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Paul Brunton's The Wisdom of the Overself: "The Birth of the Universe"

CLASS at Wisdom's Goldenrod, Hector, NY

with Anthony Damiani (AD)

September 9, 1984

PB BOOKS; WISDOM OF THE OVERSELF;

"BIRTH OF THE UNIVERSE"

TOPIC: PB Books

SUBJECT: Wisdom of the Overself

SUBSUBJECTS: "The Birth of the Universe," "The World-Mind," "The Unveiling of Reality," Cosmology, Solar Logos, World-Idea

CONTENTS:

WORLD-IDEA AS ETERNALLY FIXED AND AS COMING TO BIRTH; MOVIE REEL EXAMPLE

WORLD-IDEA AS RIGID PATTERN AND SOURCE OF INDETERMINATE POSSIBILITIES

WORLD-IDEA AS ETERNALLY FIXED; WORLD-MIND SETS UP SPACE-TIME ORDER FOR ITS CREATURES

WORLD-MIND AND MIND

VOID AS SUBSTRATUM OF WORLD-IDEA

DISTINGUISHING BUDDHI AND VOID

POINT-INSTANTS VS. ETERNALLY FIXED IDEA

TO GOD ALL STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS ARE ONE

"THE GOD IN THE SUN IS THE 'I' IN ME"

BOOKS READ FROM OR REFERENCED:

Paul Brunton, The Wisdom of the Overself
Paul Brunton, Notebooks. 16 vols; Vol. 1 entitled Perspectives (the only volume published at the time of this class).
Plotinus, The Enneads (MacKenna translation, 4th ed.)
Jeffrey Hopkins, Meditation on Emptiness

DIAGRAMS referred to (not with this transcript version) [Transcriber note: [diagram] means the speaker is referencing a diagram as he or she is speaking. If someone is drawing or writing, with audible sounds of chalk on a blackboard, I indicate this by [drawing] or [writing].]

NOTES:

Partial transcript (Scan File 1984 0909C1-11R01.PDF) exists. Other, earlier partial transcripts may also exist.
This class was held on Sunday.

TRANSCRIBED Verbatim by IT 2018. Reformatted from V11a version by JRM & JF 2019-2020, with Subheads and Table of Contents added by JRM. In 2023, IT updates prefatory matter, footer, and audio file name, expands Subsubjects, alters most Subheads to make more accurate, completes Book List, adds new notes within transcript, fixes typos and errors, reformats to accord with new conventions. Archival verbatim transcript – V14.1a.

AUDIO FILES: 1984 0909a. [Note: "Tape" and "Side" refer to original audio cassette tapes later digitized into .MP3 Audio Files.]

Highlight:

1984 09/09 at Wisdom's Goldenrod

PB Books; Wisdom of the Overself; "Birth of the Universe"

Archival verbatim transcript

WORLD-IDEA AS ETERNALLY FIXED AND AS COMING TO BIRTH; MOVIE REEL EXAMPLE

[Audio File 1984 0909a Begins]

[few seconds of baby noises, background student talking, shuffling about, bit of laughter]

S: It's the bowling alley today.

S: Ok. (some laughter)

S: I know it.

AS: Yeah, you know where the pins are [possibly one/two words inaudible] (AS laughing, laughter)

S: Especially a person with Virgo [few words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): Alright, well, if you-- would you like to start Anthony?

AD: I-- I think we should resume, right? We're on "The Birth of the Universe"?

AS: Yeah.

JB (simultaneously): Prologema.

LR: First paragraph?

AD: "The Birth of the Universe"? [student assents] And, we're trying to understand what is it that's come to birth, what's come to birth. And we started last week by pointing out that the universe itself is an Idea, an eternal Idea in the World-Mind.

S: What?

[9½ second pause]

AD: In other words, we're doing something like this, I think this is what we were doing. The-- you know, we could thrash it out. We imagine that we got this reel, and there's the whole picture in the reel, you know, two hours worth of a movie picture. But it's all in the reel, ok, and it's fixed, it's eternal, alright, and then we project it and only one still goes out there at a time, one picture is shown at the time. Now, which is the universe, what I got in the reel or what's out there manifesting? Now, in order to explain-- in order to explain, I think what PB's doing is taking a point of view that this universe, alright, because it's of an eternal order, alright, objective, an objective Idea, an Idea which has an eternal existence(--/.) You remember he-- he speaks about the World-Mind has the Idea of the universe in an all-time fixity?

S: Yeah.

S: You said it right.

AD: Then our problem is going to be-- I-- I'm sorry. Then it seems that what he's going to do is he's going to explain how the universe arises, he's going to explain for instance that there's no causality in the universe. Why? Because he's going back to the notion of an eternally fixed Idea. In other words, in the reel, alright, there is no causality. When you show it on the film, you say this comes after that and that comes after this. But you can't say that in the reel because everything simultaneously is.

S: Hm.

AD: So he's going to explain and say causality doesn't exist from an ultimate point of view, it exists from a practical point of view. Well then what is he doing? He's using the Idea of the universe, which is an eternal Idea, as an explanation. But how does it explain, how can it explain the fact that there is causality, even if it's just succession and sequence, how can he explain that here?

S: Isn't that what he does when he speaks of karmic impressions in the World-Mind?

AD: Well, he may do that, yeah. But-- And the way Bennett pointed out last week, I think he pointed out that he also brings in the subject and shows that. But the very beginning of this chapter the premises that he's laying down is what we have to grasp and that is the nature of the world that he's presenting to us is a world which is an eternally fixed Idea, alright. It has-- it has this eternality, and this is what he's offering as an explanation. Go ahead.

VM: Anthony, last week if I remember correctly the discussion, you were saying that it's through the introduction of the individual that gives rise to the notion of causality. As you were saying today, in this eternally fixed World-Image there's no notion of causality, it's actually a meaningless consideration at that level. It's only upon the introduction of let's say the individual soul that's going to manifest that universe. If I take that one step further Anthony, I seem to get into the following situation, which may or may not be correct. We often speak about the pulsating World-Idea, these flashes of-- of the World-Mind's energy and so on. Couldn't you also say that really, when you speak about a changing World-Idea, when you speak about a World-Idea that's pulsating or unfolding in time, isn't that strictly speaking just as viewed by the individual? In other words, the World-Idea is genuinely fixed and eternal. It's only upon the introduction of an individual standpoint wherein you speak of manifestation in a space-time world and so on that the notion of pulsation or change and so forth comes in. On the other hand sometimes it seems like we've spoken about the World-Idea or universe as having a certain kind of unfoldment in addition to whatever the individual brings to it or is forced to perceive when he gets involved in it. So I don't quite know where the-- that motion--

AD (simultaneously): Well, yeah, I think-- [S simultaneously: Where does that originate?] I think-- this is material for discussion I think.

LR: You know, this-- this note, this-- that little essay on causality that we have in Perspectives might be helpful for us at some point because I imagine it was written later than what was written here, although I don't know, but his statement on causality and non-causality in Perspectives, that--

VM: That's about three pages long or something, that one?

TS (simultaneously): That-- yeah. Yeah.

AD: Well, we could deal with that but I'm kind of of the opinion that that is included [LR simultaneously: In that.] in that the writings on causality and mentalism [LR: Are in here.] are among his early writings so they would be in here. But we could go over that note, there's no harm in going over that note and using it. I think right now we'll pick up a discussion and try to understand this first part of the-- you know this first section of the chapter [VM assents] and see what we can do with it, see if we can get an idea of what he's doing.

[23½ second pause]

AH: I would like to understand a little more about what is meant with the-- describe-- describe PB's presentation as an objective Idea, there's this objective Idea of this universe in a-- in a whole sense. What-- can you help with that a little Anthony? I don't know what you meant by an objective Idea.

AD (simultaneously): Well sure we could try talk-- we could try talking about that. There does seem to be a difference like even pointed out by Vic, that on the one hand you have the Idea of the universe which is a fixed Idea of the universe, the I-- the universe as an-- an eternally, you know, an eternal order. And then we have the other notion that the universe is coming into existence and passing out of existence [AS assents] moment-by-moment. You have these two things to deal with. So-- [short pause] You remember any passages where this notion of the universe as an-- of an undying and eternally fixed order, self-abiding, might be found? [S: Yeah.] Do you have any idea?

