Philosophy / Theory / Constructive Ideas?

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HEGEL, Pt 2.

Hegel on the course of world history

Hegel’s concrete account of the development of world history is organized around 4 central nodes, corresponding with what Hegel calls (i) the “Oriental world”, including the civilizations of China, India, Persia & Egypt, (ii) the Greek world, (iii) the Roman world and (iv) the “German world” (Hegel’s somewhat overarching term for the history of Western Europe from Charlemagne to Napoleon). Each of these civilizations represents in Hegel’s view a distinct phase of the development of world history only because, he claims, there was a fundamental political order: Hegel insists that only STATES can enter into history in a completely organized way.

Hegel’s view is that each of these moments of national spirit as a whole, but that the UNIVERSAL SPIRIT keeps moving, as it were, to the next phase of its history: “the national spirit is a natural individual, and as such it blossoms, grows strong, then fades away and dies” (PWH: 58), but each specific national spirit “does not simply fade away naturally with the passage of time, but is preserved in the self-determining, self-conscious activity of the self consciousness…..the universal spirit as such does not die; it dies only in its capacity as a national spirit” (PWH: 61). The course that these moments together compose is determined in general by the level of freedom available in each. Asian tyranny, Greek and Roman aristocracy and the modern European state thus represent a movement in which freedom is expanded from one person (the Persian king or the Egyptian Pharaoh) to a few (freed-men as opposed to Greek and Roman slaves) to (at least in concept) all human beings alike:

The history of the world….represents the successive stages in the development of the principle whose substantial content is the consciousness of freedom…. During the first and immediate stage in the process, the spirit….is still immersed in nature, in which it exists in a stage of unfree particularity (only One is free). But during the second stage it emerges into an awareness of its own freedom. The first departure from nature is, however, only imperfect and partial – only Some are free – for it is derived indirectly from a state of nature, and is therefore related to it ad still encumbered with it as one of its essential moments.

The third stage witnesses the ascent of the spirit out of this as yet specific form of freedom into its purely universal form – man as such is free – in which the spiritual essence become conscious of itself and aware of its own nature.

(PWH: 128-30), (Lectures on the Philosophy of World History)

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THE BOOK OF DISQUIET (1912-1935)
FERNANDO PESSOA, PORTUGAL,
Trans. Margaret Jull Costa

[66]
Outside, slowly in the moonlight of the slow night, the wind is shaking things that make shadows as they move. It may be nothing but the clothes hung out to dry on the floor above, but the shadow itself knows nothing of shirts and floats, impalpable, in mute accord with everything around it.
I left the shutters open so that I would wake early, but until now (and it is now so late that not a sound can be heard), I have managed neither to go to sleep nor to remain properly awake. Beyond the shadows in my room lies the moonlight but it does not enter my window. It is just there, like a day of hollow silver, and the roofs of the building opposite, which I can see from my bed, are liquid with inky whiteness. The hard light of the moon contains a sad peace, something resembling words of congratulation spoken from on high to someone unable to hear them.

And without looking, without thinking, my eyes closed now to absent sleep, I consider which words would best describe moonlight. The ancients would say that the moon is white or silver. But the false whiteness of the moon is of many colours. If I were to get up out of bed and look through the cold window panes I know that, high up in the lonely air, the moonlight would be grey-white with a bluish tinge of faded yellow; that on the various rooftops, in diverse degrees of blackness, it polishes the submissive buildings with dark white and floods with transparent colour the chestnut red of the rooftiles. Down below in the quiet chasm of the street, on the irregular roundness of the bare cobblestones, its only colour is a blue that emanates perhaps from the grey of the stones themselves. It will be almost dark blue on the distant horizon, but quite different from the blue-black depths of the sky, and dark yellow where it touches the glass of window panes.

From here, from my bed, if I open my eyes filled with a sleep I do not as yet enjoy, the air is like snow made colour in which float filaments of warm mother-of-pearl. And if I think the moonlight with my feelings, it is a tedium made white shadow that grows gradually darker as if my eyes were slowly closing on its vague whiteness.

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[64] 29.1.1932

Once the last heat of summer had relented and given way to a mellower sun, the autumn started – even before it was properly upon us – with a slight, long undefined sadness as if the sky had lost the will to smile. It was sometimes pale blue, sometimes almost green, but always tenuous even where the colour was at its most intense; there was a kind of sluggishness about the clouds in their different shades of faded purples; now filling the whole still desolation across which the clouds drifted, there was a feeling of tedium, not torpor.

