Theos-Talk Archives (September 1999 Message tt00094)

Sept 7th 1999

MEDITATION - PART 1 ==


Dear Tony:

Possibly the information about meditation is not given as a routine,
and only the subjects that might be considered are mentioned, because
of the many misunderstandings that arise.

Here are a few things that I have found to be useful to me, but to
another there might be some other mix that is more valuable --
everything has to be self-devised.

Theosophy offers some fundamental ideas and some propositions that
ought to be made into positive assurances in our thought box.

What I am quite sure we all have to avoid is a materializing of any
concept of meditation.  It cannot be personal or selfish to be true
and honest and in any way SPIRITUAL, and UNIVERSAL..

There is a great tendency to make it material and to ritualize it,
rather than treat it as a mental discipline over which one has full
control -- and in fact such control has to become absolute.

The focus is of course from the ATMA-- the Monad which is the inner
Self.  One has to fully realize that it is an IMMORTAL.

Then the Lower embodied self is to consider itself as  the "son" or
"pupil" and it has to offer itself as such to its "Father " the HIGHER
SELF.  This does not mean "blanking the mind."  but a most active
attempt to gather all one knows into a coherent and integrated whole.

I do not mean information only, but the subtle strings that tie
together the many disparate elements and puzzles of our personal and
individual natures.  A knowledge of the 7 principles is absolutely
necessary  and their powers, capacities and the effect of one on the
rest has to be known with accuracy.

This is a tall order and has nothing to do with rites, postures,
ritualism, mantras, dorjes,  cushions,  or any kind of purely
physical, psychological or other personal discipline that might be
imposed on the physical personality by itself in the hope that
compliance with some predescribed series of gestures, chants, thoughts
will bring this process of meditation into being.  What really needs
to be done is to seize the lower Mind and make it quiet.  Then it is
to be directed and focused relentlessly to a selected aspect of
study..  It is all in the MIND.  And it is the WILL (the spiritual
desire) that directs the process.

After all we are mind beings and ought to be able to act as such.  If
you look at a recent set of comments of mine in addition to those Rich
has posited, you will get some more pointers I think are useful.

Another reason why in theosophy detailed instructions are not given (I
posted 2 days ago excerpts from Mr. Judge's EPITOME (p. 25) on
SPIRITUAL CULTIVATION).  That is an integral part of meditative
direction and the recommendations are sound.  As I say one of the
reasons that such directions cannot be given as a routine is because
we all stem from one of the 7 rays of the divine (see SD I 570-574) .
Mediation for anyone of us then follows a technique that is in keeping
with their innate Higher Selves and personal natures -- a mix that has
to be first resolved.

I am going to insert below some quotations that I discovered in my
reading through Theosophical Literature.  As it may prove to be too
long for one insertion, I will probably have to break it up into 2
parts.

Some of your questions may be found answered there.

Best wishes,

Dal

Dallas
dalval@nwc.net 
------------------------------


QUOTE ON MEDIATION		PART  1  ====



MEDITATION

	Introductory

	The Theosophical approach to the consideration of meditation,
introspection, self-analysis can be contrasted with the methods of
investigation employed under Western Psychology, which have been
called the investigation into alternative or altered states of
consciousness.

	The approach in the "West" follows the analytical and observational
process (from "particulars" to a search for "universals").  Sensory
deprivation is one of the methods employed.  This changes the
environment of the thinking and feeling human, with the object of
examining his reactions in terms of feeling and thought to a drastic
change in physical environment.  It is the concept that the physical
state affects and greatly changes the mental.  This is not inaccurate,
but is only a small portion of the entire study of man's psychology
from the Oriental point of view.

	When physical sensation is artificially canceled to a large extent,
the reaction of the percipient consciousness is then observed under a
new series of stresses.  In some cases, the reaction to the use of
mind-altering drugs is also observed, and impressions are culled,
usually from memory.  The nature of the perceiving being which lives
in the physical body of a human is not known, but this process is
designed to discover some of its extended powers of perception.

	The record of such experiments is entirely interior to the subject.
Objective observations are always made later in terms of memory.
Memory is not always free of bias.  Return to "nor-malice" does not
imply entire accuracy in recollection.  Every human has his or her own
set of mental or psycho-emotional filters through which perception and
sensation is recorded "as if" similar to--by analogy and
correspondence--to that which is well-known in the subject's "normal
condition."

	Oriental psychology which has records of research extending back into
a great antiquity, and embraces the experiences and observations of
thousands of participants, commences with a consideration of the basis
of knowledge provided by "metaphysical universals."  These standards
were established, and repeatedly checked and verified over many
thousands of years by many who have voluntarily make these
observations.

