Was Jesus a Mystic?

[Valjean]

No they are a part of you. Just as the lower chakras are. Even after your higher ones have been activated.

Was tongue-in-cheek, student. Supercilious parody.

 

[Student of X]

Was tongue-in-cheek, student. Supercilious parody.

OK, I'm sorry if I'm too serious! I couldn't tell you were tongue-in-cheek.

Since you have not encountered the Divine, I understand why you are having to resort to parody. I have encountered the Divine and united with the Divine, so I take all this very very seriously. Maybe too seriously?

 

[Sunstone]

There is a Zen term, makyo, which has come to mean paranormal experiences. According to the Zen Buddhists, those experiences should be ignored because, fascinating as they might be, they distract people from enlightenment.

 

[Sunstone]

Perhaps the difference is between encountering the Divine and becoming the Divine.

That sounds to me an awful lot like Stace's distinction between a sense of oneness and an experience of the One.

 

[Sunstone]

I agree. I distinguish between unexplained experiences to which someone wants to attach paranormal and superstitious explanations and actual mysticism. The former frequently interferes with the latter. Superstitious thinking is not conducive to carrying mystic experience practically into the world of thought, perception and behavior.

This seems to be substantially the same thing the Zen Buddhists advise when they suggest that paranormal experiences (makyo) should be ignored in order that they do not distract us from enlightenment.

 

[Student of X]

This seems to be substantially the same thing the Zen Buddhists advise when they suggest that paranormal experiences (makyo) should be ignored in order that they do not distract us from enlightenment.

All things in moderation.

 

[Sunstone]

I agree. I distinguish between unexplained experiences to which someone wants to attach paranormal and superstitious explanations and actual mysticism. The former frequently interferes with the latter. Superstitious thinking is not conducive to carrying mystic experience practically into the world of thought, perception and behavior.

I think even if paranormal experiences were real and you, say, saw a real ghost or had a genuine vision of the future, such an event might be considered worlthless in so far as it could distract you from enlightenment.

 

[Student of X]

I think even if paranormal experiences were real and you, say, saw a real ghost or had a genuine vision of the future, such an event might be considered worlthless in so far as it could distract you from enlightenment.

Or it could be valuable insofar as it refreshes your sense of wonder and marvel, opens you to new possibilities and realities, points you to a path away from mundane materialism and toward spirituality and mysticism.

Or it could be valuable if the vision had a practical benefit. For example, the Oracle whose words allegedly led the Dalai Lama to safety once.

 

[doppelganger]

I think even if paranormal experiences were real and you, say, saw a real ghost or had a genuine vision of the future, such an event might be considered worlthless in so far as it could distract you from enlightenment.

The problem is in the interpretation. Projecting a cause of an unexplainable experience to make it "real" is counter to the direct experience by which the mystic transcends the limitations of projected thoughts and causes and focuses on the essentially epistemological nature of the activities of thought, grammar and social reality.

 

[Sunstone]

Or it could be valuable insofar as it refreshes your sense of wonder and marvel, opens you to new possibilities and realities, points you to a path away from mundane materialism and toward spirituality and mysticism.

Or it could be valuable if the vision had a practical benefit. For example, the Oracle whose words allegedly led the Dalai Lama to safety once.

I'll go with the Zen Buddhists on this one. It seems to me that people are quite likely to become attached to their paranormal experiences, quite likely to take pride in them, and to see their experiences as defining who and what they are. That attachment to their experiences seems to hamper them from enlightenment or realization.

 

[Sunstone]

The problem is in the interpretation. Projecting a cause of an unexplainable experience to make it "real" is counter to the direct experience by which the mystic transcends the limitations of projected thoughts and causes and focuses on the essentially epistemological nature of the activities of thought, grammar and social reality.

That's true not only of paranormal experiences, but even of the genuinely mystical experience of one or Oneness. We don't know what those experiences are really about. But the beauty of that is, we are left with uncertainty -- which is, as the Japanese monk once said -- life's most precious gift.

 

[maxfreakout]

I'll go with the Zen Buddhists on this one. It seems to me that people are quite likely to become attached to their paranormal experiences, quite likely to take pride in them, and to see their experiences as defining who and what they are. That attachment to their experiences seems to hamper them from enlightenment or realization.

They way i look at it, enlightenment is a matter of fully integrating and connecting together both perspectives, the normal (everyday) perspective and the paranormal (psychedelic) perspective, they shine torches of perspectives onto each other, and join together to form a fully coherent map of the cosmos

Not too much of either, but both given equal consideration

 

[maxfreakout]

From my perspective mystical consciousness has nothing to do with any 'encounters', it's an expansion of individual consciousness; a neurological blowout, so to speak

it depends how you choose to express it, for example you could reword what you say here ^, and say instead that mystical experience is "an encounter with the experience of expanded consciousness"

i think the most important point, is that it is the same for everyone, the experience (phenomenology) is universal, so the Buddha's enlightenment, Mohammed's revelation, Jesus death and ressurection etc etc, these are all variations on the same theme of experiencing mystical transformation

But how is this a metaphysical insight, Max? Metaphysical insight is a 'divine psychosis', an awakening to an expanded awareness

the 'expanded awareness' in this case is the knowledge that she was destined to be the mother of God. It is divine psychosis to be impregnated by an angel, imagine a pregnant woman trying to tell that to a psychiatrist.

Similarly with Abraham, he hears the voice of God telling him to murder his own son Isaac, that is a clear case of divine psychosis, it is divine because it involves the voice of God, it is psychotic because it is a man hearing a voice in his head compelling him to commit arbitrary, gruesome murder = divine psychosis. And this one of the foundational events of judaism, Abraham's mystical encounter

the point i was making before is that this is clearly all about will, human and divine levels of willpower becoming unified in oneness

 

[Valjean]

I think you fail to grasp the nature and magnitude of the expanded awareness I speak of, Max.

 

[Prophet]

True mystical experiences happen when the you face the lies you want to believe about yourself. This is how you experience true transformation.

 

[YmirGF]

I think you fail to grasp the nature and magnitude of the expanded awareness I speak of, Max.

Try speaking more slowly.

 

[Prophet]

Metaphysical insight is a 'divine psychosis'

Actually, the opposite. Enlightenment is divine sanity.

 

[doppelganger]

Hmmmm . . . "metaphysical insight is a divine psychosis."

I think I agree with that.

Psychosis - loss of contact with reality, usually including false beliefs about what is taking place or who one is (delusions) and seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations).

Metaphysical insight is psychologically schizmatic and in my experience counter to self-actualization and expanded awareness.

Epistemological insight following divine experience is where "enlightenment" resides.

 

[Wannabe Yogi]

Christian mysticism is an excellent tradition, imo it's the best mystical route in the world.

Have you studied and practiced all the mystic paths that ever existed in depth to arrive at this conclusion?

 

[Wannabe Yogi]

Was Jesus a Jewish mystic, open and inclusive of other mystic allegories and myths? Mystics were often open to such things with a view to reaching enlightenment or sometimes described "oneness with God".

I'd be interested to hear some views from anyone with some interest in this area.

Yes just read this.

"I and the Father are One." -John 10:10

Sounds like a mystic to me