20 Reader Responses

1. zacharius Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 1:21 pm

   if one regards ( for example ) jesus as the source of all truths, presumably because he is a manifestation of the word of god, it should not preclude one from assembling a coherent view from a multiplicity of others.

   if one proceeds from the notion that god created the manifest universe, and everything in it, then one can reasonably conclude that everything in the manifest universe reflects the touch of god, if examined correctly. if the universe proceeds from a single source then it follows that everything will show the signs of that source.

   i do think that at some point one must take refuge in the teachings of a manifestation of god to place the multiplicity of things in their correct context, but those teachings permeate the world in so many forms it’s quite possible to encounter them in the most unlikely of places.

   i beleive it was phillip k dick who said: the symbols of the divine appear intially at the trash stratum.

   or for the people of the book: the last shall be first and the first shall be last.

2. JK Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 2:36 pm

   Why is having feeling one has arrived at the “truth” so fundamentally important? And why of all times, as I see in the case of so many classical “religionists”, must it be now? What if the only taste of truth one is ever going to get, irreducibly must come at an undefined and unknowable time and place, if ever? Therefore wherever it is we are now is but a sorry shadow of what awaits ahead, if it even awaits at all.

   Why must Tim (or anybody else for that matter) conform to revelation that has been given the “empire’s” stamp of approval? Why is it so hard to envisage a method of truth finding that exists not in what has been “officially” attributed to God, but what was clearly left out for you to find on your own?

   Patience dear Christian. Patience! There is still time. God will understand. . .

3. Kylark Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 2:44 pm

   For me it’s like looking at the same thing through many different angles. A few months ago I had an experience that I would characterize as a direct experience of the Divine, although when I tried to communicate this to others, only a couple of people understood. Those closest to me thought I was suffering from delusions (maybe I was). The thing is, direct experience of the Ineffable is, well, ineffable. It is impossible to convey in words, and in fact, the more directly you try to describe it, the crazier you sound.

   The best way to try to convey this type of experience, then, is through narrative (e.g., the extensive use of parables in the teachings of Jesus). For me, the different religions are different story-systems that give a partial view of the Ultimate. I could try to formulate my own belief system based on my experience, but I find it helpful to rely on the wisdom of others who have been there. Similarly, I could rely on one religion only, but by doing so, I am cutting myself off from other perspectives. By noting what elements different belief systems have in common, and where they differ, it is possible to form a more complete picture of the Mystery behind life.

   I’m with the “Phildickian” gnostics in that I believe this picture of the divine can even (or especially) be gained through art that is not explicitly religious, whether it be painting, music, novels, or film. Jesus said, “and ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free.” Well, truth can be found in a lot of places, and the thing I find myself asking is, does it resonate?

   However, I believe that no amount of studying is a substitute for direct Experience. This can be something small, like noticing how the blades of grass push up through the cracks in the sidewalk, or something huge, like seeing things as a whole (which our culture does not prepare us for very well, and can end up landing one in the mental hospital).

4. Autrect Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 4:49 pm

   Interesting, because all my time in the Christian church, and “studying” Christianity later, I never found one ounce of coherency. In fact, as I studied other religions and the occult, I was still pressed to find coherency. It was only when I came across a guru — someone who has become enlightened through yoga, basically meditation but also with the help of another guru — that I started to find some sort of coherency. I had some very interesting and definitely paranormal experiences that made me take it completely seriously. But I was mindboggled, so I started reading all the yoga literature (”Autobiography of a Yogi” is a good place to start) until I could make some sense out of it all. And, to me, the yogic philosophy is the most coherent philosophy there is. Finally, even Christianity made sense!

   I always believed that most of the Bible was just parables, often repeated from much older religious texts, but there have been lots of evidence of divine beings (saints) that have come out of Christianity. These saints are just enlightened beings. For example, St. Francis spent many years “meditating” on Jesus (the Guru) and became exactly what Jesus was (the Church won’t admit this, but they do bend their own rules to admit that the saints are divine). St. Francis was constantly in ecstasy like so many Indian Gurus and Buddhists, etc. It’s all the same. There is a consistency and coherency to this search, because there is ultimately one source.