	As a system it traces the psychological physiological, mental and
moral evolution of man-intelligence (as a perceiver), using the
various qualitative components of his nature.  For the purpose of such
analysis the oriental psychologist considers in addition to the normal
states (waking, sleeping, dreaming, trance) certain moral components
which bear on man's nature.  Seven distinct qualities (or
"principles") in man correspond to those perceived analogetically in
nature.  These are seen to link the Perceiver in each human to the
physical vehicle (body and brain) in which he lives and perceives.

	The brain is looked on as a specialized link of refined substance
that enables the inner Thinker to work in and with his physical body.
It is important to note that the assemblage of bodily components which
give competency to any human to reflect not only his inner nature
(character, mentality, sensitivity, personal and impersonal drives,
emotional balance, etc.) but that these are assembled almost entirely
without his direct control from conception to final dissolution and
dispersal in the death of that body.  The marvelous symmetry and
sensitivity of the physical body remains largely a puzzle to the
psychologist when the links that exist between perception, conception,
will, intelligence and that form are searched for in the physical
form.
In addition, in the Orient, the reason for personal existence is
considered to have a primacy in the realm of psychological
con-sideration and analysis.  Man is considered to be a self-moving
"atom," or "unit" of consciousness, distinct from all others, yet
united to every other through the consubstantiality of substance,
objective, and coexistence.  A distinction is made between the
evanescent personality of the present life (body, emotion,
rationality, instinct, feeling), and the eternal Individuality
consisting of the Spiritual base, the moral base, and the volitional
thinking base, that form the essential and reincarnating human.

	At the end of this paper which plunges immediately into the
consideration of mediation from the point of view of oriental
psychology, is attached an essay on the seven links between Perceiver,
and the tool of perception (the body).  The mind, intelligence,
consciousness, sensation, feeling, emotion, are assigned in this
system precise origins, inter-relations and dimensions of operation.
Intuition, intelligence, instinct, reason, intellect, meditation,
dream consciousness of various kinds and levels, etc., are all
considered.  The terminology employed in Theosophy is largely derived
from that used in the very ancient Eastern development of this
science.  A familiarity with  that nomenclature and its system of
metaphysics ought to be acquired so that there is greater ease in
following the state-ments made in many of these quotations.  Wherever
possible, in square brackets, modern equivalents of the oriental
technical terms have been given.  On the other hand, students of
Eastern Psychology do make the effort to understand terms evolved in
Western investigation of the psyche and mental powers, so that they
may offer such links as will serve both systems in under-standing each
other.  In the orient, to recapitulate, the student starts with the
universal theory of intelligence, and is shown how the
particularization of this into component "units" occurs.  He is
encouraged to verify this in himself through "meditation" (as outlined
in Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, for instance).  In the west, starting with
many observations of mental and psychological effects, their cause is
sought.  Generalizations are framed as the result of experimental
observation.

	In the description of oriental psychology the personal variations in
mental action and perception are not limited to the "brain" or the
"nervous system," which in that system are considered to be the most
sensitive material tools--the last link between the immaterial
Perceiver, and the physical material form in which it lives, observes,
thinks and feels at present.

	In the oriental system the Thinker is held to be a permanent entity
consisting of the most tenuous (yet most resilient in its inherent
permanency) aspect of physical substance.  And, this is resident as
the Ego-base (the Perceiver--called Atma) in every human form.  It is
held to survive the death of the body.  The process of reincarnation
and multiple rebirths is held to be valid in the philosophy of the
universe.  It considers all ex-perience (including the human stage) to
be similar to the opera-tion and experience to be had in a vast
school, where all beings and pupils are of the same immortal and
eternal essence.  Each of these participants is held to retain, as its
own permanent base in capacity and character, in mind and moral
nature, in feeling and intuition, a record of the vast past of all
experiences the Perceiver has been through.  This record is said to be
the moral-base (called Buddhi-wisdom of experience).  The observing,
learn-ing, thinking base in called Manas, the Thinker, the Chooser,
the conscious, sensitive, feeling individual intelligence of every
human.

	The "sensory deprivation" used in the West to focus atten-tion on the
emotional and mental response of subject humans, has long been
mentally induced in the orient through "meditation, fasting and other
ascetic disciplines," which are essentially a mental control of the
perceptual environment.  This is made operative through the will, or
volition of the Perceiver within, which in effect isolates itself for
a time from its bodily per-ceptions.  The successful operator of the
Oriental method can at any time suitable enter into the meditative
condition and there seek the wisdom available to handle any situation
question or crisis.  In order to explain this to others, his process
of self-education has to be made plain.