The start of autumn was signalled by a genuine chill in the not-yet-cold air, by a fading of whatever colours had remained unfaded, by the appearance of a hint of shadow and absence that had not been there before in the tone of landscapes and the blurred aspect of things. Nothing was dying yet but everything , as if with a smile as yet unsmiled, looked knowingly back at life.

Then at last the real autumn arrived: the air was cooled by winds, the leaves spoke in dry tones even before they had withered and died; the whole earth took on the colour and impalpable form of a treacherous marshland. What had been a last faint smile faded with a weary dropping of eyelids, I gestures of indifference. And so everything that feels, or that we imagine having feelings, clasped its own farewell close to its breast. The sound of a gust of wind in a hallway floated across our awareness of something else. One longed, in order to truly feel life, to be a patient convalescing from an illness.

But coming as it did in the midst of this clear autumn, the first winter rains almost disrespectfully washed away these half tints. Amidst the occasional exclamatory bursts of rain, high winds unleashed distracted words of anonymous protest, sad, almost angry sounds of soulless despair, whistled around whatever was motionless, tugging at whatever was fixed and dragging with them anything movable.

And at last, in cold and greyness, autumn ended. It was a wintry autumn that came now, a dust finally becoming mud, but it brought with it what is good about winter cold, with the harsh summer over, the spring to come and the autumn finally giving way to winter. And in the sky above, where the dull colours had lost all memory of heat or sadness, everything was set for night and an indefinite period of meditation.

That was how I saw it without recourse to thinking.. I write it down today because I remember it. The autumn I have is the autumn I lost.

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Bruce Lee
The Tao of Gung Fu
A Study in the Way of Chinese Martial Art
(Tuttle Publishing)

On Bridging the Gap of Yin & Yang

Gentleness and firmness (yin and yang) are two “interdependent" and "complementary" forces in the Chinese art of gung fu, and the aim is the attainment and maintenance of perfect balance between these two forces.


Gentleness/firmness is one inseparable force of once unceasing interplay of movement. If a person riding a bicycle wishes to go somewhere, for example, he can't pump on both the pedals at the same time or not pump on them at all. In order to move forward he pumps on one pedal while simultaneously releasing the other. So the movement of going forward requires this "oneness" of pumping and releasing. Pumping then is the result of releasing and vice versa, each being the cause of the other.


This oneness of things is a characteristic of the Chinese mind. In the Chinese language events are looked on as a whole because their meaning is derived from each other. For instance, the characters for good and bad are different. However, when combined, the word quality is formed. So in order to form the whole word quality, half of the positive of and half of the negative of is necessary. The characters for long and for short together (long/ short) mean the "length" of something. The character for buying and that for selling, when written together, form the new word trade.


The same thing applies to the movements in gung fu, which is always the ceaseless interplay of the two forces of gentleness and firmness. They are conceived of as essentially one, or as two coexistent forces of one indivisible whole. Their meaning (gentleness/ firmness) is derived from each other and their completion through each other.


Many times I have heard instructors from different schools claim that their systems of gentleness (yin) require absolutely no strength (strength has become an ugly word to them), and that with merely a flick of one's little finger, one can send his three-hundred-pound helpless opponent flying through the air. We must face the fact that strength, though used in a much more refined way, is necessary in combat, and that an average opponent doesn't charge in blindly with his head down (not even a football tackler will do this!). He, too, might possess speed and snap and some rudimentary knowledge of fighting.


Some instructors, on the other hand, claim that with their "super powerful system" one can smash through any defense. Once again we must realize that a person does move and change just as a bamboo that moves back and forth in a storm to "dissolve" the strong wind. So neither gentleness (yin) nor firmness (yang) holds any more than one half of a broken whole which, fitted together, forms the true Way of gung fu. Remember that in order to go somewhere, one can't pump on both the bicycle pedals at the same time or not pump on them at all.


Gentleness alone can't forever dissolve away great force, nor can sheer brute force forever subdue one's foe. In order to survive in combat, the harmonious interfusion of gentleness and firmness as a whole is necessary, sometimes one dominating and sometimes the other, in a wave-like succession. The movement will then truly flow; for the true fluidity of movement is in its changeability.


Instead of opposing force by force, a gung fu man completes his opponent's movement by accepting his flow of energy as he aims it, and defeats him by borrowing his own force. This, in gung fu, is known as The Law of Adaptation. In order to reconcile oneself to the changing movements of the opponent, agung fu man should first of all understand the true meaning of gentleness and firmness.