AS: Yeah I do.

AD (simultaneously): Go ahead.

AS: You want some on this?

AD: Yeah, you got some?

AS: I got lots of 'em, ok. Well, except they're later on but I--

AD (simultaneously): Well that's alright.

VM (simultaneously with AS and AD): How about paragraph 3? When he says here--

[Transcriber note: I am using The Wisdom of the Overself by Paul Brunton, Rider and Company, London, 1943.]

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Birth of the Universe," p. 27, VM reading]: "In the same way the World-Mind manifests something of its own self in the cosmos. And its own self, as will be shown later, being uniquely eternal and undying, it is inevitable that the world-ideas which have arisen within it are eternal and undying too."

VM: It seemed to be emphasizing that eternal and undying nature of the World-Ideas but perhaps not as a-- as a whole or a totality there. Maybe the individual ideas which are expressing themselves in the universe, each of those is u-- eternal and undying but, that doesn't quite get to the idea that there's one comprehensive Idea of the universe which is fixed and eternal and fragments of it manifest at a given time. So that doesn't quite deal.

AD: I think that's a little different.

VM: It's a little different.

AD: Yeah. We probably will have to go to where Avery wants to take us, the chapter on the World-Mind Avery?

AS: Yeah. Yeah. And that was-- that was where I found the clearest expression, or at least this idea that the World-Mind knows the entirety in an eternal glance, [slight pause] for example.

JB: You got a page?

AS (simultaneously): Yeah, there's some-- Well, [flipping pages] I'm sure there are lots of places.

S: What is the paragraph number, Ave?

AS: Yeah. No. (AS laughs a bit)

[short pause]

LR: No use.

[tape break]

AS: It's near the end of the chapter, about two, three pages from the end, I don't know what--

HS: Is it the World-Mind chapter?

AS: It's in the World-Mind chapter, for example.

HS: The world [one word inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): Just on this question of what the World-Mind knows, so on. But I don't know, two or three pages, paragraphs-- pages from the end, there's a-- there's a paragraph that begins--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "The notions that the all-conscious mind of this [AS reads: the] universe can be unconscious…"

AB: 73, it's [three/few words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): I don't know what--

S: [one/two words inaudible] yeah (Vic).

AS: At the big-- the bottom of that paragraph, for example--

VM: I'd like to--

S: Page 119, [AS: Yeah.] paragraph [one word inaudible].

VM (simultaneously): There's another one too, let me find it.

AS: Yeah, that's a good one.

S (simultaneously): There's a lot.

VM (simultaneously): There's-- there's a lot of 'em here.

S (simultaneously): Well let's read one.

AB (simultaneously): Let's start with one.

LR (simultaneously): Let's start [AS simultaneously: This whole thing.] with one of them.

S (simultaneously): Cou-- could we read them all at the same time?

VM: Simultaneously, like the World-Mind would, yeah.

S (simultaneously): [few words inaudible] capacity.

S: [couple words inaudible]

S (simultaneously): Yeah David.

S: Uh-hm.

S (simultaneously): I don't mind wasting--

VM(?): (That's right.)

AS: Ok, well we could start with that one and then there's-- there's lots of them. There's one even a few pages earlier that--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 188, AS reading]: "[For] World-Mind grasps its world-idea in what to us is an all-timed fixity."

AS: Or the one Herbert pointed out--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," pp. 188-189, AS reading]: "The World-Mind's totalized all-inclusive single idea of the universe may be whole, perfect and accomplished from its standpoint but from the standpoint of the individual centres of conscious life within that great idea--being unable to expand their restricted experience--every event has to develop successively in a special time-order and every object has to rest in a special space-setting if it is to be present at all. Hence the World-Mind has to set up mental divisions of space and time within the individual in order to set up its infinite variety of karmic actualizations."

AS: And then at the end of the next paragraph, the one that begins "The notions that the all-conscious mind [AS reads: that all-conscious and mind] of this universe," he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "Hence if the World-Mind failed to recognize itself in every form in Nature, however low…it could not be the soul of the Universe. To the World-Mind all things and all knowledge and all orders of consciousness are equally present at a single glance for they are all one to it. Its own existence is therefore an eternal Now, an endless Here."

AS: And--

VM: Next paragraph is good.

AS: The next paragraph is good but, I wanted to-- Yeah, well the next paragraph too. He says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "[If] the World-Mind knows anything at all it must [also] know the way in which the space-time world appears to and is experienced by its [space-time] creatures… There is no particular form of experience which it cannot take into itself. Every place is its"here" and every time its "now". It does not leave out what is finite, it embraces all the possible finites and yet it is itself infinite."

VM: Yeah.

AS: Then two more paragraphs down he says-- the one that begins "The condition of human knowing…" He says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 190, AS reading]: "What is an immeasurable cosmos to human experience is brought to a single point in the World-Mind. … What is an eternity of time to human outlook is brought to a single instant in the same all-thinking mind."

[11¼ second pause, baby noises in background]

AS: And then, there's one-- there's this one-- [student assents] [short pause] Then there's one other quote somewhere from these-- from some notes somewhere, where he says--

PB [V16, 26:2.24, AS reading]: "Although the cosmos is a manifestation of World-Mind, it is not and never could be anything more than a fragmentary and phenomenal one. The World-Mind's own character as undifferentiated undergoes no essential change and no genuine limitation through such a manifestation as thoughts."

[short pause]

S: Say it again Ave.

S: Yeah.

AS: Then--

[short pause]

AS/S(?): Here's one.

AS: I think it's (1.3, fits) the World-Idea as it turns.

[12 second pause, baby noises in background]

VM: Isn't this (in this), "For the World-Mind grasps its world-idea in what to us is an all-timed fixity"?

AS: Yeah, ok. [students assent] [15¼ second pause] He says-- in another para he says--

PB [V16, 27:2.16, AS reading]: "The World-Mind holds in one eternal thought the entire World-Idea."

[short pause as AS flips pages]

PB [V16, 26:1.88, AS reading]: "The World-Idea is the whole idea that no human mind can grasp in its time-long entirety and its spiralled cycles."

[student assents]

[short pause]

AB: Avery?

AS: Yes?

AB: In this chapter, are we still thinking of World-Mind as cosmic soul?

AD: It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. If you think of the Undivided Mind of the Earth, alright, which is infinite to us, what distinction are you going to make between that and the World-Mind of the universe?

[students assent]

AB: From our point of view we couldn't make that distinction now.

AD (simultaneously): So why get excited?

AB: Well, I was thinking of Vic's [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): It's like you want to say there's a distinction between the Infinite Mind of the universe, total manifestation, there's a distinction between that and the Infinite Mind of my Earth. You going to make that distinction? You're only going to be aware that, you know, when you're speaking, that these words are going to cross us. In other words, the Mind of our planet we speak about as the Undivided Mind of the Earth, the functioning of the powers of the Soul of the Sun. We speak about that as the Undivided Mind of the Earth, right? You could speak about that, alright, and then we s-- you think of total manifestation, galaxy upon galaxy, alright. What's the distinction between that Infinite Mind and the Infinite Mind of our Earth?

S (very faint): I don't know.

AD: And would the Infinite Mind of our Earth, so to speak, trip up the World-Idea, work according to its own premises?

S (very faint, possibly part of background): [couple/three words inaudible]

AD: Ok? That's-- that's why I say, it makes no difference for us right now. We want-- if you want to keep these distinctions, you know, to help us as we go along. But remember, they're-- they don't exist for us.

[student assents]

DR: Well I have a feeling that-- that that book, that's my difficulty too but I'm not sure if I understand it right. If you say that there's an I-- if the World-Mind or the Mind of our Earth has some notion of co-- has an Idea of what this universe is, somehow it seems to me that there's a distinction between what we call the manifested universe and what we call an Idea for that Mind. And that might not be correct.