   I won’t go on and on about yogic philosophy, because really my point is that no matter what we read and believe, no matter what we personally experience (I’ve had a “religious experience” in the Swiss Alps and plenty of unordinary experiences with the Guru, and also plenty of synchronistic experiences that, to me, prove some sort of intelligent plan), we’re still left a bit in the dark. JK is right: we only get a taste of the truth. Even if we become enlightened like Buddha, Jesus, Sri Yukeswar, Babaji, Yogananda, Ammaji, St. Francis, St. John the Divine, etc. etc. et. al. et al., we still do not know the whole story!

   I’ve had the rare experience to be around several truly enlightened (realized) beings, and they only know what they need to know. I’ve had a guru pretty much prophecize 9/11 and the worldwide wars and terrorism that followed (in fact, I moved to CA from NY because of the constant warnings). But he didn’t actually know exactly what was going to happen. He’s enlightened, truly, but was not given the exact specifics. He knows many spiritual truths, but he doesn’t exactly know what’s next, what’s after this world, and then what’s after that, and what was before that. So even with utter direct experience of the divine, we’re still left in the dark, though at that point, when you’re truly tapped into the love, the specifics don’t matter. It’s only us spiritual intellectuals who must try to understand all of this. Talk to a yogi in a cave in India. He doesn’t actually care about anything.

   But it’s because as humans, living in a world with laws of physics, with dimensions of space and time, we can never truly understand what lies beyond space and time. We have no context for that, so we can never know the truth.

   To conclude, I must admit that even though I believe in the yogic philosophy, I believe that this particular guru is honestly enlightened beyond any doubt, and even though I’ve personally had ecstatic experiences through the Guru, I’ve still left the yoga indefinitely because I’m still not sure how it fits into my current life and lifestyle. A true coherency is always lacking.

5. Occult Investigator Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 6:34 pm

   A true coherency is always lacking.

   I think the reason this email interests me so much is that I never feel like what I’m doing lacks coherency. Or rather, I haven’t for a really long time. But from the outside looking in, I can imagine the confusion that I must seem to exist within.

   I guess things really started to become more and more coherent to me was when I decided to become an “occult investigator”. But all that really meant then (or now) was that I was making a decision to devote myself to something - to devote myself to the quest, to the questions.

   For me, I guess it’s the devotion and the decision to do this and follow through with it that creates some kind of coherency for me. It’s not always easy, or smooth or perfect. But that’s not what makes something coherent. At least not for me. I’m trying more and more to give up the need to be right, to have the answers, and to focus really on exploring the possibilities.

   I really like what Zac said above about how if the universe comes from a single source (God) then it follows that any element of the universe, whatsoever should bear marks of the hand of its maker. I also like what JK said above about how arriving at the “Truth” is not something you do one afternoon and then you’re done with it. It’s a constant struggle - I’ve written elsewhere that it’s kind of a cross between a romance and an adventure story.

   At the end of the day, I think the only difference between a Christian or somebody else of faith and me is that they know what to call themselves. They have a name that when somebody asks what their religion is, they can tell them. And they have a place they can go to pray. I think for people in the “postmodern” mold, what we’re lacking is not coherency, but a label and a way to communicate how we go about things.

6. Occult Investigator Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 6:45 pm

   Actually, here’s a simpler answer. All the things I’m interested in, all the places I look may or may not be coherent. But that doesn’t matter. I am coherent. I am the connecting thread and the common element between all the things that I try out, try on, etc.

7. bill Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 6:47 pm

   Syncretism is a feature, not necessarily a flaw. The trick is to adopt only those aspects of other philosophies and religions that improve our ability to understand the ineffable.

   In my current study of primitive Christianity and the religious and philosophical environment that incubated it, I see syncretism at every turn. In fact, our modern understanding is very much infused with Aristotelian and Enlightenment philosophy that would have been strange to Paul the Apostle. We can’t help it. We are who we are.

   We must learn to separate our religion from our faith. Or, as you might say, separate our story-system from the reality that we know we can never quite understand. Only then can we work on improving our story-systems.

   Retaining “that olde tyme religion” as if it were purer than what we might develop with increasing knowledge and inspiration, only serves those who are currently in charge of “that olde tyme religion.” Is it any wonder that they are the ones screaming the loudest against syncretism?

