’t.”

Don’t mistake me Bishop. These reflections might be construed as the ramblings of another gay, liberal priest! But we are discussing patterns of human experience that have had powerful influence and merit for 30,000 years, or more.

I know people who will not appreciate tying this issue to ancient religious patterns or the psychic and spiritual energy systems of Asia (that have codified the physio/spiritual elements including this area of concern).

…But it’s not just Asia. Billions of people around the world, Christian and non-Christian, believe in these body/mind/spirit systems that seek to balance the dualistic energies–empty/full, hot/cold, male/female, etc. This includes the American government and the American Health Insurance industry that is willing to pay for such (chi)/energy based therapies as Acupuncture!!!

I suppose that this issue cannot be decided without developing a cosmology that fully and compassionately integrates all the elements of psyche and nature, science and culture in some healthier light. We are not only a world of individuals, but an animate body constituted by Nature and Spirit. I fear for our poor culture and the world. These issues are veiled symptoms, both in individuals and whole peoples, of profound inner and organizational conflict. Other symptoms increase as well; human starvation has doubled to 1 billion in the last 2 decades, for instance—The implications reach into the eco-system itself since technocracy re-defines our role in nature. To deny the sacred nature of the world is like denying the humanity of slaves, a common tactic that makes exploitation possible.

And what a frail protest this is… After all these years.

Bishop, I thought that it would be important to keep you informed about my more pithy reflections, that you might help, if you like, to guide their development as time passes. And so that you may have a fuller reservoir of reference when it comes to making decisions about… well, you know.

Another controversial issue that I should mention before I conclude regards pornography, or at least, the appearance of pornography. Though I might find this topic unattractive, like the topic above, I believe there to be a communication of great significance in the attention paid to these matters now. It might bode ill indeed if we fail to hear what is said in this whispering, this ‘tiny sound.’ In such knowledge might be the salvation of the world.

Since physiology is as unavoidable as cosmology in the study of the history of religion, sex remains central. Not just because of the implications of biology, but also because so much of our psychological and emotional time-spent sensibility is focused on sexually related matters. Let me sum up my consideration of these topics by reference to a recently published novel, VOX, by Nicholson Baker. The whole of this work is graphically explicit telephone sex between a woman and a man. To tell the truth, I was rather embarrassed by much of the conversation that is this book. But at the same time, I admired the honest depiction of a process that ended up not in an orgasm of cheap titillation, but something else. Through the arousal came a human voice reaching—through the ether—for relationship. And that is what is accomplished. Space, matter and technology are transcended—or justified!—by being the medium in which friendship developed. Physiology rephrased. Something quite human happened, beyond any of the isolated elements of this encounter. Not that something positive is usually the product of pornographic excursions! Obviously not. But what is one looking for in this sort of experience. Satisfaction? What is the process that leads to the oh-so-relational whole, the Eucharist—the Body of Christ. Only in the marriage bed? That restriction might be justified for other reasons, but for every occasion of salvation involving sexuality?

Popular understanding of religion, and perhaps as often the very idealistic expression of the tail-end of a cathartic process that leads to holiness, does not always sufficiently credit the process involved. The “end” of religious practice is a state of being in which ‘adultery—and every other deception—does not even arise in one’s heart.’ If VOX describes what I believe it does, i.e., a process with salvific overtones—real temporal/non-temporal relationship—is not such an open approach to human spiritual realization justifiable? In this, I do not believe that I am mixing major and minor premises. Friendship is friendship. If that is with God or neighbor should make no difference. Love cannot be quantified or partial, except that we experience it partially until we advance to its divine fullness. That being the case, then, our psychosomatic processes are the very means, not the obstacle, to such fullness. Certainly such an open, yet completely localized means might be more widely approachable. Or, I should say, it is an approach more widely practiced… This is especially so, since we all receive a scientific education, more or less. So, the ancient body taboos have less impact now. I realize that most of us, culture itself, needs parameters. Though as well, most of us are just lazy, preferring a nice, clear rule to keep or break, to the hard work of honesty, realization and salvation.

Bishop, I’ve “studied” these issues for at least the past ten years, sometimes at great personal cost. I hope they have some value for people and the Church. My own fascination with these topics quiets down, now that I’ve come to some better understanding for myself. I will pursue it no further as before.

Sincerely,

Father Adam

P.S. *Gods or Goddesses here indicate an anthropomorphized sensibility about the participation of every moment, power and place in the divine condition. In the context of this memorandum, ‘gods’ refer to archetypal figures that actively engage a fuller spectrum of perception. For the “Dionysius” reference, see Halpern, Paul. The Cyclical Serpent, Plenum Press, New York, 1995. Also see, Williams, W. L. The Spirit and the Flesh. Beacon Press, Boston, 1986. For pertinent Shamanistic initiations, see “Introduction” in Shamanism, Eliade, M.

TWO

Narrator/Editor:

When this story ‘shimmered with the viscous glimmer of any fetal formation’, the precedent training was just completed after years of research and yogic practice. I am the narrator here and an editor of lore not my own. In fact, I contributed much to the stories in Book II following. Though that integration might seem nebulous to some, its binding is evoked from one’s ability to sense the ‘no-thingness’ or ineffable ‘spirit’ of things. This new ‘book’ rests in a winding cloth of themes and emotions fielded in the NEPSIS FOUNDATION, a post-doctoral project at… This project investigates an esoteric organization of mystics and sorcerers. The NEPSIS FOUNDATION is also a way of looking at the world and an experience of reality that opens a universe similar to our own, but one sparkling with magic, delight–and terror. That means these contents are the ground upon which subsequent creativity rests and this story finds footing. How one opens the doors between worlds, for instance.

Nepsis explores human identity through religion, technology, scholarship, art, politics, sexuality and money–action in the void of being. The methodological parameter of this project is marked by a counterpoint of disciplines: Art and science, mysticism and technology, academic rigors and rigorous peregrination; erring, ‘on the road’ pilgrimage, the annals of magic, etc. Then, most importantly, characters real and imaginary are drawn together to reveal the goal and integration of human personality: Spirit and Matter made One, the integration of knowledge.

…

Sexual identity is an important consideration in any field of biological consideration. In a review of human identity, it is unavoidable. Working from the basis of contemporary sexual attitudes of common knowledge, the author(s) was inspired to explore these aspects of human identity from an environmental and religious-studies perspective. Nature and religion. First, the so-called ‘natural religions’ offer a most intimate revelation about our encounter with nature and deity. One might say with Jackson Pollack, “I am nature.” Or, one might feel alien, even hostile, to the very environment that provides one’s sustenance. Then, mystical physiology in the form of a system of charkas and channels of psychic energies that flow through the human body and the world, especially the earth charkas—matter, psyche and inspiration—form the core of revelation about otherwise inexplicable human attitudes and experience.

Issues of justice and compassion are of ultimate importance but treated elsewhere.

All in all, sexuality is a small part of the whole of this research. Treated mostly in the past, only as necessary here. There is the rest of the world to be considered. There are non-biological aspects of the universe as well as spiritual or non-material, non-temporal issues that help form the context in which we might realize ourselves, find fulfillment in this world and the ‘other’ one: Justification. Rectification. Even Satan must be redeemed. The Satanic function must be redeemed so that the world may know life in its fullness—without the Great Lie.

That’s the background for this new book. Those are the ‘swaddling clothes spun from pure white gold, cloth upon which the infant of our imaginings has lain. In this new book, the exploits of Twin Warrior gods are played out. From the primordial pit of realization, the serpent of resurrection, scales scraping against scales, shapes the destiny of heroes and gods. The mysterious intention of the Shivalila women toward one surviving twin reveals itself—Stephanie’s infant of destiny at this apocalyptic moment. Who gets the money, the power, the sex, and whose gene pool produces survival and salvation…’

Narrator

THREE

Saint Agnes Hotel

There are moments in the Tropics when the extraordinary oppression of the heat can be delicious. There are times in the deserts of the southwest when the summer sun can cleanse like a dry sauna in the snowfields of the north. Simon Han, first generation Asian American, has felt both the healing and destruction of his training as sorcerer in such places. Simon is a member of the Nepsis Foundation. Some of his training will be displayed later. But a true relationship with nature is necessary to true ‘power.’ To know the power of one’s own psyche, one must know its relationship to the whole. Otherwise, one falls into the trap of many urban wizards–Toilers, unaware of the beast that contains them. Simon’s training took him through long wilderness exposure with people who had the normal spectrum of kindness and aggression one finds among humans. But generally there were not, in the wilds of his exposure, the wildly unbalanced or defensive personalities one finds in the urban environment. (There are some who have ‘entered the stream of notables’ that handle both well.) Simon is comfortable in any climate where the magics of life glitter with a potential for survival and propagation. In fact, shortly after graduating from the University of California, Berkeley, Simon spent a full four seasons training in a remote Eskimo village far to the north of anything green- or paved. Not only did Simon learn the language and culture of the place, but also he learned to survive in sub zero climates of snow and ice. This place turned out to be for him a Garden of Eden rather than the freezing horror one might expect.

As a promising shaman’s apprentice, Simon spent many nights of testing, naked in the snow. He was able to keep himself warm by generating what’s called in some places, yogic heat. Tum-mo among the Tibetans. It is the basis of all true magic and has various characteristics. Heat is the useful one here.

There will be more about the ice gardens of the north later, but now Simon is in love, and in trouble. Perhaps the intensity of his passions is a reaction to the extreme deprivations of his earlier training. But in trying to get away from some of the horrors of such formation, he is sweating an even more challenging romance in a hot triangle of the Caribbean. He and another young sorcerer have fallen in love (and lust) with a slightly older woman. She owns an old hotel on the island of St. Agnes and she has certain powers of her own. But they all represent other agents, or organizations of great influence in the markets and political arenas of the world. They represent intensely competitive people who use their skills– well, some for the good of the whole, and some not. Some are intensely selfish and self absorbed–a cruel isolation, but addictive. This is something of what I meant about urban delusions. This is the history of civilization.

How our two young sorcerers and this lovely woman from the island of St. Agnes, accomplish their goals and gain liberation from what has become a hateful indenture to larger, older powers is the action of our story, but something else happens to all three along the way. Something entirely unexpected.

Simon Han is an Asian American immigrant. He is tall, well built with an inverted triangle of a torso, narrow strong hips, long legs. His family came to America when he was a baby for all the usual reasons, but mainly so that Simon and his brother could find a first rate education as well as economic opportunity. One brother ‘did well.’ He became a doctor. Simon, to his dear parent’s dismay was entranced by other glamours. While at school he fell in with a group friends fascinated with magic. Not the slight of hand fakery of many a street performer. They wanted the real thing. Mysticism. Against the advice of certain Romanic poets, they studied religion and were caught up in its perennial attractions. Not the sort of popular religion that is just a pacifier, an opiate. They sought ‘meetings with remarkable beings,’ with the Spirit of Being itself. As a consequence they learned, as I will reveal, many practical crafts- what we usually call sorcery. In reality, it is not so easily categorized. It has so many variations. So many different applications. Its character is as multitudinous as there are qualities, or characteristics in the universe.

One such characteristic is our ability to observe the beauty of interior dispositions. By that I mean inner states of awareness or consciousness. The beauty of pure mysticism exposes one to the meaning and value of being- One’s true ineffable self. Goodness to fill one’s heart- Beauty that satisfies desire. But along the way, there are other qualities, ‘powers’ if you like, that make themselves available to the searching sorcerer. Dangerous they are. Some vicious beyond fear. Some trade on horror and hunger, eager to dissect one’s life like a biology student extracting the beating heart from a pinned, laboratory animal. It’s a treacherous path. But it has certain advantages…

Simon came on assignment to the Caribbean to seek out this woman, Stephanie. She is thought to be a vampire of legendary beauty and power. Ancient in her craft. But in the process he met young Chris. If one were to compare Chris to anyone for looks, one might think of Brad Pitt in his late twenties- and Simon’s curious resemblance to Tom Cruise, though taller. Movie star good looks and vigor. Heros don’t have to be good-looking. Though if they become real heros, their heroism gives them an incomparable appeal. He also is on the island of St. Agnes seeking this sultry, blood sucker queen. Chris had only just arrived when he met Simon. There was an odd attraction/repulsion between the two of them. They met in the dining room at the regal old hotel where Simon lodged– the only real hotel on the island. Chris in his good-natured way was trying to help a family of Arab tourists order from the English menu. Chris speaks with a high British accent that can only be learned at mother’s knee, private (curiously called Public) schools, or maybe Ampleforth, and then Cambridge or Oxford. His voice carried in such a way that silenced the rest of the crowded room. There was something about his tone that gained the immediate sympathy of the room and the staff. He really was trying to be helpful as the room filled with embarrassed smiles. Though I doubt that family of tourists was ever more cordially served in their travels as the result of Chris’ attention. Who would ever suspect that he was such a practiced killer. Chris and Simon met later in the bar.

The rest of the hotel had the simple elegance of spacious tiled floors, clean white or paneled walls, potted palms, exotic flowers eager for display, deeply carved red mahogany tables and chairs one expects in an affluent, tropical environment. The bar was as dark as pirate lore. In fact, it was the original hovel that the rest of the edifice has built around, over the centuries. It is a dark cool cave, as it serves the well-lighted lounge nearby and terrace over-looking the small bay of the island.

“Nice of you to help that Arab family,” Simon opened.

“Don’t know if I was much help, but they seemed to enjoy the process. … after a while.”

“Still it was good of you. Where’r you from?”

“Can’t you tell?” Not unfriendly, but not overly eager as men at first meeting- size up the competition.

“What part of England, then?”

“North, not far from the Lake District. A little place called Old Hutton in Cumbria.”

“My name is Simon Han. From California. Northern California. A little place called Berkeley. Named after an English philosopher.” They extend hands and shake in the usual way of offering one’s dignity to begin something with respect. Chris hesitated, still not sure of just starting a conversation with a stranger. But it was a tourist town and everyone seemed open and friendly.

“Christopher Fitzwilliam.”

That’s an English name alright.

Norman, actually.

Oh, old family then.

Various Fitz’s came with the Conquerer. Ours is a Catholic family who came with the Conquerer and stayed Catholic through the Reformation. Still are mostly, I noticed your Crucifix of St. Peter. Upside down.

You still practice the old faith? (Simon touches the crucifix at his neck, not St. Peter’s cross, a gesture of humility in the manner of his execution, i.e. upside down, but a symbol of an older faith’s resistance and resentment.)

Well, yes. A lot has happened since the Reformation, hasn’t it. It’s a new world, but still I… A few weeks ago there was a Tridentine mass, the pre Vatican II mass, in the chapel at Sizegh Castle. An old Catholic stronghold where mass was said in secret all through Penal times. I retrieved an old family missal – quite nostalgic. I particularly like the ‘Last Gospel’ in the old mass format –St John’s. The most mystical, I always think.

Quite. Well, I don’t know. My family’s Buddhist. The crucifix is a gift from a local friend. I only wear it here for her sake. The only religion I remember as far as family goes is the wall in the house where we keep our ancestors–a memorial altar I suppose it might be called. Sometimes, Mom gets up early to visit a little temple not far from our house. But I haven’t been there since I was a child. They celebrate rites connected with the cycles of the moon. The only thing we do together is connected with ancestors. Genealogy’s important, I guess. What’d you think of Mel Gibson’s movie about Jesus? A little over wrought I thought.

I liked it. But I remember thinking somewhere in the middle of the movie that that kind of religious fever is so easily translated into religious wars, don’t you think? That can’t be good. Except for some of the kindness and beauty one finds in religion, I leave it alone. It’s playing with fire. Look, I’d like to chat, but I have to find a hotel. They told me here that there aren’t any rooms available for tonight. I thought I had a reservation. But they can’t find it.

Chris slides off the bar stool and reaches for a backpack valise that was on the dark wood floor at his feet. The blackened wood planks of the floor were at least two feet wide. Old and worn.

But there are no other hotels. A few little pensions down by the bay. But they are no more than cheap rooms for a couple of hours, if you catch my drift. The rooms are inexpensive and so are the desperate hustlers who use them. Why don’t you share my rooms?

Well, I… I don’t know. I shouldn’t impose. You’re not, uh… Well, its very kind of you, but…

No ‘but’ about it. You have no choice. If this hotel has no rooms, there’s none available on the island. None that you’d want anyway. The whores are very aggressive down there. Hygiene is an alien concept. Forget about being safe.

I can handle myself, I think– Thanks for the offer, but…

Simon looked at Chris for a second and smiled mostly to himself, as images slipped through his mind of his Eskimo guides stopping their dog sleds in a 50 degree below zero blizzard to fix tea on their little Coleman burners. This as they traveled to their village beyond the ice mountains…

I’m sure you can handle just about anything. So, you’ll be perfectly safe in my room. It’s not really just a room. It’s a series of little connected rooms off a wide balcony. More like alcoves. This old, very old, building, built on a hillside as it is, has many ‘crooks and crannies’ as you might say in ‘merrie ole England.’ My ‘room’ has two beds in their own alcoves with huge thick columns in-between and their own views out over the balcony. And there’re couches in the social area in-between. There’s plenty of room. I insist. Ask the management. They know me well. I’m quite safe. We’ve been coming here for years.

