the underground man

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I did actually learn something from you today - namely, the existence of the

• function. Never took any notice of it before. So - thanks!

Funny enough he learned the trick recently from reading my posts. I'm been pioneering spacing techniques for a while now. It's sad how little new comes from Alex actually, at best he can summarise a book he's read pretty neatly but when you praise him for it he goes off summarising all those he didn't read. He can't stop!

[AlyOshA]

By Hongs' volumes - do you mean "The Essential Kierkegaard"? Thank you for offering the PDF but I'm sure I can get a copy from my library (I'm sort of old fashioned in that I still enjoy lugging around a big brick and thumbing through it in my spare time - I have no idea why someone would want a Kindle or whatever, not that I'm suggesting you do).

[Diebert van Rhijn]

What is the point of mentioning this?

He's also a member at this forum! And I helped him with his site. The larger point was that you don't have to think there's no awareness of the multiplicity of interpretation out there. Just don't get lost in it.

But what really is one to take away from them? What is the existential value?

That is not what "existential" means in this context. Anyway, in the context of this forum the question should be: what really is taken away from you?

All I can tell you, man, is that the roads of life are long and one way or another learning comes.

The learning never stops if you keep adding. If you want to learn essentials you have to learn to strip, drop away, discovery unity and even when unity would be not there: command it.

implying that I need to read whatever crap you read to get familiarity

I'm afraid it was all meant rhetorical, and the points - all my points ever - were only meant to destroy your argumentation.

Do you really think I wanted you to read even more? No, the point was to demonstrate how your argument on how the supposed Gospel-Christian essentials in Kierkegaard would express a completely different universe than the orientation of someone like Quinn or Kelly was merely presumption, just some unverified, blank statements. Especially because I know mainstream theology and the gospels quite well, as well as the Christian orientation within Kierkegaard's work and that's why I knew for sure your statements were just desperation, just posturing, overreaching.

But what can I teach you then? Not much. And aren't we all teaching with every breath we utter towards each other, consciously or not? But let me try to explain about unity. As a psychological property: the "peace making", the ability to see unity where others see diversion or division, lies at the core of any spiritual principle. The reason it's possible to "see" elements in Kierkegaard which elude the majority of analysts, and then combine them with elements in Nietzsche, Jesus, Lao Tzu, Socrates, Hakuin, etc, is nothing but seeing underlying unity, that which made the brilliance of the author possible in the first place - who went on inspiring many more, mostly those oblivious to the unity.

While analysts are wondering and warning on the dangerous diversity and contradictions in a work of Nietzsche or Kierkegaard, or the Gospels, I've never had any problem with it: all parts seemed clearly related and coherent, it was all repeating the same vision. It took me a while in my twenties to verify it wasn't just my imagination, verification outward comparing notes with academic analysis as well inward; but in the end it was my own unity which recognised another one shining through.

And unity seems something that one is born with, not something that is earned after hard work. The hard work is only involved in unlearning divisiveness and distractions, all piled upon us during developing years. But, currently I believe only a few people are born with unity intact, or at least with a strong enough sense to keep it intact, growing up into a dividing world.

No matter how high or low an intellectual jumps, someone like that can only move into the direction of diversity, repetitive pointing out the wildly varying viewpoints on a manifold of subjects. But this whole direction is opposite to spirituality. Instead, going for true essence, underlying unity, even when it forcefully has to be drawn out, almost invented on places where it might seem missing, that's how it needs to be done. Until every word one says becomes reflected into all the other ones with no discord.

[Kelly Jones]

AlyOshA,

The title is "The Journals and Papers of Soren Kierkegaard", and it is seven volumes including one volume as index. This page is the first volume on Amazon.com, with ISBN (etc.) at the bottom of the page.

I very much doubt it, but you may be able to take the whole set home to read, from a public library.

The last two autobiographical volumes are on this site. Kevin made a single PDF of these files, which I have somewhere.


...

[AlyOshA]

Oh those 7 volumes are not cheap. That's quite a commitment... I might have to file that away on the "things to do before I die" list, along with being good at playing chess. Consequently, the 9 volumes of Vivekananda's writings are REALLY cheap. India puts out some subsidized editions so anyone can afford them. We need more altruistic Kierkegaard enthusiasts out there.

[Talking Ass]

Here is the set I have: Soren Kierkegaard: Journals and Papers (7 volumes) This set sells used for $250.00 which isn't bad. If $250.00 stood between myself and Wisdom, I'd find a way to get the money. ;-)

[Talking Ass]

Every once in a while, when one explodes through the layers, some interesting things come out. It is a combination of the sincere, the absurd, the theatrical and as Diebert says 'the overblown'.

Kelly writes: Calling me "little sister" or "sisterly helpmate" is real sick."

I don't get the impression that you do irony very well, Kelly. It is almost hilarious, in my view, that Quinn and Solway have devised an intellectual and ethical program---which could become an Internet email course for zealous, pimply-faced adolescents---that is so bound up with a misogynistic position and have brought you into the fold as their 'project' on female protoplasm. If things turn out well, you may decide yourself, in the name of Wisdom and Evolution, to avail yourself to insemination so that---to really cap the project! to really demonstrate your commitment!---the REAL ubermench can finally walk upon ex-God's Earth; leaning into the wind as he sets his eyes on the jagged peaks in the Zarathustra stage-setting, with looming pine-trees cut from giant sections of cardboard and painted deep green. These images just come into my mind as if unbidden, I'm sorry! Now I've got the one of the fake Halloween beard that Nat came up with! I can see Diebert and the Twins Ryan/Nick and even perhaps Diebert's Kierkegaard buddy, wearing nothing but leather butt-chaps with chrome spikes, under the leaden clouds as the thunder grumbles, trudging up the mountain pass ... and you are there too, and you also have a little fake beard on! And your 7 volumes of Kierkegaard's works! Obviously, you'd need a donkey to carry them, and so there I am following docily behind you, with all the crew's otherworldly belongings strapped on my back, cursing, like Kierkegaard's father, the cruel divinity that 'caused' me to end up with such a strange, strange fate.