AS: Yes, I think that's-- I mean, I thought that's part of the problem to resolve, that the Idea for this Infinite Mind is eternal, it's an eternal vision that this Infinite-- that this World-Mind has, whichever World-Mind we speak of, it's this [DR assents] inner vision. But the reflex of that-- and that's-- seems to be the difficulty, the reflex of that is-- is the principle of the time-space appearances that all the individual entities participate in. Now--

VM (simultaneously): Or is it the individual that is forced to see things in time, that that would be [one/two words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): Well-- yeah but [S simultaneously: Yeah, it's the second one.] I get the-- but I get the feeling from these quotes that it-- it's not just-- I mean that the World-Mind itself has some nature which-- which allows-- which is responsible for or which is the power underlying this manifestation. Even though its own vision is eternal, this vision of the World-Idea is eternal, it also emanates or manifests something of itself. I mean there is-- there-- it seems that there's some idea here that its thoughts-- It would be just like your own mind, I mean your own mind would be able to put forth all these thoughts, it wouldn't be affected by these thoughts which appeared, and yet in some sense it was manifesting or thinking these thoughts into being. But from its point of view, it would make no difference to it whether there were thoughts-- thinking or not. Go ahead Lou, yeah.

WORLD-IDEA AS RIGID PATTERN AND SOURCE OF INDETERMINATE POSSIBILITIES

LD: So you're saying the time-series that is happening here now for us is different than the all-time that that possesses?

AS: Oh cer-- well--

LD: Then it's not all-time that possesses [one/two words inaudible]

AS: I don't-- I don't follow.

AH: I thought it was-- it was a single incident.

VM: No but it-- it also says in the same chapter, the World-Mind chapter, that it posse-- it possesses all the smaller points of view, all the individual points of view are included within the World-Mind's points of view.

S: It would have to be.

VM (simultaneously): So that would-- yeah, so that it would have to include the time-series that an individual soul experiences as well as the larger wholistic vision of the whole, just--

LR (simultaneously): Yeah but how does it include it, I mean that's [VM simultaneously: I don't know, I'm-- that's what it says in--] the problem, what does that mean it includes it?

AS: Well you know, it--

LR (simultaneously): You know, does it [VM simultaneously: Don't know.] include it through knowledge of its-- of its emanation or does it include it one instant or state of conscious? What does that word 'included' mean?

AS: I think it includes it in the sense that the Idea includes within itself all the possible manifestations of itself, and the Idea doesn't care-- in that sense, if the Idea contains all the possibilities, it's really irrelevant which particular order they get manifested in since no manifestations affect that at all. So, he has a-- somewhere he says the-- something like it had-- he has this quote, he says--

PB [V16, 26:1.112 and Perspectives, Chapter 26: World-Idea, #8, AS reading]: "It is a paradox of the World-Idea that it is at once a rigid pattern and, within that pattern, a latent source of indeterminate possibilities."

AS: So, I'm wondering if this-- there's two senses he's saying in which the World-Mind could know these particular manifestations. One is, in knowing the Idea, the eternal Idea, it already knows, its vision includes everything that could possibly manifest, but not as manifested, only as causal.

VM: Are you saying--

LR (simultaneously): Well last week we were [AS simultaneously: But--] being told that there was a [one/two words inaudible] manifestation there.

AS: No, I don't think that was the case, it was something-- when Anthony was doing the thing with this reel, he was just saying there's this reel or this background which is fixed. Now if-- [drawing] if this lens moves across this reel, ok, it's from-- it's from one point of view that it moves but if the World-Mind has an eternal vision of this whole-- of the entire sequence in its causal form, it really wouldn't matter which of the things it manifested or unmanifested 'cause in a-- in a sense they don't come into being by being manifested.

LR: Right. So the word [AS simultaneously: Each--] 'manifesting' which would be juxtaposed or called in contrast to a notion of unmanifest or latency was only-- I-- it was suggested was only relevant in terms of an individual mind.

AS: And yet the World-Mind does have something to do with manifesting the universe.

LR: Right. Yeah.

VM: This may be an inappropriate model but I just want to try it out. Anthony speaks of a reel of film where one still follows another. If I could just change that a little bit, it may be for the worse, it may be for the better, but I would like to make it not a reel [VM drawing] but imagine a two-dimensional thing sort of, where you have lots of little stills but no particular order is fixed. Like a reel, you know, you go one after another, one after another. Now, you have an infinite number of these stills and therefore all possible time-sequences are there in principle. But the individual trajectory that a life let's say, maybe I'll do this still, then this one, this one, this one, then one way down here [VM indicates on diagram]. I don't know but, what I'm trying to say is that all the possibilities are there, they're all present to the World-Mind, and maybe the indeterminate-- indeterminacy that PB is speaking about is perhaps something in the order or the sequencing or-- or the unfolding of these events is not entirely fixed. I don't know, I can't go too far with it, but I'm trying to break out of the idea, Anthony, of the stills having this fixed [AD simultaneously: Uh-hm.] sequence one after another. [AD: Uh-hm.] Whereas if I think of these infinite number of stills in a two-dimensional kind of picture, that-- then all the possible trajectories are there in principle. Maybe in a given cosmos only a few of those will come out but--

AD: Yeah.

VM: I don't know, could-- is it worth trying to play with that?

AD (simultaneously): Yeah I-- yeah I see your example, I think it-- I think your example is more meaningful. I think it approximates more closely the four-dimensional view, [AS: Yeah.] [VM simultaneously: Yeah, that--] whereas the film does not.

AS: That's what this-- this picture [diagram] was supposed to show that.

VM (simultaneously): Yeah I think so, it was really building on that Avery, that's all.

AS (simultaneously): I mean it was just the same thing, you got this entire canvas, if you will, but--

JL (simultaneously): Where's-- where's the indeterminacy though?

VM: Well which trajectory, you see. In other words, you got a million different stills or an unlimited number of stills and with even a finite set of these you can make up an enormous number of life experiences by tracing it-- maybe do your whole life again backwards, trade some stills with Louie or something, I don't know, I-- it gets-- you know, I can't do it.

AS (simultaneously): But there's a-- but there's [S simultaneously: No.] still a question of whether the World-Mind is providing the entirety of that universal intelligence at each instant. I mean that doesn't seem to be what's available to each individual at each instant.

[student assents]

VM: No.

AS: Or is it? I mean, we-- I mean, there's a huge tr-- there's a tremendous hiatus between the World-Mind's eternal vision of the internal World-Idea, which is eternally perfect, and the individual creature's-- and the individual creature's finite representations of that. Because we do-- it seems you do have to say that the Solar Logos, the emanation of the Solar Logos or the Life of the Solar Logos is providing-- is fabricating we said-- fabricating these perceptions or providing-- providing a world-image of some sort [VM simultaneously: Yeah, but for--] for the individual creatures.

VM: But wouldn't one of these world-images in some sense contain the intelligence of the whole? Although all possibilities are not in it, in some [AS simultaneously: Yeah.] ways the intelligence, the substance of the World-Mind is [AS: I agree.] in this whole, [AS: Sure.] in this still right here.

AS: I would agree with that, that the Idea-- that there's a-- an omnipresence.

VM: Right.

S: Yeah.

AS: I agree but there's still-- there's still s-- there seems to be a need to explain, as he does, the fact that the World-Mind is also responsible for the memorized-- holding the memorized impressions of all the activities, which we're going to get into that, the memorized impressions of all these activities of all these creatures. In other words the World-Mind is still in contemplation, but on the other hand there's this emanation, whenever the mind takes a form it retains something of that. So it retains the forms of all the perceptions of all creatures that are within it.

S: Yeah, like take an example of your own mind. Let's say at first you have knowledge of some certain thing, some particular thing. So far as that knowledge is concerned it's existing there simultaneously all of it at the same time. But when you start expressing it, you have to express in sequence and order one by one [couple/few words inaudible] [AS assents] sequence and sequence. You can't show all the knowledge in one instant. So is-- there's the World-Mind. The whole World-Idea expressed is all the time existing there, its past, present, future. But when it has to manifest, it has to manifest step-by-step.

AS: Right, he ha-- and that step-by-step manifestation, the World-Mind give-- is the ground for that he seems to say, but its own perception itself is not in time. It only affords-- it affords the intelligence or the life background or the power for that manifestation. But that seems to be where he gets into this self-actuating nature.

MC: Avery, wouldn't some of the orderliness of the projection refer to not only these tra-- trajectories as being objects but also containing all the subjects, all the souls or Overselves [VM: Sure.] also being therein contained and their relationships providing a karmic nature of-- of our experience, our experience in the very big sense or cosmic experience, and that karmic relationship determining then a certain orderliness. So that, Vic, I don't think any one trajectory could be just arbitrarily manifest because it would depend a lot on that particular soul that's relating to that trajectory.