	For each system to understand the other, an exchange of concepts is
essential.  The gap of language and of concepts has to be bridged.  It
may also be recognized that all the observations made by Western or
Oriental psychology are a continuation of the verifying of similar
observations made in the framing of the concepts of either system.
Both systems are thus seen to be united as they employ the human
psyche as a basis for experimen-tation and understanding, but the
starting points of the respec-tive systems are at this time almost
polar opposites.

	To put this in historical perspective, during the time of the "dark
ages" ( 4th to 13th Centuries) the West was systemati-cally deprived
by fanatics of those links of knowledge and wisdom which would have
united its progress in discovery with the rest of the scholarly world
in the Orient.  Isolated from that source, it has developed since the
Renaissance its own base for scientif-ic analysis and independent
study.  Science freed, broke the chains of theocracy and Aristotelian
thought and methods being adopted, replaced dogmas and credalism as
the Western mind was gradually unchained.  This produced an imbalance
as materialism developed, and the physical world was deemed the only
reality.  The causative basis for phenomena was lost sight of.  And
while phenomena was recognized, the source for those was not to be
found in physical structures.

	In the last two hundred years a knowledge of the rich mines of
example and experience available from ancient oriental texts has
become increasingly available to the psychological sciences.  The
contrast between the two systems is clear.  In the West the starting
point is the "particular" and the physical.  In the East it is the
"universal," and the Mental, and, in addition, a moral component is
added:  the consideration of the aims and objectives of the "whole of
manifestation" of which mankind is only a com-ponent.

	Man's existence is to be carefully considered at each point as
integrated with nature and his environment.  This "environ-ment" has
reason for existence in itself, and every component is to be regarded
as essential to living as a whole.  This under-scores the concept of
Universal Brotherhood as an essential component of all Life.  Mankind
represents perhaps the most intelligent of beings in our world, but it
is entirely dependent on the cooperation and sacrifice of a vast
multitude of other "units of lie," which sustain its form with their
lives.  Man's intelligence as a class in located at the point of
transition between the non-self-conscious and the universally
self-conscious.  In this is seen an enormous moral responsibility as
each human becomes in effect the conservator, the trustee for the rest
of the World.								-- DTB

==========

	Glossary & Notes


	Meditation ..."is silent and unuttered prayer, or, as Plato expressed
it, "the ardent turning of the soul towards the divine;"  not to ask
any particular good (as in the common mean-ing of prayer), but for
good itself--for the "universal Supreme Good" of which we are a part
on earth, and out of the essence of which we have all emerged...adds
Plato, "remain silent in the presence of the divine ones, till they
remove the clouds from thy eyes and enable thee to see by the light
which issues from them-selves, not what appears as good to thee, but
what is intrinsi-cally good."							Key, pp 10-11


	Sanyama ... [ restraint, control, concentration ]

"Fixing the mind on a plane, or subject is attention (Dharana)

The continuance of this attention is contemplation (Dhyana)

This contemplation, when it is practiced only in respect to a material
subject or object of sense, is meditation (Samadhi)

	When this fixedness of attention, contemplation, and medita-tion are
practiced with respect to one object, they together constitute what is
called Sanyama. (Perfect concentration) ... an accurate discerning
power is developed ( a distinct faculty, which this practice alone
develops)."	Patanjali, p. 37-8

  [see also, on "Attention,"  Theos Art & Notes, p. 153-158]

	Sanyama "is to be used in proceeding step by step to over-come all
"modifications of the mind," (see Pat. pp. 1, 3 ) from the more
apparent to those most subtle...(after he has overcome the afflictions
and obstructions described in earlier books, there are modifications
of a recondite character suffered by the mind, which are to be got rid
of by Sanyama.  When he has reached that stage the difficulties will
reveal themselves to him.)"
									Pat. p. 38-9

			Concentration


	Concentration ... "or Yoga is the hindering of the "modifi-cations of
the thinking principle."  (...lack of concentration is due to the
mind--"thinking principle"--being diffused over a multiplicity of
subjects.)  So concentration is equivalent to the correction of a
tendency to diffuseness--to obtaining "one-point-edness," or the power
to apply the mind, at any moment to the consideration of a single
point of thought, to the exclusion of all else...the mind is not the
supreme or highest power;  it is only a function, and instrument, with
which the soul (the higher mind) works, feels sublunary things, and
experiences...the lower mind has a plane of its own, distinct from the
soul and the brain, and what is to be learned is to use the will,
which is also a distinct power from the mind and brain in such a
way...as a servant at any time, for as long a period as we wish, to
the consideration of whatever we have decided upon.)"	Pat. p. 1,2,3.