Isn't there just an itsy-bitsy teeny-weeny bit of humor in this? No? :-(

In all truth, there are many people you 'irritate' and is often the case we have a hard time seeing clearly why we produce the effects we do. Often we just don't want to look squarely and directly at the 'facts of the case' because it hurts us to do so, so we find the fault in the other. You could not at this point actually understand the nature (and gravity) of the critique I offer of the QRS trip. The things that I am saying, in your case and the case of a number of others, will take YEARS for you to process. I don't do this for the short-haul. And I can't really say I do it for you. I am convinced (and I say this, often) that it is important to establish and 'give energy to' other 'conceptual pathways' to envision and to live spiritual life.

I find it very, very peculiar that you have written so eloquently, and with feeling, the following:

"It's an attempt to belittle and mock a female who is serious, intelligent, and strong-minded. It's as if you regard all women as nothingnesses, so when you find one that irritates you, you try to squash her into a similar subservient role --- or, you totally ignore her, to send the message that she is a nothing, a mere house-fly buzzing irritatingly at the window. It's a form of murder."

As to 'nothingness', Quinn's whole trip, and the one you have taken on, is intimately bound to 'nothingness'. You are, in fact, nothing. You have no basis on which to construct, define or defend your self. Do a little meditation on that...

[Suddenly, with a tremendous blinding flash, lightening strikes! A Kierkegaardian Talking Donkey-God makes his opinion known! Surrender! Submit!]

I suggest to you that your 'real enemy' here is not me. QRS define a position in which 'woman' is utterly and absolutely locked into her role. To define the intellect, to possess it, to administer it, is to have an unassailable position. The fact of the matter is that it is not I who has such an orientation but your own Masters. Women---all women---'buzz irritatingly at the windows' of the QRS construct. In a very real sense, and principally via their extreme impersonalism, that is to say lack of personalism, as well as their contempt and hatred of women as child-bearer, and the whole world of the family, the world of human interrelatedness, and their contemptuous denial of the relevancy and 'necessity' of emotion and feeling: this dear is where the murder takes place. I personally believe that we have to accept our human selves, accept that we need to work in our family, that we cannot define a path (of any durability) that does not address our relatedness in all senses (and it is 'pathological' to attempt to do so). If you really examined a little closer what I have written over these years you would at least get a sense of my 'program'.

"Your view of women is deeply unfair, since you believe that a female who is clearly a reason-loving person, and supportive of others she sees as reasonable, is merely playing dress-ups and dabbling like a three-year-old."

You know that I don't accept what you call 'reason' as a desired platform. (If you want to understand how I would define 'sanity' and 'balance' in human life you'd have to open up a conversation where that could be discussed.)

You must clearly see that, if the truth were to be told, I see you and the QRS (but QRS as ringleaders, along with other figures like, say, Diebert) as playing a game of dress-up. It IS true (and I have explained this) that I see women as taking the lead from men and rarely if ever the other way around, and so my essential 'condemnation' is directed to Quinn and Solway and Rowden (etc.)

PS: 'Sisterly Helpmate' was, alas, Robert's.

[Talking Ass]

• The Augsburg Confession divides repentance into two parts: "One is contrition, that is, terrors smiting the conscience through the knowledge of sin; the other is faith, which is born of the Gospel, or of absolution, and believes that for Christ's sake, sins are forgiven, comforts the conscience, and delivers it from terrors."

___________________________________________________

Kelly wrote: "Alex, when you say I'm off track with my responses about Kierkegaard, you're only shooting the messenger. My response was pretty much literally what Kierkegaard wrote. But I didn't merely copy and paste. The messenger cannot be a messenger who has not immersed themselves wholly, wholly, wholly in penitence. There is no truth in abstraction, in saying "he said that" or "that is Kierkegaard". There is absolutely no way one can hope to understand him, unless one lives and experiences self-denial, the abandonment of finitude. It isn't "Kierkegaardian". For God's sake, if you had only understood anything of what he has left us, you would never misrepresent him like that." [My italics added].

Well now we are getting somewhere!

• Main Entry: pen·i·tence
  Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French penitance, from Medieval Latin poenitentia, alteration of Latin paenitentia regret, from paenitent-, paenitens, present participle
  Date: 13th century
  Definition: The quality or state of being penitent : sorrow for sins or faults; synonyms penitence, repentance, contrition, compunction, remorse mean regret for sin or wrongdoing. penitence implies sad and humble realization of and regret for one's misdeeds. 'Absolution is dependent upon sincere penitence'.

With your worldview, I simply cannot even imagine how you construct a need for penance. 'Penance and repentance, similar in their derivation and original sense, have come to symbolize conflicting views of the essence of repentance, arising from the controversy as to the respective merits of "faith" and "good works."

• "In a sacramental understanding of the term, "penance" applies to the whole activity from confession to absolution. Generally speaking, however, it is used to characterize the works of satisfaction imposed or recommended by the priest on or to the penitent. Traditionally, penance has been viewed as a punishment (the Latin poena, the root of pen(it)ance, means "punishment"), and varying with the character and heinousness of the offences committed. In the feudal era "doing penance" often involved severe, often public, discipline, which could be both harsh and humiliating but was considered edifying. Public penances have, however, long been abolished. Traditional forms still include prayers, while corporal punishments such as the wearing of a cilice and public humiliations have become rare, even in monastic practice. More recently, taking in account the insights of pastoral theology and psychology, penances have tended to move towards acts that positively or negatively reinforce the penitent's behaviour".