8. Nicq MacDonald Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 7:20 pm

   My answer:

   What is being referred to here as “syncretism” can also be looked at from another angle- as “integration” (tip of the hat to ol’ Kenny Wilber, once again). In other words, the postmodern mind can find coherent “truths” by looking at many sources- scientific data, religious revelation, philosophical reasoning, aesthetic experience- and finding where they “match up” and where they don’t, and thus put together a coherent picture, or “map” of reality. For instance, in the topic of religious experience, some scholars and perennialists (such as Huston Smith, amonth others), have found that religious experience conforms to various patterns cross-culturally, by comparing the records of experiences of mystics of various traditions, finding the paralells between them (the practical “injunctions” undertaken, the description of the resulting experience, etc.) and thus creating a “map” of cross-cultural religious experience.

   In many ways though, this sort of integration is nothing new. I’ve argued before (elsewhere) that Christianity, for instance, cannot be understood in a vacuum, as if the Bible was the only source of truth and was written in the vernacular by God himself last Tuesday. What one arrives at through this “vacuum” isn’t Christianity- it’s science fiction (and very popular science fiction at that- it’s made Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins very rich!) Without putting the texts in their natural context- an ancient world with a lifestyle, needs, politics, and worldview often dramatically different from ours- as well as their intellectual context (the philosophy and theology that surrounded the development of the Christian religion- Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Plotinus, Clement, Origen, Anthony, Augustine, Boethius, Anselm, Aquinas, Eckhart, the Spanish Mystics, Luther, the Reformers, et. al.)- one doesn’t arrive at truth, one arrives at nonsense. Even if Jesus was one with the father, and spiritually enlightened, we do not have access to this knowledge, except, as they say, “through a glass, darkly”.

   One of my theology professors frequently liked to comment on the futility of movements that try to “get back to Jesus”- the whole theological tradition has been trying to do that for 2000 years, and throwing this tradition out doesn’t lead to Christ- indeed, it all too often leads to fanaticism. In our simultaneously overspecialized, media-saturated and dumbed-down society, however (as Fareed Zakaria recently lamented), fundamentalism and mega-churches with easy answers for spiritual issues are much more attractive than the mainline protestant churches with their elaborately difficult theologies and tight-knit communities. It’s easier to adopt a few superficial rules, vote for the right candidate, and condemn a few scapegoats than wrestle with God. The “New Age” movement and Protestant fundamentalism are in quite a few ways merely dark mirrors of each other, twin products of the same impulse.

   People today don’t want faith. They want certainty. In a world of terrorism, nuclear weapons, economic uncertainty, globalization pressures and ever-changing technology people want an absolute truth that they can ground themselves in. In the 20th century, radicals tried to make the State into God- and the failure was catastrophic. The paralell to the radical, however, is the reactionary- those who want to make their Church into God (which is a form of idolatry, IMHO- the outer forms of religion become a golden calf)- and they’re the name of the game in the 21st century. And I’m afraid it’s only beginning.

   Faith isn’t about certainty. Faith is about being open to the possiblity of truth, about wrestling with God as Jacob did. This isn’t easy, and, at the end of the week, most people don’t really want religion or spirituality, both of which are very hard work. They want a potted answer, something infallible.

   Nothing of this world is infallible. Which, in the end, is probably the twin realization of both postmodernism AND religion.

9. Jack Says:
   July 23rd, 2005 at 7:27 pm

   Where in the process of developing a worldview out of a hodgepodge of others (what we call syncretism) do you find coherency?

   Well, let’s start by taking apart what you just said and rephrasing it.

   I myself (and I’ll let others speak for themselves) do not hodgepodge anything together, but rather, take it all apart. I’m not one for ala carte religion.

   What I do is take what I find and distill it all until I have the pure essence, common threads, the simple truths that run though the world in many forms, but are always there for us to find, regardless of faith. Commonalities abound more than enough to formulate a coherent worldview grounded in scientific observation as much as in devoted faith.

   if the universe proceeds from a single source then it follows that everything will show the signs of that source.

   Exactly. I’ve always been a pretty big believer in the concept of spiritual truth being subtle yes, and elusive at times, yes, but always simple, and always within grasp of everyone on this planet without intermediary “experts” or complex systems of ritual needed to find it.

   Why is having feeling one has arrived at the “truth” so fundamentally important? And why of all times, as I see in the case of so many classical “religionists”, must it be now?

   You tell me. Have you never been haunted by the question that cannot be asked? I myself was born with an undying and unquenchable need to know what is going on, and why. It’s what draws us to faith, to seeking, to the path, whatever that path may be. I may have learned some patience in my years of hunting, but I am still driven by that need to know.