Well, that’s awfully good of you…

FOUR

In which Fr. Adam muses over questions of SATISFACTION as he begins to put together a rational explanation for some of his approach to the battle of being:

INITIATION AND PRACTICE

RELIGION AND ART: Icons, Mandalas and the Nude

Icons, like Mandalas are not the viewed image in the sense of being a painting or drawing, etc., but the world of intentions, a world of radiant beauty, that leads to the production of the art that in turn refers back to that world. And like the mandala, the icon is not primarily the painting but the spirit, then creation, then human form, then the realization of the devotee. The significance of an icon, like a mandala, is not only the aesthetic form itself but also what it evokes in the viewer, in the world. It is a reference point for the meditator, a portal of transcendence for those who understand its function. It is also required for the maker of icons to fast, pray, make pilgrimage or other forms of ascetical discipline in order for those icons to be infused with holy energy. In order to benefit from this type of experience, it is necessary for the viewer to do the same. Put yourself in the presence of God. One commentary on the icon describes the intention like this

The revelation of this future transfigured corporeality is shown to us in the Transfiguration of our Lord on Mount Tabor. “And he was transfigured before them; and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light” (Matt. Xvii, 2). In other words the whole body of the Lord was transfigured, becoming as it were a radiant raiment of the Deity. “As regards the character of the Transfiguration,” … “it was not that the Word laid aside His human form, but rather that the latter was illumined by His glory.” …St. Simeon the New Theologian describes his personal experience of this inner illumination in the following words: “In other words, beauty is holiness, and its radiance the participation of the creature in Divine Beauty.(Lossky, Ouspensky, …Icons)

In the Transfiguration, not only does the God appear to men, but humanity becomes a full participant in the Divine glory. By joining with the Deity, man becomes illumined by His Uncreated light, becoming like the radiant body of Christ.

In the icon, beauty is judged by its conformity of the image to its prototype, of the symbol to what it represents–to the Kingdom of the Spirit. But for an icon, its beauty is of the acquired likeness to God and so its value lies not in its being beautiful in itself, but in the fact that it depicts, or refers to Beauty. The Fathers of the VII Ecumenical Council say the following:

Although the Catholic Church depicts Christ in his human aspect, it does not separate his flesh from the Divinity conjoined. On the contrary, it believes that the flesh is deified and professes it to be one with the divinity.

The idea of the ‘son of god’ is that matter and spirit are inextricably one. Or, should be! The icon represents not an animate but a deified prototype, flesh transfigured, radiant with Divine light. Represented by material means, the icon is beauty and Glory, represented in physical form and visible to the eyes. A portrait of a saint is not an icon since it portrays his carnal state and not his transfigured state. Liturgical art is not just our offering to God, but also God’s presence amongst us.

Von Balthazar does not avoid the problems associated with traditional Catholicism in his discussion. He admits that western religion has lost much of its gestalt cohesion since the Renaissance, reduced as it often is to pietistic devotions or moralistic obsessions. This ancient tradition, while spiritually deep and true perhaps, was also culturally narrow, xenophobic, racist, anti-Semitic, sexist, patriarchal, and authoritarian. This, of course, like every other religious tradition, was consistent with the cultures in which it was enmeshed.

The Church is finally denuded of empire, (Pius IX was left a ‘prisoner in the Vatican’), and must face itself without its imperial regalia for the first time since the fourth century. The mortal body of the church changes… to what? What is left? Singular spiritual insight? When all else is stripped away by the harsh realities of our age, that much remains. We can, given the right state of consciousness, with Stephen Protomartyr, see the heavens open and from our physical frame draw forth the icon to focus a beatific vision into the heart of heaven itself. Traditional religion claims that we have a capacity for heaven, Nirvana if you like, or Godhead, the Source, Absolute Value, Being. As well, we have an imagination that can image ultimate reality in radiant terms, suggestive of that which is beyond ourselves and promises satisfaction. What is left is the ability to help draw the two worlds together, which is the heart of the tradition–the heart of any really religious tradition anyway.

The shift of consciousness is a capacity that suggests much about the nature of human personality and perception. As well perhaps, the shift suggests something about the ultimate nature of reality. This is reinforced by Christ’s own sense of intimacy between ordinary reality and the Kingdom, and the part that the shift of consciousness plays as a means of mutual access. Religious art, then, is that which reveals, or evokes the inner-radiance of being, what a Hesychast might call Uncreated Energy. Religious art is both the occasion of and a technique of the shift of consciousness. Icons, or Mandalas, are aesthetic tools of such technique to obtain these states of radiant realization that in the past described the parameters of Satisfaction.

For just this reason, there is vast wisdom when such figures–as the Zen archer–say, “if you really understood what is happening when you move your hand from here to here [a few inches], then you would be enlightened;” And the Chinese Taoist rainmaker who ended a severe drought, simply by setting up housekeeping at the edge of a strickened village. Enlightenment, salvation, is inherent in who we are when our temporal and non-temporal capacity is fully engaged. That great opening between the two worlds is the shift into mandalic or iconic realms of ultimate reference that tie the factual world together with its original, unnamable, mythic context.

The shift of consciousness is an anthropological fact. It is the fundamental agent of the sacrifice that is the underlying format of both religion and art. The shift of consciousness is the function of the physical manifestation of consciousness in the body. The shift is access to meaning through the lace-like folds in the memory of generations, myths, and sacred tradition. It is access to the source of our existence, the always-concurrent original moment of consciousness.

In the Roman Catholic Mass there is a section called the memoria. But it exists not just to remember or commemorate the event referenced there. It is there to ‘draw back the curtain’, revelo, of time and connect us with the singular, original moment of incarnation/ transfiguration/ ascension/ creation. What we are dealing with here is not a matter of faith, but a quality of human perception that Panikkar talks about in terms of time and non-time dualism and the integration of knowledge. This capacity is an aesthetic function of consciousness necessary, I believe, for satisfaction. The process of this resolution is the great art from which we derive certain catalytic artifacts of the shift, i.e., paintings, sculptures, etc.

Art is a physical extension of the body in the world. Body is the physical extension of the non-temporal world into the temporal. The body is a physical and real vehicle of transcendence, thus, the importance of the nude in art. As such, it is the metaphor of existence, as when the Hesychasm refers to the “way of the heart,” it is using the heart as a symbol of personality, not as a reference to sentimental emotion or an anatomical organ. In the battle for influence in the hearts and minds of humanity since the Renaissance, the Church resisted the demise of its cosmologies, often symbolically depicted by references to the body. Those cosmologies were the spiritual bond between individuals, society, and the cosmos.

Capitalism and technocracy are without cosmology except the bare requirements of production and consumption. Neither pure science nor religion seem to have won. We are in the process of not only surviving in the midst of this, but also piecing together/preserving an environment for when, possibly once again, the body and psyche of Being are in rhythm. A new cosmology must arise that pierces through to the non-temporal heart of time. Modern art and modern humanities in general have been the branch of modern secular culture that attempted to do this. As I recall Fr. Yang, my first monastic teacher, commenting, “we are in the process of developing a new system of meaningful symbols.” Or, we are in the process of destroying ourselves. In either case, who remains to be satisfied?

FIVE

Stephanie Agnes Katherine Mara owns this regal old hotel on the Caribbean island of St. Agnes. She had a relationship with Chris in a former life–A former life for Chris anyway. Simon, a new world sorcerer, and Stephanie weave a sensuous spell of recognition and immediate transfer of knowledge—Darshan fashion, to convert Chris from his evil masters. Stephanie’s not really a vampire—nor is she a witch, but believes she is because– Perhaps, she believes this for lack of a better model so far, and because of some personality problems that need to be resolved…and because she believes so totally, she experiences the qualities fabled of those beautiful monsters. She is something else entirely, yet to be revealed. Simon, an old friend from high school days, is there to liberate her from her delusion. She and Simon are there to initiate Chris to a new form of sorcery. Chris is there to kill them both as commanded by his ‘employers.’ To avoid this fate, Chris must be converted and initiated in the new, more powerful ‘way.’ This is so Chris and Simon will be able to incarnate (‘impersonate’ successfully, to ‘personate’ as some anthropologists would have it) the fabled Mayan Twin Brother Warriors who travel to the cruel, but evocative underworld (Xibalba of the Popol Vu) to defeat their spiritual enemies—and thus save the world. Stephanie believes she is to facilitate this intricate process by manipulating their dreams as now they sleep.

All of this is unveiled and experienced in a mysteriously beautiful old hotel room, as statuesque Stephanie enters through a secret door, now that the sun has set…

SIX

SIMON DREAMS

The Trip

Simon felt the need for a little spiritual and physical exercise, so he decided that during Christmas break that he would hitchhike across the United States. He lived in California, a student at the University of California, Berkeley, where he studies art and comparative religion. His high school sweet heart lived in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where she was a student at the Edgar Cayce Foundation for psychical research. Simon still loved Catherine–Cat to her friends–but she had fallen in love with another man. When Simon went away to school, Cat married this fellow, John.

Getting there was not hard. Though Simon is an Asian American, he gets rides easily. Or, he did on this trip—there have been many others. This time he had a ride with a speed freak trucker from El Paso to Tennessee, among others, who talked obsessively either on the CB or at Simon. For some reason, anti-Asian racism seems to have skipped over him. So far. Maybe, its not just because of his athletic good looks, and size…

It was an uncomfortable week to say the least with Cat and her new husband. But Simon and John got on well enough in the end. The only experience of note for the whole visit was that once, while Cat was at work—she worked as a masseuse at a chiropractic office—Simon borrowed her car and drove to some local park/wetlands that are a famous nature preserve to take a hike. I’m sure that these wetlands are known for many things of Audubon interest, but as well, in the New Age community, this place is known as a special locale for the “Ascended Beings.” That is, a group of advanced religious practitioners who long ago passed over the barriers of life and death but are still active as powerful protectors of the earth–apparently overwhelmed these days. Simon’s approach to religion is more intellectually based, and views such beliefs with skepticism. At one point on this hike through the swamp, Simon had the odd experience of feeling that he was facing a strong and constant wind, but there was no wind during that twilight stroll. It was an otherworldly force. That quality was unmistakable, but that was all. Nothing more happened. It just seemed odd. After a while, he drove Cat’s car back to pick her up after work. Next day, Cat dropped Simon on a freeway entrance heading towards Florida.

…Woman’s liberation is indeed an important issue. Perhaps, one of the most important in the 20th Century. Certainly is as far as human rights are concerned. I’ll try to make that more clear as we go along. My concern is that it also has doubled the troops of those forces that are eating up the world’s resources and helping to destroy the very environment that sustains us. It’s an example of a great good doing great evil. “Good intentions pave the road to hell,” they say. Simon had a different response to this whole question. People, who in the past were subjected to the experience of an underclass, often find quasi-liberation in taking on the traits of the dominant class. Maybe the opposite is also true. A formerly dominant class finds liberation in taking on the traits of the underclass. Not just slumming:

Simon got several rides after leaving Virginia Beach. Nothing of note to comment upon in any of these. He was dropped off in Jacksonville, Florida, on the Interstate heading west—best route to take in the winter if you go by land. Especially if you are hitchhiking! It was late evening. He waited and waited for a ride. Nothing for hours. Then, he decided to get some sleep, so rolled out his sleeping bag behind some pine trees and bushes that landscape the onramp. And soon he dreamed:

“In the dream, on a grassy hill there is a pavilion like tent. I approach. Through the tent flap, a young man, lying naked on a bed, legs over the bedside, seems to be waiting for me. The situation is spread with attraction and danger. The young man lay on some softly lit, rich fabric covering the bed. A boy/man. I approach more closely– I nurse-suckle the (energetic) milk from him as I spread further his muscular, no longer hairless, young legs. Touch the muladhara…

The scene of the dream shifts to a large procession. A group of aristocratic women in beautifully exotic antique garb move from behind the tent toward a river below and distant mountains. A thunderstorm is building and threatening above and behind the mountains.

The scene shifts again to the river’s bank and beach where I am trying to pull a heavy log by rope, up, over the bottom branches of a large oak tree.

A vast flood charges, dark and thundering down the river valley. Both the tree and I disappear in the powerful waters. Not as a rejection of the experience in the tent, rather a rite of passage into the realm of the feminine powers that govern the universe. The unconscious? Rivers of Chi? Oceans of transcendent meaning in the face of pointless hard labor. There is a sense that the waters are also destiny and great peace…

Our NARRATOR continues here and comments:

Cat muses, rather like she is struggling to form a thesis. (A rather long thesis I’m afraid):

A most important and surprising point of this dream is that when Simon awoke, he was flooded with energy of enormous delight. Great energy. For hours after he woke, sensations of ebullient joy flowed through me. Not just joy but vitality. Flowing, endless energy. For weeks after, if he told the story or even remembered the dream, he would again be suffused in delight. What enabled him to evoke these levels of light-filled delight? The erotic elements in the dream? Not exactly. I believe that the dream indicated a shift between masculine and feminine poles in his psyche that engaged states of consciousness flooded with amorphous, transsexual, delight (i.e., transcendent of opposites).

Simon seems prone to such states of consciousness. I have often mused that these might be the foundation of culture as well, since such dualistic, or pluralistic states and their resolution/transcendence are, I believe, the underlying content and construct of human perception. Homoerotic love, since it is able to evoke feelings in individuals as powerful as the heterosexual drive to procreate–the biological urge to propagate in any species, indicates a capacity to redirect major elements of human personality. The homoerotic emotion indicates a condition free of otherwise inexorable biological logic. The feminine, the earth, and the storm are evoked here.

The homoerotic emotion is a catalytic strain laced through the psychic structure of human kind, perhaps the whole biological universe. It is a culturally dangerous and invaluable alternative, the experience of which is fraught with endless social problems. If it were not very potent, why would people react so strongly to what really seems to be, otherwise, a minor issue? Only a few topics generate the level of vitriolic excitement that this issue manages to rouse. The prohibitions against it in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible are vague in that they probably are reactions against flagrant practices in erotic religious cults of surrounding cultures of ancient Palestine–the negative reaction thus being as much xenophobic as homophobic. After all, King David loved Jonathan “more than women.” Jesus Christ, who supersedes all previous God/World agreements, for Christians, said little about sex at all–but forgave the one caught in sexual sin–much less about the homoerotic emotion–except perhaps secretly… to St. John.

What I am considering at this point is the homoerotic emotion, not Gay culture. That is a different discussion. Here we merely discuss an important, powerful element in human perception. It is my belief that if there is a problem with increasing homosexuality in our culture it is because there is a proportionate problem in the heterosexual population. The problem might be in the deeper construct of culture. Many peoples in the past 10, 000 years, since the development of civilizations and empires, have been so characterized by masculine domination, as to be trapped in their own pathology of willful aggression. It is a situation increasingly, violently, out of balance. As the corporate, universal order of the world subconsciously tries to balance itself, individuals respond in the most remarkable ways. Perhaps Gay culture is such a response. I believe the more universal, homoerotic emotion certainly is such a response.

The dualistic powers that govern the biosphere might be called upon to save it. These opposite elements are but an expression of the inexpressible Godhead. Poisons become elixirs, in the right circumstances, with certain personalities. Sexuality and violence are closely related reactions that inherently seek the Eden of union, balance and radiant beauty in all things–sometimes they just react, archetypes with intentions of their own. …the natural world is reeling from traumatic blows being struck against it by militant profiteering and commercial technology. Profit and security are the motives now that dominate the dominant value structures in the world: Security in a world increasingly insecure. Profit in a world increasingly bereft of natural resources, as vast populations, dazed by suffering, mourn their own fruitful increase.

Is there a way to respond to this sad demise of the natural world, our deep spiritual relationship with it– perhaps eventually all of the living world? Is there a way beyond the rational sanctity of humanist virtue and religion that has so far failed to save us from the raging human heart? Yet, that offers certain important improvements to the human condition…

Cat is still speaking, musing, teaching, in her imagination at least:

We had both gone off to different schools. He on the west coast. Myself on the east. We wrote a lot of letters, since we couldn’t afford big phone bills. But my opinion about such topics as homoeroticism was changing.

Let me provide some background, since this is such a hotly contested issue. This is what helped me understand what was going on with Simon. So, I didn’t cut him off entirely. And this information is important for later on.

The value of such persons capable of the homoerotic response is well displayed in books such as Walter William’s. The Spirit and the Flesh. According to the anthropology in some of this research, the homoerotic capacity in an individual is an ability gifted by the divine Spirit to reflect its own nature that contains the image or ideal of all things, masculine, feminine, light, dark. Spirit familiars protect this individual. Those who harm this one, suffer. This clearly indicates well-founded, alternative attitudes in many cultures that reveal the Judeo-Christian bias regarding this topic and therefore a strong bias in the West generally. Let me explain:

A model of the homoerotic sentiment can be found in the relationship between Herakles and his young friend, Hylas. Herakles (Hercules) was a ‘Goddess priest’ who often wore the robes of the priestess to perform her rites. This transsexual theme figures largely in the history of the self-identification and god-identification found in many world religions. The suggestion is merely that certain of such sexual elements are catalytic in the esoteric action of this story. The sexual issues here evoke connections to Tantric practice and cosmological themes as well–i.e., all is essentially pure, created good. Sexuality can be a means of divine realization and enlightenment. In magical practice it is used to re-channel power. The sacrament of sexuality is not only the modern sacrament of self-fulfillment in relationships, but it is, from antiquity, the metaphor of divine/mundane union–best practiced by ones with, at least, the celibate’s dedication. This is true for both heterosexuality and homosexuality.

