Dramatic Universe : Volume III

 

Man and his Nature

 

By: J G Bennett

SYNOPSIS (MJG)

 

It is not possible to render some diagrams, tables and formulae in the book in this format. I have therefore given page numbers for consultation of the originals.

 

Part 14

 

Systems

 

 pp. 5-18

 

The Structure of the World

 

Organised Complexity

 

There is a rapid growth of our knowledge of the world. The Universe is complex.

The greater the complexity, the greater evidence there is that the world is not a chaos of atoms but a highly organised, integrated structure.

Complexity has routed simplicity and truth in physics.

The confidence we feel in scientific method is no longer based on universal laws. Behind this complexity is an organised structure which holds everything together.

**We act structurally but we think and speak analytically. We aim to see and think in terms of wholeness and structure rather than atoms and laws: multi-term systems (MG: Interesting as structure is at the basis of the work of the social philosopher Pierre Bourdieu on whom I have written some books. I have been trying (somewhat unsuccessfully) to get this last point across to an academic audience for years!!).

 

Structure and Systems

The importance of structure has come by way of practical need, not speculative philosophy.

We apprehend structure with understanding, not knowledge. Knowledge is confined to fact. The domain of fact does not contain transformation: only the domain of harmony.

**Knowing (function) v. Understanding (Will)

Structures are not objects of knowledge – but domains of harmony. We do not know structures, but we know because of structure.

Facts are facts – atomic, unrelated. We need to look at things in a new way: structure. We need structure to understand organised complexity rather than empirical laws.

Understanding (Subjective aspect of Will)
Knowledge (Subjective aspect of Function)

We can ‘know’ structures only in their functional properties, but we understand them in their working.

They are more than actualisation in time – not simply how they change.

**Structures link fact and value.

**We understand by synthetic and creative acts but we know by an act that is analytic and automatic. We experience them with sensitivity as images and conscious judgements.

Structure is the primary element of experience.

Being and understanding are separate. But:

In the study of structures, we cannot separate what we understand from what we are, nor can we separate what a thing is from the way it is known.

Systematics is the study of structure: it makes connections as primary; elements as secondary.

Systems: a set of independent but mutually relevant terms.

Order: given by the number of terms. One term system = monad; two term system = dyad, etc.

Connectivity: is common to all systems, etc. of the same order.

Modes of connectivities: zero in a monad; one in a dyad, etc.

All must be taken into account if the system is to be understood.

Systemic: Attribute = a particular mode of experiencing the world.

Monad: Totality

Dyad: Complementarity

Triad: Relatedness/ dynamism

Tetrad: combines relativity with order (activity)

Pentad: significance and potentiality

Hexad: Structure capable of transformation without loss of identity

Heptad: Completeness, combined with quality -> transformatio

Octad: Completeness

Mutual relevance of all terms of a system means they are of the same logical type and make contributions to the systems attribute of one and the same kind. We indicate this by a common designation:

Dyad – Poles
Triad – Impulse
Tetrad – Source

Each term has independence and hence has a distinctive character.
To study systems we need to identify the term character of systems of a given order.

Mutual relevance of terms of a complex system can be found by taking all the terms in pairs – first order connectiveness:

Dyad – One
Triad – Two
Tetrad – Three etc.

In this way, systems and structure are connected.

To know, we need signs and symbols (to connect mental pictures with perception).
To understand, we need connections which are in common with those in the mind.

We can describe systems as the forms of structure, but no one system taken alone can exemplify the organised complexity of real structures.

For the purposes of practical utility, systems fall into groups of four:
First four: from monad to tetrad (to see ‘how’ structures)
Second four: from Pentad to Octad (to see ‘why’ structures)
Third Four: from Ennead to Dodecad (to see harmony in structures)

The first four systems in a structure allow us to understand what is needed. To understand what the structure is, why it exists,
what is intended, we need higher systems.

Structures that are in the process of transformation lead into societies and constituencies which are more concrete than structures and usually too complex to be described in terms of systems alone.

 

Properties of Systems

Each multi-term system is a progression implying earlier ones.

Later systems are more complex and highly organised, comprehensive and practical.

Progression is from abstractness to concreteness.

For example, the Monad defines structure but tells us nothing of it. Dyad allows us to see polarity. With the Pentad, we can see concreteness and it allows us to define an entity (5 items give substance).

For knowledge, entities appear as simple notions: things, beings, societies = entities. But, we need to understand them (What? Why? How?)

A structure may exemplify one attribute more than another: for example, as an activity (tetrad-strong) but not as a coalescence (hexad-weak)

Weak and strong conveys the connection between understanding and Will.

A structure that fails to exemplify a system can be said to be lacking Will to exemplify it.

Acts of decision are needed to maintain an activity.

Term Adequacy is the terms needed for adequacy of a given structure:

man-woman- child – adaequate
man-fish-tree – inadequate

Here, there is a character of the triad (strong and weak) but when we add a fourth term in the second– for example, stream Here – we arrive at terms which are adequate for the tetrad.

Three conditions are needed in order to arrive at a well-defined system associated with a structure:

1) The structure must exemplify the systemic attribute;
2) The term characteristic must be adequate.
3) The system must be strongly willed.

 

The Monad

One-term system = Monad

Systemic Attribute = Universality

Term Designation = Totality

Term Character = Diversity in Unity

– Universe of experience
– Coming to terms with it at first stage = Monad
– Undifferentiated Diversity
– It is what it is
– Identifying the Monad requires cognition and judgement (fact and value).
– Universe of discourse – words, images
– Population: class of objects
– Field: complex of energies
– Problem = situation requiring action

The appearance of the Monad must be distinguished from the content of the structure.

We find the Monad through the appearance and not the reality of the structure. Appearance is automatic. Recurrent elements are there in us and the situation it (MG: Micro/ Macro view). But it is not a simple sum of appearances. With intuition, we must distinguish the perception of structures from knowledge of their appearances. We need to recognise the Monad as a significant whole: to be understood in terms of what it is, not just what it appears to be.

How to recognise a Monad?

Evident wholeness; for example, Man. Aggregates of Matter

Another test of a Monad is to look for an act of understanding.

To understand is an act of Will. It cannot be made in the void. In grasping a Monad, an act is required that goes beyond knowing. This act makes a connection between two real structures: one is the understanding Monad with the Will to understand; the other is the presented Monad with the Will to be understood.

 

** A Basic Distinction is:

– Epistemology = Knowing
– Ontology = Being

 

But, this leaves out the study of Willing (MG: will has a will!)

 

**The study of systematics is therefore a training of the Will as of the powers of perception and thought.

Indefiniteness of the Monad is relative.

In can be made to converge towards definition in two ways:

1) Prescribe its content (this and this)
2) Specify what it excludes (not that!)

The selection of Monads is primary –enunciation of contents and exclusion are secondary.

Enumeration tends to reduce a Monad to a fact: Exclusion makes it an object of value judgement.

Any situation to which we direct our attention is a Monad, but some are more universal than others.

The strongest Monads have complex organisations – Cosmoses.

Man is a Microcosm; the universe is a Macrocosm (but structurally resonant).

Adequacy turns on a combination of diversity and unity.

To identify monads that are strong and adequate is important in understanding ourselves in the world.

 

pp. 18-35

 

The Dyad
– The two ways of developing the Monad (is-is not) give rise to an ambiguity. Although they lead to the same result – in practice, this cannot happen. In terms of ‘understanding’, no Monad will be established.

Aphorism: ‘To understand anything, one must know everything’..

We arrive at two views of the same situation. Ambiguity is in the nature of things – What is/ is not depends on everything.

Every structure has a two-fold nature: what it is; what it does. That is content and how it affects its surroundings (with separation from the inner; with contact with the outer).

 

Dyad
2-term system: each distinct but requires the other.
Complementarity v. contradiction (Yin/ Yang; Male/ Female)

Two-term system – Dyad
Systemic Attribute – Complementarity
Term Designation – Poles
Term Characteristic – Positive-negative
Connectivity of terms – Force

– A Dyad cannot be broken into two parts, or its contradiction resolved
– The dialectic of the Dyad = the Triad. Eg. Being-Nothing-Becoming)

The attempt to derive understanding from knowledge leads us to pure being and nothing.

We pass from Dyad to Triad.

Any structure is a Monad. But, the inherent character of structure is polarity. EG. Tree as what it is (in itself); as what it does (part of world relations).
Both are true: distinct and inseparable.

We should look at strong dyads which exemplify systemic attribute (Complementaritiy is difficult to convey by description).
We need to distinguish strength from adequacy. There can be high complemtentarity but low adequacy. EG. Flip a coin: 2 poles are adequate but this is rare.
Male/ female: polar but not complementarity. Therefore, a weak dyad.

Many structures have dyads which are weak or inadequate – but some will be necessary for the harmony of the structure as a whole.

Functional mechanisms are dominated by dyads: active-passive states; pleasant-unpleasant; like-dislike; desire-aversion; approval-disapproval; yes-no.
These permeate the human psyche. It is a great step forward when we learn to accept the complementarity of dyads and cease to look to remove them.

 

The Triad

Dyad -> Triad = Force -> Dynamism (need to resolve contradiction -> Conditions to make resolution possible).

Three term system – Triad
Systemic Attribute – Dynamism
Term Designation – Impulses
Term Characters
1st Impulse – Affirmation 1
2nd Impulse – Receptivity 2
3rd Impulse – Reconciliation 3
1st Order ~connectedness – Acts
Affirmation-Receptivity – Generation
Receptivity-Reconciliation – Consent
Reconciliation- Affirmation – Decision
2nd Order Connectivities – Activities

– The nature of the Triad = all activity initiated by acts of will.
– Triad = the form of any dynamic structure: Affirmation-Receptivity-Reconciliation

If a force is to produce a result, the bodies involved must be released. Then there is accelerated motion characteristic of force fields, Same with Men/ Women: when there is complete union, the force of attraction is neutralised..

Triad: the system that shows us how acts of will enter the structure of the world.

There are three moments in the realization of events:
1. Acts where dynamism is introduced (but nothing happens).
2. Action initiates the process.
3. Activity itself.

The act is triadic and action is produced by the connectivities of the triad.

 

The activity is a triad.

 

6 second-order connectivities
123 Expansion
132 Interaction
321 Freedom
213 Concentration
231 Identity
312 Order

 

Dynamism in a structure is the result of a combination of many triads.

 

** Will as relatedness can be the same as will in action. An act is not a move from one impulse to another nor action of one on another but two-way connectivity.
The act of will is made by the coalescence of two impulses.

 

Impulse 1 and 2
Generation: Affirmation/ Receptivity – without loss of respective nature = a perfect act of will that cannot be accomplished by human self. (usually there is imbalance).

 

Impulse 2 and 3
Will where action is made possible. Surrender (Opening/ Acceptance/ Enlightenment).
True essential act of will is wholly mutual and shared by both impulses.

 

Consent – transformative when receptivity and reconciliation are unified.
Here, both terms depart from their own nature.

 

Gift: acceptance can be a self-destruction (weak connectivity) 2 and 3.
Recipient can be the reconciler: Strong connectivity 2 and 3.