   On the other hand, I have never (and will never) use that need as an excuse to formulate my own truths. How satisfying would that really be?

   A few months ago I had an experience that I would characterize as a direct experience of the Divine, although when I tried to communicate this to others, only a couple of people understood.

   Yup. You’ll have that. One of the first signs that you’re experience was authentic, in my book….

10. Alec Says:
    July 23rd, 2005 at 11:02 pm

    I enjoy reading about the occult and religion (and conspiracy theories, for that matter) only because it’s entertaining and thought provoking. Kind of like how some people want to read every note Tolkien ever wrote on the back of a napkin or watch the whole ten-disc Matrix DVD set in one sitting. Actually, the DVD analogy is a good one (I wouldn’t be surprised if Tim’s already come up with it): the occult and all that feels like a “special features” disc. Religion and mysticism are like “The Making of Reality,” conspiracy theories more like “Behind the Scenes: Human Society.” Some of the more out-there stuff is like fan fiction (which Tim definitely has written about). Digging into that sort of thing, you sometimes develop a better appreciation for or a different way of looking at the Feature Presentation. Some gesture or backdrop you wouldn’t have noticed before takes on a new significance, even though the subject itself (the analogue of the disc-one movie: the world, human experience) hasn’t changed.

    So for me, in a way, it is about building a “worldview,” but not with the goal of discovering Truth so much as interesting and entertaining perspectives. You can look at life from any angle you want, light it up in different ways, but it’s still what it is. The subject (reality, experience) is the coherent thing.

    Seeking enlightenment or revelatory Truth feels to me like trying to figure out what the hell is up with Tom Bombadil. It might be possible to come up with some cool, fourth-wall explanation that reframes the whole story and grants you some kind of new, sublime appreciation for Middle Earth, but, you know … it’s still just a cool story some guy made up, the same way what we experience is just a cool reality some God made up. It’s fun to think about it in different ways and try to determine what the intentions of the author were, but those intentions aren’t a prison that my appreciation of the work has to be confined in. I’m not holding out hope that I’m going to run into God at a bar sometime, strike up a conversation with him about Creation and prove to him that I know what it’s all about better than anyone else so he can recognize me as his number one fan and take me away from my boring life to live with him so I can see all the behind-the-scenes stuff while he’s creating the sequel. If I run into God, I’d rather have a nice chat, pick a few bones and be on my way.

    That’s a nice thought, actually. Agreeing to disagree with God. He wants you to like his work, but he’s probably expecting a few bad reviews, too. Every author gets ‘em.

    What isn’t coherent is this comment. Oh, well.

11. M Says:
    July 23rd, 2005 at 11:04 pm

    Why do things necessarily have to be coherent? It sounds like an artificiality to satisfy our human needs for order, but the last I knew, the cosmos wasn’t taking orders from us.

12. jason Says:
    July 23rd, 2005 at 11:04 pm

    At the heart of any religion lies a “path” to “truth”. Syncretism is yet more meta-speak used to round up the masses and sedate them. Oh, don’t get me wrong. . . what a great concept:
    “The (capital T )truth does not have to come from one authority (the church); it can be construed by individuals reaching out to many different schools of thought, to arrive at smaller, more easily swallowed, truths.”
    If only it were applied here in the “democratic” United States. Unfortunately, we are on the verge of Theocracy because as postmodern questions arise and solutions such as “syncretism” follow to shore up the damage, Christians can become complacent and allow such a wide swing toward fundamentalism.
    Most people need, at the heart of it all, the comfort of a faith. Democracy operates under the assumption that the majority rules. When in step together, these two realities prop up Christianity, in its traditional form, as an authority–as the final Word. And most, again, are afraid to question authority.
    Christianity, unfortunately, changes and adapts more slowly than the individuals who continue to function within it.
    No matter how many attempts one may take towards understanding that which is unknowable (spiritual knowledge while in a corporeal state), one cannot grasp the utter complexity of it. Coherency is not what’s important–the journey towards it is of the utmost.

13. Chris Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 12:43 am

    “We must learn to separate our religion from our faith. Or, as you might say, separate our story-system from the reality that we know we can never quite understand. Only then can we work on improving our story-systems.”