In many Shamanistic traditions, the example of the traditional Navaho for instance, homosexuality is viewed as a metaphoric gift, emulating the bisexual Godhead. (Bisexual because everything in the world comes from God, including the two sexes.) In the realm of the psyche, the androgen, –a person who is sexually balanced, maintaining/transcending both poles of sexual orientation–is the gatekeeper between worlds–between this world and the world of the Spirit. This was/is an ability to be prized. Not everybody can do it. It might be a gift necessary or at least valuable to culture and cosmos. (It should be noted that not all Animist/Shamanistic peoples hold this view. And perhaps most contemporary Native Americans are influenced by the dominant culture in this.)

In any case, this more tolerant view seems to be a better appreciation of talents available to human access. It is a poignant fact that this tolerance among some Native Americans and others, which might be considered progressive today, was one of the major excuses Europeans used for exterminating or enslaving the indigenous peoples and cultures of the New World.

Robert Graves’ book, The White Goddess, provides an analysis of the priest/poet/hero figure, such as Herakles, in mythology in relationship with the Goddess. (Herakles is Greek for “Glory of Hera”) The two are inseparable and perennial in human perception. This topical reference starts with the sacrificial priesthood of the Great Goddess from ancient cultures around the Mediterranean. In this construct, the hero/sacred king/priest/son/consort is adulated for a time, then sacrificed to become divine. His initiates would often eat his flesh and blood in communion with their deity. This function of the mediatory priesthood, hieros or hierophant, extends to the priesthood of Jesus Christ in the order of Melquizedek.

Beginning with the cultural and individual phenomenon of Shamanism, rooted in the early Stone Age, we can see a complex of particular insight and practice… [Characterized by] a group of radical techniques: Transsexual trauma, terror, torture, alcoholic inebriation, use of sacred (psychedelic) substances, humiliation and sickness. All are “ingested” in combination with mythological belief patterns and perhaps used in combination with more moderate practices such as meditation, pilgrimage, and other traditional practices. The danger is initiation of psychological unbalance or even death. Some young Eskimo shaman novices, when forced into a transsexual experience, commit suicide, others adjust. (Eliade, Shamanism, p. 258) The positive effect perhaps, with certain individuals, is to disorient one enough, or to separate one enough from one’s personal or cultural context to discover access to fundamental elements from the sub-strata of consciousness, the instinctual “stuff” of personality; i.e. Knowledge, Powers, and Transcendence arise. Jung might refer to this as “figures” or “powers” that arise even spontaneously from the Unconscious. (Jung’s Introduction and Commentary, Secret of the Golden Flower, p.120.)

One can discover the use of such techniques simply by reading Castaneda, or by more laboriously doing comparative religious study. A male might be exposed to the archetypal feminine and thus display in one’s life [transsexual] behavior that loosens the vice-like grip of “ordinary” consciousness. This might allow for other extraordinary archetypal experiences. For another example: Through experience of extreme alcoholic inebriation, one does not just come to understand perceptive faculties that are not apparent when one is “in control” but one experiences these faculties in such a way that integrates and empowers both in the extraordinary world of the archetypal psyche and the ordinary world of “daytime” consciousness.

This is not to claim that simply getting drunk or getting high or having unusual sex will do this for you, but in certain circumstances with certain individuals, unusual phenomena pertinent to this story–and Simon’s condition– sometimes occur.

(I would give you a similar presentation on hetero-erotic and Tantric practices, but maybe you already know about that. I’m a little rushed. Perhaps you will simply take my word that these practices are the natural product of the encounter between this world and God, leading to extraordinary powers and experiences, even onto enlightenment and salvation itself.)

NARRATOR:

Well, that’s Cat. Very authoritative. Or, she will be. And we all talk to ourselves, don’t we? Being free of that would be liberation, wouldn’t it? She seems to be able to lock into various personas quite naturally and play it convincingly. That will be important later on as our story displays its web like design… Women seem to have taken on many traditionally “male” characteristics. Some are superficial, like wearing pants instead of dresses. But some are deeper, like domination and aggression, and more worrisome. It was bad enough when only half the population was encouraged to behave like that. But maybe there are also new defenders raised up from their ranks. (In this, I do not deny the justice of the feminist movement, at all. But here I am focused on related, but very different considerations.)

Simon seems moved to respond on deeper and deeper levels, as does Cat, to the meaning and purpose of their lives. Not very typically American at all in this regard.

Stephanie visits their dreams? Is this Chris or Simon? Does Cat (Katherine) know Stephanie? An alliance? We’ll see…

WOLFMAN

SIMON: He picked me up outside Jacksonville, Florida, on his way to Dallas. He was a biker. But in a car this time, black leather coat, chains, etc. Mean expression. Recently betrayed in love… While we were traveling across Texas in the darkness of that winter night, something flashed in front of us. It was illuminated–luminous?–by the headlights. It was a wolf. Not an ordinary wolf. Did we hit it? I felt a jolt. I thought that we should stop there to investigate. But forgot that intention as ‘my ride’ began, at that moment, to tell me about his life.

His parents had disowned him when he was ten. At eleven he was sent to the Texas reformatory school for burning down a Holiday Inn. At fourteen, he and a friend stole an expensive car and drove it to the Mardi Gras in New Orleans. As an adult, he once got picked up on a mistaken identity. The cop had cuffed him to the cop car and proceeded to beat the hell out of him. But the cop got too close. Wolf wrestled the cop’s gun away and shot him in the stomach. When eventually caught again, the judge was sympathetic–knowing Texas law enforcement, told him to just get out of the state until the statute of limitations ran out on him. So, he went off to West Virginia and lived off the land for a while. During this time he had something of a conversion experience. He started to get into Jesus, but some preacher got into his girlfriend. So, he left girl, preacher and Jesus behind. None-the-less, he was trying to live straight. He was tired of being a criminal. I stayed with his people outside of Dallas for a day. Then he and I went into town. He wanted to show me around. But first he stopped at what he called a “titty bar”. It was about ten in the morning. Very plain, mostly nude women strutted awkwardly beneath strobe lights that disguised the extra fat and puckered skin. What he got there was ‘Speed’ on credit from a friend. Sick Wolf injected it in his arm, in the car, in the parking lot. Well he couldn’t show me the town because neither of us had any money. So after a while he let me out on the freeway heading west. Too bad, we liked each other, oddly. He was an artist too. He painted scenes on the sides of vans. He wanted to go straight. But where could he channel energies like that?

After this ride dropped Simon off, Simon wanted to talk to Cat, badly. Maybe because of the Jacksonville dream or the ‘titty bar’, maybe just because he was in love, Simon found a nearby gas station/convenience store with a public telephone and he tried to call her.

No answer. So Simon returned to the road. And almost immediately had a ride all the way to El Paso. Simon and his ride talked for hours as they covered the nearly 1000 miles to El Paso. It was almost confessional. But fun as well, both young men out and about—on their own… Then, after hours of talk, Simon begins to doze. And again as he sleeps, he dreams, or maybe it is something else than a dream. It sure isn’t anything ordinary. In this dream–a vision perhaps. A premonition! It was so real. In it, Simon was on his way to the Middle East:

Getting to Yemen required flying first to Cairo to obtain a visa from the Yemeni Embassy there. The airline sent our luggage to Paris and took a week to find it. It took that long to get our visas anyway. Once, while waiting for all this, we rode horses across the Sahara to a particularly ancient pyramid. We made friends with the family who owned the horses and stayed that night in their house. My window looked out directly into the face of the Sphinx several hundred yards away. The moon was full that night. We returned about three in the morning. I stayed at the window until sunrise, watching. However many times one sees these monuments they maintain a unique and powerful presence in my imagination.

Still our visas were not ready. So, we decided to take a couple of side trips. The first was up the Nile to Luxor and Karnak. As we started out, I realized that I had been traveling to this destination for a long time. There had been many indications along the way. One such was the elephant! I now remembered that I had been having visions of a great elephant lumbering slowly but determinedly along the shore of the ocean. It knew unquestionably its destination. The destination had something to do with a wonderful golden light that I had first seen while doing some energy work with Chris several months previous. Now the elephant seemed to be nearing the “place” of that Golden light. Luxor. The Hindu Elephant God, Ganesh, is the aid of pilgrims. In Africa, the elephant can be the shaman’s spirit guide.

We arrived in Luxor and took a hotel just south of town. Our floor to ceiling windows led out to a balcony that looked across the Nile to oasis-like farms on the other side and the vast barren desert beyond. The Nile here is randomly embroidered with a negligee of floating plants: cities of lilies—no, islands, populations, continents of lotus, moving as if carelessly choreographed; pushed and pulled, eddied and swirled by that ancient current.

We visited the usual sights: Valley of the Kings, Valley of the Queens, the rest. It was hot. Very hot. What would one expect for August in the Sahara? There had been for such a long time, a barren sense of waiting. Long, tedious, often lonely waiting. Now, the heat and more waiting. It all seemed endless. I am a priest. I celebrated a Mass in my room once. Somewhere inside it, I felt a great sense of arrival, completion of preparation. I saw the god enter the realm of golden light. I identified completely with the god. Wonderful, wonderful, joyous light. I don’t know what this means for the journey, for Yemen. Is it preparation? Is it conclusion? I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. If it is conclusion, then I’m ready. It is peace, absolute peace and meaning. I made a medicine bundle and threw it in the river. Then we left.

The Sinai. The drive was long and uninspiring. But the valley surrounding Moses’ Mountain is ignited with wonder. The White Fire was there. The shamanic presence was there. The surrounding mountains brood and nurture in a way nothing short of the maternal. The ancient monastery at the foot of the mountain is dedicated to St. Catherine and the Virgin Mother of God. The whole area earlier in history has been named for the moon Goddess, “Sin.” The “Wilderness of Sin” it’s called. The air at this altitude is cool, the breeze fresh and strong. The sense of the place is gentleness, care. Great power in the surrounding mountains. I was happy to be there and felt ready now for Yemen.

After Cat threatened the Yemeni consulate with a complaint to the U.S. Embassy, they finally granted our visas. We completed our dusty stay in Egypt and flew to the capital of Yemen, Sana’a. Leaving the airport there, I was invaded with a feeling of dread, of sickness, of regret, almost of despair. I couldn’t localize these emotions. Was it simply my sense of the place, its dragon? I couldn’t indulge such sensations though, since we had to locate some place to stay and deal with all the rest that accompanies arrival in a new place.

Actually, I like the people of Yemen that I met and enjoyed seeing the ancient mud brick skyscrapers for which Yemen is famous. But my sense of the place is violence. There was a movie out in the U.S. not long ago called “Blue Velvet”(1986?). The sexual violence of that movie expressed something of the violence I sensed when first in Yemen.

Soon after arriving, I began to have a series of spontaneous visions. These occurred unexpectedly and continued throughout our stay. They were of myself in a “great monk’s robe” with a staff of steel. I’m striking the ground over and over with the staff. It is some kind of shamanic action. There are leather strips hanging from the top of the staff. Sometimes I used these to help strike the ground with greater force. I seemed to be challenging something. I was completely intent on what I was doing. I was on the Plain of Sana’a. There was no city there. I was alone. Toward the end of our stay in Yemen, I, in the vision, was becoming exhausted. Then two Saint/bishops came to aid me. One was St. Augustine. The other, unidentified. They act to console and strengthen me.

It seems that Simon is being infused with some kind of visionary energy! Not a dream, but a transference of some kind that is seen in these images and places. But is something else… perhaps pure knowledge! Darshan!

We checked into a room at a once a posh hotel, now decrepit. Then, we all went for a walk in the marketplace. Simon and Cat went off to look for antique Arab jewelry, and I went to find the incense shops. Yemen is the ancient, famous source of frankincense and I wanted to get some. I met, in this process, a young Italian man. He was an international salesman. He seemed friendly and helped me with these transactions. We hit it off pretty well. He spoke some English and Arabic. We had chai in a little teashop, and then determined that we wanted to try out the variety of incense that we had just purchased, so we went back to the hotel. I had earlier set out some pictures of the Theotokos and had brought some lit charcoals in a burner and proceeded to arrange all this on a table in the room. We put on the first incense. A wonderful, full, resin smell drifted through the room. It was late afternoon, warm but not oppressive. The young Italian burned some substance that he had brought with him. I don’t know what it was. Sticky sweetness filled my mind. The room was becoming dark. The furnishings vague. I became very tired. I was sad somehow. Somehow I could no longer quite grasp where I was. I lay down on the bed. He lay on top of me. I passed out of consciousness. I came to consciousness firmly in the embrace of a powerful man, not the Italian. We were naked. I resisted. But he simply overpowered me. He took me. I don’t mean just sexually, but some other way. It seemed like my father, but wasn’t exactly. He took me. And I have never been the same since. I passed out.

Not out of consciousness, though. I was laughing. Next it was Cat. She was in the room. We embraced. Lay together. For hours. We were one… Dreams… She a goddess, I was a king. We are in a palace long ago somewhere on the Mediterranean. We are in a room with a window over-looking the sea. In one corner of the room, she and I kneel before a niche that contained her image in the form of the snake. An aroused cobra. It is a very positive, light-filled ambiance. But then through the window, one could see our harbor filling with enemy war galleys. Our palace is in a panic. We have only a small navy. They send out a small ship to test the strength of the enemy. It is overwhelmed. The enemy takes the harbor. The goddess disappears. The palace is taken. I am taken prisoner with a group of other men. An enemy warrior prods me in the back with the blunt end of his spear. We see distant mountains. Some in the group of prisoners are planning to escape there. I debate to join them.

That vision ends. I am with Cat again. Our embrace is of divine duration. Then she was a friend of mine, Chris. Such profound fraternity. Closer than brothers. Closer than family. Extensions of one another. Excursions into one another. Were one, the same. Then, it was Simon and Cat. Then blinding white light seemed to explode from our loins. The pain in my body, first in the perineum, then all over was excruciating. The light, like liquid white silver, enveloped our bodies, our being. Invaded everywhere, filled us, filled the room, exploded and disappeared as the real Simon rushed frantically into the room.

The Italian was gone. The room was clear of incense smoke. There was only the harsh glare of light from the neon in the hall. That filled the room with the ugly shadows of a cheap hotel room a long way from home. It was three in the morning.

Simon was desperate. Cat was gone!

Gone?! What do you mean?

Gone. Disappeared. Taken. Kidnapped.

What are you talking about? Don’t be crazy. What’s happening?

Chris explained:

“We had been walking in the market looking at ethnic wares. A youngish Italian man befriended us. He knew the market well and showed us the best shops. Then he took us to a tearoom. It was very beautiful. Carved wooden walls, heavily embroidered curtains across the windows. Beautiful lush oriental carpets. We drank the usual Chai. It was drugged. Cat slowly faded out of my vision… I seemed to be in a forest, I was running naked. It was twilight. I was chasing deer. One in particular. A stag. It would sometimes stop, turn to look at me catching up, then bound ahead. It was like that all afternoon. It seemed to go on for days. There was nothing for me but the chase. Then I became the stag. And I laughed, as if I finally understood something very subtle but very important. I don’t know how to describe how a stag laughs. But I laughed inside that powerful body. And I ran. No longer pursued or pursuing but I ran for the exhilaration. Then it was twilight, I found myself standing over the stag. It was killed by my spear. I was bathed in its blood. I went to Cat covered with blood. She was waiting for me. She was prepared to receive me. I came to her. It was more than love. It was like the copulation of two universes. White stars exploding. The earth re-created, fecund- all over again, with all manner of living things. Our embrace seemed to last forever. I couldn’t stop. I seemed to be dying. Then she was like a spider, withdrawing from me. She was still in human form but carried the energy of the spider. I was limp and dying on that web of oriental carpets in the room.

I came to consciousness. I could see Cat struggling in the grip of two Amazon-like women. The Italian man was with them, but he was dressed like a woman. Now he looked like a woman. They took her. I called out to her. She screamed to me. But I could hardly move. I tried to rise but fell back unconscious. When I finally came to, I ran back here to find you. I didn’t know what else to do. I was desperate. All my training to protect people, to defend, and I couldn’t even move.”

Simon was desperate:

We notified the authorities, went through endless paperwork and interrogations. Did not tell them about our visionary experiences. A search was mounted. After several excruciating days, nothing was turned up and we were invited to leave the country. We didn’t want to go, until I had this vision/dream. I saw myself and saw a vision that I had in the dream. A dream within a dream. I was once again the Great Robed Monk striking the ground with his steel staff. But this time he planted the staff in the ground on that plain of Sana’a, leathers trailing in the wind. The challenge is made. Whatever great being, or ‘power’ dwelling there, is roused. That is why we came to Yemen.