VM: Yeah, but-- but let's say one life is a-- is a winding through some of these infinite possibilities, and when it's said that a Sage can see your future development and will do something to aid in that development it seems that in some ways that trajectory or that sequence of unfolding experience must be present to somebody of a higher intelligence. So I'm arguing for determinism in a sense.

MC: Well-- but even-- I mean a Sage, in my own [VM: Yes.] puny way [VM simultaneously: It's hard to talk about a Sage.] can imagine can only go so far in his or her powers for-- for alteration.

VM: Oh yeah, I would agree.

S: Yeah.

MC: And that would depend, I mean-- although there are so many different infinities and say trajectories or stills, I should think a Sage would realize that-- that only so much can be done, only so much--

VM: He can shorten it but not do it for you.

MC (simultaneously): Well that-- I mean the karma, the karmic relationship pertaining to the historicity of that particular soul would allow a certain amount of flexibility I should think.

VM: But not an infinite amount.

MC: I have no-- I have no [VM: No.] expertise (VM laughs a bit) of course, [AS: Yeah.] but then-- And even aside from even getting into this part about what a Sage perhaps can act, you know, just in a normal--

VM: Well, I didn't want to use the Sage's ability to manipulate your karma or help you or anything like that, I just wanted to say even a Sage, which is no low-- lowly consideration, has some sense of the way you will wend your way through these infinite [student assents] possibilities, so if it's available to a Sage then the World-Mind must have [MC: Yeah.] an even grander comprehension of the infinite possibilities in which you will actualize.

MC: I thought we said [couple words inaudible]

VM (simultaneously): On the other hand there's still some indeterminacy in there which I-- I always lose that.

AS (simultaneously): But that's that-- that's that quote, he says [VM simultaneously: I always lose the indeterminacy.] it's a paradox that it is at once a rigid pattern [VM assents] and within that it's a latent source of indeterminate possibilities. And, I just-- I mean I don't know how we could express that but it seems that this infinite unmanifest World-Idea is-- is infinite in power and in productivity and so on, and so the individual-- when we say that the individual-- this can take into account or allow for the individual perceptions of the individual creatures within it, that's-- it's indeterminate in sense of the manifestations, that it makes no difference. I mean if it's all included there already, if all the possibilities are there, it's like this notion of matter we have, that the potentiality, there's this-- there's this pure potentiality of combinations of form and whatever of those potentialities are actualized, those are going to create certain karmic-- that's where you get into this notion of karma, you know, the kinetic memories. But as-- but-- but that potentiality being actualized or not makes no difference whatever to the original Idea. And it seems the whole thing of karma is-- is-- is determining-- is the law of this appearance or this-- we say this pile of vasanas, which is going to be an instance for that Idea. But the presence of the Idea or not to its instantiation can't take any time, space, or causality. I mean how far-- how far-- you can't ask how far is that Idea from its instantiation or how-- how long does it take for the Idea to be-- gets the instantiation in a couple-- [S: Yeah (one word inaudible)] what's the-- what causality [LR simultaneously: But Avery--] is there between the Idea and the thing.

LR: To say that it makes no difference for the Idea isn't the same to-- to say it's the same, is it? In other words, yeah, [AS: No.] how much of the Idea is being manifest, how well people are learning (life), all that, it's not going to change the I-- what that Idea is. But it does cha-- it does make a difference to the evolution of the Ideas and--

AS (simultaneously): Right. To the evolution of the Idea.

VM (simultaneously): To the unfolding of it you mean?

LR: Well, I would hope so.

VM: 'Cause it doesn't e-- it doesn't evolve in its own sphere, does it? It's in the Nous, the Ideas don't evolve, do they?

LR (simultaneously): Right.

VM: Yeah, so--

AS: To the evolution.

VM: It's the manifestation on (Solar)(--/.)

AS (simultaneously): Right, now so--

LR (simultaneously): This is-- this is where the confusion, you know, last week for me, was to say-- to take the extreme view that there's absolutely no difference between manifestation and what you do is not the same as saying it doesn't change the Idea. I mean it still seems-- there still seems to be a (different--/difference.)

AS: Between manifestation and non-manifestation.

LR: Between-- well I don't know, [AS simultaneously: Alright, I--] Anthony was saying no, you know, that's only from the point of view of the individual mind that there's-- that that notion of active or passive was even a notion and I still am confused about that, [VM simultaneously: Yeah.] I find that very difficult to understand.

LD: Can I bring in the example of when we (took) like the Solar Logos in a circle and Buddhi is on the outside, the Ideas [diagram], and we-- we used that in some-- a little ways back, the chart, and then when the Solar Logos takes those eternal Ideas, those universals, and particularizes them, it must go through the individual, it must do it through the, you know, the way the Sun individualizes the I's and then manifests the particular universals through those individual entities. But, that seems to be the only place where the particulars can arise is in context with an individual. [LR simultaneously: Yeah. I agree with that.] So there does seem to be--

LR: I mean I see what--

VM: I don't think there's any question(s)--

LR (simultaneously): That wasn't the-- that wasn't the point that was confusing. That's a good, I mean-- yes.

LD: I thought that that's what you--

VM: Well I didn't get your--

WORLD-IDEA AS ETERNALLY FIXED; WORLD-MIND SETS UP SPACE-TIME ORDER FOR ITS CREATURES

AD: I would have preferred you talk a little bit about this eternal Idea, the world as an eternal Idea, and that would mean repeating what you read a couple times, [AS simultaneously: Ok, sorry.] just slowly to get the feeling for it. Then go into the next chapter that this eternal Idea is fixed in the Void Mind, if [AS simultaneously: Yeah.] you hold on a minute, uh-- So that the-- the notion of the fixed Idea of the World which has for its substratum the Void Mind will give the people who were trying to understand the Hopkins book [Note: Jeffrey Hopkins, Meditation on Emptiness.] this notion of what they're talking about when they come in and say "It's all empty." Unless you grasp the notion of the World-Idea, related or have for its substratum the Void Mind, you can't understand what they're talking about that this Void Mind is going to be the basis on which there's going to be an imputation, so to speak, placed or it's going to be the ground for the designation of significance. [AS simultaneously: Ok. Do you want to read some of those--] But what I'd like to do is just follow up these ideas, and your concern about, you know, the particularity about the way the World-Mind functions, I say phooey, you know. Until you get, even if it's a trifling experience, of its total comprehensiveness, all this is going to be nonsense. To be able to see-- and I can assure you, I tried playing that game with it, I try outwitting it. Can you imagine how simple and stupid I am? [student assents] But I tried once. Every avenue and every possibility was already thought out. Every one of them. So let's not get into the particularities of how it functions. Let's now really try to get a feeling that here the entirety of this eternally manifested order, universal manifestation, is a point in its Mind, you know, so right away the relativity of what we're talking about, you know, boggles your mind.

AS: Do you want to read over some of those again Anthony?

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, I'd like to read over some [AS simultaneously: There's a few more.] of these things and get a feeling, and then locate that, Avery, if I'm not too insistent, [AS simultaneously: Oh I-- ok.] locate that into the mysterious Void, ok.

AS: We-- we-- there are a few-- we could go into a couple of the ones from "The Unveiling of Reality" chapter.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, yeah.

AS: 'Cause he actually speak-- he speaks there the most clearly of the relation between World-Mind and Mind I think.

AD: Uh-huh.

AS: Ok, well let's read these over again then in "The World-Mind" and then we'll go into that. So, we'll start back-- which one did you say that was?

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 188-189, AS reading]: "The World-Mind's totalized all-inclusive single idea of the universe may be whole, perfect and accomplished from its standpoint [but] from the standpoint of [the] individual centres of conscious life within that great idea--being unable to expand their restricted experience--every event has to develop successively in a special time-order and every object [has] to rest in a special space-setting…"

AD: Isn't this inconceivable? The universe is beginningless and endless. Isn't it inconceivable? It's a tautology.

AS: Ok. Then he-- I'll read a couple of them ok.

VM (simultaneously): Is he s-- is he arguing here-- I-- [PD(?) simultaneously: Don't though.] is it inappropriate to discuss them now?

