Very nice. The last line is a beauty. - Marsha
At 02:40 PM 2/5/2009, you wrote:
[Krimel]
I don't know enough about Islam, radical or
otherwise, to comment on that but I would say
you are wrong to claim that fundamentalist
Christianity is anti-esoteric. In fact I would say the opposite.
[Arlo]
Well I am sure now we will begin our journey of
defining "esoteric". :-) I'd argue that you are
confusing "miraculous" with "esoteric".
Certainly the fundamentalist's "personal
relationship with Jesus" is "miraculous", but
the distinction is that for the fundamentalist
Jesus is an actual person, whose description as
a being created by the sexual union of God with
a mortal female. Jesus is not a "metaphor" for
anything, it is not a myth or a finger or a
story or anything of the sort. There is no
esotericism involved, what "is" is exactly and
literally described in The One True Book of The One True God.
[Krimel]
The holy rollers are the ones to incorporate
mystical experiences directly into their services.
[Arlo]
As with "faith healing", I'd say again that this
is "miraculous" but not an esoteric
understanding of the underlying myths (in this case, Christianity) involved.
By the way, although Wikipedia recognizes that
many dispute certain inclusions on this list, it
points out some historical esoteric tradtions.
"In the scholarly literature, the term
designates a series of historically related
religious currents including Gnosticism,
Hermetism, magic, astrology, alchemy,
Rosicrucianism, the Christian Theosophy of Jacob
Böhme and his followers, Illuminism, Mesmerism,
Swedenborgianism, Spiritualism, and the
theosophical currents associated with Helena
Blavatsky and her followers." (Wikipedia).
Personally I view any approach that looks beyond
the literal, socio-cultural "words" and towards
what it is that those words point "at" to be
esoterically inclined. The most esoteric drop
all pretense about importance in the words
themselves (e.g. debating "Jesus or Allah" would
be like debating "Kirk or Picard").
[Krimel]
But I find it hard to complain that an
institution should strive to perpetuate itself.
[Arlo]
I don't make this complaint. But would you
complain about a hospital that strives to
perpetuate itself by euthanizing its patients to
harvest their organs to sell on the black
market? Or a school that strives to perpetuate
itself by deliberately uneducating poor kids to feed the needs of sweatshops?
[Krimel]
Especially within religious institution, even if
[personal power and control] are the true
motivations, at least the arguments are couched
in terms of the underlying ideology.
[Arlo]
I'd say that makes it all the worse.
[Krimel]
Nor am I sure that Mystics don't build the kind
of walls you mention. Paul was a mystic and the
chief architect of Christianity. Mohamed was a
mystic and he not only founded Islam but the
dynasty that oversaw it in its early days.
[Arlo]
Well this harkens back to what I was saying to
Michael. These people viewed the mystical
esotericism as available only to an initiated
few. The "walls" the created served the
dual-fold purpose of (1) providing esoteric
pointers to the Wise, and (2) providing exoteric
structure to control the masses. Paul was, in
this example, outright about the distinction between serving milk or meat.
[Krimel]
Pirsig is right, there is always tension between
the prophet and the priest. Call them the yin
and yang of institutional theology.
[Arlo]
I'd prefer to look past both the Yin and the
Yang and at the field in which they spin.
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