I board a plane. I fly to India. To a place in the north. The last scene of the dream is in a mountain place. A place of great power.

I wake from the dream slowly and know that to find Cat we must go to India. We don’t have any other lead. We decide to follow the dream. We will go to India. I will speak to my Tibetan friends there. We will find these women who have taken our friend.

There was something else in the dream. Something that I only remembered later as we were on the train from Delhi to the mountains above Dehra Dun. Something that I did not tell Simon. It came unexpectedly. I knew that Cat was pregnant by both of us. Twin warriors. Grandmother spider was there. It was in the dream. But I hadn’t remembered. Those babies are what the women want. But why?

This was a dream, but not a dream at all. But what? A premonition? There were visions within the dream!?

What…

What are you doing, man!!?? Simon wakes to the driver going down in his lap. Simon’s pants are unzipped, he is completely exposed. The driver sucks deeply, as his fingers seek a rhythmic stimulation of Simon’s prostate…

The car with its steamed windows is parked in El Paso. Startled, Simon grabs his gear, gets out. The ride guns the engine and steals away. Simon stands staring, incredulous, feeling moist and a little sore and slimy. They had had such great talks. Too bad it had to end like this… Simon stunned, gazes after the ride, as the car turns a corner too fast. He catches a final glimpse of the driver, no longer a young man, but middle aged, maybe old, larger more powerful, as car and driver disappear around the corner.

Now, Simon really needs to talk to Cat. He finds a small café and asks for a phone. He tries the number again and again. Again no answer. Simon stays for an early breakfast.

Zuni

The “dream” was not exactly a dream. More like a past life experience. But not that either. It certainly was someone else’s life… But how? And why? And who was that ride? Why did he… How come he was young in the beginning and old at the end? More and more is secreted in the folds of this story… (In the womb of Peace all things gestate… until in the fullness of time–birth! Realization, Salvation, Satisfaction… Shanti… Shanti… Shanti…)

Anyway, Simon traveled through the desolate country between El Paso and Albuquerque in a daze. Actually he meant to go directly west from El Paso but got on the wrong interstate and went north instead. He really didn’t care. In Albuquerque he was dropped off at the west end of town on the interstate:

Simon speaks:

A woman picked me up. She was going to the Zuni Indian pueblo and reservation where she was a counselor at the high school. I went with her and stayed there for a week. I met some of the Native Americans at the pueblo and visited many of the shrines of the reservation. Especially, I was fortunate to meet an Indian named Stephen who has become a famous artist and is bard of his people’s heritage. He is also well educated in the way of the Occident. He seemed a really nice guy, a Cursuillista and member of AA.

The strange thing is that Father Adam already knows Stephen and has been to India! This goes beyond coincidence so far as to be striking. And not only that. In this place so far off the main road west, a detour from my trip back to school, I found not only friends, this friend of Father Adam’s, an artist who was both Catholic and traditional Indian, but I found here healers for another friend in Northern California, John. (Another John…) Here among these people were men chosen by the ‘gods’ to heal especially the problem from which John suffered. He injured his spine practicing some exotic martial art. “Bone pressers” they’re called.

Stephen becomes pivotal in the progress of our story. But, more on all this later.

…After staying in Zuni for a while, I spent one more weekend in Albuquerque with the counselor’s family. We were struck by unseasonable storms, including tornado warnings. I gave several demonstrations of Kung Fu for various groups of my host’s friends. I’d studied Kung Fu obsessively when I was a kid. I was feasted that weekend at a salmon roast Saturday and a pig roast Sunday. People were impressed and issued these invitations because, I believe, during these Kung Fu demonstrations, somehow, I was able to explain for the first time, clearly, how martial arts and the spiritual life are connected: Passivity verses violent aggression; defending oneself verses depending on the Spirit, the Way of the Dao; Sunyatta, renunciation, the art of it. St. Francis. (“Hsing I, you are in control; Tai Chi, the other one is in control; Ba qua, both get lost.”) Aberrations on the path. Universal mission of Christ, or personal path of perfection. The Internal martial arts schools, individuals searching through the Body Mind Spirit complex. The martial arts school studio becomes a spiritual laboratory where one works out the impossible union of self and spirit. How? Are we fooling ourselves? Most do. All do sometimes. But still there is something of the truth in this… By totally transforming/developing one’s identity. But much remains to be seen as to what that means.

In New Mexico, I sensed that I was on a pilgrimage somehow. And this pilgrimage seemed to have passed its peak and I looked forward to going home. My friends left me on the last on-ramp going west in Gallup. I had a ride soon to the Arizona border and Navaho reservation in a pickup truck full of Indians, all of whom were varying degrees of drunk, but very nice to me, even concerned about my welfare. Left there, in 40 hours I went about 40 miles. But it was beautiful country in which to be stranded. (While there, as I lay to sleep, along the road, some invisible, hostile force hit me. A non-physical wind hit the side of my face is the best I can describe it. I started getting sick.) I inched my way to Flagstaff having been caught in rain and hail and hampered by some cold and flu like symptoms…

I had lost 20 pounds in less than four weeks and traveled around 5000 miles. I needed to get back to school. Beyond the mountains of Flagstaff back down on the desert, I was given a ride by a wild, odd, couple in an old converted bus. The man was in his late 70’s with a mane of white hair and a nut-brown body. The woman in her 60’s was into the “light mysteries” having just escaped from 20 years of schizophrenia. They had both just been two weeks at a “Medicine Wheel” ceremony near Sedona for the Great Harmonic Convergence. They were also into Shirley McClain’s quasi-religious phenomena of UFO’s, channeling, etc. However flaky all that might sound, anyone who fights the schizophrenic split for 20 years and wins might have gained some wisdom, even spiritual insight that transcends a more conventional, practical wisdom. She had ‘something.’ Anyway, our trip that afternoon through western Arizona was celebrated with magnificent desert storms, and a double rainbow of piercing clarity that we passed under and through!!

Along the way, the old lady ‘read the cards’ for me. She recognized in the cards the holocaust (the first card) of my past, and my spiritual calling (the second card) and said that this was my last incarnation. Thank God for that. The old man driving like Chiron paddling the infernal river, carried us safely west to Barstow where we parted.

I tried unsuccessfully to get a ride until 2 a.m. By then, I was very sick. I lie down and felt that in the worldly way of thinking, I had failed at everything. My youth was that of a criminal. I had chosen to study modern art and ancient religions. 20th century Art is a failure in its efforts to transform human consciousness? The 20th century is the worst of all centuries. (Hundred millions war dead, maimed and traumatized for instance, ravaged environments…) Religion has failed in the same way as Modernity, with a much longer trial period. Perhaps it is because art and religion both derive from the same human source that has not overcome its self-destructive tendency! Science has simply given us the weapon to blow our corporate brains out. Education prepared me to take my place in the very systems that are destroying the earth. It did not transform me, as I sought. As religion has not transformed the world! Thus, both education and religion has failed? Career, vocation, religion, all of it is too well accommodated to all I most deeply oppose and here I lay hidden behind some dirty bushes in fear of detection along a smelly ditch and a loud freeway. It was dark. I was alone and still sick.

Yet, strangely, in all that depression I felt a certain freedom and a lovely, odd sweetness on another level. Are we tools of larger powers? Are they ours? Or, is it a mutual relationship? We communicate and God responds, co-creators. Lovers! Or, random fodder for the Evening News.

In any case, I can’t seem to get away from the notion that this all has some significance beyond myself. Father Adam feels the same way. Stephen seems to be the one who has the in-depth, practical understanding of what this all is about. Though intuitively I feel, I know, that ‘it’ is on schedule. There have been the expected coincidences of unusual storms, fires, earthquakes, even an exploding lake, that seem to move in concert with the development of the ritual or vice versa. But world politics and economies? Who can say? To affect something specific, such as hunger relief or world peace is not exactly the intent of this working. The larger intent if accomplished will affect such specifics eventually, hopefully, but as the result of deeper, more fundamental readjustments. Working on specific problems just creates the next set of problems. The fundamental problem is the unconverted human heart now given modern technological power: nuclear and mechanical, bulldozers and commercial enthusiasm sufficient for universal suicide. The intention of this ritual is to change the very direction of Being, (if Being can be thought to have direction) and thus avoid universal suicide. I refer to at least that aspect of Being that is history, evolution, and the human project. Who can say exactly what will affect that intention: politics, money, magic, God? Since the dragon was raised in Yemen (that’s when the lake exploded in Africa) there have been peace initiatives between Washington and Moscow. But who can really say. Peace is not enough. How we view ourselves and the world must evolve as well or we will at best turn this world and all its secrets into an apocalyptic factory for consumption and production. Who can say? All I can do is record what seems to be the significant events of the spell in this grimoresque telling and get on with it.

After a week or so at the home of a friend in Southern California, I travel north to my injured friend, John. I reported my find of healers for him. We walked in the redwoods, felt strong allegiance of ideas and intentions, worked the energies. We got drunk three nights running. Real drunk. Then I had this dream. I am on a hill that overlooks the pastures of my family ranch in Texas. There is a big fire below. In the dream, it is a car on fire. My mother’s car is nearby. I see her try to drive it away, to move it. It explodes; she is surrounded by a white fire/light. She gets out unhurt. Another car is near-by, that of a female friend, it also explodes. My mother comes up the hill. Instead of being hurt or distressed she is enlivened, even exhilarated. She looks well. Interpretation? The feminine energies are up and well. Was this the subconscious intention of the pilgrimage? It has to do with the balance of duality’s, I think. Redirection of sexual roles to spiritual ends. This also balances masculine domination needs; those egotistic displays mandated by our culture and genes. Such combination is deadly to personal relationships. It is deadly for the world when multiplied by all those who now are converted to the new technocratic religion. It is the dominant world culture, this technocracy.

As I wake from that last dream, a clear sense of ‘the dragon’, the psyche of nature (?) appeared, expectant, benevolent, satisfied, approving. Somehow this represented the pilgrimage. Then, I came to daytime consciousness. I returned home. Soon after, there was a night in which I could not sleep. I had felt, the day before, that I should do a ritual that night to conclude the pilgrimage. So I did. It went on all night. One part of this ritual, the heart of it, was to take out the contents of my “medicine bag” and “re-arrange” them, then put them away in the different places where I keep such things at home. The night’s ritual ended around seven in the morning. A few minutes later, an earthquake struck Southern California, 6.1 in magnitude.

I have finally contacted Cat. We’ve agreed to meet near Reno, Nevada! I’ve decided to skip a semester at Cal. Cat’s John has to go to Florida to deal with some family problems Cat would not divulge until we meet. But in particular, there is something in the deserts east of Reno that we need to explore.

NARRATOR:

There are many possible explanations for Simon’s condition, imagination and experience. The most rationally compassionate might be that he was so motivated by his religious studies and his passion for Cat and others, that his unconscious kicks in and begins to structure these extraordinary, imaginary experiences. These might be catalyzed by Cat and Simon’s chemistry or some kind of psychic intercourse with ‘the land’ or at least, certain special places of the land. (‘Al Chem’ Arabic for the black soil of the Nile Delta. Al chem becomes ‘alchemist’ becomes chemistry. The fertile black soil is symbolically related to the black faces of several famous Madonna statues is Europe, and is also a reference to magic as well as fertility and the beginning of science.) The divine virgin mother is the surest guide to the spiritual life and sorcery.

But who is Father Adam and what is his part in this. He is Cat’s friend, and she says he is an unusual priest, with unusual– powers. He knows Simon and has always felt a special connection with him…

But that is to be more fully divulged in the next episode of our adventure…

SEVEN

Return to the Island of St. Agnes

Stephanie entered that special room of Chris’ and Simon’s repose from a complex of caves that descend to the roots of this island. In fact, for the initiate there are paths that guide one from this Caribbean island through caves beneath the Gulf of Mexico to caverns of Mayan usage still to this day in Mesoamerica. Not so far for a shaman of some power. But in these caves are preserved all the secret tablets of being–no point of perception is missing from its treasures, not reflected in its crystal troves. The psyche of the world radiates from such crystalline caves around the world.

However for our current purposes, these sub-terrainian passages offer secret access to the various chambers of Stephanie’s hotel. Chris and Simon remain in deep slumber as Cat sits equidistant between their two beds, Scheherazade with her back to the sea.

(Who are these people: How were their personalities formed… How is it that she may in trance enter their dreams and in the dream realm draw them together to tell their tale. This evokes a cycle of telling and retelling that involves a number of characters, but these five are the core. Simon, Chris, Stephanie (Agnes Catherine (Cat) if successful, are the answer to Father Adam’s dilemma, “Who told you you were naked.” And how has this exploded to our current dire vulnerability.

Each will tell their tale: Father Adam somehow participates from somewhere far away. But who is this Narrator? Who is he and how did he gain so much power?

BOOK I: APPENDIX

TWO CHAPTERS FROM A DISSERTATION:

Table of Contents

SECTION I: CHAPTER ONE

Introduction

This chapter reviews three religious traditions and one sub-topic which is pertinent to all three religions: (A.) Shamanism, (B.) Buddhism, (C.) the Christian Hesychasm, and (D.) the Energies. By the time the material of this Chapter One has developed and displayed its influence throughout this dissertation,

the most ancient religious traditions of mankind [will have met] the most modern trends of secular Man…[sic.] When comparing our contemporary situation with problems of the past, we have to take into account the different horizons of intelligibility; in other words, we have to consider the different myths which underlie the cultures we are discussing… our culture not excluded.1

Here we will briefly review the myths of several religions and cultural traditions through whose fabric is woven the thread of our theme: the shift of consciousness. Further, but also briefly, we will make connections between these traditions, their myths and theologies, with the other elements of “Interstates” such as found in the autobiographical material. All of the traditions reviewed here might be called traditions of the shift since the techniques of its practice figure largely in the practice of these faiths. This is true particularly of Shamanism and Buddhism, but is also implicit in the contemplative structures of Christianity, here represented by the Hesychasm, and of the martial arts traditions of China.

Because my theme focuses on an essential thread that weaves itself through these various religious traditions, I have had to familiarize myself with them to follow its course. Thus proceeding, one will realize the significance of the shift within the fabric of the whole and consequently to perceive its significance in the works of Raimundo Panikkar. His understanding of human perception with distilled simplicity and the quality of his expertise in the history of religion and the philosophy of science, is useful

for my studies and exposes my theme as central and universal to history of human perception itself.

A major characteristic of this dissertation is that I personally experience as far as possible that which I study. Therefore, I should explain briefly what that has involved. The character of this background and my understanding of these topics and traditions is strongly influenced by experience lived within the fold of their wisdoms. This includes six years of formal art studies and twenty years of making art; five years of monastic studies, two of which were lived in Benedictine and Trappist monasteries; five years of seminary training which allowed the M.A. project, including the first trip to India for Buddhist studies as well as Shamanistic study and initiation; subsequently there were ten years of continuing interest in Buddhism starting with the first trip to India in 1980 to study with a high Nyingmapa lama in Derha Dun, Utter Pradesh (U.P.), followed by two subsequent trips to India and Nepal, one to study the art form of the mandala with high Gelugpa lamas including His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala and another high Nyingmapa lama, His Holiness Mindriling Rimpoche. This Buddhist research concluded with my Nepal excursion and the Manirimdu festival in 1992 which included Lama dancing and the construction of an elaborate sand mandala within the ritual pattern. As well, there were exploratory visits to Hesychasic monasteries and the related practice for twenty years of frequent and long pilgrimages as a technique of conversion.

Also included at the end of this Section I, is a general work on the energies since their function is unavoidable while exploring phenomena associated with the shift of consciousness. Understanding the function of the energies is central to understanding traditional Asian cosmologies and physiologies. The energies are one of the universal elements found in the various traditions studied here, i.e., Hesychasm: created and Uncreated energies; Tibetan Buddhism: Tsa Lung; Chinese: [Tai] Chi.

I chose to study Buddhism because, among other reasons, it represents the yogic traditions of India which contain many of the world’s important schools of metaphysical training. Buddhism reforms these dominant Vedic systems of India out of which also grew the later Hinduism. I chose the Hesychasm to represent the Western phenomenon of Christianity since the Hesychasm incorporates best, art and yogic practice in one completely Christian system. I further chose to study Shamanism because I believed it to be a universal matrix of perceptive capacities out of which grows most if not all mystical experience. This study included a three month stay in the Spring of 1990 at Zuni, New Mexico, one of the best preserved Native American cultures in the Northern Hemisphere with important Shamanistic elements still extant. Zuni was the climax of many such

visits to Shamanistic or partially Shamanistic cultures and an ongoing interest in Shamanism as referenced in “Nepsis.” Chinese martial arts refer in brief to the spiritual schools of the Far East, since Tai Chi is heavily influenced by both Buddhism and Taoism. By exploring these vast territories, I hope to provide a more universal ground for the discussion of my main topic, the shift of consciousness as per the works of Raimundo Panikkar.

