02.06.12
We are back online!!!
The server site for the nemo/nemini blog network was done, and took 3 days to restore, to April 19 levels.
We are back in business, and might start some new projects ….
01.04.12
The confusions of the ‘new atheism’
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/31/greta-christina-at-alternet/
07.03.12
From Darwiniana
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/the-god-wars/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/repost-on-anonymous-churches-hack/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/new-atheism-and-911-delusions/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/dumpster-diving-in-old-testament-rubbish-what-a-treasure-trove/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/the-lost-riddle-of-the-old-testament/
Old Testament archaeologies
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/06/standing-up-to-israeli-bullying-and-militarism/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/01/design-history-and-the-illusions-of-intelligent-design-andor-natural-selection/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/28/alternet-article-on-progressive-xtianity/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/the-eonic-effect-on-evolution-as-a-resource-for-buddhists/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/hooks-from-hegel-to-marx/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/you-cant-graft-darwinism-onto-buddhism/
04.03.12
Free will debates and black magic
http://darwiniana.com/2012/03/04/the-free-will-debate-a-danger-to-science/
There is another dimension to the free will debate in the realm of the
black magicians (like Gurdjieff) seeking to use unconscious hypnosis to
enslave the wills of others
03.03.12
Did Gurdjieff wreck Christian faith?
I think that the comment today on Philokalia is of interest.
More gnerally, I have to ask, did Gurdjieff sows the seeds of the
destruction of Christianity. Not trust, but paranoia before the demonic,
attends the figure Gurdjieff, and this seeps into the stance toward
religion, as the claims for ‘esoteric Christianity’ give the impression
that behind the veil of piety lies a demonic realm of figures like
Gurdjieff and other sufis, prepared to transmit evil on believers,
unsuspecting in their faith.
It is strange that Gurdjieff behave the way he did. Anyone who gets a
sense of his meaning would decamp not just from his ‘work’, but from
Christianity altogether.
I think a lot of very high people are very angry with what Gurdjieff
did. The whole religion of Christianity (and Judaism) is at risk.
02.03.12
Comment from yesterday
nemo said,
01.03.12 at 2:33 pm
The issue of Gurdjieff and Samkhya has been raised by many, among
them the text To Live Within by an Indian guru, who pointed out the
obvious. The link to Samkhya lies in the ‘law of three’ and the idea of
triads in a doubling series. The idea of 3, 6, 12, 24, 48, cosmic laws
is pure Samkhya. But Samkhya may not be the ultimate source, and
Gurdjieff’s thinking about the subject may have had another set of
sources. It is not the deep science it is made out to be. Noone can
properly explain the meaning of this ‘law of three’, or of triads.
Everyone has failed, down to Hegel (with a slightly different tradition,
not doubt related, or the same, the ‘dialectic’, etc…). So I remain
open to the real version, but am losing hope.
Let me note that Schopenhauer, unaware of Samkhya produced a vision of
real ‘samkhya’ in his transcendental idealism of the ‘will in nature’.
If he had studied the tradition, he would have gotten it wrong!
I am hardly reactionary here, please. I am a western leftist critical of Gurdjieff’s reactionary anti-modernism, and fascist latencies.
I think that Gurdjieff has thrown a lot of things in a bad light,
such as the Philokalia. Which is unfair. But everything Gurdjieff
touched is now a toxic mess under a new monopoly. His vampire game has
delayed beyond reason the emergence of exemplars in his own teaching. He
cares nothing about this, and has ditched his own legacy, as he seeks
reincarnation (as depicted in his Karnakrocket ship myth) in a new
disguise for his next meal.
Study Da Free John here, also, he openly confesses to being a vampire
using a transit ashram to restock his energies, discarding his disciples
on death, as he moves on.
You cannot use these things safely anymore, because Gurdjieffianity
tries to coopt them. You should read the introduction to Bennett’s
Dramatic Universe, to see how Bennetf fell in the trap. He had a host of
great ideas, and a different source, but his book is now a channel
leading to Gurdjieff authority, as if Gurdjieff were in charge of it.
That’s grotesque. Bennett’s work might have prospered better in general
secular culture. But as Bennett quotes Gurdjieff telling him, you
‘trash’ (he didn’t quite say it) will be useful if it is advertising for
‘me’.
Benntte clearly distoted his vision with its hybrids with Gurdjieff.
What a shame.
So I would warn you, I wouldn’t ever again, touch the philokalia,
after the Gurdjieff demons have touched it. It is all a lost garbage
dump of ancient and mostly lost gnosticism.
It remains, of course, on one level an historical zone of great
interest. But Gurdjieff completely spoiled even the slightest interest I
might have in esoteric Orthodox Christian. I have better ways to spend
my time.
