One

It was wholly unexpected.

40 years ago I craved such an experience but had given up on the idea; the path was strewn with paradoxes and deceptions; it appeared to require that I become a far better person than I could ever hope to be. And was any of it true anyway?

But whilst on holiday, preceded by a beautiful dream and an experience of the night sky 2 days before, it came. I had an experience of cosmic Oneness which put me in an ecstasy; the ground of all being was divine bliss, a bliss that is infinite and ever-lasting. I don’t know how long this experience lasted but it must have been about half an hour. It has transformed my perception of everything.

I wrote the following:

I felt Truth kiss me in the night; her kiss was pure and infinitely Light;
In that moment she taught me this: “The essence of Nature is infinite bliss.”
Both the I and the Me obscure Divine Reality,
But Beauty and Truth combined illuminate the mind.

What I experienced was cosmic unity, eternal and infinite. It was an experience shared by many mystics, saints, and poets. In his book, “The Varieties of Religious Experience”, William James quotes the words of Dr Bucke, a psychiatrist who had such experiences himself and studied those of others:

“The prime characteristic of cosmic consciousness is a consciousness of the cosmos, that is, of the life and order of the universe. Along with the consciousness of the cosmos there occurs an intellectual enlightenment which alone would place the individual on a new plane of existence-would make him almost a member of a new species. To this is added a state of moral exaltation, an indescribable feeling of elevation, elation, and joyousness, and a quickening of the moral sense, which is fully as striking, and more important than is the enhanced intellectual power. With these come what may be called a sense of immortality, a consciousness of eternal life, not a conviction that he shall have this, but the consciousness that he has it already.” [p.384 from the chapter on Mysticism]

One thing I have written about frequently on this blog is the paradigm shift from the Ptolemaic geocentric model of the universe to the Copernican. A shift which I often liken to our need to be less ego-centric. Ironically, it was by stepping back into a pre-Copernican view of the universe that the ground was prepared for the experience of cosmic Oneness. I saw a devotional universe in which all things were participants and expressions of the same blissful order.

The question obviously arises as to whether this is a special form of perception or a special form of deception.

My view is that it is a form of perception that occurs when the normal ego-based consciousness yields to a non-egoic form of consciousness. Instead of seeing things from the point of view of our limited, temporal ego we see them from the point of view of a universal self or non-ego.

This is why we cannot will these experiences. The will is of the ego and the ego is precisely that which needs to get out of the way.

I’ve been a big fan of Sam Harris and have dabbled with his advice on meditation. This video was an eye-opener for me (payment is required but for me it was money well spent) and his recommendation of D. E. Harding’s, “On having no head” was highly useful for developing the right kind of focus (away from the ego).

The key feature of this non-egoic perception is Oneness, a sense that all is one, one is all and that there is absolutely no separation from it.

The Third Patriarch of Zen puts it this way:

“When the ten thousand things are viewed in their oneness,
We return to the origin and remain where we have always been…
One in all,
All in One-
If only this is realized,
No more worry about not being perfect!
When Mind and each believing mind are not divided,
And undivided are each believing mind and Mind,
This is where words fail,
For it is not of the past, present or future.”

Quoted in Aldous Huxley’s “Perennial Philosophy” (p.89 - Chapter “God in the World”)

If the ego stands in the way of such experiences how are we to overcome it? This is the question of all true religion.

Goethe said,

“From the compulsion that all creatures binds, who overcomes himself his freedom finds.”

The “himself” here is the ego.

I am not a Christian and have been agnostic regarding God but I can see how many of the teachings of Jesus represent genuine guidance towards the Divine Reality. I’ve never understood the doctrine that he died to save us from our sins; it strikes me as a genuine misunderstanding.

“For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” Luke 18:25

My reading of this is that the rich man has an augmented ego. He is self-satisfied and proud. It is this that blocks his path to the Kingdom of God, the experience of Oneness, which he can only reach via an absence of ego.

The dominance of the ego has to be overcome. This is scary for us because from an egoic point of view the ego is all that we are. It is vital to understand Jesus’ emphasis on humility and his own profoundly humble example.

This is also why Pride is the number one deadly sin. You’ll notice it is not murder. The deadly sins are really concerned with what blocks our way to the Divine Reality and they do this because they are all aspects of egoism, and Pride quintessentially so. Pride is that quality of puffed-up-ness which prevents us from passing through the eye of the needle.

The great Christian thinker, C.S. Lewis writes, in Mere Christianity, that pride is the "anti-God" state, the position in which the ego and the self are directly opposed to God: "Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind." Pride is understood to sever the soul from God, as well as His life-and-grace-giving Presence. (from Wikipedia “The Seven Deadly Sins” see Hubris.)