A. Shamanism:

The figure of the shaman is mystical, priestly, and political. It emerges during the upper Paleolithic period and perhaps dates back to Neanderthal time. The shaman is a specialist in the human psyche or soul, but his role covers a wide range of activities. Shamans are healers, seers, and visionaries who have mastered death. They maintain communion with the world of gods and spirits. They have intercourse with the elements of nature. They can leave their bodies behind while the fly to other realms. They are poets and singers who dance and create works of art. They are not only spiritual leaders but also judges, politicians, and the repositories of the knowledge of the culture’s history both sacred and secular. They are psychologists, entertainers, and food finders. They understand the ways of plants, animals, and the elements. “Above all, however, shamans are technicians of the sacred and masters of ecstasy.”2

Shamanism is the primordial career that utilizes the shift of consciousness par excellence. This shift contains the mystical elements later developed in major religious traditions such as Christianity, Hinduism, and Mahayana Buddhism, though there may be some reverse transmythicization 3 operating in what we know of the major Shamanistic strongholds such as in Siberia, Africa, and the Americas. Still, one might be safe to consider the Shamanistic dimension of human perception to be the mystical matrix from which develops all other spiritual experience. The substance of this consideration is Shamanism’s primary tool, the ecstatic trance. In this, one shifts out of normal stasis or out of ordinary consciousness into what Panikkar distinguishes as “other” levels of consciousness. This use of “other” rather than “altered” states of consciousness is intentional with Panikkar. The use of the word altered implies that ordinary states are somehow

more the norm to which all others should defer. In reality the other states might be preferable, even necessary, or just fact, whether we recognize that a shift has occurred or not. According to Mircea Eliade, the shaman is most importantly the “Master of Ecstasy”, that is, the shift.4

The beginning of my experience of Shamanism occurred at the beginning of my study of Zen, strangely enough. It is this inter-denominational experience, described below, that sparked most clearly in me the conviction that such knowledge was not subject to solely intellectual constructions of reference. Yet, the topic needed still to be considered by some degree of scientific method. The immediate problem for the study of such topics as Shamanism, was that of methodology. If the Shamanistic phenomenon were to be approached, it had to be approached from within, I felt. I did not choose to believe this. I felt compulsed to acknowledge this perception by this following experience.

I had befriended a noted Zen teacher and under his guidance in Los Angeles had begun to study Buddhist meditation in a series of sessins or intensive weekend meditation retreats. During one of these, I had a vision of a black claw piercing my back. I became very sick within an hour and after two weeks of convalescence, I was left with five scars on my back where I had, according to my doctor, been bitten by a black widow spider and had suffered subsequent staff infection and blood poisoning of the main wound in the middle of my back. This happened while I sat in meditation in the Zendo completely clothed in several layers of clothing. I never saw the animal. “Nepsis,” summarized in Appendix #1 of this dissertation, contains a complete account of this event as the beginning of a shamanistic initiation.

This occurrence, the hallucinogenic properties in the venom, the subsequent dreams, and the many paranormal experiences associated with this animal, might be said to indicate that I had been chosen by her for Shamanistic reasons. I do not say that I am a shaman, because I do not belong to a Shamanistic culture. So in this case, there is no universally accepted role expectation or description for a shaman’s initiation or practice. Both my experience and subsequent study of Shamanism indicate that Shamanistic experiences have been an important part of the human experience for eons and possibly remain so. This proposition about the contemporary significance of Shamanistic dimensions in human perception will be developed in later chapters, especially in the conclusions to this dissertation, Chapter Seven. For Panikkar, such elements of archaic religious traditions

have a important part to play as he reflects upon the history of religious experience and inner structures of contemporary thought.

From the beginning, extraordinary personal experience has been an element of influence in both my study and understanding of the religious phenomenon, as further discussed in the Hesychasic, Buddhist, and Energies sections of this chapter. According to Panikkar, we exist now in a milieu of mutual fecundation.5 The fact that I should be exposed, in the ethos of contemporary Pacific Rim culture, to these traditions such as Shamanism and Buddhism and be influenced to act according to these influences is not impressive or even surprising. In addition to library research, I chose to study these religious phenomena by practicing what they practice to a significant degree: Shamanistic journey and ritual, Hesychast pilgrimage, mandalic and mantric offerings, among others.6

This dual approach, under the guidance of a mentor such as Panikkar, brings these investigations of the shift of consciousness into the arena of serious, critical consideration. This is even more the case since I have pursued these interests while remaining a faithful practitioner of my own religious tradition, a tradition that includes Panikkar. He presents this tradition in a manner opened to such pursuits by its own Katholike universality in dialogic dialog with other systems of perception.7

Many Christians might be disconcerted by involvement with such Shamanistic phenomena as spirit animals, elementals, and powers. But why would the Christian Deity not use its own creation and its creatures, even the fearsome black widow spider, as a mode of natural and supernatural communication. Such figures are certainly poignant vehicles for literary and mythic reference. Spider Woman or Grandmother Spider, Kokyanwuhti among the Hopi, and her twin warrior grandsons are salvific or protective figures in several Native American cultures.8 Why does the experience of God have to

be discussed only in humanistic, Greek, or even Semitic parlance? This in no way denigrates the significance of Christ. All of creation might still yearn for ultimate completion. Such figures as the black widow spider and their mythic or even fictional context are metaphors, agents for engaging the shift into eternity and the color or energy of its non-temporal ethos in human imagination.9 This consideration of such metaphor and metaphoric, visionary experience as the claw piercing my back will be further developed in the sections of this dissertation on Panikkar, p. 58, and Art, p. 99. Suffice it here to say that the Shamanistic experience is often triggered by mythic belief patterns. The character of the Shamanistic experience is guided by such mythic context. But the Shamanistic experience is not confined to cultures typified by Paleolithic levels of development. Even today Shamanistic experience, though defeated as a mode of culture in most parts of the world, remains an active element in the germination of religious sentiment in the world.

I am reminded of the Lama Dances of the Manirimdu festival in Tibet and Nepal wherein the topic of the choreography is the defeat of the Bon-po shamans by Buddhist teachings and deities, by the Lord of the Dance.10 Yet Mahayana Buddhism grows out of the mutual fecundation of many such cultures and many histories with Shamanistic roots.11

Generally Shamanism is described as:

An ecstatic, religious complex of particular and fixed elements with a specific ideology that has persisted through millennia and is found in many different cultural settings. The term “shaman,” derived from the Vedic sram, meaning “to heat oneself or practice austerities,” [tapas] indicates influences by Paleo-Oriental civilizations. But the complex of Shamanism is more archaic, being part of the prehistoric peoples in other areas of the world. Although shamans are mainly associated with the geographies of northern and central Asia, they can be found in Africa, Oceania, Australia, the Americans, northern and eastern Europe, wherever
25

hunting-gathering people still exist and wherever this ancient tradition has maintained its shape in spite of the shifting cultural ground.12

Or as one shaman puts it,

I am he who puts together, he who speaks, he who searches, says. I am he who looks for the spirit of the day, says. I search where there is fright and terror. I am he who fixes, he who cures the person that is sick. Herbal medicine. Remedy of the spirit. Remedy of the atmosphere of the say, says. I am he who resolves all, says. Truly you are man enough to resolve the truth. You are he who speaks with the light of day. You are he who speaks with terror.13

The shaman is a traveler who moves through portals of the mind: “Nierika is a cosmic portway or interface between so-called ordinary and non-ordinary realities. It is a passageway and at the same time a barrier between worlds.”14 The Nierika is also a decorated ceremonial, mandalic, centering disk from the Huichol people of Mexico. It is “said to mean mirror as well as the face of the deity.”15

There seem to be two major classes of experience for the shaman. One is the process of initiation that he undergoes. The other is what is actually involved in shamanizing. The initiation process is as varied as are the cultures of the world; one very beautiful and poignant example of the initiation of a greater shaman is that of Black Elk, a North American Indian. He would be considered a greater shaman because his initiation was spontaneous, unsought, not hereditary, and because of the powerful wisdom of his shamanizing.

What follows is a partial summary of Black Elk’s lengthy vision:

While I was eating, a voice came and said: “It is time; now they are calling you.” The voice was so loud and clear that I believed it, and I thought I would just go where it wanted me to go. So I got right up and started.

[But he became painfully ill and crippled in the legs for a long time. Then he was visited by supernatural beings]:

I could see out through the opening and there two men were coming from the clouds, head first like arrows slanting down and I know they were the same that I had seen before. Each now carried a long spear, and from the points of these, a jagged lightening flashed. They came clear down to the ground this time and stood a little way off and looked at me and said: “Hurry! Come! Your Grandfathers are calling you!…”

[He was taken up from his village to where there was nothing but cloud and sky]:

Then as we walked, there was a heaped up cloud ahead that changed into a teepee, and a rainbow that was the open door to it; and through the door I saw six old men sitting in a row.The two men with the spears now stood beside me, one on either hand, and the horses took their places in their quarters, looking inward, four by four. And the oldest of the Grandfathers spoke with a kind voice and said: “Come right in and do not fear.” And as he spoke, all the horses of the four quarters neighed to cheer me. So I went in and stood before the six, and they looked older than men can ever be–old like hills, like stars.The oldest spoke again: “Your Grandfathers all over the world are having a council, and they have called you here to teach you.”His voice was very kind, but I shook all over with fear now, for I know that these were not old men, but the Powers of the World.16

Since Black Elk included horses in his vision, he is obviously, automatically, interpreting the experience with images of importance to him, though these images are not archaic in origin, since the horse as he would have known it, did not arrive in the Americas until the conquest. Here with this great and famous shaman, is clear indication of inherent, innovative attitudes operative even in traditional patterns. “Powwow Highway,” a film that depicts Shamanistic initiation among modern Sioux, makes the comparison between the image and power of the horse with the automobile in the spontaneous visionary consciousness of its protagonist.

Thus, it should not be surprising that Shamanistic consciousness would spontaneously develop in me fifteen years ago, through the agency of poignantly powerful images: secular symbols, artistic metaphors, and religious experiences, all of which color this study.

Visionary consciousness is engaged and one has the sensation of entering the inner structures of being. One’s experience is confined and set free by one’s belief structure, one’s myth. In some respects the job description of a shaman is similar to that

of the prophet in the Judeo-Christian tradition. They both are directly in contact with the sacred and are reputed to translate the word of God or gods into human terms for the service of the community.

Strangely though, for the shaman, as with Black Elk, it is sickness that can set one free. Profound illness seems to be a necessary aspect of Shamanistic initiation. Perhaps because illness, like other suffering, much solitude, and profound joy lay bare the basic elements of human experience.

Among the Araucanians, the illness that determines the career of a “machi” is followed by an ecstatic crisis during which the future shamaness ascends to the sky and meets God herself. In the course of this celestial visit, supernatural beings show her the remedies necessary for cures.17

In many places a kind of psychic dismemberment is also experienced during the flight-trance. The novice shakes in every limb, and evil spirits are believed to have entered him and to be tearing his body. The well-known initiatory motif of dismemberment by demons is easily recognizable here. Finally, the apprentice feels that he is carried into the sky and enjoys celestial visions.18

Shamans and medicine men, to say nothing of certain types of mystics, are able to fly like birds and perch on the branches of trees. The Hungarian Shaman could jump up in a willow tree and sit on a branch that would have been weak for a bird.19

The motif of flight is common in Shamanistic lore.

The Iranian saint Qutb ud-din Haydar frequented the tops of trees. St. Joseph of Cupertino flew into a tree and remained half an hour on a branch that was seen to sway as if a bird had perched on it.20

The flight motif of Shamanistic experience is part of powerful desire for transcendence. The breaking of the plane effected by the flight signifies an act of transcendence. It is no small matter to find already, at the most archaic stage of culture,

the longing to go beyond and above the human condition, to transmute it by an excess of spiritualization for one can only “interpret the myths and legends to which we have been referring by a longing to see the human body behaving like a ‘spirit,’ to transmute the corporeal modality of man into a spiritual modality.”21

I have long been fascinated with the relationship between what I understood as psychic and holy spirituality. The old Shamanistic nature gods or powers that seem to be archetypes, the psychic structure of the cosmos and of our own minds, are the reference to the Powers and Dominions that St. Paul mentions in Ephesians 6:12. When one delves into this realm, one is delving into a seemingly endless realm of esoteric experience that might or might not be at one with an Uncreated Godhead. But it seems that it is through this very experience of becoming conscious to these psychic structures that the Holy reveals itself. Perhaps as we reach deeper levels of integration in ourselves, the vision of God becomes clearer, but it is through archetypal realms that we wend in our erring way for truth.22 It has been a concern regarding such issues that evidences a temper in our times open not only to a wide plurality in the expression of truth, but implies a human identity, even the intuition of a cosmology, characterized by such plurality.23

It is the experience of the shaman’s ecstasy that is a personal or communal epiphany. There are many examples of Shamanistic ecstasy, though, that seem more cthonic compared to conventional Christian notions of the Holy.

God’s penis lies this way (K’xau’s hands demonstrate its enormous size as it sticks out in front of him…)Lo-o-ong! A bunch of people stand in a line before him and carry it on their shoulders. His penis lies there… A strange thing this… a foul thing.24

There are other examples, such as that of Black Elk’s vision, that translate more easily. Though both seem to be an experience of considerable magnitude in its implications about humanity’s self-identification. Panikkar recognizes this as the breaking of planes between worlds involved in the dynamic of sacrifice–the temporal and the atemporal are

integrated, time and matter are “saved”, the union of worlds is effected in the grand affair of Shamanism.25 If Shamanism is a basic movement towards the sacred into the interior realms of the psyche, the soul, then Shamanic voyage is the heritage of the interior peregrination famous in Christian and other spiritualities. What one finds on such a voyage, dark and/or light depends a great deal upon the voyager. As one Eskimo shaman states, “True wisdom is only to be found afar from people, out in the great solitude, and it is not found in play but only through suffering. Solitude and suffering open the human mind and therefore a shaman must seek his wisdom there.”26

B. Buddhism:

I provide the following anecdotal information because it contains material that is influential in my developing study of Buddhism and other religious traditions and thus the “nepsis”27 experience of this dissertation project.

My study of Buddhism started when I decided not to become a Buddhist but a Catholic, being attracted to both in the early 1970s. However, my teacher in the Catholic monastery where I was baptized, was a Chinese monk who had been raised a Buddhist in Asia. He converted to Catholicism when he was sent to Europe by his family to study. His family had sent him to Europe to free him from the influence of his father who was becoming a Buddhist hermit. His name was Fr. Thaddeus Yang and he eventually received a Ph.D. in Diplomacy from Louvien as a Benedictine monk. I questioned him often about Buddhism as he taught me about Christianity. He was the first to tell me about the noble ideal of the Bodhisattwa. But Fr. Yang was also the first to emphasize in detail the importance of the historic nature of the Christ in comparison with mythic and moral ideals. That was in 1975. The hands-on significance of such dates and personalities will be more apparent as we begin to discuss postmodern attitudes in Sections II and III. Considerations about temporality and the non temporal condition,

i.e., history and eternity, and the role of artistic metaphor in our experience is the touchstone of both the aesthetics and theology in those Sections and the eventual conclusions in Chapter Seven.

Important for the early development of the methodology of this dissertation was the example of Fr. Yang, artist and monk, and the monastic life that he represented. His approach to the questions that interested me was one of “action,” of gaining understanding from the perspective of the lived experience, while incorporating study and meditation. This is a particular approach to knowledge, interesting to compare to a more academic approach. The pertinent consideration here is that some kinds of knowledge can only be known in this more holistic way.

I chose not to become a Buddhist because I had read most of Will Durant’s Story of Civilization in 1974 and believed its author when he said that few Westerners could really become Buddhists because of the question of the ego. This was reinforced by Fr. Yang, who felt that few Westerners could submit to a master or guru in the manner required, or, as a Asian could because of differing emphasis placed on the individual ego in one’s upbringing.28 I agreed with both these teachers and became a Catholic. But Buddhism continued to fascinate me. So in my first year of theology at the seminary, as the result of an independent study project, I became associated with the Ven. Shinzen, a well-known Buddhist priest in Los Angeles at the International Buddhist Meditation Center. Though he was teaching Zen meditation at the time, he was originally ordained as a Shingon priest. Shingon is a sect of Tantric Buddhism from pre-Zen Japan.

However, it was during a series of short, intensive meditation retreats in the Zendo of that meditation center, that I received the beginning of my Shamanistic initiation described previously. Because of the poignant intensity of this experience and subsequent medical complications, I could never bring myself to meditate in that Zendo again. I was still interested in Buddhism, though, and eventually completed an M.A. which incorporated Buddhism in the topic, under Panikkar’s guidance.

I traveled to India in the summer of 1980, following the incident with the black widow spider. There, I studied for three months with Paltrul Rimpoche, Abbot of the Nyingma monastery in Derha Dun. He taught me, from wood block texts, the initiation system of Tsa Lung. Of importance to this dissertation are the elements of this system that include: Mantric repetitions numbering 1,000,000, mandalic offerings numbering 100,000 and physical prostration accompanied by a complex and changing visualization exercise, perhaps 500,000 in number.