There is no dislocation in the Way of gung fu movement. They are done with flowing continuity like the movement of a river that is forever flowing without a moment of cessation or standing still. As soon as a movement is approximately finished, it immediately flows into another one without stopping. Thus, defense and attack are alternately producing one another.


Firmness and gentleness in the Chinese art of gung fu are not isolated, but coalescent, and the same goes for the various movements such as attack and defense, expansion and contraction, pushing and pulling, etc.


I've learned a lot from observing nature (see "a Moment of Understanding" in Part 3 of this book). Such theories of movement and utilization of energy are brought about from the regularity of the tides and from the effect of the wind upon branches or grass. I've established my own postulate on the utilization of energy and the Way of movements of gung fu. The movement of gung fu is like that of a string of pearls. The pearls are the techniques used and the string is the linking of each technique. The utilization of energy and movement in gung fu should flow on continuously without cessation. There is no broken or interrupted action. As soon as a technique is finished, it begins to melt and blend into another one. Expansion is interdependent with contraction and vice versa.

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Free Infidels Remaster:





Tracklist:

1. Don't fall apart on me Tonight
2. I & I
3. Jokerman
4. License to Kill
5. Man of Peace
6. Neighbourhood Bully
7. Sweetheart like You
8. Union Sundown
9. 'This vehicle is reversing....'
10. 'You have arrived at your destination'



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Quinn The Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn)

Ev’rybody’s building the big ships and the boats
Some are building monuments
Others, jotting down notes
Ev’rybody’s in despair
Ev’ry girl and boy
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here
Ev’rybody’s gonna jump for joy
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

I like to do just like the rest, I like my sugar sweet
But guarding fumes and making haste
It ain’t my cup of meat
Ev’rybody’s ’neath the trees
Feeding pigeons on a limb
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here
All the pigeons gonna run to him
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

A cat’s meow and a cow’s moo, I can recite ’em all
Just tell me where it hurts yuh, honey
And I’ll tell you who to call
Nobody can get no sleep
There’s someone on ev’ryone’s toes
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here
Ev’rybody’s gonna wanna doze
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

Copyright © 1968 by Dwarf Music; renewed 1996 by Dwarf Music

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http://www.akirarabelais.com/i/i.html

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59. Huan / Dispersion [Dissolution]

above SUN THE GENTLE, WIND
below K'AN THE ABYSMAL, WATER

Wind blowing over water disperses it, dissolving it into foam and mist. This
suggests that when a man's vital energy is dammed up within him (indicated
as a danger by the attribute of the lower trigram), gentleness serves to break
up and dissolve the blockage.

THE JUDGMENT

DISPERSION. Success.
The king approaches his temple.
It furthers one to cross the great water.
Perseverance furthers.

The text of this hexagram resembles that of Ts'ui, GATHERING TOGETHER
(45). In the latter, the subject is the bringing together of elements that have
been separated, as water collects in lakes upon the earth. Here the subject is
the dispersing and dissolving of divisive egotism. DISPERSION shows the
way, so to speak, that leads to gathering together. This explains the similarity
of the two texts.
Religious forces are needed to overcome the egotism that divides men. The
common celebration of the great sacrificial feasts and sacred rites, which gave
expression simultaneously to the interrelation and social articulation of the
family and state, was the means of employed by the great ruler to unite men.
The sacred music and the splendor of the ceremonies aroused a strong tide of
emotion that was shared by all hearts in unison, and that awakened a
consciousness of the common origin of all creatures. In this way disunity was
overcome and rigidity dissolved. A further means to the same end is co-
operation in great general undertakings that set a high goal for the will of the
people; in the common concentration on this goal, all barriers dissolve, just
as, when a boat is crossing a great stream, all hands must unite in a joint task.
But only a man who is himself free of all selfish ulterior considerations, and
who perseveres in justice and steadfastness, is capable of so dissolving the
hardness of egotism.

THE IMAGE

The wind drives over the water:
The image of DISPERSION.
Thus the kings of old sacrificed to the Lord
And built temples.

In the autumn and winter, water begins to freeze into ice. When the warm
breezes of spring come, the rigidity is dissolved, and the elements that have
been dispersed in ice floes are reunited. It is the same with the minds of the
people. Through hardness and selfishness the heart grows rigid, and this
rigidity leads to separation from all others. Egotism and cupidity isolate men.
Therefore the hearts of men must be seized by a devout emotion. They must
be shaken by a religious awe in face of eternity-stirred with an intuition of the
One Creator of all living beings, and united through the strong feeling of
fellowship experienced in the ritual of divine worship.