AS (simultaneously): No, no, we should, no I think [VM simultaneously: Oh.] we read them all-- a few of them once and [VM simultaneously: Right.] you have discussion in class.

VM (simultaneously): Well, let me just read it again and point to the clause that I find provocative.

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 188-189, VM reading]: "The World-Mind's totalized all-inclusive single idea of the universe may be whole, perfect and accomplished from [VM emphasis] its standpoint but from the standpoint of the individual centres [VM reads: center] of conscious life [VM emphasis] within that that great idea--being unable to expand their restricted experience--every event has to develop successively in a special time-order and every object has to rest in a [special] space-setting…"

VM: And so on. You think he's saying there that it is in fact the individual centers of consciousness which bring about the notion of space and time, that sequence?

AD (simultaneously): Well, if we took a-- an example at a lower level, like on our planet. Could we say that our planet, for instance, the planetary Mind, alright, has already an-- an-- an Idea of what it is to become.

S: Total.

AD: It's an eternal Idea, [VM assents] alright? The creatures within it cannot experience that Idea, they can only experience particulars within that Idea.

VM (simultaneously): Yeah, yeah.

AS: And--

VM (simultaneously): So this-- this is an argument then Anthony towards-- see, that was what I started out with, that [AS assents] question, like when we speak of a pulsating World-Idea and so on, is that really only from the individual's point of view or is there a position--

AD: Well, the point here is exactly now what is an individual.

VM: Yeah.

AS: Right.

VM: Maybe an individual Solar Logos.

AS: Because, you [S simultaneously: Yeah.] know he says Vic, you [VM simultaneously: Go ahead.] didn't read that--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "[Hence] the World-Mind has to [AS emphasis] set up mental divisions of space and time [AS emphasis] within the individual [student assents] [VM: That (couple/three words inaudible)] in order to set up its infinite variety of karmic actualizations."

AD: So then could we say that our planetary Mind sets up [S simultaneously: Is--] a space-time order for the creatures within it. [AS: I-- that's exactly--] Can we say that the Intellectual-Principle sets up a space-time order as to where this planet appears, [AS: Right.] when and where. [AS: Exactly.] In other words, you have a hierarchy of what you're talking about when you say "individual".

VM: Ok.

AS (simultaneously): Right. And at the highest level here even of the Su-- Solar Logos, that Solar Logos too in its inward aspect is eternal but is setting up the conditions for all of the planets and so on. It's just like when we said you have this tentative illumination and you have a nested s-- you have like a nested sequence of that World-Idea in which each level is elaborated more and more for the benefit of the entities below it. At the highest level I think you could imagine that the entire universe is set up so that Solar Logoi could manifest.

AD: Alright. [AS: I mean--] Let's try a little more.

AS (simultaneously): I mean it's-- it's inconceivable it seems. Alright, the next paragraph, so end of the next paragraph, he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "To the World-Mind all things and all knowledge and all orders of consciousness are equally present at a single glance for they are all one to it. Its own existence is therefore an eternal Now, an endless Here. This is esoterically expressed in the very name of Allah, the Muhammadan God: Al signifying the beginningless, La meaning the endless [AS reads: This is the meaning of Allah, signifying beginningless and endlessness]."

[short pause]

AS: And, he says a similar thing in the next paragraph.

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The World-Mind," p. 189, AS reading]: "It does not leave out what is finite, it embraces all the possible finites and yet it is itself infinite."

AS: And, two paragraphs later in the middle, the one that begins "The condition of human knowing," he says--

AH: Anthony, [S simultaneously: Yeah.] is that its Void aspect?

AD: Uh--

AS: No.

AD: No, not yet.

AS: I don't think so.

AD: Not yet.

WORLD-MIND AND MIND

AS: No. It's going to take a while. [9 second pause] Here-- now if we go to this one, the n-- the next chapter, the second paragraph there. Now-- now he even juxtaposes this-- this notion of the World-Mind that knows the entirety, endlessness and spacelessness of manifestations, with its inner nature. It-- like the second paragraph, says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 191, AS reading]: "For the universe is in space and time whereas"the Mind of the World-Mind", if such a phrase may be used, is not to be wholly subordinated to its own emanation but must claim its own freedom… These two states of its own existence are as far apart as black and white. The incessant movement of ideas which constitutes its manifestation of a cosmos does not represent the course of its own life. … Everything which is in this [AS reads: a] universe is a perishable show of itself by the imperishable World-Mind, but [it] is a show which hides immeasurably more than it actually reveals."

[10 second pause, flipping of pages]

AS: And then he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 192, AS reading]: "[Thus] we arrive at the problem of the World-Mind's own [AS reads: inner-- inner] nature."

[26¼ second pause]

AS: Tony, you want to--

VM: Repeat this properly.

[students assent, very faint]

AS: Well, I don't know.

VM: I don't know if that's what he had(--/.)

AS (simultaneously): I know what Anth-- if-- do you want to read some things from here Anthony or di-- Is there something in particular you wanted to--

AD: No, if you could pick them out, you know.

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 193, AD reading]: "[Thus the] World-Mind is not solely and entirely wrapped up in the cosmic image. We must distinguish between its exteriorized existence and its interiorized life, [that is to say] between the foreground of its attention concentrated upon its space-timed [AD reads: space-time] activity and the background of its attention concentrated upon its [AD reads: the] undisturbed stillness…"

AD: You know, [AS: Uh-hm.] basically what we're doing is just reviewing a few items, you know, [AS assents] about the nature of the World-Mind itself, [AS assents] alright, until we get to the--

AS (simultaneously): The next page-- well, the next page too he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 194, AS reading]: "Thus Mind exhibits two aspects…"

AS: This is paragraph 11, if you have them numbered.

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 194, AS reading]: "…the first as self-contemplative wherein it is aware solely of itself; the other as self-evolutionary wherein it progressively manifests the world and [AD/S(?) simultaneously: Uh-hm.] [thus] limits its own life and consciousness. The first aspect is sheer Mind-in-itself. The second [aspect] is Mind as it stands in inseparable relation with the universe. The first we call Mind and the second World-Mind, but both are really one."

(Side 1 of original cassette tape digitized as 1984 0909a Ends; Side 2 begins)

AB: --space-time form. Both of those seem to be contained in the second half of the quote he just read. In other words, where it says the World-Mind progressively manifests the world and limits its own life and consciousness, that would contain those two, its eternal contemplation of the World-Idea and the way it operationalizes that. And that self-contemplation of itself as Mind would be perhaps even beyond that.

AS: Yeah, I-- I think-- think you're right Alan. Yeah I'm-- that's what I--

S: Ok.

[short pause]

AB: So that, I mean, Vic's question, it really does both it seems in its downward-facing phase. It has the World-Idea in an eternally fixed form but it has to adjust it to the form of consciousness with a-- which the centers within it will have.

[18 second pause]

AS: Well, should we go on?

VM: How about a summary, Avery?

[student assents]

AS: What?

VM: "Psychologically, all this may be summed up…" [Note: PB, The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 194.]

AS: Oh, "Psychologically, all this may be…"

S (very faint): [couple words inaudible]

AS: Huh? Except it brings in the problems he's--

VM (simultaneously): Brings in the whole (emptiness) thing.

AS (simultaneously): Yeah, I--

VM: Brings up our psychology.

VOID AS SUBSTRATUM OF WORLD-IDEA

AS: Maybe we should hurry along to the Void.

AD: Yes I think you should because then you gotta go back to the chapter on the birth of the universe. The only purpose is to refresh our memory, alright.

S (simultaneously): (For this/It is) important(--/.)

AS: Yeah. So in-- in the chapter on "The Mysterious Void"--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 199, AS reading]: "…we must…"

AS: The beginning of the thing.

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 199, AS reading]: "…we must think away all limitations from [the] World-Mind's essence if we would catch even a hint [AS adds: of a hint] of its true and perfect being."

AS: In the next paragraph--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 199, AS reading]: "When we probe deeply into the nature of Mind we find [that] it is ultimately inconceivable, except by negating all its properties, which leaves a vast Void that is paradoxically the only existence. When the World-Mind is by itself in between the cosmic periods and has withdrawn its emanations, it too merges in this unfathomable Void. In this, its own ultimate state, the World-Mind comes to final rest."

AH: Avery?

AS: Yeah.