I have made many such mantric and mandalic offerings along with other devotional practices in the course of twenty years of pilgrimages. But after several thousand of each, I stopped counting. So, it might not be so impressive to be able to perform a psychokinetic feat such as described in “EBACY ’91”. Many yogis are much more accomplished in paranormal activities with less time spent. But if we compare what Panikkar describes as the central Vedantic and Buddhist accomplishments with kenosis or even refer to the story of the Zen archer in the Introduction, then it is evident that the size of the paranormal event is not at all significant except in so far as it is able to evidence the existence of a significantly altered awareness such as might be described by kenosis or sunyata.29 As is developed in Section II: Panikkar, this level of the shift is not only central to the religious question but perhaps is the major issue of human perception and identity, underlying the most important concerns for our times.

I do not say that such categories as these are the same experience but they perform a similar duty in their respective cultures. For me to claim to have experienced kenosis orsunyata is pretentious. To claim that because one has a paranormal experience such as psychokinesis, for example, is misleading if one claims it as evidence of such high states as kenosis or sunyata. But I do claim that historically such high states and paranormal phenomena are associated and that it is the intention of the art associated with this dissertation to utilize this traditional and popular association. The model of the miracle stories in the gospels is an example of how this association operates in religious literature.

The art here is meant to explore and express the phenomenon of the shift of consciousness. The study of Buddhism for me performs a similar function of providing a comparative perspective to better understand the physio/psychic/mental/spiritual practices

of Christianity in the West. More specifically, Buddhism helps me better understand the practices of the Hesychasm, which is itself influenced by Tantric and Sufi mysticism.30

But perhaps the most important aspect of the comparative approach to these investigations is the function of a religious art form in such a fully integrated manner as the sand mandala in the context of a traditional religious ritual as found in Tibetan Tantric Buddhism. The complexity of this integration cannot be glossed over. Therefore, I include detailed notes on the function and practice of the mandala in the Appendix #4 of this dissertation. Among other reasons, because this art form has its roots in Mesopotamia as do the Abrahamic religions,31 we have here a fertile ground of comparison with Christianity and eventually with modern art and thought as developed in Section II: Panikkar, and Section III: Art, My Art and Religious Aesthetics.

The shift of consciousness is basic to Buddhist meditation from the simple experience of general meditation to the deep trance states described in Abhidharma literature. To indicate clearly the function of the shift in meditation, I include in Appendix #3 of this dissertation an essay on Buddhist meditation.

However, I would like to comment here upon the development of Tantric Buddhism, since the study of Tantra has been so influential not only for the “Nepsis” aspect of my research, but so many of the general attitudes that have guided the various paths of this investigation. What follows, to the end of this segment on Buddhism, summarizes the presentation of this subject to be found in the Buddhist Religion by Robinson and Johnson:32

Tantric Buddhism became a focus of interest in my study of Buddhism because it integrates a number of religious tendencies and psychic/physio techniques that are significant here. What follows is a brief history and description of the Tantric Buddhism of Tibet. Since the Panikkar section deals to some degree with the history of knowledge

in his epistemological considerations, I include historical elements as well as culture, religion, and art in these essays about pertinent religious traditions.

Buddhist Tantra is mysticism mixed with magic, combining both distinctly Buddhist and traditionally quite non-Buddhist elements. Like yoga and bhakti devotionalism, Tantra is widely practiced throughout India and its many religions.

Tantra is the culmination of trends long present in Buddhism. Buddhist Tantra originated in the frontier lands of classical India, sometime during the sixth century A.D., where it flourished, both in the far northwest and northeast of India. In the far northwest, it was influenced by Brahmanism. And northeast of India–in Bengal, Orissa, and Assam–Tantra was influenced by local magic and occult practices; Prajna-paramita ideas were combined in Tantra, uniting metaphysics with ritual, magical practices. Magic was allowed in Buddhism; the early Pali Canon contained spells, for instance, that offered protection from such dangers as snakebite. Magic spells, dharani, were also practiced in the Mahayana sutras as early as 200 A.D. These spells were thought to epitomize the doctrine of the sutras, giving those who repeated them a shortcut to enlightenment. By the seventh century, Buddhism borrowed the Hindu idea of intrinsically efficacious sounds, such as AUM, and created a set of magical syllables, each linked with a major figure in the Tantric pantheon and with a center or chakra in the meditator’s body and mystic physiology.

The mandala or magic circle, another characteristic specific to Buddhism, derived many of its features from the early religious architecture of the stupa. The first of these shrines were intended to be replicas of the cosmos. When the Buddha image came about in 100 A.D. [sic.],33 images were placed on the stupa or around it, making the shrine a three-dimensional mandala.

The Tantric innovation turned the creation of mandalas into a rite of actualization in which the agent becomes the deity conjured up. Yogacara meditation, which specialized in elaborate visualizations, indicated that monks meditated on external figures kasina such as colored circles as a vehicle for their practice of meditative visualization. These developments aided the evolution of Buddhist Tantra. Mandalas base the imaginative recreation of the mystic diagram on an external text or painting such as a hanging scroll for meditative support. They can be depicted in many different media: painting, three-dimensional models, and dramatic acting, to name a few.

The mandala, a divine cosmoplan and a theophany, manifests divinity itself when used as a meditative object. It receives the gods into its sacred space, allowing human beings access to divinity. In its center and its complex design of variously colored circles, squares, and triangles exist the gods as if residing in their labyrinthine, divine palace complete with rooms, towers, and gardens. There are four entrances or doors in its periphery, allowing the meditator to symbolically receive initiation into the world of the divine reality.

Tantric practice traces much of its roots to Brahmanical origins. Buddhist Tantra differed significantly from the classical Buddhist tradition, allowed principally byMadhyamika metaphysics which had declared the world empty and essentially pure. This allowed unorthodox components such as erotic elements to be added into Buddhist ritual. A large amount of esoteric yoga practice was taken over from independent circles of yoga, including Hatha Yoga, along with parts of popular magical ritualism. Hindu ritualism such as magical rites, instructions for ceremonies, and their formulas mostly originated from the northwest, traditionally a stronghold of Brahmanism. Hindu emphasis on the necessity for having a guru or preceptor to direct one’s difficult learnings and transformation also influenced the development of Buddhist Tantra. Still, the highest purpose of Tantric ritual actualization is the attainment of enlightenment, a traditionally Buddhist goal.

Mantras were so integral to Tantric meditation that Tantra, Buddhist and Saivaite, is also named Mantrayana, the Mantra vehicle or Course. To call mantra a yana, or vehicle, affirms its legitimacy as a distinct path to salvation to those who use it. The term mantra originated in Vedic Sanskrit to designate a verse, particularly one used to invoke a deity, whose presence was required for success of the meditation. From its inception, mantra was not just a prayer but an instrument of the mind in an etymological sense, which through speech engaged cosmic forces. In the Rig Veda, mantra is also associated with protection provided by the gods in response to the recited “mantra of the praising poet.” In Tantra, these meanings are remarkable in their similarity.

Mantras used in Buddhist Tantra were used by the meditator to evoke deity so as to become one with him or her. In this sense their full soteriological importance becomes apparent. A mantra could also be used to protect oneself against evil forces and adverse events. It could be used for meditation to gain insight or to induce mental calm through silent or vocal repetition. Not surprisingly, Tantra has been excoriated by many modern writers who believe that it was a degeneration that grafted the Hindu cult of female energies onto Buddhism, and that the graft crushed the life out of Buddhism.

In reality, the opposite occurred. The main Buddhist tradition assimilated diverse non-Buddhist elements, restructuring and reinterpreting them, until it would be more correct to say that pure Buddhism smothered out the Tantras. By 800 A.D., Tantric studies had become legitimized as an academic discipline.

The Tantric poet Saraha says:

Here there’s no beginning, no middle, no end, no samsara, no nirvana. In this state of supreme bliss, there’s no self, and no other. Just as water entering water becomes of the same taste, so when the sage thinks vices and virtue the same, there’s no polarity.34

The crux of the matter is skill in means. The Hevajra Tantra says, “the unknowing worldling who drinks the strong poison is overpowered. He who has expelled delusion, with his mind on the truth, destroys it utterly.”35 What is licit under the direction of the preceptor or guru and within the consecrated mandala is still illicit for ordinary people. When taboos are broken, they must be broken with a pure mind and not for worldly pleasure.

The aim of Tantra is to destroy the passions by means of passions; it fuses spiritual and physical love, in idea and in practice. The depiction of mystical realization in terms of erotic consummation is not limited to Indian beliefs, though it is fundamental to Hindu devotional cults. Traditional Christian interpretation made the “Song of Solomon” an allegory for the spiritual marriage, a concept that was popular among medieval European mystics. In China, the shamans’ “Songs of the South”, Ch’u-tz’u treat the meeting between shaman and spirit also as an erotic encounter.

Tantra, in terms of what this pan Indian yogic school of thought and practice offers as a world vision, integrates individual and cosmos, physical and spiritual capacities important to the development of this investigation. This is especially true for Tantric Buddhism as it combines shamanistic and artistic elements with orthodox Buddhism that is already deeply connected with this dissertation’s topic, the shift of consciousness.

C. The HesychasmIntroduction:

Three important and interrelated concepts together form a vehicle that carries much of the substance of this dissertation: a. Erring, b. Divine Energies, and c. Bodily Techniques. All three of these are operative concepts in the Byzantine Christian spirituality of the Hesychasm:36

a. Erring

The first concept is that of erring, as in knight-errant, also called “serpentine wandering,” or “sauntering.” This following two quotes are taken from Mark Taylor’s bookErring. The author presents a passage from Henry David Thoreau in the first selection:

Sauntering: which word is beautifully derived from idle people who roved about the country, in the Middle Ages, and asked charity, under pretense of goinga la Sainte Terre, to the Holy Land, until the children exclaimed, “There goes a Sainte-terrer,” a Saunterer, a Holy-Lander. They who never go to the Holy Land in their walks, as they pretend, are indeed mere idlers and vagabonds; but they who do go there are saunterers in the good sense, such as I mean.

The time and space of graceful erring are opened by the death of God, the loss of self, and end of history. In uncertain, insecure and vertiginous postmodern worlds, wanderers repeatedly ask: “Whither are we moving?… Are we continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we erring as through an infinite nothing?” While the death of God is realized in the play of the divine milieu and the disappearance of the self is inscribed in markings and traces, history “ends” when erring “begins,” and erring “begins” when history “ends.”37
37

One cannot speak of or name God without some degree of blasphemy. Self is the drop of water returning to the primordial sea of transcendence. Historical consciousness is a mistaken direction of consciousness leading to even greater death and disaster than before, perhaps ultimately, according to Panikkar.38

Also, from the Section II: Panikkar : “Letting Being be and letting Being express–the Word!” are not only the basis for the art treated in this dissertation, but I believe, in all true creativity. This contemplative attitude requires a tranquillity or stillness that is the basic definition of hesychaia. Here the comparison between Indian meditation, Western contemplative traditions and creativity is apparent as one also reads the other parts of this chapter and the essays on Buddhism in Appendices 3, and 4, p. ???, the Tai Chi interview in Appendix 5, p. ???, and the Critique of “Window” in Appendix 6, p. ???.. Further consideration of this important comparison between contemplation and creativity can also be found in Chapters Five and Six.

Pilgrimage is the major technique employed for effecting the shift of consciousness in “Nepsis.” The essence of pilgrimage is erring. Hesychasic pilgrimage, as described in such anonymous works, The Way of the Pilgrim and The Pilgrim continues His Way, were the inspiration for most of the erring in “Nepsis.” The figures of the pilgrim/monk, the Great Robe monk and the thaumaturge were also images of influence in this work from the Hesychasm. My understanding of pilgrimage included an understanding of the exterior exercise that reproduced analogously the interior journey.

b. Divine Energies

The Uncreated energies of Byzantine and Hesychast theology are the active accessible Grace of God as distinguished from God’s unapproachable essence. Created energies refer to the energies constituting the created world. The Hesychast draws up created sexual energies from the generative organs and pushes down the intellectual energies of the mind to be offered on the altar of the radiant heart.39 That is, the energies of one’s person are transformed by the divine indwelling not only through devotion and intention but actual physical and mental practices as well. Such

physiological and devotional methods can be compared with the Tantric yoga of India and the Far East.40

Generally speaking, wherever the shift of consciousness is practiced, especially as a specialized technique, the energies characterize much of the subsequent experience. Though, in all the major traditions of the shift, the overarching intention must remain ultimate salvation or enlightenment primarily, not the working of wonders as is sometimes associated with manipulation of the, sometimes magical, energies.41 The energies are operative in the ethos of the “ether,” the only one of the five arcane elements; earth, water, air, fire denied and left untouched by the calculations of modern science.

c. Bodily Techniques:

The physicals techniques described in footnote #41 below, refer to a spiritual and physiological attitude that is companion to the elements delineated in numbers (1.) Erring and (2.) Divine Energies, above. This attitude about such techniques describes concepts and practices to develop the subtle body of created and Uncreated energies in the physical body in a manner analogous 42 to certain attitudes about the world in relationship to heaven.43 The body is the temple. The heart, symbolically connected with the sacred

heart of Christ, is the altar where conversion takes place. From well of living waters, is drawn the metaphor that becomes the fountain of energies revitalizing and empowering one’s spirit, body, and actions.44 This physio-mystical experience can be compared to such experience as that of Kundalini yoga in the Saivaite traditions of India 45 or the Tibetan practice of Tsa-Lung,46 or the Chinese martial practice and physiological attitude of Chi-gung.47

The Hesychasm–an brief overview:

Generally, the Hesychasm is a monastic movement whose origin goes back to the “Fathers of the Desert” in the third century, and is the major school of mysticism in Byzantine Christianity.48

The Hesychasm uses a physio/psychic method of prayer that integrates the physio/psychic dimensions of our personality with the spiritual in a singular act of worship. The concept of entasy is crucial in understanding this method because this term applies to the Kingdom within. This is different from ecstasy which is reference to a sense of experience outside of this body or the experience of going out of the normal state, stasis, of this body/mind condition through the Shift.

The Hesychastic method seeks to realize our potential for transformation to the divine; this method operates within the divine economy of creation where every act and condition offers the potential for divine/organic transformations. The prayer that allows the practitioner access to these transmutations is physical and mental as well as spiritual. Thus, the opportunity for conversion is an ever-present possibility in which the religious person reorders and opens his whole being to the processes of deification ortheosis.

The relationship between the inhaled or inspired breath and the Spirit–pneuma, the divine breath–is much more than a metaphor; it is a real, analogical correspondence, allowing the inspired breath an auspicious vehicle for attaining the Spirit.49 The same vertical movement connects the heart, the physical center of the body, to the intellect, the spiritual center and light of the soul and, by the same token, to God the metaphysical center and heart of the Universe. This foundation concept is also found in the teachings of St. Gregory of Nyssa. He believed that God resides inside the heart–the image of image, i.e., image of Nous, God’s mirror in man–to the extent that corporeal consciousness and incorporeal consciousness–simultaneously centered in the heart and in the intellect–coincide through their Uncreated center.

The heart is considered to be the symbolic, affective center as well as center of intelligence. It is not the seat of discursive reason, symbolically located in the brain. The heart houses the intellect, the spiritual organ created for contemplation in the sense of illuminating knowledge and love; it possesses the intuitive faculty directed toward the spiritual principle of coincidence of opposites in the divine darkness. This might be compared to the dualism of opposites in the Chi systems, such as Tai Chi as discussed in the “Energies” essay at the end of this chapter.

The Hesychastic method is designed to create the transformation mentioned by St. Paul of the physical body into the spiritual body. The recitation of the Jesus Prayer hundreds of thousands if not millions of times is central to this practice. This method is analogous to the Tantric, Mantrayana practices discussed in the Buddhism essay earlier in this chapter on page 34.

The essential elements found in the later spiritual tradition of Eastern monasticism were defined by Evagrius and Macarius; in later centuries their views were brought together. As a result, Evagrius’ “intellectual prayer” evolved into the “prayer of the heart”

in the East, a personal prayer explicitly addressed to the Incarnate Word, the Jesus Prayer, in which the main focus is the “recollection of the Name.”50

Diadochus, fifth century bishop of Phobic in Epirus, helped spread desert spirituality in the Byzantine world. He placed an emphasis on the sacramental life and the personal character of Christian prayer, indicative of Evagrian spiritualization. However, he expressed the concern of an orthodox spiritual master, to integrate “hesychasm” with biblical perspectives of history whose essential elements are the fall, redemption, and future glory. We are the image of God through the Spirit that dwells within us. But Adam’s sin defiles the traits of this image-likeness and our body fell into corruption. Then, the Word of God became Incarnate and, being God, was able to introduce the real rebirth of Baptism. The actions of the Holy and life-giving Spirit in Baptism purify both soul and body, for the Holy Spirit once again lives in us and casts out sin. In the soul of the baptized, grace hides its presence, waiting for the time for the whole person to turn to the Lord as the Spirit slowly reveals itself from within.