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KAHIL GIBRAN
JESUS THE SON OF MAN

Mary Magdalen
'On meeting Jesus for the first time'


It was in the month of June when I saw Him for the first time. He was walking in the wheatfield when I passed by with my handmaidens, and He was alone.

The rhythm of His steps was different from other men's, and the movement of His body was like naught I had seen before.

Men do not pace the earth in that manner. And even now I do not know whether He walked fast or slow.

My handmaidens pointed their fingers at Him and spoke in shy whispers to one another. And I stayed my steps for a moment, and raised my hand to hail Him. But He did not turn His face, and He did not look at me. And I hated Him. I was swept back into myself, and I was as cold as if I had been in a snow-drift. And I shivered.

That night I beheld Him in my dreaming; and they told me afterward that I screamed in my sleep and was restless upon my bed.

It was in the month of August that I saw Him again, through my window. He was sitting in the shadow of the cypress tree across my garden, and He was still as if He had been carved out of stone, like the statues in Antioch and other cities of the North Country.

And my slave, the Egyptian, came to me and said, "That man is here again. He is sitting there across your garden."

And I gazed at Him, and my soul quivered within me, for He was beautiful.

His body was single and each part seemed to love every other part.

Then I clothed myself with raiment of Damascus, and I left my house and walked towards Him.

Was it my aloneness, or was it His fragrance, that drew me to Him? Was it a hunger in my eyes that desired comeliness, or was it His beauty that sought the light of my eyes? Even now I do not know.

I walked to Him with my scented garments and my golden sandals, the sandals the Roman captain had given me, even these sandals. And when I reached Him, I said, "Good-morrow to you."

And He said, "Good-morrow to you, Miriam."

And He looked at me, and His night-eyes saw me as no man had seen me. And suddenly I was as if naked, and I was shy.

Yet He had only said, "Good-morrow to you."

And then I said to Him, "Will you not come to my house?"

And He said, "Am I not already in your house?"

I did not know what He meant then, but I know now.

And I said, "Will you not have wine and bread with me?"

And He said, "Yes, Miriam, but not now."

"Not now, not now," He said. And the voice of the sea was in those two words, and the voice of the wind and the trees. And when He said them unto me, life spoke to death.

For mind you, my friend, I was dead. I was a woman who had divorced her soul. I was living apart from this self which you now see. I belonged to all men, and to none. They called me harlot, and a woman possessed of seven devils. I was cursed, and I was envied.

But when His dawn-eyes looked into my eyes all the stars of my night faded away, and I became Miriam, only Miriam, a woman lost to the earth she had known, and finding herself in new places.

And now again I said to Him, "Come into my house and share bread and wine with me."

And He said, "Why do you bid me to be your guest?"

And I said, "I beg you to come into my house." And it was all that was sod in me, and all that was sky in me calling unto Him.

Then He looked at me, and the noontide of His eyes was upon me, and He said, "You have many lovers, and yet I alone love you. Other men love themselves in your nearness. I love you in your self. Other men see a beauty in you that shall fade away sooner than their own years. But I see in you a beauty that shall not fade away, and in the autumn of your days that beauty shall not be afraid to gaze at itself in the mirror, and it shall not be offended.

"I alone love the unseen in you."

Then He said in a low voice, "Go away now. If this cypress tree is yours and you would not have me sit in its shadow, I will walk my way."

And I cried to Him and I said, "Master, come to my house. I have incense to burn for you, and a silver basin for your feet. You are a stranger and yet not a stranger. I entreat you, come to my house."

Then He stood up and looked at me even as the seasons might look down upon the field, and He smiled. And He said again: "All men love you for themselves. I love you for yourself."

And then He walked away.

But no other man ever walked the way He walked. Was it a breath born in my garden that moved to the east? Or was it a storm that would shake all things to their foundations?

I knew not, but on that day the sunset of His eyes slew the dragon in me, and I became a woman, I became Miriam, Miriam of Mijdel.

- --oOo-- -

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KAHIL GIBRAN
JESUS THE SON OF MAN

Philemon, a Greek Apothecary
'On Jesus the master physician'


The Nazarene was the Master Physician of His people. No other man knew so much of our bodies and of their elements and properties.

He made whole those who were afflicted with diseases unknown to the Greeks and the Egyptians. They say He even called back the dead to life. And whether this be true or not true, it declares His power; for only to him who has wrought great things is the greatest ever attributed.

They say also that Jesus visited India and the Country between the Two Rivers, and that there the priests revealed to Him the knowledge of all that is hidden in the recesses of our flesh.