• "Penance" also refers to acts that a believer imposes on him or herself outside of the sacramental context. Penitential activity is particularly common during the season of Lent and Holy Week (mainly the Passion week, inspired by Christ's suffering; hence in some cultural traditions still including flagellantism or even voluntary pseudo-crucifixion) and, to a lesser extent, Advent, when penance is often combined with acts of self-discipline, such as fasting, voluntary celibacy, or other privations. In the Roman Catholic tradition especially, such acts of self-denial are sometimes called mortification of the flesh because of the belief that an unrestrained corporeal body endangers salvation, unless controlled by the spirit, serving to detach the penitent of his worldly passions, as to draw him into closer union with God."

I really like the 'pseudo-crucifixion' reference! I've never tried it myself, what's it like?

You have provided with this reference an opening into the core psychology of QRS! I have always been under the impression that they are, and that their trip is, a sublimation of a form of Calvinism, and now all the elements are on the table. We have punishment and self-afflicted punishment 'outside of the sacramental context'. We have the notion of penance as being 'inspired by Christ's suffering'. We have a way of viewing self-dicipline, 'voluntary celibacy', and privations generally. And the real beauty! Mortification of the flesh 'because of the belief that an unrestrained corporeal body endangers salvation, unless controlled by the spirit, serving to detach the penitent of his worldly passions, as to draw him into closer union with God'.

Well, well. In my last entry we were all trudging up the long long hill to the Zarathustrian Heights, but now we have additional and very much more theatrical props! Everyone is fasting and starved and their ribs poke through their tattered tunics! Diebert and David brandish whips like in The Seventh Seal! It's all so 13th Century my skin crawls! Shrieks, the curving flight of ravens, the howling of winds in the crags, huge drops of cold rain! And poor Kelly! Blood trickling out of her mouth! Lonesome eyes turned up to Heaven, the silent, inner roar of God's 'inverse dialectic'! The masochistic sacrifice! Religious virgins! Hermits! Recluses! Zennish pilgrims! QRS and GF as a Penitential Order!

Oh! Oh!

[Talking Ass]

• Our good-buddy Climicus has written: "To demonstrate the existence of someone who exists is the most shameless assault, since it is an attempt to make him ludicrous, but the trouble is that one does not even suspect this, that in dead seriousness one regards it as a godly undertaking. How could it occur to anyone to demonstrate that he exists unless one has allowed oneself to ignore him; and now one does it in an even more lunatic way by demonstrating his existence right in front of his nose."
  
  C. Stephen Evans: "If Kierkegaard were alive today, he would doubtless have new, creative ideas for dealing with the situation [of evangelism], and he certainly would urge us to use our creativity to develop new strategies for encountering our contemporaries" ... "and I believe that Alex Jacob, aka Talking Ass, is carrying on this work with real intellectual integrity which is only eclipsed by his creativity and panache. And damn, he is funnnnnnn-ney.

_______________________________________________________

[Laying down rosary] So much work! It never ends! I do not complain though or grumble too much...

Diebert writes: "...the point was to demonstrate how your argument on how the supposed Gospel-Christian essentials in Kierkegaard would express a completely different universe than the orientation of someone like Quinn or Kelly was merely presumption..."

I assert and I maintain that Soren Kierkegaard defined himself as a Chrisitian, as a disciple of the flesh-and-blood Jesus who existed as the atonement for human sin, and whose humanistic value-structure was directly derived from the Biblical values. I assert and maintain that, like many who have come to Kierkegaard, and independently of Kierkegaard, and under the influence of a whole host of motives, people have selected aspects of Kierkegaard and have 'privelaged' them, and on that foundation constructed a platform 'for their own use'. I can easily see how someone, lacking the relationship to the 'core' of the Bible revelation and teachings---personalism, ethics, humanitarianism---could concoct from Kierkegaard's writing an atheistic existentialism (or call it what you will) and take this in whatever direction they wanted to. I do see that. I suggest that, as they do with EVERY FIGURE who they get their hands on (most recently I refer you to David's utter reinterpretation of Ramakrishna which I suggest is nearly absolutely incredible!), this is exactly what QRS have done with Kierkegaard. It is imperative to deny all aspects of the Judeo-Christian revelation that do not fit into their program and to 'purify' K's own relationship to 'all that'. That is pretty much the beginning and end of my statement. If you can argue against that with specific references I am quite happy to entertain it.

"No matter how high or low an intellectual jumps, someone like that can only move into the direction of diversity, repetitive pointing out the wildly varying viewpoints on a manifold of subjects. But this whole direction is opposite to spirituality. Instead, going for true essence, underlying unity, even when it forcefully has to be drawn out, almost invented on places where it might seem missing, that's how it needs to be done. Until every word one says becomes reflected into all the other ones with no discord."

I am not sure what to think of this or what came before it in your post. I think I agree that an intellectual as intellectual will 'always' move toward 'diversity'. But I do not agree that what an intellectual does must needs be different from what the 'spiritual person' does. But really, more than anything, the core difference I have with you and Quinn is that you do not define and 'defend' or even understand a whole wide group of 'things' about human beings. I use the 'gospel' example principally to demonstrate this. You take out and you 'sacrifice' the quintessential elements and you privelage other, abstract elements, and in this way you 'invent a lie'. You have bought into it substantially yourself, and it is my impression that like a 'rhetorical machine' you are forced to defend a whole direction you have taken.

While I agree with the concept of 'underlying unity' (between all spheres) I believe that you work with 'underlying selectivity' and you do this 'for your won purposes'.

[jupiviv]

Denmark has since been transformed from a pious Christian state to one of the most atheistic states in the world. So there may be something in it, after all.

I think that's because they've become affluent and secure since then and no longer need a universal, all-powerful father-figure to give a semblance of meaning and hope to their otherwise meaningless and miserable lives.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Denmark has since been transformed from a pious Christian state to one of the most atheistic states in the world. So there may be something in it, after all.

I think that's because they've become affluent and secure since then and no longer need a universal, all-powerful father-figure to give a semblance of meaning and hope to their otherwise meaningless and miserable lives.

When it comes to "belief in a spirit or life force", the Scandinavians are still going strong (source). For "true" atheists, look at France, Germany and Benelux instead!