    I half agree with you, but only in the sense that our story-systems are unecessary. Religion, and God, are placebos; placebos work because we believe they will–we have faith in them. But it’s our faith in the placebo (and not the placebo itself) from which we derive benefit. Faith in ANYthing is beneficial. But it’s not easy to have faith–most of us are natural-born skeptics. For some people, a mere sugar pill (or benign, non-denominational God) is enough to believe in; others need something stronger (a bitter-tasting “vitamin” pill, or a fundamentalist religion, or a complicated story-system) to bolster the illusion that the placebo itself is actually doing something. It should be possible to short-circuit the process by dumping the placebo altogether and simply having faith in the power of faith. That, in my opinion, is as much spiritual reality as one needs to understand. Everything else is just idle entertainment while we wait around for the end.

14. blueapples Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 3:08 am

    Christianity itself is a syncretism.

15. Thomas Conlon Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 9:35 am

    categorization… leads to calamity, to hack Ibsen and Alan Watts…

    I’m of the frame of mind that yes, all these systems and ‘organizations’ tend to be ’sugar coating’ for the bitter pill that all you’ve got is your reflection in the mirror this morning, and truth must be found within…

    I think the syncretic rationalization — and apologistic presumption of MSM (in the US at least) — of the Christian way can’t be divorced from some heavy hitting violations of the 10 commandments - eg Crusades, and the KJV is more or less the sanitized version (ie no Apocrypha etc), safe for the masses, and politically and organizationally expedient, for boxing people into a safe domestic herd.

    Not what “Jesus would have done”, but sadly the end result.

    Getting some vibe here off “render unto Caesar” in that the Catholic Church has been supported by and fundamentally protected (nurtured?) and so forth by the remnants and ruins of the Roman empire (et in Britannia), but I have to fix a computer and my muses are not getting processor time here…

    I have no doubt most people will be like what the fuck is this guy talking about, it’s happened here recently to me.

    But to answer my own question hehe imagine that, I think the meta-dualistic syncresis of God’s will/Thelema is the IT of Zen. And most people need materialistic stuff and power and shit to provide the illusion that this I don’t know why I want to write shell or part of the thread is all there is… But I think on a symbolic and primal level these things go deep and could be reconciled on some level - God/Sun/nature/things we can’t control/wish/desire to ‘fit in’–be passed over by the angel of death/get over the next mountain vs. shaping the world in your own image/killing your enemies etc.

    Ciao.

    “one great big festering neon distraction
    better swim…”

    -Tool

    “fear is the mind-killer” — I wish I could remember the long form of this quote I’ve only seen Dune about 12 times and read the first 4 books like 3 times each.

16. alistair Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 2:13 pm

    syncretism is a natural process of learning. if a child couldn`t do it he/she would never develop language,social skills and all of the other stuff we need to be able to do to be human. the hope is that we will be able to pull back the curtain like dorothy did and expose god for what he/she/it is. i think we`ll just find more people trying to get answers. what isn`t coherent? even the babbling lunatic is obviously insane. coherent means agreeable though, and that`s more a choice that a hodgepodge. when one dogma calls another incoherent that`s just name-calling. it all works on one level or another.

17. Occult Investigator Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 2:40 pm

    coherent means agreeable

    I tend to think you’re right. Or rather, I find that argument “coherent”

18. L Williams Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 2:44 pm

    Hi Everyone. Thanks for thinking through this with me. You have all added a layer that deserves serious thought. I like what you said Tim… your method isn’t necessarily coherent, but you are. That adds quite a different element for me to work on. I got more than I bargained for when I asked the question and I appreciate everyone who has and will contribute.

19. Occult Investigator » The Special Features Disc Says:
    July 24th, 2005 at 2:49 pm

    […] page!

    The Special Features Disc

    Alec made a really cool analogy in the comments that I wanted to take a sn […]

20. Lion Kimbro Says:
    July 25th, 2005 at 6:04 pm

    There is an extreme premium on rationality, reason. Anyone can be reasonable and rational about something, it’s just a matter of: “What do I want to be reasonable and rational about? How much time will I dedicate to being reasonable or rational about this thing?” And then there are all those things outside of the particular subsystem that we’re working on making iron tight.

    It’s easy to get so caught up in our welding, that we ignore (as “too time consuming to verify”) something from outside of our system that would seriously take it apart.

    There are two types of things from outside our system: Those that will intrude, and those that will not. People can live their whole lives with a false belief system, simply because there’s nothing from outside that will provoke them enough to force them out of it.