Other examples of Jesus teaching humility are:
- “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone”
- “Address the mote in your own eye before the beam in another’s”
- “Blessed are the meek”
- “Blessed are the poor in spirit”
- “Blessed are the pure in heart”

Humility is the prime cardinal virtue. It describes that state of the ego as softened and pliable like water. In this state it has transparency and the ability to allow other things to pass through it; things like light and heavenliness. It is the truly religious throughout the centuries who have cultivated this state.

Beauty has the power to soften and sometimes overwhelm the ego giving rise to powerful experiences of Oneness.

The Seven Deadly Sins are correctives to egoism.

In Milton’s Paradise Lost, Lucifer becomes the fallen angel on account of his pride. Pride severs his relationship with the divine order and precipitates his fall from grace. The egoic and non-egoic are on a see-saw, the more one is up the more the other is down.

Conversely, in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice we experience the uplift afforded by the overcoming of pride by love.

Which brings me to Muhammad. I don’t know what happened to Muhammad in his early days as a religious teacher but during the later Medinan period he is clearly aligned with the ego, the anti-God state.

Islam became an entirely egotistical religion, almost a religion of the ego and the will, and it was overseen by an egotistical God of arbitrary will, summed up by the ubiquitous boast of “Allahu Akbar” – our god is greater.

Muhammad’s intense pride can be seen in his inability to bear the criticisms and mockery of his detractors. He therefore had them assassinated.

He identified the goals of his own will with the directives of divine will. Divinity in his mind was almighty and arbitrary, a supreme ego akin to his own. The Islam of Muhammad is a massive ego trip.

Whereas Jesus illuminates the world by reflecting the light of divinity, Muhammad darkens it with his nefarious, egotistical will.

That Muhammad divided the world into those who accepted his prophetic status and those who did not was evidence enough of his falsehood. The attribute of Divinity is Oneness not Twoness.

The Deadly Sins of the Ego are: Pride, Gluttony, Avarice, Sloth, Envy, Anger, Lust.

Muhammad appealed to his followers in terms that would satisfy their egos and the deadly sins. The promise of worldly wealth and grandeur; the promise of sex slaves to satisfy their lust; the opportunity to get the better of those who were more successful; the promise of an afterlife modelled entirely upon the appetites of the ego: virgins, wine, unlimited sensual pleasures.

He raved about the torments that would be suffered by those who failed to accept him and continually encouraged his followers to gloat on them, indeed one of the great pleasures of the afterlife would be to see them suffer. This is egoism pure and simple.

He taught that “those who believe” should hate everyone else: Divisive not unifying.

I believe you will search the Koran in vain for a scrap of spiritual guidance. This is because, for all its bloated pretensions, it is a book of the ego not one of divinity.

One of the greatest teachings of Jesus was to guard against self-righteousness. Islam gives its followers much of the appearance of spirituality. Slavish devotion, obsessive rituals, fasting, prayer, modesty of dress, external cleanliness, but the inner fruits of its doctrines are pride and contempt for others. This is a wholly unspiritual outcome.

With the doctrine of voluntarism, Islam has even developed a metaphysics of egoism. According to this metaphysics, no event occurs in the universe that is not specifically willed by Allah. Allah is not subject to any constraint such as the laws of Nature, to suggest so is to suggest his absolute will is not absolutely powerful. "Inshallah" is the appeal to Allah's supreme egoism.

Because it has no spiritual truth it has to resort to force and coercion. Devoid of truth it deploys the ultimate fallacy – the argument of the stick (argumentum ad baculum).

The Koran is not one of the world’s documents of the spiritual life. It is rather a testament to the egoism of one man – Muhammad.

Muhammad, whose ego was so lustful he married a girl of six and found a “divine” reason (a “revelation”) saying that he should have his cousin’s wife, Zainab.

This is not the behaviour of a spiritual guide but of a wholly unspiritual egoist. Muslims should be told this in no uncertain terms whilst they have time to rectify their lives in accordance with better principles.

I think the fundamental idea behind the Islamic project is to create a sacred space that is unassailable; logically, a world dominated by Islam would be unassailable. The only snag is it wouldn’t be sacred. Islam as it is now constituted is a massive ego-trip. Ego-trips aren’t sacred.

Islam has burst through the centuries building exponentially upon the first ejaculation of Muhammad’s rapacious ego. That is really all it is; an elaborate extension of his ego.

Islam now stands face to face with a decadent de-Christianized West. Our politically correct culture has descended into a farce of ego protection wherein certain groups of people are protected from the beneficial pain of corrective truth – a dismal fact that ensures our descent into ever greater pretense and untruth.