 

Decision 3rd Connectivity
The true act of will as commonly understood but never realised in human experience.
Unforced-unconditional
Usually, decision is affirmation, weakly linked to the structure to which it refers- not free decision or true commitment.
Union of affirmation and reconciliation is one and the same act of will (a quality we will to attain but cannot).
In human problems – actual structures – we do not find triads in their essential purity.
2nd order connectivity or actions are more evident than first – > 6 types of process (Hexad).

 

EG.
Home
1st Impulse – to realise the potential of people and place.
2nd Impulse – comes from home itself: to be health and heart of the family.
3rd Impulse – mutual love that creates the family.

All three are needed. Any weakened and the home loses its character.

Existence is in perpetual flux.
The will does not contradict the world, but it makes it possible.
Large and small situations -> activity (Tetrad).

 

The Tetrad

Triad connects (makes action possible).

Tetrad is the form of all activities that lead to change in order.
EG. Bread: 4 Ingredients: 4 sources from which bread-making is suststained.

Tetrad: an activity of transformation.

Activity must be orderly, flexible, intelligible and rational.

Processes: blending, activities, transforming, fixing.
(All connected with Order – projections of cosmic processes whereby existence is created, transformed.

All Being is in a state of transformation and all transformations have the same basic structure.

There is a rational reason for everything.

4-Term System – Tetrad
Systemic Attribute – Activity
Term Designation – Source
Term Character
Motivational: Ground. Goal. Direction
Operational: direction. Instrument. Interplays.

 

see page 31-34 for diagrams

 

We cannot understand the working of the mind other than ordering/ goal-seeking.

Operational conditions fall into 4 distinct groups (recognisable in every ordering activity: First two are motivational; the second two are operational.

 

Representations

Square= displacement from one lead to another.
Cross = distinction/ vertical/ horizontal
Tetrahedron= connection between between unity of goal and plurality of path (apex = completion).

In every situation, there is an interplay of terms that both diminish their identity and enrich content.

 

Motivational
Ground = raw material/ separation urges/ component elements
Goal = ideal pattern of the structured whole
Direction = Cognitive element whereby activity is ordered
Instrument = entire working of the activity (quality f feeling rather than thought).

Goal
Instrument – Direction
Ground

Vertical arm stands for ascent/ descent but cannot convey the complexity of an activity.
Horizontal arm stands for the interplay of inner/ outer or positive/ negative forces but can express rational elements of an activity.

Adding cross to the Tetrahedron gives six connectivities.

Square shows activity as both ordering of the ground and attainment of the goal. Combines two distinct notions: Being and Becoming

Being is a state of inner togetherness.
Becoming is transformation

 

Square

Horizontals = ordering of the ground/ realization of the aim.
Verticals = transformation of ground as extremely ordered into self-directed whole.

 

Tetrahedron
Apex = Goal
Ground state is changed by the aim which is shared
Direction goes beyond simple adaptation to seek realisation of the aim with an existing circumstance.
Instrument is subjected to a demand beyond provision of immediate necessities. Each of the 3 effects modifies the whole structure and gives it, first unity and coherence, and then intelligible form which can be understood and valued.

 

Six fold Interplay
6 connectivities between any 2 of 4 terms. Each represents an interplay of two sources.

 

Goad (A)
Instrument (D) – Direction (C)
Ground (B)

 

ABCD = 4 Sources
Lines= First order connectivities
Letters A and B and Ground = Motivating source (Motivated by the need and the goal by aspiration)
Lines A-B = varying degrees of blending of 2 motivations

Interplay A-B represents a spectrum of motivating influences rather than 2 opposing patterns of the immediate and actual needs and the ultimate and ideal goals.

Pure need exists only in the moment and must be satisfied as a condition of maintaining activity – as a living body must breathe.
Pure aspiration is eternal and unlimited by conditions.
The greater part of the activity within any rational structure is motivated by some intermediate influence.

Horizontal line C-D = blending of qualities of direction and instrumentation.

Direction can only be effective through an instrument and every instrument has a creative degree of self-regulation that tends towards direction.

In every structure there is an optimum degree of interplay of the influences that come from the environment and those that arise from the structure itself.
C-D = a spectrum of instrumental agencies.

A-C = interplay of goal and direction (doing the job for its own sake – direction – and doing it to serve a greater purpose (goal).

Between goal and instrument there is a connectivity, which can be interpreted as integrity.
Structure must be divided against itself but devoted to the purpose for which the activity has been launched. (Lines A-D)

C-D = direction or governance – guides activity – keeps it on track.

Other side is the interplay between instrument and the work they have to do.
Where people are concerned, the line B-D is skill r instrumental ability.
More generally, B-D = sound constructive and economic use of available materials.

 

Pages 31 – 34 for diagrams

 

pp. 35 – 50

 

The Aristotelian Tetrad pages 36, 41 43, 45, 46, 47 48 for diagrams
This section begins by completing the tetrad section with the ‘Aristotelian Tetrad’:

The arising of any significant object requires four independent terms: Matter and Form; a third factor is one that cause changes – but directed towards forms. The two operative functions: the efficient cause that produced the change; the final cause towards which its end is the form.

Matter and form are less a dyad than two motivational terms of the tetrad: one expresses a need (artisanal), the other calls forth (technical). Tetrad:

 

Formal
Efficient — Final
Material

 

For Aristotle, there were 4 causes or reasons (sources): 2 principles/ material sources; 2 agents (Efficient and final Forms). Aristotle does not explicitly distinguish between energy that drives the action and the instruments the worker uses, but: efficient source = instrumental terms for the Tetrad.

Here, Being is an activity : including Being as Becoming, and integration of ends
(motivational) and means (operational).

The relativity of Being derives from the property of the tetrad whereby the blending or qualities gives rise to different gradations or levels.

Tetrad limitation = lack of central emphasis.
The tetrad allows us to study an activity but not associate it with a person or entity.
Lacking intrinsic significance, it does not allow for existence of separate entities because of lack of centre. The first four systems (Monad, Dyad, Triad, Tetrad) represents structural features that pervade experience – they do not show us the place of entities – things, people, bodies, societies, events.

In order to find all the elements that are combined in every entity, we must pass on to the pentad because entities are not simple notions but can be recognised only when a certain degree of organisation is attained.

The Pentad  see page 41-43  for diagrams
– Dynamism and activity are characteristics of structure;
– We need to add meaning and potentiality to activity to go beyond the tetrad – then it becomes a structure;
– We need to go beyond the pentad as essence/ essence-class/ spiritualisation.

 

There are three kinds of meaningfulness:
1. By its own nature. Centre of gravity of structure (event or entity). Unique contribution to Total Significance.
2. By its potentiality: Potential is always greater than actualisation.
3. By the way it is connected to the world. Upper and lower limits of meaningfulness of connections. Therefore, the outer limits of significant connectedness with the world and inner limits of connectedness with one’s own potentialisation.

In sum, 5 points:

Five Term System: Pentad
Systemic Attribute: Significance
Subsidary Term: Potentiality and Meaning
Term Designation: Limit

 

Term Characters
Intrinsic Limit: Uniqueness-Ipseity
Lower Term Limit: Lower Nature
Upper Inner Limit: Higher nature
Lower Outer Limit: Nourishment
Upper Outer Limit: Master

 

1st Order Connectedness
Mutualities
10 Mutualities in a Pentad

 

2nd Order Connectedness
10 triads
Nourishment-Uniqueness-Master = the law of reciprocal maintenance.

3rd Order Connectedness
5 tetrads: each gives the form of the basic activities of the structure.

There are therefore 31 systems in a pentad.

Significance = activity, dynamism, complementarity, universality.

Meaning is therefore complex!

JGB sets out two patterns for the Pentad: the first is derived from his previous discussion in volume 2; the second is derived from Robert Fludd. He offers the example of the Home:

 

Version from Volume 2:

Home potential (Human Society is nourished by)

Higher Limits
(Self-realisations)

Home

Lower Limit
(Books/ Chairs)

Nourished by Life on Earth

 

Robert Fludd:

Master

Higher Nature

Ipseity

Lower Nature

Nourishment

First 4 systems – Monad (Universality); Dyad (Complementarity); Triad (Dynamism); Tetrad (Activity) – are abstract.
With the Pentad, a new property is given by terms as limits – and separating within and without.
Structure becomes an entity (known by inner structure and outer connections).

 

An independent existence cannot be predicated of any structure whose form is less concrete than the Pentad.

 

Corollaries:

 

1) Significance predicated of entities but not universalising, complementing, dynamism, activity.
2) Significance associated with potentiality-range, or multi-potency, both inner and outer.
3) Every significant entity is in a state of transflux equilibrium and maintains itself by exchange with the environment.
4) Every entity has a Master that it must serve as a necessary constituent of its significance.
5) Life is associated with the fifth level of energies where significance begins to emerge.
6) The combination of significant identity with the possibility of undergoing change requires a 5-term structure..

 

Each of the ten mutualities expresses a meaning. Example: Life is Generation.

 

Man
Animal
Germ
Plant
Soil

 

Soil-Plant – Soil nourishes the plant/ Plant enriches the soil.
Soil-Germ – Soil maintains germinal life and germinal life is significance of the soil.
Plant-Germ – Germ nourishes the plant – and plant is life for the germ.
Plant-Animal – 2 Kingdoms of Life – Mutuality is necessary.
Germ-Animal – Germ is potential animal, and animal develops the germ..
Soil-Man – Man is rooted in the earth, and soil realises its potential in giving birth to man.
Plant-Man – Vegetation existence is basic life.
Germ-Man – Man’s significance is to be Master of Germinal world and germinal essence is fulfilled by man
Animal-Man – Man is the Higher Nature of animal and animal is lower nature of man.
Cosmic Roles – A mode of existence; mode is a group’s significance; 5 modes of existence (inner and outer limit).
Entity = Complex structures that can be recognised as significant in their own right. Manifold potential = Cosmic Place

The Hexad page 45- 48 for diagrams
A complex structure can be recognised – studied as an entity without reference to its hold on reality.
Potentialities actualised in different ways – some will exclude others.
Until situated in the existing world, it remains indefinite.
A Time and place but also self-self-consistence and actions upon other structures.
These derive from pattern in eternity + hyparchic substantiality.
When situating comes about, we have an event.

 

Event = structure as an act of realisation. (Determining Conditions: time, space, eternity, hyparxis)
An act of realisation = Dynamism substantiated

? the difference between Actualisation and Realisation
3 time like dimensions
3 space like dimensions.

 

Space:
Configurative – positional C
Dynamic – Directional D
Rotative or vertical R

 

Time
Time T
Eternity E
Hyparxis H

Every event is a present moment.
Successivenes is not inherent in the event how we experience it.
We know them – not as they are but as facts.

To understand events, we must grasp their complex structure (as independent terms).

 

Another Hexad
6 grades of pre-organic existence.

There are 2 Hexads in the scale of existence: one leads from simple energies to cellular organisation; the other leads from the animal organism to the universe.

 

All the terms in the first hexad can be described according to mechanical processes. None of the terms in the second hexad can be described without reference to experience (organised sensitivity).
When the two are compared, we see the cyclicity must be associated with 6-term systems.

 

Dynamism of every possible event is a combination of the 6 fundamental triads:

Order 312

Freedom 321 – Interaction 132

Identity 231 – Expansion 123

Concentration 213

Each point characterises a triad by indicating the central impulse. The two triangles show how existence realises itself in events.