Or perhaps it has something to do with the State church with its special church tax, which is rumored that it only could be avoided once by registering specifically elsewhere or specifically as "non-believer". There are other reasons to believe their lack of separation between church and state has hollowed out the religious tradition faster, in the age of individualism, and of course : existentialism, thanks Kierk!

[jupiviv]

For "true" atheists, look at France, Germany and Benelux instead!

I don't think you can categorise the general population of any country as being "true" atheists, because people have a lot of false beliefs regardless of whether they believe in God or not.

Many a person believes he has become free of the one God, because he has devoted himself to several others. - Otto Weininger.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I don't think you can categorise the general population of any country as being "true" atheists, because people have a lot of false beliefs regardless of whether they believe in God or not.

With the qualifier "true" I was only emphasizing the distinction made in the referenced table. And being atheist doesn't generally mean a complete lack of false beliefs. The term 'enlightened' might apply in that case. And they could fit in any category while they'd belong in none.

[AlyOshA]

Just out of curiosity, can we have a show of hands how many people have actually read all seven volumes of Kierkegaard's Journals and Papers?

Mr. DQ I think I finally see the main point at which we diverge and in seeing that difference I wonder if it's even fruitful to discuss such a thing. Well, certainly no harm can come of it even if no good is possible either.

I like that. Very nicely phrased and expressing an important truth.

You agreed with my "GS" which is not surprising because after reading your descriptions I kinda figured we were in some type agreement about the philosophical understanding of God. But to me philosophical "wisdom" and "truth" is only one aspect of the absolute wisdom and truth. When you philosophize about something you are attempting to label and analyze an experience and often divorce yourself from the actuality of that experience. There is a benefit to doing this but you also temporarily lose something in the process. For instance when you see a tree, the mind automatically pulls up the identification memory of "what" a tree is and for most people they now see the mental conception of their previous identifications with trees and no longer see the "true" form of that exact living energetic manifestation in that exact place and time. To go a step farther one might cut the tree in half and try to label the ring's of the tree to identify it's age, they might rip the leaves off and extract the chlorophyll to identify the photosynthesis, so now they have further and further dissected and labeled each aspect of a tree, causing a greater understanding of the physical process of trees IN GENERAL but ultimately divorcing themselves from the actual "experience" of one particular tree - here and now.

The famous Semiologist Alfred Korzybski proposed that we evolved to understand the world through symbols, then through symbols of symbols then through analysis and categorizations of symbols and so on and so forth until we are so far removed from reality that we no longer live in reality. We loose our "connection" through layers upon layers of intellectual disassociation and abstraction. 99.9% of us can't even think clearly. When something happens to us or some kind of event occurs (no matter how complex or simple) of the 100 billion pieces of information surrounding that event our brain can only process maybe 15 pieces of information. With that 15 pieces of information we intellectualize and categorize it into something that is "useful" to us or that we can "learn" from. So maybe we keep 2 pieces of information. We further distance ourselves by labeling those 2 pieces of information with words (an abstract association). Then we analyze those words and re-categorize them by adding layers upon layers of personal biases and discrepancies until what we are left with is so far removed from that actual event that it becomes farcical to even associate with the actual event.

This is my verbose and roundabout way of saying that ultimately philosophical "wisdom" is a distanced or abstracted form of wisdom. I agree that it is possible for philosophy to lead someone to the actuality but the very nature of philosophy is to analyze, label, and dissect - layer upon layer of removing yourself from physical reality. Notice as you are writing your post, you loose awareness of the feeling of the key board as each finger touches it, you don't pay attention to the smells in the room, the sound of traffic in the distance, the hum of the computer, the point where your feet gently kiss the ground underneath, the experience of each breath you inhale and exhale. You are going further and further into a movie of reality, deeper and deeper into a "thinking" form of abstraction.

Though we might agree on our conception of how to "understand" God we disagree about our method of experiencing God. Which is perfectly fine since experience is significant only in a subjective sense. Hence, the futile act of "discussing" it.

But I never use them to capture or contain anything, or to construct dogmatic edifices.

I could be wrong in my accusations. But they are only my attempt to elicit discussion. Admittedly or not you enjoy a "challenge" so I try to provide one.

Like Alex, you must have a singularly low opinion of Jesus.....

Actually I have a singularly VERY high opinion of Jesus. I was only joking when I said I was not going to be a Christ figure and help you realize that ""As long as his self-analysis is not complete, man argues with much ado. But he becomes silent when he completes it. When the empty pitcher has been filled with water, when the water inside the pitcher becomes one with the water of the lake outside, no more sound is heard. Sound comes from the pitcher as long as the pitcher is not filled with water." I was hoping that an arrogant statement like that would be construed as humor, but I have long ago realized that I am the only one laughing at my jokes and that ultimately my humor is not effective on others...

I actually know some of Jesus's principles that you can agree with by listening to your podcast "Christian Faith and Logic". But I think where our spiritual perspectives diverge is in the understanding of the following principles:

Luke 17:20-21
Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, "The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, 'Here it is,' or 'There it is,' because the kingdom of God is within you."

1 Corinthians 6:19
Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;

John 6
"I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 3:6
Those born of flesh are flesh, those born of spirit are spirit.