AH: What does it mean paradoxically it is the only existence? What does that--

VM: Aren't you talking about Mind?

AS: Yeah.

AS: I think that's the paradox, the paradox--

AH (simultaneously): [one/two words inaudible] Just prior to that-- that point, the forms were considered as existent.

AS: As inde-- yeah. And now--

VM (simultaneously): When you negate-- when you negate all the properties in some ways it appears that you're leaving existence but then he says no, it's the only true existence.

AH: Those forms-- those forms had a-- a provisional kind of existence in comparison to this real existence.

[student assents]

AS: (Well--/No.) And he-- he says-- he calls it a Be-ness also, he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 200, AS reading]: "The Void is really un-nameable, for even this word itself is entirely a negative one and does not hint at the positive"Be-ness" which fills the actuality it represents and which has a real if mysterious existence of its own."

VM: Can I go to a semantic quibble here? If, [S: Yeah.] if we're strict in the use of the word 'existence' and try and use it like Anthony was using it on, this was Friday night, when we were talking about existence versus Being. In some sense when he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 199, VM reading]: "…except by negating all its properties, which leaves a vast Void that is paradoxically the only existence."

VM: If we were going to use 'existence' in that specialized way and contrast it with Being, would it be more appropriate to say that it's paradoxically the only Being? Because how can you speak about existence when all manifestation has been retracted?

AD: Yes, of course, if-- you know, if you use the word the way I do but you must remember--

VM: No I'm not saying PB's doing it that way.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah. The word 'Being' [AS: He's not.] has lost its august sense and is now even equated with sensible reality.

VM: I'm just-- yeah.

AD: But you know, there's also passages in Ploti-- Plotinus, he speaks about the Authentic Existence.

VM/S(?): Right.

AD: So that existence in itself is not authentic because it's always flowing but Authentic Existence is something else and he makes-- You always have to go by the context in which you find these things, otherwise we'll constantly fall into mistakes. But he does use-- he does use it in that way.

AS: I think he has ones like-- There's also some-- where he-- relative to relativity. This is paragraph 38, I don't know what-- what it is in your book. Begins (one) "The Void…"

VM: I guess--

AS: Yeah go on, go on.

VM: Well, I guess Anthony, I don't want to go backwards all the time and go to previous or other classes but it seems like when the Madhyamikas speak about existence, self-inherent existence, it seems to me they're speaking about Being. And they want to deny Being to appearance all the time and I'm all in favor of that.

AD: Yes.

VM: On the other hand, there is a point of view where you can say the only thing in appearance is its Being, but, setting [AD(?) simultaneously, whisper: Yeah.] that aside for a moment but--

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, I think, I think you're going to see semantic problems galore, the way they speak to us.

VM: No but you know, like, for example, others have taken their definition to task in-- in a sense, but if you s-- you know, of self-existence, but if you see it as they're trying to develop the notion of pure Being through that idea of self-existence, then it seems quite legitimate to always make arguments to deny the moving appearances or the-- or the existent forms as having this special notion of self-inherent existence. Well, again I'm-- if that's an intrusion from another class I'll leave it out.

AH: In regard-- in regards to that point generally, the quote you just read, where it said paradoxically this is the only existence. It seems that in that-- in that statement, what-- what were formerly properties of forms or plural kind of existence have to now be considered as a singular existence in that--

AD: I'm sorry, you have to run that up-- run that by again.

AH: In this quote from PB where it talks about paradoxically-- where all the properties are removed and you-- you're left with Void which paradoxically is the only existence, it seems that the properties or forms could've been considered as individual existents of a plurality of existents. But, upon this paradox of considering the only existent, it's a singular reference. Is that so?

AD: Yeah.

AH: Existence now is singular.

AD: Uh-huh.

AH: Formerly it was plural. So, the meaning of existence has been transformed [VM assents] in a-- in a very radical way. I--

S: Single existent.

AD: Well, if we go over to the next paragraph where he says--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 200, AD reading]: "It is admittedly not easy for our form-ridden consciousness to accept this notion that Nought is the equivalent of Reality, that Emptiness is the basis upon which all our wakeful, dream and sleep experience is built and not a solid ultimate material stuff, but once we thoroughly comprehend it we comprehend also that it solves the final enigma of existence. [VM assents] We must deny everything before we can understand everything. We must first find and affirm the Ultimate to be not this, not that…"

AD: And he goes on there.

AS: Right.

[students assent]

AS: Yeah, and that's where he-- he's--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Unveiling of Reality," p. 200, AS reading]: "The Void is [really] un-nameable, for even this word itself is entirely a negative one [and] does not hint at the positive"Be-ness" which fills the actuality it represents…"

[short pause]

AS: Well this--

[11½ second pause]

VM: Anthony, is it appropriate to say that [AS simultaneously: From a previous line.] maybe from a substantial point of view that it is appropriate to deny Being to any of the appearance, but from a noetic point of view all that you ever know in appearance are these fixed ideas. Maybe that's an artificial--

AD (simultaneously): Yeah you cou-- of course. Why not, you could express yourself that way.

VM: See because I-- there's times when we speak about the only truth of the material changing world and so on are these eternally fixed Ideas. On the other hand, from another point of view, like the way the Madhyamika keep trying to come in and denying this notion of Being to any of the phenomena, it seems-- I'm not sure if it's substantial but it certainly is another point of view.

AD: Well, I think the fact that you're pointing out is that there is a hierarchy of knowledge, and that at various levels we'll have various hi-- levels of knowledge. You get to the-- you get to the Void you get to the ultimate and unique knowledge. But that's not to say that the other isn't some kind of knowledge of-- [VM: Right.] Alright? So we're certainly entitled to saying that the appearance is of Being, it's not going to be an appearance of nothingness.

VM: Of course.

AD: Yes. But, do you see what-- what happened here, how the World-Idea gets related to the World-Mind. The essence of the World-Mind is of this quality of being void, empty of any quali-- qualities and all that. [student assents] So that this is what he does, you know, to explain what the ultimate substratum, you know, of the World-Idea is, but, like I try to point out, in-- in explaining in "The Birth of the Universe" the nature of the World-Idea, alright, I don't think we have to go back that far, to the Void itself. It's enough that we go to the World-Idea, which-- as conceived by the World-Mind, as thought of by the World-Mind in this all-- you know, like in this-- like a point or in this all-time fixity. Once we do that, alright, there-- I don't think there's need to go back to Void yet.

DISTINGUISHING BUDDHI AND VOID

AS: Ca-- can we then clarify something Anthony? I don't know if it's worth it [AD simultaneously: Let's--] but, I'd like to try and at least get some correlative terminology perhaps. Now, it seems to me that you're saying that-- that PB is saying also that this-- there are two views. On one hand the World-Mind or the Sun Soul has an all-time grasp of the World-Idea. But this is still in relation to a perpetuity of manifestation. It's not-- it would be like the causal level or Buddhi, it would be its view of universal intelligence. But if we even penetrated behind that, we would get to the Void, which would be like the triple-- the triple Hypostasis, the One, Intellectual-Principle, [AD simultaneously: Yeah.] Absolute Soul. And that would in no sense be-- even if we spoke of an Intellectual-Principle there and the 12 Ideas so to speak, it would be-- it would not be a World-Idea, it would just be the pure Void, there'd be no-- no differentiations.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, I would say-- I would say that that's no explanation of anything.

AS: Right. But that-- but that the World-Idea we're speaking of that the World-Mind has as World-Mind is like the way we spoke of Buddhi or the way-- Louis mentioned it, the universal intelligence.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah. That-- I would look to that for an explanation.

AS: Right, and that-- and even though that is perpetual, it is not the-- the Nous per se, it's the World-Mind's grasp of that Void. I don't know if you could speak that way but say that the-- even the Solar Logos-- the Solar Logos has it-- has some-- its Intellect has some grasp, some eternal grasp of that Absolute Void within itself and then (say/so) that's the World-Idea or the eternal World-Idea.

AD: Of course.

AS: Now, um--

JA: I didn't-- I didn't understand that.

AS: What?

JA: I didn't understand your [couple words inaudible]

AS: You didn't understand what that--

JA: (It's going to.)