The triads of order, expansion and identity bring the universe into being and maintains existence.
The three triads of freedom, interaction and concentration enable existence to escape its own limitations and recover the unity of Being sacrificed in the act of creation.

No words to express interpenetration of creation and counter-creation. Some look for adequate descriptions in structural events.
It is not ebb-flow/ outgoing and return. Here, cyclicity is too strongly expressed. Usually, cyclicity is taken to mean phases which occur successively in time.
**We need to get away from that to express the 6 characteristics of the hexad.

 

Hexad of Progressive Cyclicity
Sufi symbol – akin to Rosicrucian pentangle.
Two open and two closed triangles. This enables us to express the 2-fold character of creation/counter-creation, and that the system moves to a goal.
So, we combine cyclicity and progress (going beyond notions of endless return and progress).

 

This is not just what continually is but also what is in the process of becoming and what can never be.

Because of the construction of our bodies and mind, we cannot directly perceive the coalescence of contraries except in mutual destruction.

 

But, we can give coalescence the meaning of Being and Becoming: the property of structure, whereby significance acquires depth and enrichment and yet retains the unique character associated with particular events.

 

Six-term system: Hexad
Systemic Attribute: Coalescence
Subsidary Attribute: The forms of event; recurrence; Progress of self-realisation; Independence.
Term Designation – Law
Laws govern the coalescence.

 

Term Character
1. Order
2. Expansion
3. Identity
4. Freedom
5. Concentration
6. Interaction

Since the direction of the step influences its character, there will be 30 steps involved in the complete coalescence structure.

Steps = to bring out the difference between the limits of significance and the steps by which significance is realised in practice.

 

The hexad is the system most appropriate for studying structures in process of realising their significance.
Coalescence is not really studied but men know the difference between what is and what might be.. Also, events do not cease with their actualisation. They live on and transform according to laws beyond time.
Coalescence – events require all determining conditions.

 

Hyparxis means it differs from simple actualisation.

 

The cyclic character of events is their projection into time – we cannot see its intrinsic nature with the hexad.

The total structure of events is hard to grasp because events are confused with irrelevant factors.

We focus on 6 triads because they are instructive, but we should not rely on them.

Commonly, we experience successive actualisation in time. We are eternity blind and aware of hyparxis only by projection. Our space-intuitions are defective owing to the form of our perceptions.. The true character of significant events escapes us.

The hexad directs attention to the separateness and isolation of events from one to another.

We need awareness of total structure – 7 terms systems.

 

 

pp. 50 – 63  pages 52, 53, 55, 57, 58, 59 60 for diagrams

 

This section continues JGB’s journey through the structural systems of systematics. Basically, these systems are not stand-alone but each enclosed within the other; so, the triad is made up of a dyad, a tetrad by a triad and an additional element, etc. In this section we are reaching much more complex levels: seven and eight terms systems. Increasingly, we are moving away from internal, essential processes, to systems operating with respect to external environmental – existential – conditions. This makes understanding them ever more demanding: not that we cannot do this in principle, but to see them in terms of all their possible connectivities requires a high level of seeing. Impossible for me. Nevertheless, I do have a sense of what it would be like to see the world – the dramatic universe – in terms of these interconnections.

 

The Heptad pages 52-56 for diagrams

The heptad is a seven-term system:

 

Systemic attribute:  Transformation

Subsidiary attribute: Structure, History

Term designation: State

 

Term Characters:

 

7. Completion
8. Renunciation
9. Insight
10. Harmonisation
11. Separation
12. Involvement
13. Initiation

 

 

1^st Order Connectivities:  Intervals

2^nd Order Connectivities:  Harmonies

 

There are radically different forms of existence, and each is susceptible to radically different forms of change: random change is different from intentional change, for example. Coalescence of events (the hexad) is a total change that integrates an entire region of existence into a new wholeness.

 

 

Action itself is different from structural situations (kinds of change is different from kinds of things or modes of existence): to understand this is necessary in order to go beyond dualistic and dialectic thinking. ‘Systematics is a way of thinking the unthinkable’.

 

At this point, we can no longer separate the structure from the context in which it exists.  From now-on, changes in the environment affect the changes in entity. We therefore need two independent structures within a superstructure common to both.

 

Self-realisation requires a well-defined identity, whereas integration requires dissolution of identity.

 

We have to allow for complexes undergoing changes that affect them not only inwardly and outwardly, but also mutual action that introduces a new complex distinct from either of them. Here, change can occur where there is a real gain or loss of significance.

 

The situation created by the combination of three independently changing complexes could not be described in terms of a static system: no structural organisation could accommodate the almost unlimited variations that could arise unless there were some principle of order of a different kind from those of six term systems:

 

Transformation – the systemic attribute of the heptad. 3 possible effects:

 

1. An entity becomes or realises itself;
2. The entity is realisation itself acquires new properties that were not potential or even possible in its non-realised state;
3. The entity while retaining its identity is integrated into a structure as part into the whole.

 

**We do not easily distinguish the novelty of the situation brought about by real transformations because we rely too much on sense experience, and too little on finer perceptions. Also, real transformations are quite rare because the conditions for their arising do not occur without conscious intention.**

 

 

Transformation is only understood by its total action – not its beginning and end. There is no single symbol for the heptad.

 

 

It is not just a question of an object changing into something else but the participation of the environment in that process.

 

We can picture transformation in terms of the domains of fact, value and harmony: fact is changed, but value acquires substance in the process – both within the domain of harmony:

 

page 52

 

Here, 1-2-3-4 can be the domain of fact and 4-5-6-7 is the domain of value: so, 4 is the domain of harmony.

 

This can also be expressed as a double cone, but, although there are indeed levels or stages, these are not of equal importance.

 

We can also regard the heptad as a combination of a triad and tetrad:

 

3+4 = 7

 

…in contrast to the dodcad:

 

3X4 = 12

 

We must be able to see the higher structure before we see the lower one enter it.

 

The connection between 4 and 7 is one of the secrets of the Pythagoreans:

 

–       The tetrakyts and its combination in the diapason leading to the seven qualities of sound;

–       The musical scheme of the Greeks is based on the doctrine of the mean – the middle string of the lyre and the centre of the heptachord. Hence, two tetrachords are unified to give complete harmony:

 

7                                              Nete

6                                              Paranete

5                                              Trite

4                                              Paramese

3   Mese

2   Lychanose

1   Hypate

 

 

The point is not the transition from hypate to nete but the integration of all seven properties.

 

The seven note scale – with its unequal intervals – is a good representation of the heptad.

 

Gurdjieff combines three representations: structure of the organic complex of opium (seven qualities); the spectrum of white light (integrative character); and the octave of sound (transformation requiring three independent factors).

 

Thus, integration and diversification are combined.

 

The heptad can also be represented as a shell symbol.

 

page 55

 

Transformation can never be obligatory or compulsory. It must have an element of freedom and hazard. This is because it connects the spiritual and material realms: essence and existence.

 

The complementarity of our natures can lead to transformation beyond nature. The two remain as they are, but **, in being connected through action, they are brought into a new realm of harmony. One or other does not lose what it is, but a third element enters. For example, body, spirit and soul. Body and spirit are both expressed as tetrads of activity, but the soul develops a monad of simple possibility of existing to the heptad that integrates into a complete whole both itself and also body and spirit.

 

A blending of qualities accompanies integration.

 

One of the problems with the heptad is an apparent conflict in the interpretation of the seven sages of qualities (see above). This apparent contradiction is necessary in the systemic attribute of transformation.

 

Transformation is never perfectly achieved in the existing world. It can be partially achieved in cosmic constructions such as the human organism. The life of mankind on the earth is a vast transformation involving material and spirit and, by this, human life is integrated into the stream of universal history.

 

 

The Octad  pages 57 – 59 for diagrams

 

At this point, the internal connectivities become so complex that JGB abandons comprehensive treatment of the structure. Nevertheless, on the basis of the double square, much can be expressed:

 

Eight-term system: Octad

Systemic Attribute: Completedeness or organised totalities

Term designation: Element

Term characters fall into two tetrads:

 

1-3-5-7     Active Elements

2-4-6-8     Structural Elements

 

The Eight Term Characters:

 

1. Summits
2. States
3. Atom
4. Functions
5. Base
6. Necessities
7. Totality
8. Ideals

 

JGB offers different representations:

 

The Eight Square Symbol

The Total Octad Symbol (The Mystic Rose)

 

JGB draws attention to their use in middle eastern patterns for decoration on buildings

 

The mystic rose:

 

page 59

 

 

The two squares – 1-3-5-7 and 2-4-6-8 dilineate an inner region: the Arena – an area common to both squares.

 

The two squares represent two domains by the fusion of which historical process achieves its completeness: 1-3-5-7 the domain of fact, and 2-4-6-8 the domain of value – the arena being the domain of harmony.

 

The Octad is different from earlier systems as it can represent the single and the whole, the particular and the totality. For example, the horizontal line 3-7 (unit/atomic-totality/social); or the vertical line 1-5 (spirit/form-matter/content).

 

The square 2-4-6-8 represents the states or conditions, which the completed action requires; points 2 and 4 are the functional and being aspects of the atomic units; points 6 and 8 are the corresponding aspects of the totality.

 

The Octad is expressed in terms of Education, as an example:

 

1. Spirit
2. Powers
3. Child
4. Abilities
5. Life
6. Necessities
7. Mankind
8. Ideals

 

1. Spirit

1. Matter (Life)

 

1. Unit (Child)

7. Mankind (Totality)

 

 

We can also designate all the intersections between 3-7 and 5-1:

 

3->7

1. The Unit: Child or Person
2. The Primary Action: Teacher and Pupil
3. The basic situation: The class or group
4. The central focus: The School or College
5. The immediate environment: The School within society
6. The presiding genius: The nation as cultural source
7. The totality: Mankind as an evolving society.

 

a-c are subordinate

e-g are superordinate

d is Coordinate

 

 

5->1

A: Personal habits and disciplines taught in childhood

B: Sensory-motor skills including speech and writing – basic mental operations, social disciplines.

C: Mental Skills, manual skills, learning of facts, techniques.

D: Balanced education according to personal and social conditions – vocation guidance.

E: Judgement, moral responsibility, capacity for work and practical effectiveness in life.

F: Creativity, spontaneity, freedom in personal relationships, leadership.

G: Complete integration of perfected individual into social environment.

 

Each of the connectivities discloses, not only a mode of action, but a range of actions or interests. So, we can represent greater detail of the organisation of complex structures:

 

First-order connectivities (dyads) : Components

Second-order connectivities (triads) : Initiations

Third-order connectivities (tetrads) : Fields

Fourth-order connectivities (pentads) : Significant sub-structures

 

These suggest the immense complexities of completed self-directing structures. The power of the Octad’s value is classificatory, interpretative, heuristic, and predictive. However, it is only applicable to those structures that are organised in depth: like Education.

 

pp. 63-75 pages 64, 65,  66, 69 for diagrams

 

The Ennead  pages 63 – 66 for diagrams

There can be no transformation beyond Completion: the Octad. Completion does not stand for all experience, as some situations in existence cannot be completed. Total Completion is impossible in the existing world: all situations are liable to disturbance and unpredictability. Beyond the Octad are systems which allow for uncertainty and hazard but are still harmonious. The ideal depth and breadth of completeness in the Octad never exists in the actual world because of incompatibilities, imperfections, uncertainties and loose-ends.