There is a grain of goodness in political correctness in so far as those who are politically correct are often trying to protect those they see as weaker than themselves. We should guard against the pride that can grow from being better educated, better qualified, better mannered, or better financed than others but the game of PC has become an absurd circus of protecting the egos of others from harsh truths. We know truth when we hear it; when know it when we see it (though we’ll often turn away quickly). It has an undeniable resonance. Those people would be far better off left unprotected that they might feel the force of truth to diminish their egos. They would then, less full of pride, be beacons of truth themselves.

The Christian preoccupation with not straying into egoism has an echo in the orientation of the cultural left. The left is always referring us back to our own cultural failings when we point out the failings of other cultures. Political correctness is to some degree a corrective against cultural egoism; likewise the constant reiteration of tu quoque arguments: “what about the Crusades”, “what about the slave trade”, ”what about colonialism” etc.

Where there might have been an element of nobility in this tendency it is also a great falsifier. Truth must prevail. Ignoring the faults of others whilst constantly inflating our own may feel like a kind and noble thing to do but it has the awful effect of falsifying reality and energizing the egoism of people whose culture already renders them proud and contemptuous of others.

And yes, there is much to be said for concentrating on putting our own house in order. However, we cannot do that if some egotistical savage has destroyed the house.

One of the easiest forms of pride to fall into is in-group supremacy. Here again, the Left is frequently urging a corrective but it becomes overly negative towards the in-group and overly flattering towards out-groups. When this flattery is directed towards those of a supremacist culture it makes their cultural egotism even more bloated.

Western hedonism may be little better in terms of educating us away from the ego but it does have the merit of leaving individuals at liberty and not inducing intolerant expressions of piety - although the new piety of political correctness is a strong contender. The culture of the West has also allowed the possibility for cultural self-criticism to exist. This is a direct product of the non-egoic teachings of Jesus. Christianity, being a true expression of divinity, puts us on guard with respect to our ego, both the individual and the collective form.

The question is now whether we can regain enough awareness of what we are really about to return to non-hedonistic, non-egoic terms of existence and prevent a worldwide slide into the abyss of Islamic egotistical totalitarianism.

A Verse

Muhammad was an egoist and therefore not divine,

His influence for centuries has never been benign.

Sam Harris provides an Antidote to Cognitive-Egocentrism

Reading from the latest edition of the ISIS magazine Dabiq, Sam Harris takes us with chilling lucidity into the mind and worldview of the jihadist.

Are you constantly exasperated by people's inability to step outside their 21st century Western worldview and put themselves into the mind of a devout Muslim? Do you wish politicians and media would stop talking about "alienation" and "poverty" and "lack of opportunity" because these are largely irrelevant to our understanding of the devout Mohammedans and their motives and aspirations? 

These are all aspects of cognitive ego-centrism - the inability to step outside our own worldview in order to put ourselves into the worldview of another, especially when that other has a very different worldview to our own. 

What is it like to adopt a perspective on life (and death) which is essentially medieval, but nonetheless real for that?

Listen to this 42 minute podcast by Sam Harris in which he asks his listeners to stop imposing their worldview onto the jihadists and accept what they say about themselves to be true and truly felt.

Sam Harris: What do jihadists really want?

Observations on the narrative narrative

Observations following on from Sam Harris's idea of the narrative narrative.

Whence comes this notion that focusing our attention on the specific threat that is originating from Islam will drive more Muslims into the camp of the jihadists?

The Left have developed a conceptual environment in which things are generally held to be equivalent or equal; a culturally relativistic environment; an environment in which to discriminate in a cognitive sense (that is to use discernment or judgment) is equivalent to discriminating in an affective, persecutory sense.

The power of discerning between these two senses of discrimination has been vitiated by anti-discriminatory political correctness (the conceptual environment that seeks to "equivalize" all things); to discriminate is to err.

This is a conceptual environment in which discrimination is the root of all ills, including the ill of Muslim violence. In the politically correct mind this violence will be traceable to some form of discrimination. Therefore any discrimination, including the discrimination of attending to one thing over another, will fuel Muslim violence and polarization.

Just thinking aloud...

Sam Harris explains the "narrative narrative"

The ever-lucid Sam Harris recorded a very interesting interview with David Gregory in which he sought, among other things, to explain what he has come to refer to as the "narrative narrative".
This narrative is something we hear increasingly from politicians of the left and centre, less so from the true right.

I have transcribed Sam's words from the soundcloud recording which you can access here. The section I've transcribed starts at around the 40 minute mark.

Sam Harris: the narrative narrative.