In my perspective, there is an all-pervading spirit that can be experienced in a physical sense, in a conscious sense, in an energetic sense, in the world of phenomena and in the world of knowledge and wisdom. My particular "way" is not isolated to the world of phenomena or the world of wisdom, it is more holistic and within and beyond the limitations of wisdom and experience. I knew of an exceptionally advanced human being who among other things was a grand master in Aikido martial arts. He could "wow" his students with super physical feats (or parlor tricks as you like to call it). But he also had a profound understanding of the "energy" of life. He NEVER lost against an opponent because, as he would say, "when you fight me you are not fighting "me" you are fighting the universe - how can you defeat the universe". He was so advanced in these regards that before he passed away he told his top students "I am sorry to tell you that this art will die with me". Meaning that none of his top students developed an applicable understanding to the degree that he had. Humans are evolving within their lifetime and overall in the biological sense. Likewise, consciousness is evolving. You may think that you have reached a mountaintop and that you will not evolve towards a better understanding than what you've already obtained, but I assure you that you are still advancing, and that by claiming that you've reached the mountaintop, you have absolved yourself to stagnating your growth. The reason I respect you is that despite this fact, you've still chosen a path more difficult, rigorous, and courageous than most. I just wish you would humble yourself to the position of a climber, one who still has much to learn in regards to "truth". I am a climber. And I intend to consider myself a climber until the moment that my physical form ceases to be and my spiritual form, like a salt doll meeting the ocean, dissolves into permanent oneness ie when I die.

This irritates you because you believe that you are in the right and I am seemingly implacable in my refusal to acknowledge it.

I promise you I am not "irritated" nor does any type of aggravation inspire me to respond. It is the learning and mutual understanding that inspires me.

I have no idea what any part of this sentence means. Even the full-stop is having trouble handling it!

That's because I didn't elaborate or finish my thought process so I probably shouldn't have said anything at all. My mistake. I wanted to comment on your podcast "Christian Faith and Logic" but halfway there realized that it would be too verbose, unnecessary, and that this probably wasn't the right thread for that discussion.

As for Wittgenstein and Dostoevsky, I'm afraid you've only scratched the surface of what they have to offer. You were initially turned off by some misunderstanding of a small selection of their material and deemed it unnecessary to dig deeper. There is probably a wealth of wisdom in theoretical mathematics, but I admit that I have only scratched the surface of what it has to offer and would likewise never generalize my opinion that it is not a path to "wisdom".

you need to provide good sound reasons for the claim that the use of philosophic words and concept invariably leads to a road block to understanding.

I did try to provide some sound reasons for that claim. If you did not see that then ultimately it was my failure to properly communicate. Nevertheless, you did not comment on my attempts.

namely, that you are still treating spiritual enlightenment in a mystical, dualistic manner.

The surface nature of existence is dualistic, but ultimately God is not dualistic, nor is the "self". Mathematically, God is Infinity^-3,-2,-1,0,1,2,3^Infinity. In this sense God is both finite and dualistic as the number "10" and the number "3" are finite and dualistic. But God is also infinite as 10/3= infinity. The point at which the dualistic natures converge, the point where -1 meets +1 is Zero. I am using this to describe an experience of the nature of God and of the "true" self. Through years and years and years of diligent and arduous meditation I feel it is possible to consciously align Zero, Infinity, and Now. If you consider this mystical then you must also consider Zero and Infinity as mystical because they are not obvious to our empirical senses. But I believe our senses can "evolve" and advance within our lifetime and within consciousness as a whole. I have been sharpening my ability to sense my "self" the rider, so that I can better control and understand my chariot, reins, the charioteer, and horses as we ride into the battlefield of the dualistic delusions of Maya.

Plato paints the picture of a Charioteer driving a chariot pulled by two winged horses. One horse is white and long necked, well bred, well behaved, and runs without a whip. The other is black and short-necked, badly bred, troublesome.

The Charioteer represents intellect, reason, or the part of the soul that must guide the soul to truth; the white horse represents rational or moral impulse or the positive part of passionate nature (e.g., righteous indignation); the black horse represents the soul's irrational passions, appetites, or concupiscent nature. The Charioteer directs the entire chariot/soul, trying to stop the horses from going different ways, and to proceed towards enlightenment.

Or perhaps a much more in depth and meaningful example in the Katha Upanishad:

1. 'There are the two, drinking their reward in the world of their own works, entered into the cave (of the heart), dwelling on the highest summit (the ether in the heart). Those who know Brahman call them shade and light; likewise, those householders who perform the Trinâkiketa sacrifice.'
2. 'May we be able to master that Nâkiketa rite which is a bridge for sacrificers; also that which is the highest, imperishable Brahman for those who wish to cross over to the fearless shore.
3. 'Know the Self to be sitting in the chariot, the body to be the chariot, the intellect (buddhi) the charioteer, and the mind the reins.
4. 'The senses they call the horses, the objects of the senses their roads. When he (the Highest Self) is in union with the body, the senses, and the mind, then wise people call him the Enjoyer.'
5. 'He who has no understanding and whose mind (the reins) is never firmly held, his senses (horses) are unmanageable, like vicious horses of a charioteer.'
6. 'But he who has understanding and whose mind is always firmly held, his senses are under control, like good horses of a charioteer.'
7. 'He who has no understanding, who is unmindful and always impure, never reaches that place, but enters into the round of births.'
8. 'But he who has understanding, who is mindful and always pure, reaches indeed that place, from whence he is not born again.'
9. 'But he who has understanding for his charioteer, and who holds the reins of the mind, he reaches the end of his journey, and that is the highest place of Vishnu.'
10. 'Beyond the senses there are the objects, beyond the objects there is the mind, beyond the mind there is the intellect, the Great Self is beyond the intellect.'
11. 'Beyond the Great there is the Undeveloped, beyond the Undeveloped there is the Person (purusha). Beyond the Person there is nothing--this is the goal, the highest road.'
12. 'That Self is hidden in all beings and does not shine forth, but it is seen by subtle seers through their sharp and subtle intellect.'
13. 'A wise man should keep down speech and mind; he should keep them within the Self which is knowledge; he should keep knowledge within the Self which is the Great; and he should keep that (the Great) within the Self which is the Quiet.'
14. 'Rise, awake! having obtained your boons,understand them! The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path (to the Self) is hard.'
15. 'He who has perceived that which is without sound, without touch, without form, without decay, without taste, eternal, without smell, without beginning, without end, beyond the Great, and unchangeable, is freed from the jaws of death.'
16. 'A wise man who has repeated or heard the ancient story of Nakiketas told by Death, is magnified in the world of Brahman.'
17. 'And he who repeats this greatest mystery in an assembly of Brâhmans, or full of devotion at the time of the Srâddha sacrifice, obtains thereby infinite rewards.'