1. The nine-term system allows us to study the workings of structures as we meet them; basically, we see the completedeness of the Octad ‘broken into’ or ‘disrupted’ by an outside element. If this element cannot is incorporated, something must give way to restore the harmony. In education, we can construct it eight terms, as an individual with a series of groups. However, if we have to take account of some purpose for man, unconnected with personal life or fulfilment, we need nine terms. In order for existence to be spiritualised, a special contribution from human essence must be made. This contribution is made in a dimension other than man as a unit, or mankind as a totality. Man is capable of selected transformation.A new kind of harmony is needed, one which breaks out from the Octad.Hazard and uncertainty are as real as order and completeness in human affairs. Hazard consists of a combination of the triad and the hexad: dynamism and coalescence. This gives the inner form of the Ennead: a closed triangle and two open triangles. This symbol is usually encircled by the serpent Chronos, and is connected with numbers seven and ten: the decimal of which is 0.142857.The systemic attribute of the nine-term system is harmonisation. There are two types of terms: three sources – 3,6,9; and six steps – 1,4,2,8,5,7.The two-fold progressions are: 1-9 and 142857

   The Enneagram accounts for a defect in causality: not a linear A->B sequence, but a path liable to disruption by environmental conditions. A process – P – can deflect a path, and even deflect it back. In this way, a determined path can become indeterminate. Deviations come from the uncertain, hazardous nature of events. There are so many possible unpredictable deviations. Even when all possible adjustments have been made, there remain uncertainties. Such is the conditioning effects of time and space.

    

    

   We can formulate a proposition regarding universal hazard:
   The structure of the Universe is such that no process whether causal or purposive or both can reach completion except in artificially contrived environmentsWe can conclude that the phrase ‘artificially contrived environmental conditions’ assumes an importance in understanding life itself in that required conditions therefore involve two independent lines of actualisation: one gives an initial direction; and another to affect necessary adjustments and adaptations. Will has a Will. Primary construction, operational feedback, and end-product self-perfecting make up three terms of a triad. The structure of organisation can be found in mechanical systems and living organisms. In the latter, they are not only self-regulating and self-renewing but purposive and conform to the same pattern. So, although the nature of existence is pervaded by uncertainty and hazard, the latter can be overcome.

    

   The formal systematics of the Enneagram:

   1. Every process, leading from an initial state A towards a final state B (9 to 1 in the Enneagram), must undergo deviation and distortion due to environmental disturbance.
   2. Only with an artificially constructed system of compensation can a process be made to continue in a pre-determined course.
   3. A point of hazard can be identified at which a process can be corrected for deviation by the impact of a second independent, yet related, process CD (3 to 4 in the Enneagram) initiated at that point.
   4. The second process requires itself adjustment in the same manner as the first. When this second adjustment EF (6 to 7 in the Enneagram) is correctly applied, the system is brought into a state of dynamic harmony that can continue indefinitely so long as the construction holds together.
   5. The three processes must be such as to blend and reinforce one another after each point of mutual impact.
   6. The construction must be such that there is an interplay of adjustments apart from the processes themselves. The latter produce the result and the former help the construction from collapsing or degenerating.

   The adjustments are represented by the Enneagram.

   The three points – AB, CD, and EF – correspond to the three points of the triangle. This is the dynamism of the structure. The inner construction corresponds to the six-point figure 1,4,2,8,5,7: this indicates the way the processes correct and reinforce one another.

   AB enters at point 1; reaches hazard at point 3 where it meets CD; the two continue to points 4 and 5; second hazard at point 6 is corrected by then entry point of EF; AB is completion at point 9 where the final hazard is overcome.

    

   Example: The Kitchen

    

   Total structure = all elements (building housing the kitchen, its equipment, utensils, fire, stove, foodstuffs, conditions, head cook, assistants, knowledge of cooking, planning meals.

   Operations are hazardous by the conflicting of the kitchen as a utilitarian establishment; and as a place concerned with vital transformations and psychic experiences (a dyad!).

   In the preparation of a meal, three processes are involved:

   AB: The kitchen is brought into activity and fulfils the purpose of its existence. (The world of material objects)

   CD: The raw food is prepared and transformed into a state suitable for human consumption. (The world of life)

   EF: The meal is planned, brought into existence and shared by the community. (The world of human experience.).

   This is a triad and the structure is complete only when the three processes are correctly conducted and coordinated.

   The initial state is the kitchen in its ideal state – point 9; activity begins at point 1; raw food enters at point 3; preparation begins at point 4; the meal as a plan of action at point 6; realizations begins at point 7. Nine points:

   1. Kitchen prepares. Cooks arrive;
   2. Meal planed; tasks allocated;
   3. raw foodstuffs assembled;
   4. Food cleaned and prepared;
   5. Food cooked;
   6. Plan of meal emerges;
   7. Dishing up begins;
   8. Meal taken to dining room;
   9. Meal eaten.

   For the Chief cook, his attention has to travel along a different route: he begins at point 8 – the finished meal; from here, he calculates when the dishes go into the oven – point 5; he sees the point of serving – 7; and begins actual work – point 1. He has to calculate the amount of food – point 4; everyone begins at point 2. So, the attention of the Chief cook travels over 142857: thus its structure of harmony. However different to content, the six stages are always present and are linked in two ways: one successive and one recurrent. It is the inner sequence that determines the coherence and perfection of the meal that is served and the good order and efficiency of the meal.

   The lines 8 to 2 and 8 to 5 must always be kept open: one directs the kitchen, the other watches over the food.

   Once the cooking is completed, the centre of attention moves to its serving. This is point 6 – a shock or stimulus.

   Once the meal is completed, the Chief cook sees to it that the kitchen is restored to its original point of readiness..

   Points 4 and 5 are the ground work of the kitchen: scene of the actual cooking. Going from point 1 to 2 is routine, but as soon as cooking begins, hazard enters. Deviations from the plan are unavoidable. Therefore, at point 3, intention changes to decision. There is a different hazard at point 6 – completion. The adjustments between point 6 and 7 depend on the creative genius of the cook. Point 9 is the beginning and end point.

   The Ennegram gives the minimum requirements of dynamic activity. In the anabolic transformation of energies in the human organism, the three processes are: AB metabolism of food; CD respiration and transformation of air; EF sensation and transformation of impressions. An important feature of energy transformation in man is the distinction between action on air CD that is automatic and that of sensation EF that can be effective only if intentional. The core of ‘the work’: Intention.

    

   The Dodecad
   The Ennead gives the form of structure and how hazard is overcome. If by appropriate combination of processes, the hazards are overcome and the basic aim achieved, the auxiliary processes are left unfinished: no finite structure can attain perfect harmony. In ten and higher term systems, we find principles of organisation whereby structures can enter into dynamic and yet stable systems.

   The ten-term system has the systemic attribute of integrative complementarity: the ability of several sets of processes to compensate for one another’s defects and produce an overall harmony that reacts on and reveals the individual structures.

   The eleven-term system goes further and provides the conditions for mutual completion of structures of different kinds: synergism – that human Will cooperates with Divine Grace in the work of regeneration.

   Ten and eleven term systems characterise societies or communities in a state of dynamic harmony. They are too complex to be investigated here.

   The dodecad is the last of the set of four that begins with the Ennead: it should therefore represent the ideal complete structure in which hazard is totally harmonised.

   Twelves are found everywhere in the universe. Examples of twelve term systems: the twelve tone scale in music; twelve categories of fact; twelve levels of potency; twelve levels of existence; twelve gradations of energy; twelve substances; twelve stages of creation; twelve essence classes.

   The dodecad is significant for understanding the whole structures of the universe, because it is the first system in which the main elements of our experience can be represented: the hexad combines complementarity and dynamisn (but not the distinction between Existence and Essence). In the study of will, this distinction enters at world XII where six triads are initiated by essential impulses, and six by existential ones. This brings the dodecad in the line of self-limitation of the Absolute Will. We also fine three domains, each formed as a tetrad, occurring in various forms. Thus, the dodecad combines dynamism and diversity, or relativity and relatedness..

   More important though is the dodecad as the terminus of the third tetrad of systems. The uncertainty and hazard of existence cannot be expressed in terms of the first eight systems – therefore incapable of conveying the dramatic character of the universe. The dodecad can be taken as the culmination of the transformations whereby the structure of existence is first disordered then corrected, then redeemed, and finally perfected. The traditional view also is that the number twelve is associated with perfect structures. The systemic attribute of the dodecad is therefore Perfection.

   There are three type-characters in the dodecad:

    

    

   1) Upper and lower: hexads;
   2) Dynamic: triads
   3) Cooperative: tetrads.

   Thus, the structures, entities, qualities, processes and organisations of the universe can be understood by applying systematics. But, this is not to say that we understand alone through systematics. Understanding is a property of the will. But, structural insights do not become conscious unaided..

   We are at a stage where an understanding of structures is imperative. Human affairs are still largely conducted by contradictions: agree/ disagree; like/ dislike; active/ passive; extraversion/ introversion; good and evil – all dyads; therefore bound to exclusion and contradiction. Scientifically, we are being led towards notions of greater complexity. Art, psychology, history, sociology, and religion can only be understood by discerning structures.

 

pp. 76 – 91

 

Values

 

The Systematics of Values
Values are motives which move will, set up relationships, arouse desire, respect, wonder, and obligation. They are structured and must combine with facts to be real. We know them, not by knowledge but judgement. They are real when we ascent to them.

There are different kinds of values but it is difficult to generalise them, or set up a base classification. The structured character of value explains the difficulty: they reinforce each other by their diversity, even their conflicting nature (sensual, intellectual, emotional, moral). The totality of qualities is the value experience of man: to act to appeal, delight, warn, etc. For a person, the value for them is what they can recognise and respond to. The totality is the Monad of Human Value. What is beyond would be a part of the Unknown Whole.

The Human value Monad can change; whether only in content or capacity, it is not known.

 

Within the Monad, we can discern two exclusive modes of value experience: the first attracts our interests, arouses our desires/ fears, etc.; the second depends on our consent and voluntarism. The dyad of values if thus delight and obligations (I want and I ought). The two depend on each other – one needs the other – we can see them as relative and absolute good.

 

Aristotle says that ‘virtue’ is the way that ‘good’ is achieved: both are absolute and relative because virtue is the means to holding the mean between defect and excess, but also the ideal to be aimed at (but only attained in the supreme Good – God).
Relative good is only manifest in our response to value influences; absolute good is in the value of the second kind – God.

 

Values are therefore contradictory. For example, the beautiful is both ‘particular’ and ‘absolute’. This contradiction always arises in questions of value, but never in fact. Beauty is not in or outside of an object. Truth is not a correspondence between image and object.

 

Values are also associated with three term systems: dynamic. We are used to a static concept of values whilst, in the East, they have a more fluid view of them. We have also abandoned a fixed view of values. Nevertheless, in our world, the theoretical and practical, the ethical and aesthetical, have lost contact with each other. As a result, the contradiction continues: values are seen as absolute, but practitioners have to work with relative versions of them.