When every outlet of the mind is closed by the recollection of God, it loudly demands something to satisfy its need of activity. It requires the Lord Jesus (cf. I Cor. 21:13), the sole occupation that fully answers its need. When the soul is agitated by anger, dissipation, or oppression, the mind cannot achieve recollection of the Lord. But when the soul frees itself from passions, then it possesses the very grace that meditates with it and cries to the Lord Jesus; grace thus guides us to the Lord so that we may know him even in our sleep. The apostle says: “The spirit likewise comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should but the Spirit makes intercession for us by unutterable groanings” (Rom 8:26).51

This method of prayer becomes an inner Eucharist in the sense that the Christ is the food that feeds the fires of our conversion. The Word was made Flesh not because God is anthropomorphic but because man is theandric.52

Panikkar feels that of the Christian institutions, the Byzantine Hesychasm is the one that best maintains the contemplative tradition.53 It is the physio-spiritual practice

as well as the theological insights within a richly sacramental system that makes this connection for Panikkar. In such a system, time is saved, that is, transformed and incorporated into the sacred, into eternity.

Two important connections between the Hesychasm and the themes of this dissertation are; one, that which concerns the created and Uncreated energies and practices associated with them, and two, the role of the icon. Specifically, the Hesychasm provides a Christian point of contact and communication with the strongly physio/mystical practices in India and the Far East concerning the energies and the shift of consciousness. The religious art form of the icon is inextricably imbedded in the Hesychasic tradition.

Icons are a mode of access for other states of consciousness which can be a program of grace in human potential, encoded in the very flesh of our existence. The Hesychasm was strongly iconophilic. Icons, like mandalas are not really images or pictures in the sense of a painting or drawing, but a world of radiant beauty that leads to the production of the art that in turn refers back to that world. The significance of an icon, like a mandala, is not the aesthetic form itself but what it evokes in the viewer, in the world. The image is a reference point for the meditator, a portal of transcendence for those who understand its function. The maker of icons is required to fast and pray and go on pilgrimages, to practice perhaps many other forms of ascetical discipline in order to infuse the icons with holy energy that comes from such practice. It is similarly necessary for the viewer to do the same in order to shift into the realm of the divine presence, to access that capacity for this type of experience. “Put yourself in the presence of God.”54

The Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor revealed to us this future transfigured corporeality. The whole body of the Lord was transfigured, becoming as it were a radiant raiment of the Deity. “As regards the character of the Transfiguration,” say the Fathers of the II Ecumenical Council, referring to St. Athanasius the Great, “it was not that the Word laid aside His human form, but rather that the latter was illumined by His glory.”55

In other words, in the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, humanity appears in Divine Glory at the same time that Deity appears to man. Those who acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit become a participant in this Divine glory, this “Uncreated and Divine Radiance,” as St. Gregory Palamas called the light of Mount Tabor. By uniting with the Deity, man is illumined by His Uncreated light and assumes the likeness of the radiant body of Christ. St. Simeon describes his experience of this inner illumination in this way: “Beauty is holiness, and its radiance the participation of the creature in Divine Beauty.”56

In its relevance to art, beauty is granted by God, according to its ability to depict the image of its prototype, the symbol of what it represents, the Kingdom of the Spirit. The beauty of an icon lies in its likeness to God and so its beauty lies not in itself or in its appearance, but in it depiction of Beauty.

There has been charges of Nestorianism made by critics of the Orthodox Church regarding the relationship of the representation, the icon, with what it represents. The Fathers of the VII Ecumenical Council have responded that the Catholic Church’s depiction of Christ in his human aspect does not separate his flesh from the Divinity conjoined. Instead, the flesh is deified and professed to be one with the divinity. The icon is a depiction of a deified prototype, an image not of corruptible flesh, but flesh transfigured. It is beauty and glory, represented by material means and visible in the icon to physical eyes. In the same regard, a temporal portrait of a saint cannot be an icon, because it reflects his ordinary carnal state and not his transfigured state. This peculiarity of the icon makes it different from all other forms of pictorial art. Thus, liturgical art is more than an offering to God; it is God’s descent into our midst, allowing the meeting of God with humanity, of grace with nature, and of eternity with time.

The icon is not a representation of the deity, but an indication of the participation of the religious person in divine life. It attests to the concrete practical knowledge of the sanctification of the human body. The icon offers the opportunity to move, to shift into this realm of the other world. That movement is largely confined by the cultural context of the mover’s limitations. The experience is limited by attitudes that the practitioner associates with it or one’s gift.

The Hesychasm is a psychic, physical, intellectual, artistic/symbolic and spiritual system of transformation that requires one to operate on all those levels in order to gain its full benefit. Such full use of one’s perceptive faculties is not as elitist as it sounds, since these faculties are common to all. The Hesychasm compares well with other such

highly developed modes of religious realization and creative expression investigated for this dissertation, such as Tantra and Tai Chi, the Mandala and Abstract Expressionism.

D. The Energies:

The following brief review of the energies is included here because in all the religious cultures mentioned so far, this phenomenon plays an important if secondary role, inseparable from the main experience of that religion. This review of the energies will consist of two parts: The first part is a general reflection upon the existence and function of the energies. The second part consists of a presentation of one mystical tradition, Tai Chi, structured entirely around the energies. This will be in the form of an interview with a recognized adept in the practice of this tradition. The complete text of that interview will be found in Appendix 5 of this dissertation, p. 319, with a summary provided here.

Part I: An overview of the phenomena of the energies.

My first formal knowledge of the energies was imparted from a therapist, with Ph.D.’s in psychology and physiology from the University of Texas, Dr. Ed Wortz of Pasadena, California. He treated me in 1978 for migraines. The migraines continued but in reference to the energies, he taught me how to work with them as well as various theories about their source and function. He was a practicing Buddhist who was not only familiar with the Asian traditions concerning the energies but had done extensive clinical research about them. Dr. Wortz introduced me to Ven. Shinzen, who started me on the path of Buddhist studies. It was then, as mentioned previously, that I had a strong Shamanistic initiation experience. It was at this moment as well that I was introduced to Dr. Panikkar who would guide me through a more formal investigation of these topics. I believe that this complex of meetings was catalyzed by these said energies resulting, in this instance, from a particularly arduous pilgrimage I had taken the previous summer. But such a scenario is typical of the belief pattern in which the energies would be thought to operate.

Fire is a universally important symbol, and is elemental to the machinations and transformations of sorcery and Shamanism. The Fire Shamans among Pueblos and the Navajos are particular examples of this.57 Certain elements such as fire are part of the

consistent vocabulary of symbols and experience in religious transformation throughout the world. A connection between cultures as separate as those of Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and the Siberian wilderness, is suggested when certain human capacities and limitations are expressed through common symbols. This connection is often expressed through such symbols as fire and the snake goddess so important to yoga–and “Nepsis.”58 A basic understanding of these symbols seems elemental to understanding the use of such metaphors, say, in the Bible, whether they are synonymous or not. What is the fire reference? One modern interpreter of the sorcerer/Shamanistic experience would explain the fire like this:

The primary principle of magic is connection. The universe is a fluid ever-changing energy pattern, not a collection of fixed and separate things. What affects one thing affects, in some way all things: All is interwoven into the continuous fabric of being. Its warp and weft are energy which is the essence of magic.59

The connecting element is energy. Such fire can represent the presence of God. It is so considered by the Vedic tradition, by Agni worship for example. Fire is generally considered as the element of the sacred. It is an exterior, as well as an interior experience.

However, a scriptural indication of a relevant dynamic in this regard is:

Then the Lord said, “Go outside and stand on the mountain before the Lord; the Lord will be passing by.” A strong and heavy wind was rending the mountains and crushing rocks before the Lord–but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake–but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake there was fire–but the Lord was not in the fire. After the fire was a tiny whispering sound. When he heard this, Elijah hid his face in his cloak and went and stood at the entrance of the cave. (1 Kings, 19:11-13)
46

God might not be limited to creation, but creatures are limited in that we communicate about the holy through the veil of human perception, i.e., symbols.60 So, what does this indicate about the divine energies, the fires? Are they really the manifestation of the Absolute? Or are they the essential stuff of which creation is made?

The tongues of fire at the Pentecost is the formal initiation of the Church in the world, the empowerment of the Church by the Spirit. As well, it is an important part of the scriptural foundation for two of the sacraments of Christian Initiation that combine rituals of Baptism in water with Confirmation in the fire of the Spirit continuing the Old Testament Exodus theophany.

In a related way, in his book Messianic Idea in Judaism, Sholem says the following about a certain practice of certain masters of the Hasidim:

God was revealed in His potencies and His various attributes (Justice, mercy, etc.). By these powers through which He willed to effect Creation He formed “vessels” destined to serve the manifestation of His own being. (It is a binding rule that whatever wishes to act or manifest itself requires garbs and vessels, for without them it would revert to infinity which has no differentiation and no stages.) The divine light entered their function in creation, but the vessels could not contain the light and thus were broken. This is the phase which the Kabbalists call “breaking of the vessels.” And what was the consequence of the shattering of the vessels? The light was dispersed. Much of it returned to its source; some portions, or “sparks,” fell downward and were scattered, some rose upward.61
47

Are these divine sparks the equivalent phenomenon to the Kundalini of the Tantric Hindus, the fire of the divine love of the Christians in the Pentecostal tongues of fire, of the Tibetan Buddhist Tum-mo, i.e., yogic heat? Is this the elemental process of conversion/initiation of religious practice and experience? Is such fire a manifestation of the Holy? Christianity maintains a separation between creation and creator. Yet, divine union and the body of light described as the glorified body in Christian traditions remains undefined in unspeakable mystery. Byzantine Christians talk openly about the relationship between the energies and God. Buddhist Nirvana and the energies of enlightenment, are unspeakable, indescribable states of bliss. Each of these traditions would answer yes to their own fiery agent being the vehicle of salvation.

In Indian mythology, the primal power that remains after the ongoing creation is coiled up energy symbolized by the form of a serpent that supports the universe. Kundalini, the goddess whose emblem is this same coiled serpent, means “bowl of fire.” Kundalini is the fiery, serpent force. The dragon symbol is understood as the life-principle in many parts of the Far East not as a symbol of evil. The serpent in the Old Testament is associated with the fiery seraph, a divine presence in Numbers 21:6. The snake like seraph may be conceived as personification of the fire of theophany and the brazen serpent was probably a cult object formed from similar traditions as above.62 But, once again how much connection is there between the descent of the Spirit and the rising Kundalini? Kundalini, in its completion, implies not only total personal integration but absolute, perfect, blissful union with God. The major symbols associated with the rising of Kundalini are fire and the serpent.

It is interesting that in its highest practice the necessary purification and initiation into Tibetan Buddhist “Tsa-Lung” are meant to prepare one to be able to concentrate, visualize, possess great faith, integrate the body mind complex, and develop attitudes of compassion and selfless service to others. Then, one might be ready for the high experiences of Tantric empowerment; charismatic powers, gifts, and creativity, that flow from the heat of Tibetan Tsa-lung Tum-mo energy. As my first Tibetan teacher once told

me, this [energy] is the source of all power, magical or otherwise.63 Enlightenment is the goal. The Kundalini is the bestower of the Siddhi powers and of creativity. Kundalini is power: the power behind occult power, as well as all the rest of ordinary life experience.64

Visual theophanic elements as the tongues of fire and wind are associated with the Sinai experience. An early Palestinian tradition associated Jesus’ Ascension with his Pentecostal gift of the Spirit as the “law” of the new covenant. This was probably inspired by the symbolism of Moses returning with the gift of the Law after ascending to God (Ex 19:3). The first occurrence of the thematic word glossa (tongue) as in “divided tongues as if of fire” (Acts 2: 3) is used in a different sense. The qualifying adverb,hosei, is indicative of an apocalyptic comparative which often appears in accounts of visions, emphasizing the inability to fully describe the celestial realities they mean to express. The pedagogy here is the same: to communicate the experience of heavenly and spiritual realities in terms and images familiar to human experience.65

The gift of the Spirit inaugurates the era of Church and mission, the new epoch of salvation history, in place of the parousia. Panikkar comments that in this parousia-replacement, the mystical moment is circumvented, claiming rather that the Church is that moment itself when era, epoch, and history are circumvented by the experience of the divine energy. This important ecclesial shift in perspective, noted by Panikkar, is treated in Chapters Three and Four of this dissertation.66

But, who is it that rises in the ascension of the Kundalini fires? Who is it that is met? Who is it that is manifest in this kindling? Eliade comments about “magical fire” at great length in Shamanism. But his treatment of Tapas and Diksa in the Hindu tradition is most illuminating for the purposes of this essay on the energies. So, I include this note below that provides this pertinent background:67 How this heat relates to Christian

experience is best related, I believe, by a consideration of the Divine Energies, both created and Uncreated, of the Hesychasm. There are there careful distinctions made between created energies, and the Uncreated Energies of divine grace and essence in the Hesychast tradition. Yet, even with such distinctions, mutual knowledge and a certain identification between divine and mundane seems to be necessary for the consideration of such relationship even to exist.68

Part II: Tai Chi, an interview with a practitioner of this martial art.

The appearance of the energies in the Far East is nearly universal. Among the Chinese, the energies are the Chi. In order to make reference to this importance fact and to experience and to understand a metaphysical system whose practice depends almost entirely upon the energies I studied Tai Chi. The following summary of an interview with Sifu Joseph Crandall, concludes for me five years study of Tai Chi and related internal martial arts. Sifu Crandall is owner of the Xiaomian Mu school of Chinese martial arts in Berkeley.69 At the beginning of my study of Tai Chi, Sifu Crandall was Tai Chi instructor in the University of California, Berkeley’s widely respected Martial Arts Department. This study involved eight to ten hours per week of classes and practice for about two years during my Ph.D. comprehensive program. This practice is what I thought necessary for me to understand aspects of martial consciousness related to the themes of this dissertation. The interview/discourse seems to me a particularly valid presentation of this material given the traditional teacher-disciple relationship of this ancient discipline.

The warrior, discussed here under the auspices of the Tai Chi warrior, is a connecting theme of importance because it represents the function, in certain cultures, of the shift in a milieu of action. This contrasts with the more contemplative values enclosing the other traditions studied here. The warrior/hero theme is also a connecting element in “Nepsis,” which charts the author’s exposure to the shift of consciousness. As well, the Abstract Expressionists, who have greatly influenced the understandings developed here, viewed themselves and their world from the context of war and themselves as fighting a battle for ultimate meaning in the face of the martial horrors in the twentieth century.70 Further, European monasticism viewed monastic life as militant and his monks as warriors for God.71 The medieval knight errant wandered the realm doing good and heroic deeds, waiting for, seeking to do, God’s will, in a manner dependent upon the shift, i.e., seeking the Holy Grail.

I have chosen the Chinese martial systems represented by Tai Chi, also to make reference to the great spiritual schools of China and to compare to a small degree the Far East Asian approach to the body with that of India and the Christian Hesychasm. A full text of the Crandall interview may be found in Appendix 5 of this dissertation, p. 319. Suffice it to say here that Tai Chi and the philosophies that surround it, supply at the very least, an effective means of fighting. But as well, Tai Chi is a thorough body-mind-spirit system of address to the practical realities of the world and an integration of such material reality with states of absolute transcendence. Tai Chi as a system, was perfected according to the Taoist, Confucian, Buddhist integration that was current in the culture during the final development of this martial art, as noted in this interview. Though many of its adherents are Christians, Communists and Western Secularists now. As such, Tai Chi offers an unique opportunity to further investigate many of the religious traditions and elements, like the chi energies, connected with the shift of consciousness.

This chapter has dealt with my exposure to religious traditions pertinent to the conclusions of this dissertation. This chapter, along with the Section II on Panikkar’s work that follows, as well as parts of Chapter Five, provide for the reader a minimum of such necessary background, making select references to a vast corpus of religious, philosophical and artistic traditions.72

Back to Table of Contents
Forward to Section II: Panikar

1 Raimundo Panikkar, “Time and Sacrifice,” p.704.

2 Joan Halifax, Shamanic Voices (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1979) p. 3.

3 Transmythicization–acceptance into a culture’s mythic system elements of another culture. See Chapter Four, note #8, p. 82.

4 M. Eliade, Shamanism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1972) p. 4ff.

5 See Chapter Five, p. 105ff, Note #13, of this dissertation for further exploration of this term.

6 See introduction to this section, p. 20, and general introduction to the dissertation, p. 1, for dates and circumstances of research.

7 See Chapter Three of this dissertation, pg. 71ff.

8 G. M. Mullet, Spider Woman: Legends of the Hopi Indians, (Tucson, Az.: University of Arizona, 1991) p. 2. In January, 1994, I visited the Navaho reservation for a month, staying at St. Michael, Arizona. During a conversation with a Navaho herbalist, we began to discuss Spider Woman and Changing Woman. Spider Woman, in addition to the salvific role in the mythic evolution of “the people,” is also used by shamans in battle, to confuse the minds of the enemy. Changing Woman, on the other hand, is always benevolent, “like the Blessed Virgin Mary” according to my source. Information about Spider Woman came from research subsequent to my experience with the black widow spider in “Nepsis.” This conversation is on tape and in my possession.

