spirituality - lesson 1: why spirituality

tribal spiral pattern

in this human needs cycle we have envisioned 4 main stages in life - from the age of childhood (4th, upcoming and last course of this cycle), through the exploration of sex (1st course), to the social obligation of work (2nd course), we now move onto the next stage: spirituality. the age of spirituality is - a time in which an individual is released from so many of the usual responsibilities of society and can begin to turn inwards and decide what they would like to do next. - a time to definitely shed the egoic self and connect to something beyond yourself. it is not (necessarily) that one becomes disillusioned over our materialistic society, more that there is a need for meaning other than the physical. youth and middle age are for fulfilling one's desires and duties, and when a person is spiritually ready, he is less self-centered and allowing the young to replace him in power positions. the person spends more time in philosophical pursuits and begins his inward journey - a cultural practice of moving to greater truth. 'GOD is dead' proclaimed a cover story in time magazine in the 1960s, and held science responsible for it. case closed? far from it.

spiral staircase

-I want to know how GOD created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know HIS thoughts; the rest are details. (...) what I see in NATURE is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. this is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism. (...) my religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind. (...) the scientists' religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection. (...) GOD does not play dice with the universe. (...) nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet. (...) the important thing is not to stop questioning. curiosity has its own reason for existing. one cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. it is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. never lose a holy

curiosity. (...) intelligence makes clear to us the interrelationship of means and ends. but mere thinking cannot give us a sense of the ultimate and fundamental ends. to make clear these fundamental ends and valuations and to set them fast in the emotional life of the individual, seems to me precisely the most important function which religion has to form in the social life of man. these are a few of albert einsteins thoughts, (he is of hebrew origins).

the nautilus shell -university of cambridge physicist stephen hawking, best known for his contributions to the fields of cosmology and quantum gravity, especially in the context of black holes, said something similar: my goal is simple. it is complete understanding of the universe, why it as it is and why it exists as all. -george ellis is professor of complex systems in the department of mathematics and applied mathematics at the university of cape town in south africa. he coauthored the large scale structure of space-time with stephen hawking in 1973. he is president of the international society for science and religion (support of inter-disciplinary learning and research in the fields of science and religion): even hard-headed physicists have to acknowledge a number of different kinds of existence beyond the basics of atoms, molecules and chemicals.

-werner heisenberg (physicist and nobel laureate, one of the founders of quantum mechanics and especially known for the uncertainty principle) to his students: take from your scientific work a serious and incorruptible method of thought; help to spread it because no understanding is possible without it. revere those things beyond science which really matter about which it is so difficult to speak. -and max planck, one of the founders of modern nuclear physics, rather begs the science enthusiasts to be more sensible and give consideration and due respect to the larger issues for the advancement of knowledge, in the following words: as a physicist, i.e., as a man who has devoted to the most matter of fact branch of science, namely the investigation of matter, I am surely free of any suspicion of fanaticism. and so after my research into the atom I say this to you: there is no such thing as mater per se! all matter originated from and consists of a force, which sets the atomic particles in oscillation and concentrates them into minute solar systems of the atom. but as there is neither intelligence nor an internal force in the universe we must assume a conscious intelligent spirit behind the force. this spirit is the basic principle of all matter

spiral jetty, landart by robert smithson, 1970 -sir roger penrose, professor of mathematics at the university of oxford, renowned for his contributions to three distinct fields of modern scientific inquiry, who has devoted much of his career to unifying the physics of the large - the general theory of relativity - with the physics of the small quantum mechanics - into a single comprehensive theory. penrose gets down to the business of how science is really done: in the present climate of fundamental research, it would appear to be much harder for individuals to make substantial progress than it had been in einsteins day. teamwork, massive computer calculations, the pursuing of fashionable ideas these are the activities that we tend to see in current research. can we expect to see the needed fundamentally new perspectives

coming out of such activities? this remains to be seen, but I am left somewhat doubtful about it. perhaps if the new directions can be more experimentally driven, as was the case with quantum mechanics in the first third of the 20th century, then such a many-person approach might work.

ancient art - spiral serpent

primordial soup most researchers believe that the origin of life depended heavily on chemicals delivered to earth by comets and meteorites. but researcher james ferris, a prebiotic chemist at rensselaer polytechnic Iistitute in troy, N.Y., doubts that atmospheric electricity could have been the only source of organic molecules. his recent research results suggest that earth's early atmosphere could have produced chemicals necessary for life! from einsteins work on general relativity came the recognition that there must be an origin for matter and energy and from penrose, hawking, heisenbergs, plancks and elliss work came the acknowledgment that there must be an origin for space and time too. maybe GOD does play dice with the universe but according to his own bewildering set of rules. it seems that just before the big bang there was a state called singularity, a state of infinite density and unlimited temperature; which begins to sound uncomfortably like a super-natural state and

once again science has tried to get out of this but could not. the universe, say scientists, is expanding after the big bang and can be contracted in a scientific model back to 10 -34 seconds after the event. speculation abounds about this tiny interval of time, but the model has not been disproved and probably never will be. what we are left with is stephen hawkings conclusion that the universe begins and ends in singularities where the laws of physics and materialistic science simply do not work.

vortex and water how can we approach spirituality? you tell some one that water is formed of hydrogen and oxygen. and if that man stubbornly opposes saying it is a superstition because two invisible gases can never form water, which is visible, you are helpless. at the most you can tell him to go and first to have some preliminary knowledge about chemistry and then experiment himself. still if he maintains it is all mere superstition, it is better to leave him and mind your own business. spirituality is a verifiable science and if one is prepared to do the experiment then he can know whether there is an immanent spirit or not. when one drinks water one quenches ones thirst, but one cannot by that act quench anothers thirst. it is common knowledge that when a person undergoes the basic disciplines of personal development he experiences the reinforcement of his physical, mental and spiritual faculties. this course, a unique of its kind, is being released for the benefit of its students who are at the initial stages and who are supposed to acquire a direct knowledge of the world, gradually getting revealed in systematic degrees of perception. the course is not intended to direct the student to any one particular form of spiritual belief but rather toward spiritual investigation as a whole. we will not examine the worlds religions, and not the many philosophies, but propose you a school, a collection of techniques, which ensure a divelopment in all directions: physic, psychic, mental and spiritual.