25th June 2013
For thousands of years we had been guided by man’s quest to
find God. We perceived the world around us as evil and created religions around
the wise words of people like Jesus, Buddha and Mohammed, who tried to infuse
morality into a harsh world full of highly narcissistic human beings. We
considered the spiritual ‘climb’ to God as our duty and salvation, and ruled
the world in this image of the One at the top and the many (lesser) creatures
at the bottom. We created hierarchies and strict rules according to the whims of
our tribal chiefs, and later our emperors and monarchies. These leaders were
perceived as Gods, and their word dictated the evolution of art, science and
politics, all of which had to conform to God’s rules. Then something unprecedented happened...
The enlightenment in the 17th and 18th Century was the first time in human history that the spheres of art, science and religion began to evolve separately and independently. By that time a critical mass of people had evolved to a world-level of consciousness whereby all humans are perceived as equal. Slavery was abolished for the first time in all of human history, and women’s rights were recognized and fought-for. Many countries all around the world were being governed by these principles, reflecting the morals of a minority of people (albeit a critical mass) whose level of consciousness had evolved to a world-centric perspective.
The enlightenment in the 17th and 18th Century was the first time in human history that the spheres of art, science and religion began to evolve separately and independently. By that time a critical mass of people had evolved to a world-level of consciousness whereby all humans are perceived as equal. Slavery was abolished for the first time in all of human history, and women’s rights were recognized and fought-for. Many countries all around the world were being governed by these principles, reflecting the morals of a minority of people (albeit a critical mass) whose level of consciousness had evolved to a world-centric perspective.
The enlightenment reversed thousands of years of striving to
go ‘up’ to God by bringing us ‘down’ to earth, with an objective and scientific
exploration of reality. The masculine climb was replaced by the feminine
descent to physical reality. These so-called white patriarchal men had reversed
the masculine climb to the heavens with the feminine descent to nature. By doing
so, and quite understandably after the terror of man’s interpretation of the
Spiritual through religious lenses and from ethno-centric levels of consciousness
and below, the feminine descent into reality with a world-centric perspective turned
its back on Spirituality and meaning, culture and consciousness. The inner
world of meaning and morality, which could only be observed through
introspective interpretation and dialogue, was shunned for all that can be
measured with instruments. The Soul was reduced to mere conceptual reflections
of reality by the mind, and Spirit ceased to exist altogether. The wagon of meaning
was essentially placed in the back of the train, and the locomotive of
technological progress on the rails of capitalism led the way forward.
Today we see a cultural and physical war between those who
want to take us back to the ‘climb’ towards the One, and those who want us to
remain in the ‘real’ world. They might both have a point! Unfortunately neither is perceiving the future from higher levels of consciousness. The religious fundamentalists are interpreting the 'climb' from a very ethno-centric perspective, thus attempting to take us back to the pre-enlightenment era (oh dear!!), and the world-centric post-modernists are denying the space for Spiritual growth and meaning, instead either prescribing chopping down the trees or patenting their genes for profits (liberal capitalism) or hugging the trees to become one with nature (New age romanticism).
Evolution is a process of breaking away from the old, fusing
with the new, and then transcending both the old and the new by merging them
both to form the novel. One way we can begin to, for the first time in history,
ascend and descend at the same time, in a quest to reach Zen, the one hand
clapping, the One Taste, is to recognize the evolution of consciousness which
has brought a critical-mass of us to a world-centric perspective, by adding
this vertical dimension of perspectives in our understanding of how we as
individuals change our world-views over time from the day we are born (as well
as throughout our long history as humanity), and co-evolve with our cultures
and political and economic systems. Only then can we re-integrate the rational
gaze at reality and the ecological perspective of late, with individual consciousness,
morality and meaning (Hahaha).
Sources: Inspired by Ken Wilber and common sense.
:)
:)