Yet that knowledge may have been given to Him direct by the gods, and not through the priests. For that which has remained unknown to all men for an eon may be disclosed to one man in but a moment. And Apollo may lay his hand on the heart of the obscure and make it wise.

Many doors were open to the Tyrians and the Thebans, and to this man also certain sealed doors were opened. He entered the temple of the soul, which is the body; and He beheld the evil spirits that conspire against our sinews, and also the good spirits that spin the threads thereof.

Methinks it was by the power of opposition and resistance that He healed the sick, but in a manner unknown to our philosophers. He astonished fever with His snow-like touch and it retreated; and He surprised the hardened limbs with His own calm and they yielded to Him and were at peace.

He knew the ebbing sap within the furrowed bark—but how He reached the sap with His fingers I do not know. He knew the sound steel underneath the rust—but how He freed the sword and made it shine no man can tell.

Sometimes it seems to me that He heard the murmuring pain of all things that grow in the sun, and that then He lifted them up and supported them, not only by His own knowledge, but also by disclosing to them their own power to rise and become whole.

Yet He was not much concerned with Himself as a physician. He was rather preoccupied with the religion and the politics of this land. And this I regret, for first of all things we must needs be sound of body.

But these Syrians, when they are visited by an illness, seek an argument rather than medicine.

And pity it is that the greatest of all their physicians chose rather to be but a maker of speeches in the market-place.

- --oOo-- -

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When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side of the lake. Then a teacher of the law came to him and said, "Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go."

Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."

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Shelley, Sonnet

Lift not the painted veil which those who live
Call Life: though unreal shapes be pictured there,
And it but mimic all we should believe
With colours idly spread, - behind, lurk Fear
And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave

Their shadows, o'er the chasm, sightless and drear.
I knew one who had lifed it - he sought,
For his lost heart was tender, things to love,
But found them not, alas! nor was there aught
The world contains, the? which he could approve
Through the unheeding many he did move,
A splendour among shadows, a bright blot
Upon this gloomy scene, a Spirit that strove
For truth, and like the Preacher found it not.

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http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/179

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from The Spiritual Heart of Tibetan Medicine
SOGYAL RINPOCHE

The ancient science of Tibetan medicine is rooted in the teachings of Buddha, and the essence of these teachings is the central importance of the mind.

The Buddha said:

Commit not a single unwholesome action
Cultivate a wealth of virtue,
To tame this mind of ours -
This is the teaching of the Buddha

[very difficult!!]

He also said

We are what we think.
All that we are
Arises with out thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.
Speak or act with a pure mind -
And happiness will follow you."

[even more difficult!!?]



.....


The Buddhis practices of compassion and love are immenseley powerful at transforming the emotions, and healing ourselves and others, and one which has had an enormous impact among Western people is tonglen, the practice of 'giving and taking'.

.....

Tonglen practice reduces and eliminates the grasping ego ,while enhancing our concern for others. As a result what has been discovered is that it is deeply therapeutic, especially for those who feel in their lives the sense of lack [Me!], or unfulfilment or even 'self-hate' which are so prevalent these days.

In Tibet, the healing power of tonglen was legendary; in the West today, the potential of such practices is largely unexplored, but they could, I believe [SOGYAL RINPOCHE], have astounding results if applied more widely in cases of mental and physical illness.

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Rest in natural great peace
This exhausted mind
Beaten helpless by karma and neurotic thought,
Like the relentless fury of the pounding waves
In the infinite ocean of samsara.
Rest in Natural Great Peace

Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche


Through the practice of 'calm abiding', or tranquility meditation, our restless, thinking mind subsides into a state of deep inner peace. The warring, fragmented aspects of ourselves begin to settle and become friends; negativity and aggressions are disarmed; frustrations, tension and turbulent emotions are defused; and the unkindness and harm in us is removed, revealing out inherent "Good Heart', So meditation is real

'inner disarmament.

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The Earth is flat

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/science_and_ ... 414201.stm

catefrances

i stood in my driveway tonight leaning against my daughters car, looking up into the night sky explaining the partial lunar eclipse to my son as we watched the earths shadow hassle the moon..

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Bloody hell

The real miracle is that anybody is still reading this crap!

(Nice words from you though Cate, thanks)

The best explanation (summary) of this entire thread is

'There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy Horatio'


______________________________________


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shakespeare

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THE LITTLE BOOK OF WISDOM
DALAI LAMA
£2.50

'inner visions create outer reality'

if we want a beautiful garden
we must first have a blueprint
in the imagination
A Vision.
Then that idea can be implemented
and the garden can be
materialised