 

Another issue is values as connected with time, evolution and progress. Progress is often seen as getting better rather than deepening a significance of what is already there? For example, an event is first seen as of little importance (or confusing) but is later grasped in its full significance. As memory fades, the trace of fact remains leading to an impact of value which attracts new content now, originally seen. So, the influence remains. This is ‘progress in hyparchic depth’ – not subject to time, but not timeless either.

 

We need to see values as structures: not as lower and higher but as co-terminus. Crude needs and Blind urges are not about movement of one from the other, but equally a part of beauty, consciousness and progress. Value becomes real in pattern and structure. Degrees or perfection are recognised when separate elements are integrated into a single event. Harmony depends getting the subtlest shades of value right. The artist includes the essential and excludes the inessential but does not make the mistake of seeing the latter as the ‘highest’.

 

We say that progress is a transition from abstract to concrete – not simple to complex. Most Monads are complex but are experienced as abstract until seen as a dyad of contradictory elements. Then, they are more concrete/ real.

 

We are always aware of value impulses. But, we do not see them: we may even be overwhelmed by them – we become confused and frustrated – until we see them as structures. We can only make judgements about them when we see them as contradictory groups: those that awaken natural impulses (desire and passion); and those that arouse supernatural impulses (obligation and worship). Here we move from a catalogue of values to categories that take shape as a systematic structure in which all values are found to be significant.

 

Again, progress should not be seen as a movement from less to more, but a deepening concreteness/ coherence of value judgements. This is mostly hyparchic (partly temporal).

From the dyad we move to the triad:

There are three kinds of value related Self-hood:

Higher Part of Self Universal Values
Central Part of Self Personal Values
Lower part of Self Natural values

That is: U, P, N.

Personal values are the impulses which inspire the self to reconcile the affirmation of Universal Good with the multitudinous denials of experience.

 

The Universal Affirmation is permissive rather than compulsive – it can be ignored, distorted and denied.

 

The contradictions, inconsistencies, and denials and uncertainties of the Natural Order are also not compulsive. Man need not identify himself with either. In his search for reality in which both are reconciled, he is brought to the Dynamism of Value. To know this, we can look at the six fundamental triads given above:

 

U-N-P (Expansion) Mankind is the vehicle for the transmission of value.
N-U-P (Concentration) Mankind as the evolving heart of Nature.
U-P-N (Interaction) The ‘I’ as the link between nature and Supernature.
N-P-U (Identity) The ‘I’ as the seat of the Value Impulses.
P-U-N (Order) Man as Responsible Being.
P-N-U (Freedom) Man as the creator of New Value.

 

Each has an essential and an existential form. They determine ways in which values penetrate human life: value-experience, value-judgements, value-seeking. But, they do not show us how the activity of value realization is organised. For that, we need the tetrad.

 

Each tetrad of value is constituted by two motivational and two instrumental terms: the separation of Goodness and Virtue. The good is value as motive; virtue is value as instrument. The instrumental terms of the tetrad are Mind and Matter.

 

With Descartes, the tetrad collapses into a dyad. With Spinoza, it is expressed as ‘higher’ motivational terms and ‘lower’ passive affections.
Instrumental terms: ratio, reason, true knowledge and conatus (power inherent in each individual).

 

The motivational terms in Kant’s Ethic are the Categorical Imperative or transcendental sense of obligation, and natural inclinations. His distinction between the personal and universal sanction for actions bring out two sides of the instrumental scheme of values: intuitive sense of Duty and Moral action. The Critique of Judgement sees the Sublime and Beautiful as aesthetic values, and the faculties of perception and inception as instruments.

 

So, in various philosophies, although they seem to conflict, we always have a tetrad for the activity of value: a distinction between two kinds of motive and two modes of action.

 

If we combine the tetrad and the triad, we have the dodecad: the Twelve Fundamental Categories in which all possible value experience and value realisation can be described.

 

Next, we assume that each of the three groups of values – Natural, Personal and Universal – involve a complete activity of its own. So, there are three tetrads corresponding to each of the three groups.

 

The First Tetrad – Natural Values
The tetrad of receptivity – Natural Values/ Lower part of Self

 

The ground state of value experience is uncertainty – our ability to think of the future.
There is also the feeling that there must be security beyond the hazard of the moment: that there is universal and meaningful order behind phenomena. The sense of ‘nature beyond nature’ gives rise to the emotion of the ‘joy of experience’. As it is a natural emotion, it belongs to the first tetrad. This, with all the positive motivations that make contact with nature meaningful, is the goal of the first tetrad.

 

The instrumental values or virtues arise from: the masculine impulse self-assertion – of one value occupying the place of another; and the feminine impulse – protection – one value caring for another.

 

We look to establish a structural scale of values. So, we begin with a single tetrad and work to the dodecad. We take all the values in succession from the ground state and number them 1 – 12.

 

1. Contingency
Why does anything matter? In the domain of fact, there is no answer to this question. All facts are indifferent: experience cannot be indifferent. We always are uncertain about what lies outside the present moment. Wherever there is uncertainty, there is the beginning of drama; where drama, value. The Dramatic Universe.

 

We do not begin life with a sense of value, but hazard or uncertainty.

Contingency is not a kind of fact.

 

 

We cannot observe anything without changing it.

 

This does not matter usually. It does not represent hazard of existence. Hazard as contingency is of a different kind – it brings us to the domain of value. There is always an unpredictability in everything, which makes life interesting.

 

Life would be impossible without contingency: every moment offers an infinite number of happenings. We cannot take them in! We make a selection but it is never intentional. Our attention blows like the wind. Events may be predictable but awareness of them is not predictable. This contingency is built into the structure of experience. It makes value possible and necessary.

 

2. Conflict
As we become aware of contingency, we encounter conflict between nature and ourselves. The conflict concerns means but occurs in the context of aims and objectives. We wish to free ourselves from contingency.

 

Conflict is the second category of value. It is different from opposition/ reaction. Struggle does not necessitate conflict.

 

The dyad in the true struggle for existence is between incompatible demands. Self-assertion rather than necessity. It continues even after the single event has passed. Conflict is a strange value. Not all conflict is negative – for example, inner conflict.

 

Involution and evolution in man produce a fundamental conflict of self-assertion and self-denial.The dyad of conflict belongs to the domain of value. Self-assertion and self-denial are complementarities; without them there would be no urgency in our experience. Accepting conflict sets free activity by which the Tetrad of Natural values acts.

Connection of conflict and direction is masculine; in conflict an aim is attained.

The force of the dyad is to get free from hazard and contingency; can lead to the realisation that creative dynamism can come out of it.

 

3. Concern
The feminine response to contingency is concern. Mutual acceptance between two entities.

 

Participation mystique: that something other than us exists.

 

Concern is a natural virtue or value-power which we can share with animals.

 

Concern must be mutual: a true relationship. Acceptance of our role in the world.
(Heidegger’s Forsorge = the difference between authentic and non-authentic experience).
The precariousness of our existence evokes this.
Whitehead: mutual sensitivity

 

Concern is an instrumental term in the tetrad: it guides and directs our actions but is not the ground of anxiety which sets them in motion. It is a relational value corresponding to the progression of systems in the triad. Conflict and Concern in their infinite variety bring into action the values of the first tetrad.

 

4. Joy
The highest natural value comes from a sense of security and harmony between self and the world: Joy. It is the goal of human natural life.

 

It crowns and emerges from nature. It is not exclusively human. Nature rejoices in animals. Facts do not rejoice. All nature has meaning because joy is hidden but beckons. But, it is still part of a tetrad of ‘natural’ values: we accept but do not create them.

 

Many philosophers think there are no values in nature: that it is amoral; values only emerge from what nature evokes. The problem arises from Cartesian dualism: matter is defined as that which is inert and insensible, and, since values imply sensitivity, it logically follows that there can be no values in matter. However, if we consider this in terms of fact and value: there are not two substances – mind and matter – but a whole scale of energies known as facts, and a whole scale of qualities judged by value. The two are distinct but separate.

 

Wherever there is value, there must be experience. If we do not recognise it, it is because of our limited perceptions. It is the highest of out natural experience: they are to be accepted not possessed.

 

‘He who binds to himself a Joy (MG: I think JGB is wrong: it is ‘binds’ not ‘bends’?!)
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the Joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity’s sunrise’

 

Joy and freedom are inseparable. Joy is the natural freedom of the will. It should not be confused with the freedom which comes from the realization of personal values.

 

The Second Tetrad – Personal Values
Central part of Self

 

Intermediate and reconciling values are voluntary and purposive. Associated with the activity of selves.

 

The dynamic of nature requires the purposive link to reconcile the universal and natural values. Universal values can be experienced but not created by selves (our link with the supernatural order). The natural values can be experienced but not controlled by selves (acted upon natural values).

 

Intermediate values are both natural and supernatural. Same as human self-hood – participates in both, but in its motivations and modes of operations.

 

The human self-hood is ambiguous because its reality is essential but can only realise itself in existence. Our power of judgement derives from our two-fold allegiance to the values of our existential and essential natures. In exercising this power, we are moved by values personal to ourselves, which we create.

 

The personal values from the tetrad: two are motivational; two are instrumental. The search for value is the ground of intentional activity. When there is a sense of something not to be found in nature, there is the substitution of aim for desire.

 

Desire is causal and structural. We desire because we come under the influences of the structures of contingency, conflict, concern and joy. We then entertain the idea of something created rather than found.

 

The quality of ground state is hope of creative activity. Value activity looks, not for what it is, but what it might be. The human self-hood is dissatisfied: by its mortality, and his precarious hold on nature. It is lifted out of this by being lifted out of nature: where Being is Becoming. Striving towards a goal – not realised in the limitations of self-hood – to secure a place in the cosmic scheme. There is not escape from this once it is realised.

 

The instrumental terms are equivocal: the male and female terms interchange their characters according to the nature of the activity. Resolution, courage, and direction come from the hunger for Reality. But direction also requires sensitivity, wisdom, insight.

 

1. Hope
We have a sense that there must be a resolution to dilemmas – Hope. Are we moving outside the theological triad? – Faith, Hope and Love.

 

No: there is personal hope that does not have a supernatural quality of hope beyond the limitations of existence. Man can have Hope even if he has no perception of Reality beyond life. We are led – with hope – to seek answers to questions we have not even asked. It is different from ‘goal-seeking activity’ of the natural order. It is different from Directiveness. Hope means more than direction; but it also means less.

 

Since the self-hood of man can be of different kinds – Material Self, Reactional Self, Divided Self, True Self – there are different forms of hope. The hope of the Material Self is fictitious (no true search, only, only ‘efficient causation’); hope of the Reactional Self will appear on the spur of the moment and quickly disappear; hope of the Divided Self can be stable but spurious – borrowed from other. Only the hope of the true self is authentic value experience.

 

There is a similarity between hope and contingency. Both are vague, indeterminate factors of experience. This is common to all ground state tetrads.

 

pp. 91 – 106

 

Need
There comes a time in every day when we feel discomfort, which we realise is hunger.

 

The first state is instrumental; the second state is motivational (the second, because we look for a meal as a consequence).

 

In our spiritual life, there can be a sense of unrest, which makes us search for a purpose. This may be awareness of a value that does not yet lie within our power to realise it..

 

Such values are not quantifiable; are not cause-and-effect; but they arouse us to act to overcome our limits. These are personal values: self-respect, courage, kindness, honesty.

