![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
For all the Kabbalists (and Qabalists)in my audience, just wanted to let you know that there is a sexy article on ein sof by Reb Cooper in the latest Parabola.
(Sorry for the lack of italics. I am posting from my phone while reading said magazine, listening to hip hop, and drinking a pomegranate margarita - hail Persephone - on the deck of a sun drenched East Bay bar. Yes. God Herself is everywhere and life is a blessing.)
May the Boundless fill your life with blessings.
(addendum: Patrick Laude's article on the Tao? Equally sexy. Can't wait to read this whole issue.)
(Sorry for the lack of italics. I am posting from my phone while reading said magazine, listening to hip hop, and drinking a pomegranate margarita - hail Persephone - on the deck of a sun drenched East Bay bar. Yes. God Herself is everywhere and life is a blessing.)
May the Boundless fill your life with blessings.
(addendum: Patrick Laude's article on the Tao? Equally sexy. Can't wait to read this whole issue.)
God is a "Verb"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_th
or this,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_ph
or him,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Nor
In his book. He writes as if he discovered this stuff, which he didn't and as if his interpretation of "Kabbalah" doesn't owe a bit of a debt to this kind of thinking. Other then that, I found his book entertaining.
Though, having attended one of his classes on "Jewish Meditation" with my Jewish Renewal Ex Girlfriend, I found he'd basically taken his experience of Zen Buddhism and "Torahfied" it. Spiritual teachers still need to give credit where credit is due.
Re: God is a "Verb"
Re: God is a "Verb"
Yep, and maintains a lowest common denominator psychology which both, perpetuates and reflects, the cultural decline into nihilism.
Re: God is a "Verb"
Re: God is a "Verb"
My point concerning nihilism is this: If spiritual teachers like Cooper are offering teachings which neglect to reference their sources, or challenge there constituents, or speak to truths that may be uncomfortable (I.E. not "accesible") then what exactly are they offering us? What great spiritual wisdom is it that is so slocky, unelegant, and incoherent that it is so riddled full of the errors above?
What exactly is spirituality, then, then a form of new age, watered down and accesible dross one sells to make money while wearing the mantle of spirituality?
In essence, it's just another product, albeit a poorly designed one, in the form of symbolic capital.
I'd rather know that I'm dealing directly from a capitalist straight up, then those who supposedly eschew materialistic values in the name of the lofty thing they claim as "spirituality."
Cooper could have given a more rigourous approach to such a lofty topic as the Kabbalah, and, I don't know, the processual nature of the cosmos,
He could have referenced his influences as well as a larger body of work (process theology), or a variety of much more interesting things then his highly watered down discussion of "practical kabballah" which he alludes to, and uses to tantalizes his readers in a "Guru-Like" manner, thus asserting his own authority.
But instead, as in his lectures, he presents a watered down, version of something incredibly profound to sell books and tapes. He calls much of what he teaches "Jewish Mysticism," while negating the Eastern roots that inform a large part of his teachings. He claims to be a keeper of such mighty truths as "Ein Sof" but plays by the same tactics as any good PR dude, and thus negates the same thing he claims to be elevating people with.
I find all of this an excellent reflection of a society where spirituality is equated with egalitarian accessiblility, the leveling of values, and feel good comfort: all products of the end stage nihilism of a culture in decline that Nietzche profesied.
The negation of truth and rigor values in favor of feel good comfort and accesiblity is symptomic of something much deeper: Nihilism deflates all supposed "Values" in their own contradictions.
Questions
Is Ein Sof the same as or comparable to the Tao?
Is the experience of Ohr Ein Sof the same as or comparable to what Buddhism characterizes as the state of "without thinking," which I understand to be neither thinking nor the negation of thinking ... having trouble articulating this ... in which one experiences Enlightenment?
Is Quakolorina comparable to or the same as Ein Sof?
Am I to understand that the sitting practice you require of your students exists to assist us in experiencing Ohr Ein Sof, if only for fleeting moments? Something began to click when I read this: "the contemplative practice of sitting quietly, mindfully, allowing each moment to arise in its own purity, brings us into momentary Awareness, like a brilliant flash, that can be repeated over and over again in a way that shifts our normative consciousness."
Is that why I feel the shifting occurring, because I am sitting every day? It's mysterious to me, and I've not been able to explain it.
Please pardon my halting mental process. I think I've just had my mind blown.
Re: Questions
Re: Questions
Which goes back to your recent post and what elorie wrote about it not working that way. I am horrified at how much that applies to me.
Thanks again.