In fighting ISIS or resisting the spread of Islamic theocracy more generally, we must at all costs avoid "confirming the narrative" of Islamic extremists. So the fear is that any focus on the religion of Islam or its adherents, like profiling at the TSA or intelligence gathering at mosques or merely acknowledging that we are not at war with generic terrorism but Islamic terrorism in particular; the fear is that this will drive many more Muslims into the arms of the jihadists; they'll become jihadists because of this.

But now think about what's actually being alleged here; think about the underlying horror and paranoia of this claim: let's say (this isn't a perfect analogy but it should work) you're a bald white man, right, and unhappily for you there just happens to be a global insurgency of neo-Nazi skinheads that's just terrorising a hundred countries, right; most white men are of course perfectly peaceful but this insurgency has grown so widespread and so captivating to a minority of white men that no city on earth is safe.

Bald white men have blown up planes and buses and burned embassies and even murdered innocent children by the hundreds, point blank; and we have now spent trillions of dollars trying to contain this damage; and many of these white men are seeking nuclear materials so they can detonate dirty bombs and even atomic ones, and to make matters worse many of them are validly suicidal and therefore undeterrable. 

Now imagine what it would be like to hear presidents and prime ministers and newspaper columnists and even your own fellow white bald men expressing the fear that merely acknowledging the whiteness and baldness of neo-Nazi skinheads would so oppress and alienate other white bald men that they too would begin murdering innocent people; OK, imagine being told that at all costs we can't confirm the narrative of neo-Nazis by acknowledging that white bald men festooned with swastikas pose a greater security interest than elderly Hawaiian women, for instance, or that any kind of focus on people who look like this could be so offensive that it will lead other white bald men to act out in this completely insane way.

Now this is either the most pessimistic and uncharitable thing ever said about a community, in the case of the world's 1.6 billion Muslims, or it's true. 

OK, now, if it's the former, if it's just pure paranoia to be saying this then we should stop saying it, right; but if it's the latter, right, if it's actually a legitimate fear that calling a spade a spade here will drive some terrifying number of otherwise ordinary Muslims into the arms of theocrats, so these people will then be "radicalized", they'll be calling for clitoridectomies for their daughters, or they'll be supporting people who throw gays from rooftops, well then we should be talking about nothing else; we should be obliging Muslims to talk about nothing else.

This is the most bizarre, uncanny fact about our world at this moment, if true. 

Daniel Greenfield takes on the narrative nonsense here.

Muslims Are Victims

Yes, Muslims are victims. They are victims of Islam and they threaten to make the rest of us victims, either as converts...

...or corpses.

What is a bigot?

Another of the common accusations thrown at opponents of Islamisation is that they are bigots. With its usual smugness, the Left is now apt to call a bigot anyone with opinions that they dislike. But if you look at the real meaning of the word it has more to do with the way that opinions are held and one's attitude towards opinions different to one's own.

Let's start by looking at dictionary definitions of the word bigot:

Using the dictionaries that I have available in my home and looking at online sources I have found the following definitions of bigot:

1. [Oxford Illustrated Dictionary, pub. 1962] - one who holds irrespective of reason, and attaches disproportionate weight to, some creed or view.
2. [Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, pub. 1966] :
   • hypocritical or superstitious professor of religion circa 1600-1700
   • obstinate adherent of a creed or opinion 1700 onwards
3. [The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles, pub. 1973]
   • circa 1598, a hypocrite
   • to 1664, a superstitious person
   • 1661 onwards, a person obstinately and unreasonably wedded to a creed, opinion, or ritual
   • Bigoted: Obstinately or blindly attached to some creed, opinion, or party, and intolerant towards others
4. Current online dictionaries:
   • A ​person who has ​strong, ​unreasonable ​beliefs and who does not like other ​people who have different ​beliefs or a different way of ​life. [Dictionary.Cambridge.org]
   • A person who is intolerant towards those holding different opinions [OxfordDictionaries.com]
   • A prejudiced person who is intolerant of any opinions differing from his own - [Vocabulary.com]
   • A prejudiced person who is intolerant of any opinions differing from his own - [TheFreeDictionary.com]

The Left seems to be in the process of shifting the definition of "bigot" so that it means anyone unsympathetic to the Left's agenda, that is so say someone who seeks to avoid societal suicide. So anyone with conservative opinions who seeks to preserve their way of life is now classed as a bigot. In particular, anyone determined to protect their society and way of life from the predatory advances of Islam is a bigot. Thus counter-jihadists are portrayed by the Left as bigots.