 

When we see ourselves as lacking them, we experience them as a defect to our being.. They are instrumental because they are the values or virtues by which self-hood is attained.

 

It might seem to assemble the values associated with character, and describe them collectively, as a Need; or, to see moral virtues as imperfections. But, the self that has attained union with Individuality will have no need of virtues – right action is second nature.

 

Moral virtues are means not ends.

 

In order to create values, man needs instruments..
Some natural qualities are indistinguishable from moral qualities; for example, generosity. It can arise from concern or self-discipline. Only in the second case, is it a moral virtue.

 

Moral virtue is not felt as a value; if it were, there would be an absence of humility. It cannot be borrowed; it has to be of the Self. Need, when transformed by instrumental means becomes virtue.

 

Need is more than the objectification of humility – it is a general condition of receptivity. It maintains goal-seeking activity. Here, it is feminine in character. But, is also a force – for the good.

 

It is dyadic in character: when only know we need when we already have.

 

Values must arise from hope. We cannot experience need unless we have experienced hope Need is both the clarification and realisation of hope.

 

Natural values do not hold the seeds of their own transformation. Only when they approach self-hood do they have the possibility of transformation.

 

Discrimination
The values from need are non-selective. We need more intelligence/ conscious use of power. The sixth value is therefore discrimination.

 

Discrimination is a triadic or relational value. It corresponds to concern in the first tetrad. It relates to Self in a dynamic fashion: function, being, will. Discrimination comes from the struggle to understand oneself, other people and the world. Concern and moral values are closely linked: one leads the other. Discrimination cannot arise without conflict.

 

Discriminative values are not necessarily better, higher values – they would be ineffective without moral virtues to make them effective.

 

There are many situations where functions – thought, feeling, sensation – will act to be able to act rightly. Here, the right balance is maintained in the light of response to value stimuli. The triad of Discrimination is the instrument of transformation; as the dyad of need is the instrument of reaction. Both require right action and right transformations.

 

Serenity
This is the fruit of moral action and the summit of personal values. It is achieved when the self unites with the Individuality. Never fully realised when the Self-hood is present.

 

Values = harmony and perfection. True to oneself. Here, the Self can be united with the Individuality. Rightness (in objects); justice (in action).

 

These values are motivational or normative rather than instrumental. Restfulness.

 

It also has a subjective state: the sense that we should only accept perfection. This is attainable in all we do: it is sufficient reason for right action.
Connects personal values with universal values. The source of obligations, which lie within the limitations of the self-hood. It is the eighth value and can be associated with conscience.

 

The acceptance of obligation is a free act of will (santosh = serenity; dharma=obligation). It requires both awareness of need and understanding coming from discrimination..

 

We can see the eight values as a progressive series: Hope; Need; Discrimination; Serenity…..

 

The Transformation of Value Experience

 

First Stage: Hope. Basic motivation: value-activity; search or longing for value; eg. Expectancy of achievement; surprise; distress, disappointment; dissatisfaction with self-hood; change is possible.

 

Second Stage: Need. Recognised and non-realised offers a sense of need: eg. Operation of moral virtue; taste without judgement in art; disparity between what one is doing and what one might do.

 

Third Stage: Discrimination. Successful search for harmony/ completeness directed by understanding of the relativity of value: eg. Sound judgement; discrimination of methods; ability to see oneself and take account of what one sees; artistic judgement; taste and technique; authenticity; integrity; creative activity.

 

Fourth Stage: Serenity. Contentment in attainment of goals. Mostly seen as awareness of the unattainable. Insatiable demand for perfection. Awareness of Individuality.

 

They are experienced under the conditions of eternity and hyparxis: potential states – awareness of them even if not experienced. They are not linear/ can be experienced in visions..

 

Natural values are there whether we seek them or not; Supernatural values are always independent. Personal values are what we make them.

 

 

The Third Tetrad – Universal Values

 

There are values that do not depend on any of the finite selves in the universe. They proclaim the sense and purpose of the universe. They are the source of the dynamism of the universal drama.

 

Universal values are of a quality that is inherent in the very nature and condition of existence. They give rise to a sense of awe and reverence – first evidence of the Deity. Universal values also allow us to recognise the world as a rational whole with a goal.

 

We use the word Transcendence to designate the presence in the Universe of a value that is beyond nature, and without a form of its own. At the other extreme is the highest achievable goal: Fulfilment of all purpose, then peace of God which passeth all understanding.

 

The instrumental values or cosmic virtues must have qualities which enable the universe to fulfil its purpose: Holiness and love (i.e. our experience of supernatural activity).

 

 

Transcendence

The ground of Universal values. It has neither form nor intellectual content. But still we can submit to it. Attributes of the Deity.

 

Holiness

This is the first instrumental value on the Universal Scale: sense of awe and wonder as we contemplate creation. Holiness is the good we find and the virtue it engenders. A mystery so great in the world that it acknowledges its own nothingness in front of the hidden power which creates and sustains it.

 

Holiness is consequent on the awareness of transcendence. We wonder at Creation and our own insignificance in front of it.

 

As the second member of the tetrad, it is dyadic. Contradiction and complementarity: the greatest mystery and the hushed , trembling humility. Man’s own nothingness and transcendental holiness are the same thing!

There is a danger of pantheism. However, if we say Holiness is the divine essence by which the world is sanctified, it is to say that God gives everything (and in this sense therefore IS everything).

 

Love

Relatedness is necessary for the realisation of value. Love is the instrumental value which holds the universe together. The nexus of holy relationships. Love comes after Holiness. Love without Holiness is little more than a relationship of concern. Love cannot be ineffectual, but it can be unsuccessful – i.e. unfulfilled. Love is associated with Unitive Energy (E2).

 

Unity or Love is the masculine; Holiness or Purity is the feminine instrumental value.

 

Two spiritual powers: Pure spirit and Spirit of Love (Gnostics and Babylonians).

 

With Man, love is both a good and virtue, a state and an instrument. It is by love that the Self-hood is united with the Individuality. This is the first step by which the human is united with the Divine. When love is seated and centred within the True Self, it is a projection of the Universal Love that can be free from distortion, though inevitably diminished by scope and intensity.

 

We can reproduce in the union of a man and woman, the quality of suprapersonal love that is not subject to the limitations of time and space. Each of the 4 selves of man can love: Material Self is concerned with gain and cannot reach beyond the value of hope; Reactional Self – love comes from dissatisfaction and the need for security; Divided self – authentic but falls short of union; True self – knows union and so reproduces the work of Universal love.

 

Fulfilment

This highest value is where the significance of creation is consummated. The gaol of universal striving. It is present in every moment. The highest value is always is always potential; is projected in the act in service to the Cosmic Purpose.

 

Value does not compel – it summons. Every value is on offer but it must enter the Domain of Harmony, and this only comes about through an act of will. We are endowed with the will to realise value. We do this in the tetrad of personal values – but then we give substance to the Reconciling Impulse that harmonises the Universal and natural values.

 

Peace: Eternity; Hyparchic Condition. It is the final plunge into the depths that takes us within ourselves to the point where existence is annihilated and Being enters into the void.

 

There are three points of rest in the progression of values from Contingency to Fulfilment:
The first natural joy that comes by way of harmony with the laws of nature; the second is personal serenity that is achieved through right action; the third is supreme bliss that comes with the awareness of fulfilment – the just man made perfect.

 

The Dodecad of Values:

 

The Tetrad of the Universal Values
Fulfilment
Love
Holiness
Transcendence
The Tetrad of Personal Values
Serenity
Discrimination
Need
Hope
The Tetrad of the Natural Values
Joy
Concern
Conflict
Contingency

 

The Harmony of Value
In order to find an interpretation of value-activity throughout Creation, we need to establish a general tetrad with activity flowing from 4 independent sources. So, we take the systematic structure of the Dodecad: each value is connected with one of the four systems; first – monad; second – dyad; third – triad; fourth – tetrad….

 

Triad of Monads
Transcendence
Hope
Contingency
Triad of Dyad
Holiness
Need
Conflict
Triad of Triads
Love
Discrimination
Concern
Triad of Tetrads
Fulfilment
Serenity
Joy

 

Here, we find four Coalesced Values

 

Beauty
The ground state of the tetrad is Beauty (Contingency, Hope and Transcendence).

 

First, beauty requires spontaneity and therefore contingency is appropriately the receptive impulse. Second, beauty has a transcendent quality that gives nature more than nature has. Third, beauty is not instrumental. It does not belong to moral virtue of discrimination. As Hope arises out of Joy, we see why it is the reconciling impulse in the triad of beauty. It gives beauty its power to evoke the longing to realise it eternally:

 

Transcendence Contingency Hope
Affirmative Receptive Reconciling

 

Beauty is connected to the Monad: it does not depend on its internal connections. It is a triad of monads. Its own universe.

 

The transcendental term in the triad connects Beauty with the Universal values.

 

Nature-philosophers and nature-poets like Wordsworth are well aware of the contingency of Beauty, its fragility and elusiveness.

 

How do we bring together the beauty of nature with artistic creation? They arise from the six triads of the dynamism of beauty: hope is the reconciling impulse – ‘purposiveness without purpose’ .

 

We can use the expression ‘Coalesced Value’ for each of the qualities discovered through the interpretation of the four triads. Beauty is the first and least concrete.

 

Goodness

 

Holiness Conflict Need
Affirming Receptive Reconciling
Sense of Holy Choice of right and wrong Moral virtues

 

Goodness is a coalesced/ instrumental value.

 

Goodness arises out of conflict.

 

Right action is a virtue only when it comes from conflict. It is the struggle of ‘yes’ and ‘no’. This distinguishes goodness from natural right.

 

The above triad gives the coalesced value which is Goodness.
A moral person is not necessarily a good person: a moral personal who is not filled with awe and reverence in the presence of the Holy has not the affirmative impulse to be good. It is automatic action (Reactional Self) No anguish, conflict. However, an anguished man without moral virtues is not a ‘good man’.

 

Goodness is based on the dyad of right and wrong.
But a ‘good man’ does not feel himself to be good.
One cannot satisfy the dyadic nature of the Goodness. No one feels he is good enough.
The dyadic nature of Need colours the dyadic nature of Goodness. We are driven to act according to Need (we only know this by experiencing what we lack). Need is prior to morality, but the source of virtues.

 

Goodness occupies the place of the feminine instrumental value. The transition from Beauty to Goodness is brought through the perception that not all is beautiful and that beauty is not enough.

 

pp.106 – 119 pages 108, 109 for diagrams

 

Mercy
This is the third coalesced, instrumental value. The problem with straight ‘goodness’ is that it is not sufficiently dynamic. Mercy is formed by the triad:

 

Affirmative – Receptive – Reconciling
Love – Concern – Discrimination

 

Goodness and Mercy give us the instrumental for the Realization of value.

 

Mercy is primarily Instrumental. Love and Concern through Discrimination leads to Action (through the manifestation of Love – expansion 1-2-3; and the transformation of Concern – concentration 2-1-3).

 

The true role of virtue is discrimination: it summons Concern to ensure right action (order 3-1-2) and calls Love to give Freedom (3-2-1).

 

Mercy is beyond Goodness but does not take its place. Both are Universal.

 

Mercy, like all complete values, is a coalesce of the Natural (Concern), the Personal (Discrimination), and the Universal (Love).

