Wednesday, May 19, 2010

knowing as we are known

The knower is not separate from the known. Learning is revelation, opening to aspects of oneself previously ignored. The opposite of revelation is ignore-ance. The knower is not separate from the known. This has profound cosmological implications.

We, in this post-postmodern era, have jettisoned all gods, a' la the presentiment of Nietzsche. Or at least we say we have. What we have done is to make gods of ourselves. And then get worried and shaky that we are not god enough. We are on the right path but have not dared to pursue it to its logical, Logos-ical end: the beginning of our life as cosmic beings.

We are spiraling around to new understandings. (No linear path here.) God is not dead. What we previously thought of as God is dead. This is no time to stand around, fists on hips, bawling our calf-like challenges to the universe while convincing ourselves we are bellowing like bulls.

We are co-creating a new knowledge of our Source. The co-creator is our Source Itself and is intimately personal. We know as we are known and when we set aside, come out of our calcified shells of bravado and despair, we open into the true being that we are: the Source sourcing.

The post-postmodern way is to make objects of ourselves and to learn who we are through this objection. We subject ourselves to our objections. We throw ourselves under the bus of our objections, forgetting that our ob-jections are pro-jections of our sub-jections. We throw (ject) one or a few aspects of what is within without and regard that part, that portion as our object, our objective.

Infinity in all directions, we project our objections, eternally hoping to build a fitting nest, a home that satisfies. And it never does. And it never will.

Eventually we may come to know that we are That which births us. To know that we must unknow. (Sunyata, kenosis, empty, of no reputation, nothing in our own eyes, not hing-ed, the gateless gate, conduits.) To be unknown is our nightmare, our fear. No fear. That which breathes us knows us.

2 comments:

  1. The observer is not separate from the observed is the same as the knower is not separate from the known. The problem is that information can be lost in the act of observing according to Heisenberg. I do not know if the Uncertainty Principle applies to the observer observing itself. But nature is full of surprises and we are still a very ignorant species. Recognition of our ignorance should make us humble.

    To be unknown is not necessarily a nightmare. Not knowing who you are may lead you to knowing yourself ultimately. Who you truly are. To be unknown may lead to the Known as it were. It is fear of the unknown that leads us into nightmare, but as Rod Serling says, "There was nothing in the dark that wasn't there in the light". Almost all darkness arises from fear. The fearless man has already gone through the gateless portal. He or she is free. But ultimately, our forms will all be unknown in the mists of time. The ego will not survive the death of the body at any rate.

    We all are offered the portal at some point. It's best to go through, but many recoil in fear so it is said, though that too may be more fiction than fact. If Enlightenment is so difficult to attain, why are there all these Zen Buddhists running around and becoming Zen masters? We even have a Zen Baptist running around, beating everyone with a mental stick to wake up!

    Thanks for the beating, George.

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  2. Interesting that a posit-ivist perspective has spawned a method of 'self-knowledge,' by making the self a 'nail' to receive that hammer's swift strike (perestroika?). Not too surprising, though, if all you (think you) have is that hammer.

    George said, "Eventually we may come to know that we are That which births us." And Jesus said, "I and My Father are One." (John 10:30)

    jbmoore: Am uncertain about the Uncertainty Principle. However, it specifically applies to quantum states; generalizing it to macro-physics may be committing the Fallacy of Composition.


    --Gary

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