With Gurdjieff et al. it will all be sufi fried chicken. Be forewarned. Criminals don’t deserve you false reverence.
I think that Bennett explained in his autobiography the source of his
own work, in the later thirties or early forties, and this source is
not Gurdjieff, hence his friction with Ouspensky.
Bennett seems to have contacted the ‘demiurgic powers’ he speaks of
later. In any case, his work should stand by itself, without a Gurdjieff
connection. But, of course, he used a lot from Ouspensky in his hybrid,
so the damage is done.
His work should be rewritten in a new form, to be the independent work that it was.
I should note that Bennett was in contact with a source of radical spirituality, the force behind the rise of modernity, perhaps, and his correct insights into the rise of democracy and communism, and his ideas about 1848, are signatures of this unknown domain of radical spirits, anathema to the likes of Gurdjieff and vice versa. Bennett unwittingly exposed his liberal views, which have made him unmentionable in reactionary sufis circles.
01.03.12
February stats
Yesterday we had 7096 page views, and 2114 visitors!!????
For february,
Total Pages 57578
Total Visits 19929
IN a month with almost no new posts, the traffic increased! The visits to the archives persist.
I think what should be done is to put the material in book form, and/or ebook form.
Bennett’s miscast version of the demiurgic powers
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/25/the-platonic-demiurge/
I must wonder if J.G. Bennett hasn’t miscast the legacy of the ‘Demiurge’ with his somewhat peculiar treatment in The Dramatic Universe. The ‘demiurgic powers’ are made out to be some kind of carnivorous devil pack in the scheme of Gurdjieff’s completely speculative and malevolent ‘food hierarchy’ of cosmic beings. I think that Gurdjieff’s scheme has done more to confuse the issue, and discredit his movement, if not the general field of gurus, than any other of his outlandish nonsense. It is not the case that humanity is ‘food’ for celestial powers, and the notion is a remnant of some ancient occult paranoia, and, of course, the realm of animal sacrifice, whose deeper meaning was long ago lost, and in any was a stage of primitive humanity. Gurdjieff on the subject of food is the man’s belly chakra projected on the universe, next to the sufistic mental block on spiritual vegetarianism. Gurdjieff’s food hangup is perverse. It IS true that certain black magicians act after the manner of vampires, appropriating the conscious energies of various human victims, but to project this scheme of occult stupidity onto the divine scale is one of the notably grotesque aspects of Gurdjieff and his dark sufis sources. If the divine/angelic world had to depend on man for ‘food’, god help them, they would starve. Gurdjieff’s whole notion of ‘god’ is perverted by this thinking, as if good were some vagrant in his own universe who has to prey on lowly humans to maintain itself. Where did this paranoid insanity come from? And how pervasive has it become in Islamic sufism?
This is one of the issues that has wrecked Bennett’s The Dramatic
Universe, and behind that the legacy of sufism. You have to just stay
away from all of it, and of all the vampire gurus, like Da free John,
and E.J. Gold who want to target victims in these schemes.
They have non canonical statud in any real spiritual tradition, and they
have clearly destroyed much of what is called ‘sufism’. But as our
previous link shows, the greater world of sufism is almost unknown to us
here, or to me, so I hope they are all happy with their ‘ism’, whatever
it is.
The psychotic cannibal occultism of the Gurdjieff madhouse is pathetic, where not dangerous to your health.
Moral: ancient sages milliennia suggested the spiritual path be
vegetarian, but the lapse of that tradition has produced an immense
circle of hell where the norm is cutpurse guruism, sufism, and
Gurdjieffian sharks. It has no real status as spirituality, whatever its
occult basis.
The same was said of Crowley’s magick, and Hubbard’s Scientology. But
these adventurers are changing the environment of religion to a dark
version of their malevolent visions.
It is not entailed by religion.
Worth reading Tolkien’s books here. But, unfortunately, people like
Gold have tried appropriate that for their own purposes. Suruman dressed
up as Gandalf.
Don’t be fooled.
Sufism link
Sufi Reoriented worship center project approved
In one way we have missed the boat on sufism here on this blog: the
‘movement’, diffuse, and global, and really a sub-religion of Islam
breaking off into its own universe, is not the one we have been
describing in such dark terms. Part of the reason is the unnatural
character of Gurdjieffianity, with its malevolent shadow aspect, and the
realization of that in the shady figure of E.J. Gold who is trying to
play monopoly with a fragment of sufistic tradition. Why would he do
that? It is a most ennervating and destructive occult quagmire made out
of the honest goodness of the sufistic stream. But perhaps theese
‘sufis’ are naive, and have missed the larger milieu. It would be better
to drop the discussion of sufism, in general terms, and stick to the
issues of Gurdjieffianity, perhaps. But I am wondering if the dark
occultism of E.J. Gold, and beyond that of Ron Hubbard, the German
occultists, and the likes of Gurdjieff, is noto pervasie behind the
public scenery of Islamic/Indian sufism…???