 

Truth
This triad is composed of the three goals of human and Universal striving:

 

Affirmative – Receptive – Reconciling
Joy – Serenity – Fulfilment

 

We see Truth in the integration of all three: nothing that the whole possess will be lacking in the part.

 

It is realised in the Natural Order as Bliss – here, the Self-hood and Individuality are in union; in the Universal Order it is the Beatific Vision – union with God.

 

Can we say that Truth is an activity?
It is an act: a supreme act where the potential becomes real. It is not static. There can be no end to Truth – it is infinite.

 

The Tetrad:

 

Truth

 

Goodness Mercy

 

Beauty

 

Here, we see that Truth is the ultimate goal of existence.

 

 

The Realization of Value

 

The example of music/ voice training is given. It corresponds to a Triad of processes set out across the Enneagram:

 

Receptive: Contingency (‘Accident’ of a good natural voice).

 

Reconciling: Hope (Training towards an unclear resolution)

 

Affirming: Transcendence (Art of music beyond the person).

 

 

The First Process – The Voice

 

Here, the singer notices her voice; friends suggest training.

 

Stage 1
Enters the Enneagram at point 1: trial lesson; tested; she thinks she might make progress; teacher accepts her.

The teacher goes from 1-4 while she goes from 1-2.
Teacher enters at point 3; initiating the process.

 

Stage 2
Plan is decided; family agrees; she sees for herself – the learning gets underway.

1. The Voice
4. The Work
2. The Method

 

The teacher feeds back to her: 4-2

 

The singer is dependent of the teacher.

 

Stage 3
She sees she can work; she contacts what might be, but understands that she does not know how it is done.

 

The Second Process – the Training
Everything depends on the teacher; he is honest; he does not show tricks.

 

It is necessary to return to stage 2 and look ahead to see what the voice might really become (point 8).

 

Enneagram
Realization in time 1-2-3-5-5-
Eternal pattern 1-4-2-8-5

 

Stage now ready for real progress:

 

Stage 4
Maximum distress; 5th point – greatest tension; no real control, but a sense of how to work; the third process is sensed.

 

She sees that she is serving Art, not herself. Sacrifice becomes the Third Force. The teacher is an outside intervention: she must go back to him. He must come into intimate contact with the process.

 

The Third Process – The Musical Art
Music is not a thing in itself but an experience/ activity.

 

Playing music is Music!

 

It is recurrence: Hyparchic

 

Perfect sound is independent of time and place. It proceeds from a transcendental affirmation beyond Self-hood. Music in nature is not different from music in art. The thrush, nightingale, bull and stallion are all artists – a cosmic affirmation.

 

These musings cannot enter the mind of the teacher; yet the Transcendent of Music is there – a Third Force!

 

The only step of the Enneagram that coincides with Time and Eternity is that between stage 4 and stage 5.Music thus moves around and conquers time – another soul is ‘captured’.

 

Stage 5
Outwardly, little change – the work goes on. However, there is a change of motivation. Music is now the Master! Art is now a significant reality; but also ‘beyond’ and ‘unattainable’. Hard work and ‘moments of truth’.

 

She sees her own limitations. She faces her commitment. She cannot sing for herself alone. She must share it with other. There is now a holy quality.

 

Enneagram Point 7: She must expose her weakness and live through the anguish faced with a merciless world. The teacher has nearly completed his task.

 

Stage 6

Completion of the student’s transformation.

 

What was a mere fact has now become a quality: voice -> music.

 

External conditions do not matter.

 

Joy is her art; serenity is her conscience; fulfilment is her purpose in life. Truth is the goal of her endeavour. Truth is unattainable but longing for the supreme value becomes a life goal.
Moments of Truth come rarely. A new Enneagram begins: the search for the Soul.

 

Point 8: the teacher and student part company.
The third process passes through two stages: vocation and contribution. If it is to continue, she will enter a cycle which leaves a legacy: the World of Music in which all have a part.

 

From this, we see that values are not isolated qualities, but elements in a total scheme; no less real for being non-factual.
Values are not subjective experience; not emotional responses.
Values are a Domain of Reality which penetrates the whole of life experience.

Realization of Value is not the same as the Actualization of Fact. The Structure of Value is not the same as the Structure of fact. Between the two lies the Domain of Harmony.

Man is what he realises himself to be: History is what the World realises itself to be.

 

 

Systematics and Anthropology

 

Anthropology

 

The Complexity of Human Nature

 

All existence is Organised Complexity. This complexity is not just functional but includes different levels of being-experience; and different patterns of will, fate, and destiny. No account of man in purely functional terms will therefore be adequate.

 

Every discipline of the natural science involves understanding human nature. Therefore, instead of speaking of art, religion, history, sociology, psychology, etc., we should only speak of Anthropology: the Study of the Total Structure of Man and his World.

 

We are complex, but complex in different ways: physico-chemical; biological; psychic; external relations, etc.

 

There is a lot about man that we do not know; but a lot that we do – especially amongst specialists: poets, musicians, painters, etc. Thousands of years of knowledge have given us a lot.

 

This chapter attempts a translation of a knowledge – that existed in Asia before the Sumarian Culture about 5000 years ago – to the idiom of the present age.

Even with this, there is much that we will not know.

 

The complexity can be allowed for in its entirety in terms of two elements: knowledge of Man as biological; and as a Social Phenomenon.

 

We can deal with complexity is two ways: simplify (the procedure of the natural science – to take apart and formulate working hypotheses/ lines of action); or, to start with the totality. In the second case, we accept complexity but look for organised structure so as to examine the whole.

 

Natural scientists continue to regard their disciplines as avenues towards objective knowledge, true knowledge of the world.

 

Politics and jurisprudence deal inconsequentially with human problems because they lack an adequate account of human nature.

 

No area of human knowledge is more lamentable than the science of man himself.

 

We need an adequate anthropology – a science of total man, not one confined to limited aspects of psychology and behaviour.

 

pp. 119 – 134

 

Man and his Worlds
Man is nothing on his own, but is what he is because of his connection with the Cosmic Process. We get nowhere by reducing his complexity to simplicity, and thus leaving out man’s multidimensional nature. A total anthropology might include:

 

I. Physical
1) Energetics
2) Mechanics of the human body
3) Anatomy and Function
4) Physiology and Genetics
5) Taxonomy
6) Evolution and origin, Palaeoanthropology
7) Ecology of man in the Biosphere
II. Mental
8) Function and behaviour
9) Experiential and Cognitive factors
10) Aesthetic and Mental powers
11) Development and education
12) Higher powers of cognition and Action
III. Social
13) Natural societies and their evolution
14) Economic and Technical activities
15) Juridicial activities
16) Political activities
17) Cultural activities
18) The heritage of the past
IV. Spiritual
19) Man’s undeveloped potential
20) The Will, Morality and Ethics
21) Religion and Theology
22) Spiritual progress of mankind
V. Cosmic
23) Man and the Biosphere
24) Man’s cosmic role and significance
25) Man and God
26) The Integration of Anthropologies

 

Only the last allows us to study man as a whole.
The total is structured and it falls to pieces if the integrative principles are removed. Content is not enough. Systematics is a system for the study of structures and their integrative nature: that combines different levels and different system attributes.

 

Total man is an organised whole. He is more than a dyad; his nature is three-fold; he needs to be understood as an activity – therefore a tetrad.

 

The Human Monad
We need to form an understanding of the human monad. We do this by affiliating man to various regions or ‘worlds’.

 

The World of Energies
Processes are really the transformation of energies: For Man as a generator and an engine.

 

Twelve kinds of energy in three groups of four: mechanical, vital and cosmic.

 

To consider the four mechanical energies:

 

Dispersed heat (E12)
Cohesive Energy (interactions) (E11)
Directed Energy (Motion) (E10)
Plastic Energy (identity) (E9)

 

Men are concerned with the transformation of energy: this implies men have a personal destiny which includes a specific task – a certain energy liberation.

 

The World of Material Structures
Energies have no structure: they are the means of doing work.

 

Simple structures are things. Our bodies are material objects: systems of energies for the production of useful work.

 

The most important quality of all material objects is that they are inert – not capable of independent action.

 

Because men come to know the world through things, they tend to treat it ‘thing-like’; i.e. a dyad. Dyadic reactions are minds, bodies, and feelings.

 

Life
Life is different from ‘thing-hood’ because it depends on the exchanges of energy and materials.

 

Things are neither free or dependent; life is both free and dependent. Life – at the Automatic level – forms a special link between inert Hyponomic and cosmic Hypernomic. We depend on life; we pay with our lives. Life is immense; only a small part is directly relevant to man.

 

Life is most important for us. But, what life is remains a mystery.

 

The World of Selves
Self-hood is a complex entity in which Will, Being and Function are related.

 

Intelligence is the common characteristic of different kinds of self.

 

Human powers – sensations, feelings, mental processes, attention, choice, understanding, psychic functions – are not necessarily unique to man. Therefore, the structures we associate with the self-hood may well share common characteristics with larger and more permanent units than man. These may be ‘Higher Intelligence’.

 

There is more intelligence in the world than we know. Yet, we have a substantial stake in this intelligence.

 

Motives
Motives are our response to values. Our values define our motivations. We recognise them, and accept or reject them.

 

Values are not energies, things, living or intelligent; nor subjective.

 

We have an immediate connection with 12 basic Values. There are Natural, Personal, and Cosmic values – which determine for men a world in which we have a part. It is the world of motives, purposes and obligations – not the world of actions, objects. Therefore values cannot be included in any of the first four worlds.

 

History
We have considered five worlds – all of which we connect with in the here and now. But, there is another world – that of History (significant events of the world).

 

We are what we are because of the past; we have a special connection with the past through our selective memory. We connect with the future in a special way; we cannot ‘be’ without a notion of the future.

 

We need more than persistence; we need significance as well.

 

The Non-Rational World
In all experience, there is an unaccountable irrationality: i.e., an element that cannot be reduced to knowledge. It is different from value, and unknowable as fact. Yet, it is rational, consistent and recognisable.

 

The non-rational eludes sense perceptions. It cannot be explained in terms of energies and actions. It is closest to ourselves.

 

The essence of experience is irrational. We can account for the rational world; but we need an irrational element to experience it. Will is irrational.

 

The irrational is not meaningless, chaotic, but cannot be expressed in factual, logical terms. It is the World of the Spirit (no place, no time, no measure, no number).

 

This is the Spiritualization of Existence. We belong to a world that is spontaneous and irrational: it is the seventh world of our human world.

 

 

The Ambiguity of Human Nature – the Dyad
Man’s dyadic nature is self-evident: fact and value (natural and supernatural; existence and essence; what he consists of and what he is). Existence is poorer than Essence.

 

Man’s existence cannot be other than it is; but his essence can grow and diminish.
Existence: life and Death
Essence: Reality and Unreality

 

Man contradicts himself. Our essence is secure but we do not know it.

 

We hold a two-fold anxiety: restricted anxiety (based on the needs of our existence) and total anxiety (the mystery of the whole). The fact that we experience to second but turn to the first is a representation of our contradictory nature.

 

Value is what we judge or assert as essence quality; but we should not see it as identity. Existence is not confined to fact: it includes the essence classes – value takes hold of reality through its association with fact.