This is the point at which we diverge spiritually and this is what needs to be addressed. You might have a problem that I am quoting instead of reinterpreting this truth in philosophical words (the realm of reins and the charioteer), but ultimately the self is the highest form of "wisdom" and we only reach that state of super consciousness on our personal journey towards controlling the other elements of the chariot. Only by holding those elements perfectly still can we experience the self. You can only see the pearls on the ocean floor when the surface of the water is completely still (which in itself most people RARELY accomplish). Once we jump into that ocean to grab those pearls we disturb the water surface again, stir up the murky sand on the ocean floor, our perspective becomes distorted by the magnification properties of the water and we loose site of the pearls again. Or as the salt doll measuring the ocean, we dissolve our "I" into the Infinite.

[Kelly Jones]

AlOshA,

You asked which of Kierkegaard's writings were recommended by others. I recommended the journals and papers. Knowing that you would be unlikely to take home the full set, but - if you found them in a public library collection - be required to sit and read them at the library as reference type books, I offered you the several PDFs. It's another reason why I made the effort to make the last two volumes available online. None of it is available online otherwise.


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[AlyOshA]

Hi Kelly,

I'm sorry I misunderstood you. How can I obtain the PDFs? Or are they on that website you posted?

[Kelly Jones]

It is almost hilarious, in my view, that Quinn and Solway have devised an intellectual and ethical program---which could become an Internet email course for zealous, pimply-faced adolescents---that is so bound up with a misogynistic position and have brought you into the fold as their 'project' on female protoplasm. [blah blah blah]

More belittling, and mocking. You have a real love of this sort of thing, don't you? I tend to think it's the main reason you stay around here.

I am convinced (and I say this, often) that it is important to establish and 'give energy to' other 'conceptual pathways' to envision and to live spiritual life.

I have no problem with pathways that help elucidate the nature of Reality, and bring oneself closer into line with it. This also includes deliberately going into "worldly" issues, and exploring them more deeply to pluck out the thorns of attachment, instead of suppressing the issues.

If one's behaviour is not focussed on awakening fully, then it can't be helping. If you disagree, then you need to present an argument.

I find it very, very peculiar that you have written so eloquently, and with feeling, the following:

It's an attempt to belittle and mock a female who is serious, intelligent, and strong-minded. It's as if you regard all women as nothingnesses, so when you find one that irritates you, you try to squash her into a similar subservient role --- or, you totally ignore her, to send the message that she is a nothing, a mere house-fly buzzing irritatingly at the window. It's a form of murder.

As to 'nothingness', Quinn's whole trip, and the one you have taken on, is intimately bound to 'nothingness'. You are, in fact, nothing. You have no basis on which to construct, define or defend your self. Do a little meditation on that...

I am talking of the hatred and violence of your mocking of a serious, thoughful, reason-loving female. You want to annhilate such a person. This is completely different to being aware of the true nature of all things (and things do exist). Nazi-like hatred is not the same as wisdom.

QRS define a position in which 'woman' is utterly and absolutely locked into her role. To define the intellect, to possess it, to administer it, is to have an unassailable position. The fact of the matter is that it is not I who has such an orientation but your own Masters. Women---all women---'buzz irritatingly at the windows' of the QRS construct. In a very real sense, and principally via their extreme impersonalism, that is to say lack of personalism, as well as their contempt and hatred of women as child-bearer, and the whole world of the family, the world of human interrelatedness, and their contemptuous denial of the relevancy and 'necessity' of emotion and feeling: this dear is where the murder takes place. I personally believe that we have to accept our human selves, accept that we need to work in our family, that we cannot define a path (of any durability) that does not address our relatedness in all senses (and it is 'pathological' to attempt to do so). If you really examined a little closer what I have written over these years you would at least get a sense of my 'program'.

Your program is not to see women becoming enlightened, rational, strong-minded and free of attachment, but accepting of their comfortable, familiar, unthreatening and subservient roles as mothers, child-carers, and dishwashers. You'd rather see women as poetic, homely creatures of motherly warmth and spring-time flowers.

If you really wished to help women break free of their servile positions, where any seeds of consciousnesses are being constantly sloughed off by the social demands that they fit in, be attractive and affectionate, bathe the male's need for comfort and security in a salve of homely, dependent harmlessness, then you would not continue to mock a female who has broken free.

You are the one who is locking women into a role.

KJ: Your view of women is deeply unfair, since you believe that a female who is clearly a reason-loving person, and supportive of others she sees as reasonable, is merely playing dress-ups and dabbling like a three-year-old.

AJ: You know that I don't accept what you call 'reason' as a desired platform. (If you want to understand how I would define 'sanity' and 'balance' in human life you'd have to open up a conversation where that could be discussed.)

You have no idea what I call reason, actually. You couldn't coherently reject reason at the same time as understanding it.

You must clearly see that, if the truth were to be told, I see you and the QRS (but QRS as ringleaders, along with other figures like, say, Diebert) as playing a game of dress-up. It IS true (and I have explained this) that I see women as taking the lead from men and rarely if ever the other way around, and so my essential 'condemnation' is directed to Quinn and Solway and Rowden (etc.)

Again you're assuming that women are, must always be, subservient to men, and that this is how things must be. And you call me misogynistic!

But this is more evasion on your part. You'll find any excuse to evade my criticisms.

PS: 'Sisterly Helpmate' was, alas, Robert's.

Robert said "sweetie", and then apologised for his self-indulgent vanity, when it was pointed out.

You can't pass the buck. It's yours to take home to ruminate on....


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[Kelly Jones]

Hi Kelly,

I'm sorry I misunderstood you. How can I obtain the PDFs? Or are they on that website you posted?

They aren't on the website. Should be, actually. Check your PMs in a day or two.


