Huge compliment, bb. Thank you.
Yes, it is, but you gotta do the Sufis and the Buddhists, not just Meister Eckhart.
I know, dear Phaedrus. So does that mean you'll take the gig?
p.s.: To Lurkers and other fair-minded people:
"Mystic" and "mysticism" today generally denote an ill-reputed line of inquiry in our society. Yet I'll bet anybody practically anything, that you will not find mysticism confined to any particular cultural tradition, or even just a few.
Culture reflects the collective psyche of real, existing, historical people. And such people are free to consider the "balance of power" that exists in their own particular society in the relations of physis (the "physical") in dynamic communion with psyche (soul, spirit).
Mystics just naturally seem to come down on the "spirit side" of that split.
So to say that mysticism is a "bad thing" is simultaneously to impugn such traditions as: the Jewish Kaballah, Platonic speculation, the Christian Dispensation, and even modern secular humanism.
The modern, "enlightened" projects seems to require that such inquiries are quite futile. Don't even try.
Thus the substance of human existence has deliberately been left without a leg to stand on.
My understanding of mysticism is as a "paradigm shift" of attention to the spiritual side of human existence -- and experience. That shift of focus does not deny the material basis of human life, nor the material world and its "just claims" in any way.
The beauty of mysticism is that it can conceptualize things in human life which are critically well worth noting that cannot be expressed in material terms. In fact, mysticism specializes in just this eternal endeavor.
Then I guess you get to compare notes with the scientists. :^)
Who aren't necessarily the clueless lot they sometimes appear to be, in my suspicion. :^P
I know, dear Phaedrus. So does that mean you'll take the gig?
p.s.: To Lurkers and other fair-minded people:
"Mystic" and "mysticism" today generally denote an ill-reputed line of inquiry in our society. Yet I'll bet anybody practically anything, that you will not find mysticism confined to any particular cultural tradition, or even just a few.
Culture reflects the collective psyche of real, existing, historical people. And such people are free to consider the "balance of power" that exists in their own particular society in the relations of physis (the "physical") in dynamic communion with psyche (soul, spirit).
Mystics just naturally seem to come down on the "spirit side" of that split.
So to say that mysticism is a "bad thing" is simultaneously to impugn such traditions as: the Jewish Kaballah, Platonic speculation, the Christian Dispensation, and even modern secular humanism.
The modern, "enlightened" project seems to require that such inquiries must be adjudged a priori (hopefully with the blessing of what passes for "peer review" these days) quite futile. So don't even go there.
Thus the substance of human existence has deliberately been left without a leg to stand on.
My understanding of mysticism is as a "paradigm shift" of attention to the spiritual side of human existence -- and experience. That shift of focus does not deny the material basis of human life, nor the material world and its "just claims" in any way.
The beauty of mysticism is that it can conceptualize things in human life which are critically well worth noting that cannot be expressed in material terms. In fact, mysticism specializes in just this eternal endeavor.
Then I guess you get to compare notes with the scientists. :^)
Who aren't necessarily the clueless lot they sometimes appear to be, in my suspicion. :^P