9 See Chapter Three of this dissertation, and Panikkar, “Christian Mission and Inter-religious Dialogue,” Interculture, 1990.

10 The conflict between Buddhism and Shamanism is a subject of one of the Lama Dances in the Manirimdu festival which I attended at Chiwong monastery near Phablu, Nepal,, Fall 1992. See Elaine Brook, Chiwong Mani Rimdu. Peterchurch HR2 OTE, United Kingdom, Himalayan Travel Nurses Cottage, 1992.

11 See following essay in this chapter on Tantric Buddhism, p. 33ff.

12 Halifax, Shamanic Voices, p. 3.

13 Ibid., p. 208.

14 Ibid., p. 1.

15 Ibid., p. 1.

16 Ibid. p. 95. See also, John G. Neihardt, Black Elk Speaks, (Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1961), p. 20.

17 Eliade, Shamanism, p. 12.

18 Ibid., p. 32ff.

19 Ibid., p. 481.

20 Ibid., p. 482.

21 Ibid., p. 407.

22 Mark Taylor, Erring, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), p. 149ff.

23 See this dissertation, Section II: Panikkar, Chapter Two, p. 56, note #5.

24 Halifax, Shamanic Voices, p. 58.

25 Section II: Panikkar, p. 76, paragraph designated by #5.

26 Halifax, Shamanic Voices, p. 6.

27 One of the definitions of “nepsis” is “preparation” for spiritual experience, i.e. the Lord’s return, for example. Nepsis is New Testament Greek work meaning to be “awake, watchful, sober” as the five maidens with sufficient oil for their lamps were in Matt. 25, 1-13. This story indicates the formal preparation and practice that are necessary in the faith, as per talks given by Archbishop Timothy Kallistos Ware at Immaculate Heart Hermitage, Big Sur, Ca. Spring, 1977. Nepsis is a point of comparison with Buddhist notions about waking up that are central to the significance of meditation. These talks are on tape in the Hermitage archives.

28 Though Fr. Yang and these conversations were real, he is becoming a mythic figure. Mention of Fr. Yang in this dissertation is justified on several levels. He is a dramatic and fictional character here whose person introduces concepts pivotal in their mythografying importance to the conclusions in Chapter Seven. The presence of his character demonstrates the transition from actual to mythic or fictional or dream symbolism. As well, Fr. Yang represents spiritual or teaching authority that is personal as well as institutional. His presence here represents the understanding that the full human perceptive faculty is necessary for the accurate evaluation of knowledge, discursive and non discursive, as is stated in the conclusion in Chapter Seven of this dissertation His monastic obituary in Appendix 9 of this dissertation, p. 388, reinforces the conclusions in Chapter Seven by expressing the beneficial, gestalt influence of his life upon others.

29 For how Panikkar uses these terms, see general introduction to this dissertation, kenosis, p. 4 and Chapter Two in Section II of this dissertation for sunyata, p. 63.

30 Matus, Thomas. “Symeon the New Theologian and the Hesychastic ‘Method,'” 1975. Diakonia.

31 Philip Rawson, The Art of Tantra, (Vikas Publishing House, London, 1973) p. 160. An interesting connection here is that, according to some authorities, the Tibetan Buddhist mandala and stupa derive from the Vedic altar and that Aryan/Dravidian format from the sacred space or sanctuary of the Mesopotamian [Sumerian] Ziggurat.

32 Robinson, Richard and Johnson, Willard L. The Buddhist Religion, (Encino, California: Dikenson Publishing Company, Inc., 1977) p. 116-123.

33 Ibid., p. 117

34 Ibid., p.121

35 Ibid.

36 Generally, the Hesychasm is a monastic movement whose origin goes back to the “Fathers of the Desert” in the third century, and is probably the major school of mysticism in Byzantine Christianity. See especially, Meyendorff, John . Saint Gregory Palamas and Orthodox spiritually. (New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1974). P. 117ff.

37 Mark Taylor, Erring, p. 149ff.

38 Chapter Three, this dissertation, p. 86ff.

39 L. Sabbath, The Radiant Heart, (Denville, N.J.: Dimension Books, 1977) p. 31ff.

40 Matus, Thomas. “Symeon the New Theologian and the Hesychastic ‘Method,” 1975. Diakonia.

41 G. Maloney, forward to L. Sabbath’s Radiant Heart, p. 8. “All humans seeking to touch the Transcendent Absolute in their lives have used techniques to accomplish this. Singing, chanting, dancing, using candles, incense, music, vestments, art work, and sacred places of withdrawal from the daily profane, sacraments and sacramentals have always been used in Christian and non-Christian groups.

The basic intent of such techniques is to have man move from a state of habitual outward dispersion toward multiplicity and to enter instead into a state of recollection. Recollection is disciplined concentration on one’s habitual consciousness to expand into deeper levels of consciousness. Man must learn to relax and, in a prayerful context of faith, hope and love, allow his unconscious to be brought into an integrated union with his consciousness.

The Christian East never dichotomized the human person into separated parts. Thus we find a healthier attitude among such Christians toward an “incarnational” use of bodily techniques in prayer to integrate the Christian as a total bodied, souled, spirited being in adoration before the transcendent, indwelling god.”

42 See essay on Buddhism in Appendix 3 of this dissertation, p. 256, for the Buddhist use of such “analogy”, p. 258, in meditation.

43 G. Tucci, Theory and Practice of the Mandala, (New York, 1969): See the Shreechakra Mandala in Tucci’s Appendix plate III. Especially the Shreechakra Mandala draws the connection between individual and cosmos though this is a practice in every mandala offering. One of the preliminary exercises in Tsa Lung, as taught to me by Paltrul Rimpoche, at the Nyingma monastery in Derha Dun, U.P. India, July, 1980, is to imagine oneself as small as an atom or as large as the universe for long periods of time in preparation for the more complicated visualizations associated with the prostrations and other initiatory exercises associated with Tsa Lung. This particular exercise is meant to help free oneself from quantitative notions about self and universe.

44 L. Sabbath, Radiant Heart, p. 21. St. Macarius: “The heart governs and reigns over the whole bodily organism; and when grace possesses the ranges of the heart, it rules over all the members and the thoughts. For there, in the heart, is the mind, and all the thoughts of a soul and its expectation; and in this way grace penetrates also to all the members of the body. Within the heart are unfathomable depths. There are reception rooms and bed chambers in it, doors and porches, and many offices and passages. In it is the work shop of righteousness and wickedness. In it is death; in it is life. The heart is Christ’s palace: there Christ the King comes to take his rest, with the angels and the spirits of the saints, and He dwells there, walking within it and placing his Kingdom there.

The heart is but a small vessel; and yet dragons and lions are there, and there poisonous creatures and all the treasures of wickedness; rough, uneven paths are there and gaping chasms. There, likewise, is God, there are the angels, there life and the Kingdom, there light and the apostles, the heavenly cities and the treasures of grace; all things are there.” It is an easy step to take to compare this palace of the heart with the characteristics of the Tantric Mandala Palace. See essay on the Mandala in the Appendix 4 of this dissertation.

45 A. Avalon, (Sir John Woodruf). Serpent Power, p. 72.

46 See essay on Buddhism in this chapter, p. 30.

47 See essay on “Energies” in this chapter, p. 45.

48 John Meyendorff, Saint Gregory Palamas and Orthodox Spirituality, p. 117-121. The information in the following passage of two and one half pages about the Hesychasm, except where cited differently, is taken from Meyendorff as indicated.

49 Compare this to the analogic practice in the essay on Buddhist meditation in the Appendix, p. 258.

50 Ponticus Evagrius, Chapters on Prayer. Translator, John Eudes Bamberger, (Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications, 1970), from, Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos: Chapters on Prayer.

51 Myendorff, Gregory Palamas and Orthodox Spirituality, p. 117-121.

52 Ibid. Re: Theandric: this concept can be compared with Panikkar’s Cosmotheandric. Panikkar’s ideas here seem to parallel and combine with Taylor’s direction in Erring, p. 149 and with the more ancient notions found in the Hesychasm.

53 Byzantine (Orthodox) monasticism, see Chapter Four in this dissertation p. 96, re: Freedom.

54 Practicing the “presence of God” is of course a basic contemplative attitude. But my reference here carries an artistic anecdote. Fr. Yang advised me that since I, an artist, was becoming a Catholic, I would have to overlook a lot of bad art and bad design in churches. I should just put myself in the presence of God when I was in a Catholic church. Whatever the aesthetic merit or deficiency, the holiness of the place offered a special opportunity for spiritual experience.

55 Leonid Ouspensky, Vladimir Lossky, The Meaning of Icons. (New York: State Mutual Books; London, Mawbry Books, 1981), p. 34 .

56 Ibid., p.56.

57 This information about the Fire Shaman is from a conversation with a Navaho woman and an Acoma man about types of shamans at St. Michael, Arizona, January, 1994. In this situation, the “fire” is more than symbolic. The hands of these medicine men heat to high temperatures as they heal according to the practices handed down from their ancestors. Bone Pressers and Hand Tremblers are other types of Native American shamans in the Southwest. All, I believe, use different manifestations of the energies. This conversation is on tape, in my possession.

58 Dragon symbol as life principle in the Orient, is related, in a positive light, to the serpentine seraphs of the Old Testament, (McKenzie, John. Dictionary of the Bible, New York: MacMillan Publishing Co., p. 789.) and to the curative brazen serpent, also of the Old testament, and to the snake symbol of the (energy) goddess Kundalini, (Sir John Woodruffe–A. Avalon, Serpent Power, New York: Dover Publications Inc., 1974), and many other positive references, such as the Caduceus of the Medical Profession. The snake or dragon is not necessarily a reference to the evil serpent-dragon of the Book of Revelation, but is definitely connected to the element of deity, fire.

59 Starhawk, The Spiral Dance (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979) p. 129.

60 Mark Taylor, Erring, p. 172. “All we can experience is signs and signs of signs.”

61 Scholem, Gershom Gerhard. Messianic Idea in Judaism. (New York: Schocken Books, 1971) p. 44. Scholem continues: “sparks from the divine light” are “the forces of holiness”(p. 45). “Adam, Noah, Abraham, the Torah are all in order to restore the Holy sparks to their right place.” (P. 67.) “A man can indeed lift up the three parts of his soul in every sphere and restore them to his own root by proper action. Here we have the sparks of his soul migrating into parts of his immediate surroundings where they wait for him to be restored to their proper place.” (P. 88) “A man who has so lifted up his sparks is called a “master of the holy soul.” “God takes care to let everyone meet the sparks that belong to his own root.” (P. 189.)

“Every man is responsible for the special world that is his own. No one can do the work of his fellow man, no one can do the work that is not his own.” (P. 190) “The environment of a man is a special world of his sparks.” (P. 190) “Only the Zaddik [holy man] or he who attains the state of ‘devekut’ (communion with God) is granted the privilege of meeting the sparks of his own soul. ‘Ba’al Shem’ (p. 192) “The Zaddik has the power to annihilate the forces of severity and rigor (evil) by getting down to their root and sweetening them at their original plane. This is a kind of reversal of the lifting up of the sparks: he faces the dark powers at their root and transforms them by meditating on the element of holiness which is inherent in them.” (P. 190)

“Vital, Hayyim–you ought to know that a Zaddik is able by his deeds to reassemble the sparks of his nefesh, his ruch or his neshamahand to lift them up from the depth of the ‘husks.'” (p. 191). “…either Israel will have the power to withdraw all the sparks of holiness from the realm of the ‘kepipah’ so that the Kelipah will wither into nothing, or else the Kelipah will become… filled with holiness…”(p.195) “For the Hasidim, realization, the seizing of reality, was a precarious enterprise. Under the strain of such realization, as it is contained in the teaching of ‘lifting up the sparks’, ‘reality’ itself might break open giving way to the Messianic reality” (p. 143).

62 McKenzie, Dictionary of Bible, (New York: MacMillian Publishing Co., 1977) P. 789.

63 Venerable Paltrul Rimpoche, abbot of the Nyingma monastery in Derha Dun, U.P., India. Study with Paltrul Rimpoche, July, 1980, is recorded in notes in possession of the candidate.

64 Sir John Woodroffe, (A. Avalon), Serpent Power.,p. 69.

65 R. Brown, Jerome Biblical Commentary, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1968), 44:20,2-4. P. 731. Also see, Liddell and Scott’s An Intermediate Greek English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992) p. 908, Hosai = “just as if” or “as though.”

66 In this dissertation especially see, Chapter Three, p. 77, and Chapter Four, p. 97.

67 Eliade, Shamanism, p. 412-414. “The same continuity between ritual and ecstasy is also found in connection with another conception, which plays a considerable a role in pan-Indian ideology: tapas, whose original meaning is “extreme heat” but which came to designate ascetic effort in general. Tapas is definitely documented in the Rg-Veda, and its powers are creative on both the cosmic and the spiritual plane; through tapas the ascetic becomes clairvoyant and even incarnates the gods. Prajapati creates the world by “heating” himself to an extreme degree through asceticism; he creates it, that is, by a sort of magical sweating. The “inner heat” or “mystical heat” is creative: it results in a kind of magical power that, even when not manifested directly as a cosmogony (cf. the myth of Prajapati) “creates” on a lesser cosmic plane; for example, it creates the countless illusions or miracles of the ascetic and yogin (magical flight, negation of physical law, disappearance, etc.).

Now, “inner heat” forms an integral part of the technique of “primitive” magicians and shamans; everywhere in the world acquisition of “inner heat” is expressed by a “mastery over fire” and, in the last analysis, by the abrogation of physical laws–which is as much as to say that the duly “heated” magician can perform “miracles,” can create new conditions of existence in the cosmos, and in some measure repeat the cosmogony. Regarded from this point of view, Prajapati becomes one of the archetypes of “magicians.” This excess of heat was obtained either by meditating close to a fire–and this ascetic method became extraordinarily esteemed in India–or by holding the breath. It is scarcely necessary to say that respiratory technique and holding the breath had a large place in organizing the complex of ascetic practices and of magical, mystical, and metaphysical techniques that are included under the general term Yoga.

Tapas, in the sense of ascetic effort, is an essential part of every form of Yoga, and we consider it important, in passing, to note its “shamanic” implications. We shall later see that “mystical heat,” in the proper sense of the term, has great importance in Himalayan and Tibetan Tantric Yoga. We will, however, add that the tradition of classic Yoga employs the “power” conferred by prandydma (breath control) as a “cosmogony in reverse,” in the sense that, instead of leading to the creation of new universe (that is, of new “mirages” and “miracles”), this power enables the yogin to detach himself from the world and even to destroy it in some measure. Yogic liberation is equivalent to completely breaking all ties with the cosmos; for a jivan-mukta, the universe no longer exists, and if he projected his own process on the cosmological plane he would witness a total re absorption of the cosmic forces in the first substance (prakrti) and a return to the undifferentiated state that existed before creation. All this goes very far beyond the horizon of “shamanic” ideology; but it seems to us significant that Indian spirituality, seeking a means of metaphysical liberation, employed a technique of archaic magic reputedly able to abolish physical laws and play a part in the very constitution of the universe. But tapas is not an ascetic exercise confined to “ecstatics”; it forms part of lay religious experience. For thesoma sacrifice requires the officiant and his wife to perform the diska, a consecration rite that involves tapas. Diska comprises ascetic vigil, meditation in silence, fasting, and also “heat” (tapas), and this period of “consecration” could continue for from one or two days to a year. Now, the soma sacrifice is one of the most important in Vedic and Brahmanic India; this is as much as to say that asceticism to the end of ecstasy necessarily forms part of the religious life of the entire Indian people. Continuity between ritual and ecstasy, already observed in connection with the rites of ascent performed by lay persons and of the mystical flight of the ecstatics, is also found on the plane of the tapas. It remains to inquire if Indian religious life, as a whole and with all the symbolisms that it includes, is a creation–“degraded” in a measure, in order to become accessible to the profane–produced by a series of ecstatic experiences on the part of a few privileged persons, or if, on the contrary, the ecstatic experience of the latter is only the result of an effort toward “interiorization” of certain cosmo-theological schemas that precede it. The problem is pregnant with consequences, but it lies beyond the sphere of the history of Indian religions as well as the subject of the present study.”

68 Panikkar, p.4, note #11, this dissertaion.

69 Sifu Crandall has translated many martial arts texts from Chinese into English. Pertinent literature available for this nearly non-literary tradition is listed in the bibliography.

70 Stephen Polcari, Abstract Expressionsism and the Modern Experience, (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1991), p. xxi.

71 P. L Travers. “Le Chevalier Perdu,” Parabola, Sp. 1991. Claude J. Peifer, O.S.B. Monastic Spirituality, (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press) p. 182.

72 Because of the multiple categories and sheer volume of expertise under consideration here, the accuracy of these ambient references does not depend alone upon my intuitive sensibilities or my research to represent these great traditions of human understanding and expression. This accuracy also depends upon verification from the dissertation committee members, outside readers, and other respondents, including Raimundo Panikkar, chosen for their particular expertise in the different themes of this dissertation as is further developed in Part II of Chapter Six, 151.