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[Kelly Jones]

You have provided with this reference an opening into the core psychology of QRS! I have always been under the impression that they are, and that their trip is, a sublimation of a form of Calvinism, and now all the elements are on the table. We have punishment and self-afflicted punishment 'outside of the sacramental context'. We have the notion of penance as being 'inspired by Christ's suffering'. We have a way of viewing self-dicipline, 'voluntary celibacy', and privations generally. And the real beauty! Mortification of the flesh 'because of the belief that an unrestrained corporeal body endangers salvation, unless controlled by the spirit, serving to detach the penitent of his worldly passions, as to draw him into closer union with God'.

Well, well. In my last entry we were all trudging up the long long hill to the Zarathustrian Heights, but now we have additional and very much more theatrical props! Everyone is fasting and starved and their ribs poke through their tattered tunics! Diebert and David brandish whips like in The Seventh Seal! It's all so 13th Century my skin crawls! Shrieks, the curving flight of ravens, the howling of winds in the crags, huge drops of cold rain! And poor Kelly! Blood trickling out of her mouth! Lonesome eyes turned up to Heaven, the silent, inner roar of God's 'inverse dialectic'! The masochistic sacrifice! Religious virgins! Hermits! Recluses! Zennish pilgrims! QRS and GF as a Penitential Order!

So, for you penitence is another way to glorify the self? Interesting. Sad, but interesting.


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[AlyOshA]

Hi Kelly,

What are my PMs and how do I check them? Go ahead and explain it to me like you would a child, I will not get offended :)

[Dan Rowden]

Your PMs are your private messages from board users. There's a link to them top left of the page, next to the "logout" link and directly under the "Genius Forum" banner. It says "2 new messages" - or however many are actually there awaiting you.

[AlyOshA]

Thank you Dan and Kelly.

[Kelly Jones]

I assert and I maintain that Soren Kierkegaard defined himself as a Chrisitian, as a disciple of the flesh-and-blood Jesus who existed as the atonement for human sin, and whose humanistic value-structure was directly derived from the Biblical values.

More blather from an ignoramus. You assert and maintain star-dust from your own addiction to being a "scholar". As Diebert said, you just can't help yourself.


1. Kierkegaard didn't regard himself as a disciple/apostle, as this was a level much higher than he could possibly bear. For instance:

Since all the writing under the title Practice in Christianity was poetic, it was understood from the very first that I had to take great pains not to become confused with an analogy to an apostle.

Here I thoroughly understand why it is so important that I hold myself back and do all I can to prevent being confused with something à la an apostle: precisely because I am able to provide a point from which the qualifications of an apostle may in some measure be scrutinized. But what disarray if I myself were to cause the confusion.

Alas, I have been endowed with the eminent intellectuality of a genius, but I am anything but what might be called a holy man, and anything but one of those deep original religious natures; and an apostle existentially stands a whole quality higher, but in eternity men are ranked existentially.

This is why I feel like a child when I contrast myself to an apostle or even to a figure like Socrates, despite my knowing very well what intellectuality I have compared to that of an apostle, who does not exactly excel intellectually, whereas he existentially stands above Socrates.

2. Kierkegaard often said his own actuality was closest to Socrates. There was no "Biblical value-structure" (whatever the hell that is) in Socrates' time.


For instance:

At a very early age I became engrossed in an idea whose origin I cannot account for, an idea which found a model in Socrates, the man with whom I have had an inexplicable rapport from a very early age long before I really began to read Plato — the idea: How is it to be explained that all those who truly have served the truth get into trouble with their contemporaries while they are alive and no sooner are they dead than they are idolized.

The explanation is quite simple: the majority of men can relate to ideas, the good, the true only by way of imagination. But a dead man has the distance of imagination. A living person, however, who provides actuality (being a nobody he exists for everyone, consequently without the support of illusions) — him they cannot bear, they are offended by him, put him to death, trample on him.

Kierkegaard's values are his own. He didn't derive them from anyone.

He didn't simply absorb premises as if they were true because an authority said them. He examined and reasoned through everything, and critiqued the content, not merely the approach, of many theologists' and philosophers' treatises. He explored everything, and actually made new meanings for much that he read in the Bible. This is why he was refused a teaching position by the Bishop Mynster, and one of the causes for him dying early from poverty (he couldn't get a position as a pastor, because Mynster publicly reviewed his religious writings as unorthodox).


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[Talking Ass]

Kelly, I have developed certain 'strategies' in order to function in this environment---an environment of a certain dysfunction. I can only suggest to you that you see that. There is a great deal of distance between our points-of-view. If I said: I think a bridge could be built, I suppose you would say 'Yes, when you become rational' (or something like that). Is it easier for you to perceive that 'I write from a position of madness'?