	"Real concentration is in fact Union with the Divine.  We are to
understand that we are each the Divine.  There is no separateness, but
the one Spirit is in each, reflected in each person.  "Thou art that
Spirit !" is well understood and felt before concentration can become
possible...study Patanjali [ the philosophy of concentration]  The
true source for concentration is selflessness, for as long as we feel
the shackles of the personal self, so long is concentration hindered
in various ways."					WQJ - Pract. Occ. p. 275


	"Real concentration is not acquired by experiments in thought
transference, [for] in those [cases], one of the persons has to be
passive or over-sensitive.  Passivity leads at last either to
indifference or to undue and unequal development of psychism, which is
very undesirable...There are two kinds of concentration.  First that
of the brain and mere nerves, includ-ing attention, and Second, that
sort which is higher and spiritu-al, pertaining to the ideals of life
and the soul itself.  The first is properly cultivated by ordinary
methods of study and attention, especially the latter and which
results in good memo-ry.  The second is cultivated by fixing the
aspirations on the highest good for all and on the unity of all
beings;  by acting for the good of all;  by practicing altruism;  by
endeavoring to spread the light of truth to as many persons as
possible, ignor-ing what seems like present advantage to oneself;  in
fact, by "right speech, right thought, and right action."  All this
second practice results in giving to all the qualities in the being,
to every cell and atom, one single impulse and direction;  and when
that is fully established, knowledge flows in on all sides, as it
were, spontaneously.  Any other practice deludes us by seeming
agreeable or fascinating, but in fact results only in small special
effects...our real character...is improved or enlarged only by a
spiritualized life and motive."
								WQJ Pract. Occ. p. 290-1


	"At the time of concentration, the soul abides in the state of a
"spectator without a spectacle."  (This has reference to the
perfection of concentration...by hindering the modifications of the
thinking principle, the soul (lower manas) is brought to a state of
being wholly devoid of taint of, or impressions by, any subject.)
Pat, p. 3


	"The "modifications of the Mind" are:-- Correct Cognition,
Misconception, Fancy, Sleep, and Memory."	Pat, p. 4


	"The "hindering of the modifications of the Mind" (lower Manas)...is
to be effected by means of Exercise and Dispassion.
 	"Exercise is the uninterrupted, or repeated effort that the mind
(lower manas) shall remain in its unmoved state, (or apply it to any
one point to the exclusion of all others.)...This exercise is a firm
position observed out of regard for the end in view, and perseveringly
adhered to for a long time without inter-mission.  (Q.:  Does he
devote every moment of his life to it ?  A.:  No, but to the length of
time that has been set apart for the practice.)

	Dispassion is the having overcome one's desires, (a state of being in
which the consciousness is unaffected by passions, desires, and
ambitions, which aid in causing modifications of the mind.)

	Dispassion carried to the utmost, is indifference regarding all else
than soul (Higher Manas), and this indifference arises from a
knowledge of soul (Higher Manas) as distinguished from all else."
Pat, pp. 5, 6, 7.


	"Meditation or "distinct cognition" is four-fold:  Argumen-tation,
Deliberation, Beatitude, Egoism.  (excludes every other modification
than that pondered on.)


	Argumentation...pondering in comparison with other things.


	Deliberation... pondering sources and fields of action of the subtler
senses and the mind.


	Beatitude ...   pondering on Higher Manas and abstract Truth.

	Egoism	which then becomes a stepping stone to higher degrees of
medita-tion...self-consciousness alone results;  does not include the
consciousness of the Absolute or the Supreme Soul."
									Pat. pp 7, 8.


	"The meditation just described is preceded by the exercise of thought
without argumentation.

	Another sort of meditation is in the shape of the "self-reproduction
of thought"  after the departure of all objects from the field of the
mind (Lower Manas).

	The meditative state attained by those whose discrimination does not
extend to pure Spirit (Atma), depends upon the phenome-nal world.
 	In the practice of those who are, or may be, able to dis-criminate
as to pure spirit, their meditation is preceded by Faith, Energy,
Intentness (upon a single point), and Discernment, or thorough
discrimination of that which is to be known.  (In him who has Faith
there arises Energy, or perseverance in meditation, and, thus
persevering, the memory of past subjects springs up, and his mind
becomes absorbed in Intentness, in consequence of the recollection of
the subject, and he whose mind is absorbed in meditation arrives at a
thorough Discernment of the matter pon-dered upon.)"						Pat, pp. 8,
9, 10




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