But when we look at what is really going on today I think the Left's definition of bigot cannot withstand scrutiny. On the contrary, it seems to be the Left itself that most successfully fits the historical meanings of the word. Ex-Muslim Sarah Haider describes them as "benevolent bigots".

Meaning #1: hypcrite. A hypocrite is someone who does not practice what they claim to believe in.

Those on the Left like to see themselves as the champions of human rights, equality, social justice, peace, and that nebulous, undefined good known as "diversity".  The Left fails to live up to these claims because they surrender to the demands of Islam whenever it conflicts with their ideals. They capitulate to Islamic norms with respect to women thereby allowing gender apartheid; they are ready to accommodate Sharia courts and other instruments of Islamic control thereby enshrining all the inequalities of the Sharia in our societies; they fail to protect the peace by allowing the growth of jihadist elements and the almost unavoidable prospect of civil wars within western societies.

Even the stupid notion of diversity will eventually come unstuck as Islam transforms societies into closer and closer approximations of Islamic State.

The Left tests positive on definition #1.

Meaning #2: Obstinacy of opinion or unreasonable adherence to a belief

Since 9/11 many of us have taken the trouble to put our cultural assumptions to one side and try to understand the nature of Islam in its own terms. We have learned about the Koran and read it in whole or in part; we have learned about the central importance of Mohammed and his life; we have learned that his example is a key component in the development of Sharia law and that his moral example offers some appalling examples of deception, betrayal, enslavement, conquest, the murder of non-violent opponents such as poets, marriage to a child of six, sex with a child of nine, genocide, banditry, and that Islam's prime imperative (derived from Mohammed) is the subjugation of all to the belief that Mohammed is the last messenger of God and all should submit to the laws derived from his teaching and personal example.

In order to do this we have had to counter a natural tendency within all of us to cling to opinions and existing beliefs. We have a had to constantly revise our worldview in the light of what we found and had to come to terms with the painful recognition that Islam is a wholly different and aggressive worldview which is in direct and permanent conflict with our civilization. We have not sought this information because we like it but have had to come to terms with its existence in spite of the dread it inspires in us.

The Left, on the contrary, has remained obstinately wedded to its pre-existing worldview that all cultures are harmless and colorful additions to the fabric of our societies; that Muslims are not inspired and committed in varying degrees to a creed that is divisive and discriminatory; that we can coexist with any number of Muslims and preserve a tolerant, open, and rational society based on the principles of human rights.

They have stubbornly resisted the evidence that this is not a reasonable view in light of what we know about Islamic doctrines, Mohammed's character, the history of Islamic culture hitherto, and the practice of Islam today as shown in the 57 Muslim countries of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

They have stubbornly resisted the evidence of 27,670 terrorist attacks carried out in the name of Islam since 9/11.

They have stubbornly resisted the evidence of Christian persecution that anyone genuinely concerned for human rights would be interested to know.

They have stubbornly resisted the evidence of creeping Sharia and stealth jihad in one Western society after another - the same pattern, the same process, the same outcomes.

Instead of undertaking any revision of their opinions informed by reason and evidence they have clung to childish slogans and beliefs.

The Left tests positive on definition #2.

Meaning #3: Intolerance of beliefs or opinions different to one's own

The Left have demonstrated time and time again just how intolerant they are of opinions that differ from their own. Today's university campuses, dominated as they are by left-wing thought, have become places where conservative opinions can seriously impede one's career.

The current "safe spaces" fiasco on university campuses is another manifestation of this intolerance of contrary opinion. Students are demanding places where they can feel safe from the threat of opinions they dislike.

Another university phenomenon that has been gradually normalized by the Left is the "no platform" to speakers they disapprove of. Even a secular ex-Muslim such as Maryam Namazie has been barred from speaking at Warwick University in the UK.

Time and again the Left demonstrates its hostility to "free speech" when others refuse to intone the acceptable leftist platitudes. They also shut down the voices of others by labeling as "hate speech" the speech that they hate.

The Left tests positive on definition #3.

As you can see, it's not even a question of the pot calling the kettle black when the Left accuses the counter-jihad of bigotry. It's more like demons tearing at the flesh of innocents. They test positive on each meaning of bigotry outlined above and should be addressing it.

As a start they might consider taking seriously their avowed commitment to human rights and acknowledge the threat that Islam poses to these. They might study the Koran and the life of Mohammed and the theological doctrines derived from them and revise their worldview accordingly. They could also try allowing people to voice their concerns about the most intolerant religion on earth instead of shouting "bigot!" at all who take truth seriously and go by the evidence.

And, contrary to what the Left may like to believe, someone holding opinions that the Left does not like cannot for this reason alone be defined as a bigot. In today's context, those on the Left show far more of the attributes of bigots.