• What does penitance mean to you? Penitance from what?
• Try to understand: Basically, this forum is constructed on 'belittling and mocking'. It is done, it's true, in the name of 'truth-telling'. But the 'core assumption' is that 'we' (that is, 'you') are Right and everyone else is Wrong. I suggest to you that that is an original and understructured 'belittling and mocking'. I take such 'truth-telling', invert it, and push it to the extremes.
• 'Why I stay around here', by Alex Jacob (with assistance from Diebert van Rhijn). Would you like me to explain to you, in the most direct terms (humorlessly) why I 'stay around here'? Would you believe me?
• Kelly: "If one's behaviour is not focussed on awakening fully, then it can't be helping. If you disagree, then you need to present an argument." Alex: "I present arguments in a deliberate but radically different manner. I deliberately and almost wickedly side-step all your corralling tendencies."
• I definitely do not want to 'annihilate' you or anyone.
• I wrote: "In a very real sense, and principally via their extreme impersonalism, that is to say lack of personalism, as well as their contempt and hatred of women as child-bearer, and the whole world of the family, the world of human interrelatedness, and their contemptuous denial of the relevancy and 'necessity' of emotion and feeling: this dear is where the murder takes place. I personally believe that we have to accept our human selves, accept that we need to work in our family, that we cannot define a path (of any durability) that does not address our relatedness in all senses (and it is 'pathological' to attempt to do so). If you really examined a little closer what I have written over these years you would at least get a sense of my 'program'."
• The above is different from your characterization of what I wrote. As I said, you'd have to read a little closer what I have been writing to understand me better.
• I wouldn't myself characterize it as you have: "Your program is not to see women becoming enlightened, rational, strong-minded and free of attachment, but accepting of their comfortable, familiar, unthreatening and subservient roles as mothers, child-carers, and dishwashers. You'd rather see women as poetic, homely creatures of motherly warmth and spring-time flowers."
• If you want to hear more of what I think, and share more of what you think, I am certainly open to it. My basic 'rule-of-thumb' is recognition of interdependance. As you know, I can't accept your defintion of 'enlightenment' (David's anyway, which is just 'sanity'). I think the term is non-useful and we have to speak in concrete, down-to-earth terms.
• We are on a list where all sorts of ideas get discussed. We are bound to be challenged from time to time. I accept that. You say "then you would not continue to mock a female who has broken free", and I respond that I do not see you as having 'broken free'. My impression is of a person---and people---who are constructing other sorts of knots. But I will grant you that there is an important conversation there, about 'all that'.
• The word disciple was more of a conventional usage. Meaning, one who serves the Gospel Jesus. I included this quote: ""I ask: what does it mean when we continue to behave as though all were as it should be, calling ourselves Christians according to the New Testament, when the ideals of the New Testament have gone out of life? The tremendous disproportion which this state of affairs represents has, moreover, been perceived by many. They like to give it this turn: the human race has outgrown Christianity."
• Ideals/values: more or less the same.
• Having those feelings/ideas about Socrates does not negate or alter his essential relationship *through the Bible*. (Mέσα από τη Βίβλο)
• 'Biblical values' are the values he deals on, even though he interprets them anew. 'Biblical values' is a 'real' term---it refers to a real thing---and can be discussed if you wish.

[Kelly Jones]

Kelly, I have developed certain 'strategies' in order to function in this environment---an environment of a certain dysfunction. I can only suggest to you that you see that. There is a great deal of distance between our points-of-view. If I said: I think a bridge could be built, I suppose you would say 'Yes, when you become rational' (or something like that). Is it easier for you to perceive that 'I write from a position of madness'?

Yes, but not for the reason you assume. It's easier for me to see that your position is insane, than to invent a less likely explanation, which is that you are sane.

What does penitance mean to you? Penitance from what?

Penitence is recognising what is false, what is true, and applying it fully in all aspects of one's being. In Zen terms, it's fighting the demon kings in the holes of lotus threads.

Try to understand: Basically, this forum is constructed on 'belittling and mocking'. It is done, it's true, in the name of 'truth-telling'. But the 'core assumption' is that 'we' (that is, 'you') are Right and everyone else is Wrong. I suggest to you that that is an original and understructured 'belittling and mocking'. I take such 'truth-telling', invert it, and push it to the extremes.

There is no such assumption. Your suggestion that I belittle and mock others out of an arrogant, baseless, and hubristic claim to be always right, is wrong because (notice that I am giving you a reason?) it is wrong: I don't critique people whose reasoning is sure. No one gets belittled and mocked, but corrected where the reasoning presented is wrong.

Your assumption that the forum is constructed on gratuitous malice and aggression is totally wrong. Such behaviour is ego-defensive, and confusing it with genuine attempts to point to the truth, is certainly not going to help anyone.

That is why I continue to ask people to present their reasoning in support of their conclusions --- and focus continually on the thought processes that leads them to take certain positions. It's not gratuitous malice. It's deliberately focussed on getting to the truth of the matter. That is why I keep fishing for the concepts that a person holds dear, the "rules of thumb" as you call them. This is what makes them who they are, that reveals what they are. And this is why I focus on reasoning, so as to winnow out the grain from the empty fibre, so to speak, and then reckon on the quality of that grain.

'Why I stay around here', by Alex Jacob (with assistance from Diebert van Rhijn). Would you like me to explain to you, in the most direct terms (humorlessly) why I 'stay around here'? Would you believe me?

I already know why. You're bored and tired with yourself. That's why you choose theatrical ways to express your hatred. You want to have fun mocking people, because it makes your boredom with yourself a little less discomforting.

I wouldn't myself characterize it as you have: "Your program is not to see women becoming enlightened, rational, strong-minded and free of attachment, but accepting of their comfortable, familiar, unthreatening and subservient roles as mothers, child-carers, and dishwashers. You'd rather see women as poetic, homely creatures of motherly warmth and spring-time flowers."

Of course not. You'd rather entertain yourself with the belief that you're a sympathetic, earnest, kind, interesting, intellectual man. You're significantly immersed in hypocrisy there.

My basic 'rule-of-thumb' is recognition of interdependance.

Where things are interdependent, there cannot be real existence. Even Robert knows of that "rule of thumb", if he's read Nagarjuna as closely as he professes to have.

I do not see you as having 'broken free'. My impression is of a person---and people---who are constructing other sorts of knots.

One has to have faith in reason to accept what is true. And, more importantly, faith in reason is a knot that only faith in reason unties.

In other words, the knot you see us constructing, which you evidently have a great distaste for, is the one that you haven't untied....

Consequently, you neither know what is true, nor are able to experience the freedom that arises once one has such knowledge. This is why you cannot see freedom.



[editted paragraph: That is why I continue to ask people to present their reasoning in support of their conclusions --- and focus continually on the thought processes that leads them to take certain positions. It's not gratuitous malice. It's deliberately focussed on getting to the truth of the matter. That is why I keep fishing for the concepts that a person holds dear, the "rules of thumb" as you call them. This is what makes them who they are, that reveals what they are. And this is why I focus on reasoning, so as to winnow out the grain from the empty fibre, so to speak, and then reckon on the quality of that grain.]


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