AS: I didn't have a point. I just-- I just wanted to make-- just clarify and see if-- if we correlated the World-Mind's eternal grasp of the universe, it's time-long grasp of the World-Idea, not of the universe, of the World-Idea, is its grasp of universal intelligence, is in its Buddhi or the Intellect within the World-Mind, its Idea, its eternal Idea, which is in some-- from Mind's point of view, from the point of view of the triple Absolute of the In-- of One, Intellectual-Principle, Absolute Soul-- yeah, right-- No not in that way, I'm sorry.

S: Repeat.

AS: Sorry. That the World-- the World-Mind's eternal or perpetual time-long vision of the World-Idea is what was called Buddhi, or its Intellection, what it has within itself, its vision. But looked at from the obverse side, we would have just the sheer voidness of Mind, the triple principles of One, Intellectual-Principle, Absolute Soul, which is no-- no-- not even that kind of a determined Idea, not even a perpetual Idea, just Void.

JA: So, [AS simultaneously: And that you don't--] why do you say then-- why do you speak of grasping the Void? How does [AS simultaneously: I'm s-- I'm--] that-- what does that have to do with the World-Idea?

AS (simultaneously): Oh because in s-- in some way you could say that the Wor-- he says that the World-Mind is a thought of Mind and the World-Idea is a thought of World-Mind. So in some way, the World-Idea is an expression of that Void.

JA: Alright, but I-- but it seems that you could say then if-- if it ha-- has that nature too it doesn't need to grasp that nature, it has that nature. In other words isn't the Void [few words inaudible]

AS: But I was just trying to s-- I just thought maybe you could say that the World-Mind has a Thought, has this World-Idea, which is its Thought or its Intellection of that absolute Voidness, its outer expression. Huh.

POINT-INSTANTS VS. ETERNALLY FIXED IDEA

AH: May I ask a question? If we trace back-- when you say discussion of World-Mind and Mind to its-- point to the Void, would before-- World-Mind's presentation of the stills is referred to as the point-instant in some cases, is it not? Like the notion of point-instant as the presentation of these individual stills. But it seems that tonight we've talked about another point-instant. It's not the still but a way of speaking about the reduction of Mind, that last-- last principle before speaking of it as Void?

VM: Right.

AH: Is that the same point-instant?

S: No.

AD: No, they're-- we--

AS (simultaneously): I don't think so.

AD: We're going to be speaking about-- when they speak about the point-instant, in other words the Logicians in the Sautrantika school, they're not speaking about the universe as a point within the-- the World-Mind.

AH: No.

AD: They're not speaking about that. They're speaking about how that eternally fixed Idea, whatever it may be, if there is such a thing, how it is communicated [S: To the individual.] to individual consciousnesses and how those consciousnesses interpret that. So they're not talking about that.

AH: Ok.

LR (simultaneously): It's an epistemological thing you're saying?

AD: Yeah, it's an epistemology they're talking about. What we're talking about now is metaphysics and ontology, how to the World-Mind the entirety of-- and the totality of universal manifestation is of an eternal order, fixed forever. And the reason we're doing that is if we can get back to-- to the "Birth of the Universe," is to help us understand the way he's explaining or non-ex-- not explaining, [AS simultaneously: The causality.] alright, this first section about the, you know, the world order. Like--

PB [The Wisdom of the Overself, "The Birth of the Universe," p. 27, AD reading]: "It is a scientifically-ascertained fact that the planets and stars and nebulae…are [AD adds: all] of different ages."

AD: Things like that, alright. What we're-- what we're doing here is trying to understand the substratum or the background to the existence of this World-Idea that we find ourselves within. Now, what is mind-boggling is that all of this, the totality of universal manifestation, is but a fixed Now to this incomprehensible Mind. [student assents] That's what we're trying to get as a background. If that is so, ok, if that is so, we understand that, then we can understand why causality is not a law. But you first have to understand that, alright, that everything (is/has) already, you know, been laid out. Yeah.

TO GOD ALL STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS ARE ONE

S: Perhaps we can put this whole notion in the sense of the World-Idea manifesting like the turiya, prajna, taijasa, and vaishvanara. At the turiya stage, the whole World-Idea, I-- all possibilities are there, but none of the Idea is manifested, none of Idea is streamlined, it's like a total void. And from there one Idea starts manifesting, that's it, of one universe, and that Idea when it-- it becomes one particular Idea manifesting, then the prajna stage come again. And then as it kind of goes to the [couple words inaudible]

AD: Yeah, so then, then from the prajna to the taijasa [S simultaneously: Taija--] stage and then the wakefulness.

S: Yeah.

AD: Now, somewhere in between there, alright, you're going to have to insert the universe as becoming. In other words, the universe is going to be received by the individual drop-by-drop or moment-by-moment or whatever way you want to explain it. So that we have these two orders we have to keep in mind, the eternally fixed order of the universe, which is what it always is to the World-Mind, and then the way the individuals are going to receive that and are going to say, "Look, we're evolving. Aren't we great?" [AS simultaneously: Would you speculate--] Alright, so you've got to keep those two orders in mind.

AS: But would you [S simultaneously: Yeah.] speculate at what level?

S: So at prajna state the whole Idea, I mean, is still-- the totality of one Idea is there, one universe. And, his past, present, future, everything is streamlined there, [AD: Uh-huh.] but none-- no one is manifested yet.

AD: Ok.

S: Then when it comes to taijasa, at that stage, each Idea step by step starts (separating).

AD (simultaneously): Yeah. Now, you see this is where a lot of them get upset because I told them that to the Great God waking and sl-- waking and dreaming are one and the same, they all get upset. So, we have to withdraw that, right?

S: Why?

S: I think so.

AD: You think there's a distinction in God between waking, dreaming, and sleeping? What are you talking about?

S: Well, wait a minute, first of all I think-- I (think/see) there's-- there's vaishvanara, taijasa referring to waking and dreaming. It's-- I think it's very rarely but in-- but in our macrocosm and cosmic order it's not equal it at all.

AD: It's not--

S: It's not quite ex-- quite the same as dream and wake [one/two words inaudible] It is only the stages of manifestation. And, let me-- let me take just one example, for example. Let's say-- let me take the example of people like one electronic engineer. Suppose he-- just once that he's electronic engineer. He has the potential or capability of coming up with any electronic instrument. But none of the instruments measures manifested. But then all of a sudden he starts thinking of television and so on, I can-- And when he thinks of that television, that one idea starts manifesting. So long as the idea is within his mind and trying to develop, and that's the prajna stage. When the idea is trying to manifest but nothing is there it's in [one word inaudible] And [VM: I'm sorry.] then when he starts putting that step by step let's say in the form of a drawing, the television is not still there in front of us but the whole idea is totally inspi-- in-- in the drawing. And then finally all those drawings are assembled, or gross television appears in front of us. That's the ultimate in vaishvanara stage, that we have the whole-- the whole product in front of us. The same analogy if we take in the case of one mind, like author's mind. So in turiya stage the potential is there, complete idea, whole-- everything is there. And out of that now one idea has to manifest one by one, that's at the prajna (state/stage). And then when that idea tries to manifest, before coming into vaishvanara stage, before coming into actual-- this [S hits something] solid material thing, the idea gets streamlined in the form of taijasa and imagine-- well, imagine your-- whatever solid thing-- subtle form. And then finally it takes the gross-- gross shape of it, whatever that--

AD: Yeah, you see, the Platonists would do this a little different. They start out with the Ideas and they end up with the sensible object. You're calling the turiya state the Ideas, ok, and then you go down the line. Now somewhere along the line, alright, we're making these distinctions, like we're saying here's the sensible. You know, Plato tried to help us, he says now take this line, divide it in four parts. On one end you have the turiya world, on the other hand you have the world of conjecture, of opinion, alright, and-- [student assents] and then you make these distinctions along. Now, what I'm trying to say is this applies only to us of a, you know, us creatures with limited knowledge. There is no such break in the knowledge itself. There isn't a separation between the object as it sensibly exists and the turiya consciousness. There is no division, I mean you don't find that division in the actual knowledge. We're putting it there. And in the same way, for a God, there's no distinction in a God between-- if you tell him he's awake, alright, he's not sleeping, it just doesn't make any sense to a God--a God, all these states of consciousness are one and the same.

AS: Or also for a Sage.

AD: For a Sage too, yes.