By Elisabeth Nardi
Contra Costa Timesmercurynews.comPosted: 02/29/2012 03:27:51 PM PST
March 1, 2012 6:11 PM GMT Updated: 03/01/2012 10:11:25 AM PSTWALNUT CREEK — A plan for a large sanctuary center won final county approval Wednesday afternoon, likely ending a long-running battle that pitted religious devotion against neighborhood values.
The Contra Costa Board of Supervisors voted 4-0 Wednesday to allow the 350-member Sufism Reoriented group to build a 66,000-square-foot worship center in the Saranap neighborhood just outside Walnut Creek.
The Sufis’ plans had set neighbors against one another in disagreements over traffic, parking and other effects. Wednesday’s hearing drew 400 to the Lesher Center for the Arts in downtown Walnut Creek; more than 700 attended an all-day hearing at the Lesher Center on Feb. 21.
Supervisor Gayle Uilkema, whose district includes the site, listened to the meeting by phone Wednesday but did not vote. She also listened to the Feb. 21 hearing, explaining later to this newspaper that doctors told her to rest as she battled pneumonia.
After hours of public testimony Feb. 21, the supervisors heard more Wednesday. They discussed and added detailed conditions in ultimately deciding to support the project.
“I am as happy as I could be,” said Bob Carpenter, a Sufi overseeing the project, which has been in the works for four years. “We are very grateful to the supporters in the community.”
Supervisors said that while parking was a major concern for them as well as opponents — 74 spaces total for the building — Sufis have proved over several
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years that they walk and carpool to services.“I am satisfied that the parking issues have been addressed,” Supervisor Karen Mitchoff said. “It is difficult to get citizens to participate in reducing car trips. I want to commend the members of Sufi who have been doing this.”
Supervisors added conditions to make sure any change in ownership of the facility or parking availability, or violations of the conditional-use permit would trigger a county hearing.
The sanctuary — two-thirds of which will be underground — will house a worship hall, classrooms, offices, a bookstore, a cafe and skylights on 3 acres in the small unincorporated neighborhood of Saranap.
The white-domed structure will be a place of worship for Sufism Reoriented followers who believe in the teachings of Meher Baba and in a core of divine love at the heart of all spiritual systems.
The project also was criticized for the size of the building and its aesthetics, traffic hazards, flooding issues and the overall discontent with the 1,400-page environmental report.
“It’s a dark day for unincorporated family neighborhoods in Contra Costa County,” said Wayne Fettig, president of the Saranap Homeowners Organization.
Neighbors have worried that their semirural neighborhood will be forever changed by the Sufi sanctuary site, where single-family homes once stood.
“There are so many things that have been shoehorned in — it’s an elephant balanced on a toothpick,” Fettig said.
This likely brings to an end a debate that had grown intense in recent months, notably during four public meetings that preceded approval by the county planning commission in November.
Sufis say they plan to start building within a few months and that construction is expected to take 18 months to two years.
A lawsuit could delay or halt that process. Fettig wouldn’t comment Wednesday on whether his organization would sue to block the center’s construction, and he said he had no control over what his neighbors may do on their own.
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29.02.12
Some links from Darwiniana
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/28/alternet-article-on-progressive-xtianity/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/the-eonic-effect-on-evolution-as-a-resource-for-buddhists/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/hooks-from-hegel-to-marx/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/27/you-cant-graft-darwinism-onto-buddhism/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/25/infiltration-and-covert-action-from-intelligence-agencies/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/25/the-platonic-demiurge/
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/25/existence-not-a-predicate-of-god/
25.02.12
The Demiurge
http://darwiniana.com/2012/02/25/the-platonic-demiurge/
One of the problems here with Bennett’s work is that he grafted it onto Gurdjieff’s work, with confusing results. Gurdjieff people assume ‘ownership of the ideas, when in fact they, and Gurdjieff, are ignorant of all of it, but pretend to knowledge.
15.02.12
Danger of Gurdjieffianity to the Christian legacy
Gurdjieffinaity, an obvious pun on Christianity, is actually a liability for Christianity. It seems strange that Gurdjieff would speak of ‘esoteric Christianity’, without any real evidence. I will be that the real esoteric Christians have always been horrified at the torpedo in disguise Gurdjieff launched at that religion: the outcome is the loss of the innocent trust that animates real Christians, and the entry of a cynical reactionary black magic that makes all spiritual cults into dishonest scams demanding money. So I think that Gurdjieff, whatever his intent, was far more destructive of Christianity than the secular crowd.