AH: Isn't there a way-- is there a way of speaking about even-- even our experience--

AD: No, no.

AH: --participate in those four states?

AD: Well, we could participate in them but we make these distinctions and they're very strong, very powerful.

AH: We made a distinction--

AD: Between wake and dream.

AH: But-- but actually--

AD: Actually, we're getting off the point. Let's go back, let's continue now, alright, and try to get a feeling, alright, of what PB is using, alright, to explain these things to us. Because in the next chapter, I mean the next section we're going to have difficulty, the karmic impressions. Because here we have that eternal Idea fixed in the Mind of the-- of the-- of this mighty Intellectual Being, alright, and then we're going to have it transmit that Idea of the World to the creatures within it. And that's the next section. I don't know what the third section was.

S: Birth of the in-- individual.

S (simultaneously): [couple words inaudible]

"THE GOD IN THE SUN IS THE 'I' IN ME"

AD (simultaneously with both students above): Birth of the individuals, alright. There's a quote that I found in PB's notebooks. You remember that one?

LD: Yeah I've got it right here.

AD: You got it?

LD: Do you want it?

AD: Yeah, can you read it?

[short pause]

PB [V16, 25:1.1, LD reading]: ""The God in the…""

AD: That one.

PB [V16, 25:1.1, LD reading]: ""The God in the sun is the 'I' in me"--this put tersely is the essence of man's relationship to divinity. A whole book may be needed to explain it, a whole lifetime to get direct experience of its truth as insight."

AD: And that's going to help us a great deal in understanding "The Birth of Individuals". Again, there's no birth of an individual. [short pause] Now I suppose you people take a break and then when I--

S (very faint): Is it [couple words inaudible]

AD: Time is it, 6:30?

S: Uh-hm.

AD: What time was it for them, 7?

S: 7:30 I think (it was).

AS: I think it's earlier than that.

MW: Set a time, yeah.

S (simultaneously): [couple words inaudible]

AS: So far so good.

AD (simultaneously): What time is it?

S: [few words inaudible]

AS: Yeah.

AD: But I think we'll see, when we get through this chapter, we'll have a m-- a much deeper and greater appreciation what he did and how difficult it is to do what he did.

VM: Gets better every year.

AD: And, of course, that's why these books have to be read a few times because, after you read them a couple of times then when you go to the Chapter 2 you know that it depends upon a lot of explanation that comes much later on, but he can't put those explanations in Chapter 1 because Chapter 1 won't be conducive to-- He has to work this, alright. And I think it'll also help us understand something of what the Buddhists are speaking about their emptiness, the emptiness that they're speaking about. In other words, what they're saying is this Void, what he calls the Void here, PB, alright, they're calling emptiness and they're going to say that that is the substratum of everything. Without that there isn't anything, alright. And we're going to say yes, but that's not enough. The-- there is the Void and there is the All and I'm always going to work with a dualistic point of view. If I-- if I work with the singular point of view, well, I wouldn't have to worry if I believe that. I just can disappear, get out. We can't work with the singular point of view, it's not enough. The dualistic point of view is very good. We have Mind and we have the Thoughts of Mind and you always have the two of them, you can't get away from that. [student assents, very faint] Alright, why don't yous take a little break and then meditate.

LR: Did anyone gather quotes on the sunset meditation besides--

AD: Well, that would be really a wonderful project to get all-- to get together all the quotes on the Sun.

S: Yeah.

AS: Yeah they-- as soon as that-- they're all in a-- they're all classified into a particular place in Chapter 4. As soon as that gets all together they'll all be-- they'll all be right there. [student assents] He has a-- he has a sub-head on sunset.

AD (simultaneously): But you know, I've seen them scattered in a lot of different places too.

AS: No but that-- that's what I mean, they're all--

LR (simultaneously): Yeah, but that-- but now they're all getting reclassified (it'll/it'd) all be in the same place.

AS (simultaneously): They're all being--

AD (simultaneously with LR and AS): Oh I see, I see.

AS (simultaneously with LR): As soon as they all get-- I mean it'll probably take a little bit but [few words inaudible]

VM (simultaneously): Maybe (a couple months).

AD: You know, something like that deserves to be put in a booklet form all by itself.

VM (simultaneously): Sure it does. "Advanced Techniques of Meditation".

AD: Yeah.

AS: They should eventually all be in one place.

LR: It's right here.

AS: But Tim-- Tim had a-- Tim's got a-- don't you-- do you still have that Tim?

TS: No [couple words inaudible]

AS: Somewhere there's a number of pages.

S: Somewhere.

S: You were saying--

AD: Would you-- would you read that again, [CDA simultaneously: (Both quotes.)] that quote? It's so unbelievable. You know, I come across it, I was stunned. 'Cause you know, he's not one to talk about astrology or the cosmo-- cosmo-- you know, cosmology. [AS simultaneously: Cosmology.] Although he tells you you gotta know about it. You know it's not like the scientists would say there's sticks and stones out there, you know. There's ice on the Jupiter snow ca-- mountain caps and all that. I mean it's so irrelevant, what do I care?! [said in gruff voice] Ice in Jupiter. (laughter) I want to know what Jupiter means! (AD laughing) Alright, I'm sorry.

PB [V16, 25:1.1, LD rereads]: ""The God in the sun is the 'I' in me"--this put tersely is the essence of man's relationship to divinity. A whole book may be needed to explain it, a whole lifetime to get direct experience of its truth as insight."

S: Read it once more.

S: Yeah.

S: Uh-hm.

S: Once more.

LR: Read it once more, would you?

AS: That-- I have a couple more but-- I just have a-- [AD simultaneously: Sure, read them.] have another couple of them, [AD simultaneously: Yeah, read them.] not as good as that but I just have it.

AD (simultaneously): Are they of that nature?

S: Uh-hm.

AS: They're-- they're on that topic, they're [AD simultaneously: Go ahead, read it.] not of that nature. (AS laughs a bit) Here he has one, he says--

PB [V3, 3:6.78, AS reading]: "All of us acknowledge the physical sun as the original source of our physical life. If we humans are so much more advanced than our animal cohabitants of this planet that we alone can produce the three aforementioned things, we cannot all recognize that we owe our spiritual life--what there is of it--to the spiritual Sun, the ever-glorious Sun behind the sun, to our relationship with God."

[short pause]

AS: I should've read-- I only read part of it.

AD (simultaneously): And they speak about that coming into conjunction with the sensible Sun, you know. They say it's coming into conjunction with the sensible Sun. [student assents] Whatever that means, I don't know, maybe Tim could tell us. (AS laughs)

S: Would you read that once again A?

AS: Yeah I-- it's 'cause I read only half of the quote it sounded-- maybe I should read-- I should read the beginning.

PB [V3, 3:6.78, AS reading]: "No animal, insect, fish, or bird has ever produced a metaphysical work or written a mystical poem or wondered about its own consciousness. Yet each possesses intelligence within its grade and each, from a bird like the crane to a creature like the chimpanzee [AS reads: chimp], turns instinctively to the sun at certain times, showing its reverence, again within its grade. All of us acknowledge the physical sun as the original source of our physical life. If we humans are so much more advanced than our animal cohabitants of this planet that we alone can produce the three aforementioned things, [AS: That is, metaphysical work or mystical poem or wonder about its consciousness.] [AS adds: still] we cannot all recognize that we owe our spiritual life--what there is of it--to the spiritual Sun, the ever-glorious Sun behind the sun, to our relationship with God."

[40½ second pause]

AD: So, if you-- you know, like if you keep in mind what we're doing, you'll see that we have the World-Idea, then the karmic impressions or the telegraph wire, then the individual, and the World-Idea is going to be commin-- communicated through the telegraph wire to the individual. And we begin to get an idea of the way PB's working out this cosmology. And with what we've done, you know, in astrology and cosmology, it'll come to our aid, I think it'll be a lot of help, understanding what we're doing. And we won't be nincompoops when we read him.

S: Yes.

AD: You'll read with some understanding, and some idea of the magnitude of, you know, the things we are dealing with. Alright, why don't yous take a rest and then(--) excuse me.

S: Ok.

S (faint whisper): Alright.

[students getting up to leave, shuffling about, background talking]

[Audio File 1984 0909a Ends]

Anthony Damiani Archive

Class

Sunday, September 9th, 1984