 

We experience our two-fold nature as if there were two opposing forces: centrifugal, drawing us out to great worlds, or inwards to the depths of our existence; centripetal, which holds us to the immediate, tangible present. We must accept the incompatibility of our two natures. But, we must get beyond the Dyad. This dyadic projection is inherent to the nature of existence.

 

Men tend to be centrifugal: creative, away from the immediate and real.
Women are centripetal: conservative, rooted in the actual.
Except, of course, no-one is wholly man or woman.
The complementarity of the sexes must be accepted. This implies equality but not identity..

 

Being opposite in nature, they must disagree. Yet, their disagreement is the condition of mutual understanding.

 

The harmony of the dyad means accepting the contradiction with awareness of complementarity.
The nature of sex is based on the two-fold nature of man himself. The need to accept his own contradiction.
Man cannot be satisfied with what he is; yet, neither can he abandon it.

 

Men and women could be described as the marriage of essence and existence; whereby separation is overcome, and distinction destroyed. This union transforms space and time.

 

The human dyad is manifested in the sexes; it is also present but unmanifested within every human self. It is a truly human characteristic because the self-hood of man is poised between essence and existence, drawn equally towards two poles. The acceptance of this hazardous and poignant situation is the first condition for recognising the self as potential Soul, bearing within it, its own Individuality.

 

Man as Triad
Man participates in the fundamental triad: Function, Being and Will. Each has its own structure.

 

Thought proceeds from acts of Will that may be strong or weak; though is also a function – conditioned by our state of Being.

 

We would need a higher term system to study complex triads. As it stands, it does not give rise to the structures which hold experience together. But, we can examine the three elements as they enter experience.

 

The Element of Being
All experience is contained in the present moment. The present never changes: it is always present. It is in flux.

 

It contains three main types of experience: immediacy; trace memories; and expectations.

 

The present moment changes, not only in content, but also extent and duration.

 

Mind: the knowledge that ‘something’ is the locus of this total but limited experience.

 

Three modes of experience in the mind:

 

Automatic (E6)
Sensitive (E5)
Conscious (E4)

 

These, in combination, are the ordinary state of man’s mind.

 

Mind is therefore a region of experience of the present moment – that expands and contracts. It can also subdivide and recombine.

 

This ability is possible because of the functional powers of sensation, thought, etc. We can distinguish the latter from mind by dent of the fact that it gives us experience of immediate presence.

 

The mind is capable of transformation. A core of experience develops that allows the mind to recognise its own identity.

 

Further coalescence leads to a stable energetic structure that we can call ‘the soul’. The soul evolves out of the mind and the mind evolves out of the present moment of experience by the interplay and coalescence of energies.

 

The Soul is not a fixed condition but a structure capable of further development.

 

This enlarges the present moment of experience. It brings us to a higher level of order: Creative Energy (E3).

 

These concepts – energies, present moment, traces and expectations, minds, soul, transformation, evolution – belong to Being. Being is capable of transformation (together-ness).

 

The Element of Function
Awareness of function comes after awareness of mind. Functions can exist with little mind, or even no mind at all.

 

We begin the description of function with the material structure relevant to him: his physical body.. We know the limbs, organs, etc. by the way they influence the awareness of the present moment. This suggests a distinction between Material functions, Vital functions, and Psychic functions.

 

Material functions provide a physical, flexible structure. They include mechanical devices and engines for transformation. They are maintained by bio-chemical structures – complex, interlocking structures: subject matter of anatomy, physiology, bio-physics and biochemistry. These depend on a dispersed range energies: for example, of heat (E12) to vital energy (E7). There is a progressive integration of functions from separate mechanisms towards the organism as a whole. At some point, an integrative function comes into play and produces three main types of psychic function that are experienced in the mind. These fall into three groups: Sensation, Feeling and Thought. The body mechanisms are therefore:

 

Inner Sensation: Instinctive vital processes of the body;
Outer Sensation: Perceptions, Movements and bodily action upon other bodies;
Feelings: Emotions, like and dislikes, desire and aversion;
Thoughts: Mental images and signs. Traces and Memories. Expectations.
Sex: Connection between two bodies and minds.

 

These groups are co-ordinated by brains or the ‘Centres of Function’.

 

Each function can produce a ‘state of mind’. To designate as ‘power’ the three main connections between functions and mind:

 

Sensation has the power to produce the experienced of presence.
Feeling has the power to produce the experience of Force.
Thought has the power to go outside the present moment by connecting with perceptions, memories, traces, expectations, mental images. These collectively give the power of direction.

 

The functions are coordinated according to the energy they have activated:

 

Vital Energy (E7) – functions below the mind, coordinated by their construction.
Automatic Energy (E6) – lower threshold of the mind, coordinated by habitual patterns. Sensitive Energy (E5) – Centre of the mind functions, coordinated by sensitivity. ‘Conscious functioning’.
Conscious Energy (E4) – upper limit of the mind. Here it touches ‘universal energies’. Power to integrate functions in a state of self-awareness. I-consciousness.

 

There are two further levels of functioning – but only when mind is transformed into soul:

 

Here, Creative Energy (E3) enters the present moment. There is then an awakening of Higher Personal Reason: the highest that can be expected within the present moment of a human person. It reveals total presence, or Destiny, of the individual. This requires the awakening of the soul. Until this accomplished the Higher Personal Reason appears as Conscience.

 

The highest functional integration comes from Unitive Energy (E2). This connects the Personal Individuality with the Cosmic Individuality. The limitations of the mind are transcended and the Higher Objective Reason takes the powers of presence, force and direction, which are related to it as the body is related to them: that is , as instruments.
Amen!

 

 

pp. 134 – 149 see pages 136, 137, 138, 139, 145 and 147 for diagrams

 

The Element of Will
Will is the active function of the triad: ‘Function-Being-Will’.

 

All separate parts of the world are moved by their own Will, and all partial ‘wills’ are fragments of one Total Will.

 

For man, Will is a multiplicity: within any present moment, there are a multiplicity of Wills according to function, the conflicting Wills of several centres, changing Wills of habits, memories, and expectations. Man has many Wills.

 

These Wills are grouped under ‘Will patterns’, or personalities; traces are features, that is unconscious.

Will patterns occupy definite regions of the mind and acquire a particular energy pattern. This can lead to separate lives in pathological states; mutually closed regions of the mind.

 

There is no unity of Will in normal men and women until they develop a soul. However, specific combinations of Will produce the Selfhood.

 

The four selves – Material, Reactional, Divided and True Self represent different modes of coalescence of the Will.

 

The undivided state of the Will, personal and free from existence is called the Individuality.

 

Personal Individuality is self-limited of the Essential Cosmic Will, and therefore different from existential Wills. Will in man is dispersed in fragments according to a changing present moment: concentrated and unified in Personal Individuality. This enters his personality when he acquires stability and permanence.

 

Each of the three elements of man is therefore associated with his present moment. To understand their forms and structures, we must pass from the triad to the tetrad.

 

 

Man as Ordering Agent
Man is a cosmic agent for creating order. His activity depends on the ordering of sense impressions and mental images in the mind; his life depends on the ordering of chemical substances and energies. Self-realization depends on ordering the mind, as the vehicle and sinstrument of Individuality.

 

We move from the triad of Function-Being-Will to the tetrad of Ground-Goal-Direction-Instruments.

 

Example 1: Food

 

Nutrition (Goal)

 

Metabolic System (Instrument)—————-Instinctive Brain (Direction)

 

Food Stuff (Ground)

 

The ordering process separates the raw foodstuff into more highly ordered proteins. The ordering process cannot operate without direction. Direction cannot be assimilated into the instrumental term.

 

The brain directs functions and provides the Instinctive Centre for the integrative work of the nervous system and blood.

 

 

Example 2: Selfhood

 

True Self (Goal/ Creative/ E3)

 

Reactional Self (Instrument/ E5 – Sensitiv————-Divided Self (Direction/ E4 – Conscious)

 

Material Self (Ground/ Automatic – E6)

 

The Divided Self is the source of direction/ Personal Ego or Psyche: it seeks to bring order to the present moment.

 

A vertical line from top to botton is the ‘line of motivation’ = order
The horizontal line from left to right is the ‘line of activity’ = operation

 

 

The Four Sources of Man’s Activity
All activity takes place in a present moment, but is not all actual. Ground energy changes according to cause and effect; Creative energy is spontaneous and unpredictable (i.e., not limited by the conditions of predictability. It is ideal because it has its own laws.

 

The two operational terms (from left to right) are theoretical and practical:

 

Ideal (Goal)

 

Practical (Instrument)——————-Theoretical (Direction)

 

Actual (Ground)

 

All ordering activity derives its meaning from the state towards which it is striving; although the goal is not in sight..

 

It is a pattern or structure to be realized; it cannot be defined in the limits of an existing situation because unknown factors enter from other worlds. The ideal cannot therefore be fully known.

 

The actual is not just the state of affairs but the constantly changing process of time and space. The actual remains actual although unchanged. The Theoretical is knowing what to and how do it – to make the necessary adjustments.

 

The theoretical acts within man himself: with it, he can criticise and reflect on himself, but only if he connects with different worlds to which he belongs. The theoretical must be aware of the goal of the activity, but also direct the instruments and take account of the actual situation as it constantly changes.

 

The Practical term includes more than the instruments of man’s activity, but also his functional powers, bodily organisms, his strength and ability.

 

Levels of Order in Man
There are ‘three levels’ in the tetrad.

 

PT is the scene of the activity we call ‘stream of consciousness’ or conscious life, but only when conscious and sensitive energy are kept separate. In a normal state, man cannot hold these apart, and sensitivity collapses into consciousness. Then, he loses the power to watch himself and activity. The theoretical then dries up, and man is dominated by the Material and Reactional selves. Separation is therefore the key to right working of the tetrad, i.e. Self-remembering(Gurdjieff), Philokalia (Greek fathers), neepsis (sobriety).

 

Separation is therefore weak in the natural state. Nevertheless, PT is always present: a single state of awareness, or clearly separated states (True Self – located as presence in the Divided Self). This is similar to the essence of consciousness (E4) and existence of sensitivity (E5). The state is painful when the Divided self interprets its own experience as reality. When it see that it is only an instrument and becomes conscious of ‘I’, then the end merges into the form. True self becomes the ruler of Self-hood. The True self is not experience but it is the seat of experience.

 

 

The Structure of Human Activity
The theoretical and practical must work in harmony.

 

The right action is subordinated to the ideal: neither is an end in itself.

 

Theory is for seeing: not doing. Practice is for action: not knowing.

 

The needs of the actual situation must be separated from the ideal. The actual situation must must be considered separately from the ideal.

 

Only an assessment of actual position with respect to the ideal situation will keep the activity on course.

 

IA – Ideal/Actual can be viewed as creativity and automatism. Creativity can by-pass consciousness and creativity (which can astonish the self).

 

IA is also the separation of the True Self and the Material Self.
The material self sees needs as aims. When it does this, it usurps the position of the True self.

 

 

Four Connectivities

 

1. I-T Respect
Ideal and theory preserves values. Conscience entered the sub-conscious and was therefore preserved. Conscience is the operation of creative, spontaneous response. The breakdown of the connection between conscience and understanding (what is right and true), turns theory into mere knowledge.

 

2. I-P Faith
The connection of Ideal and Practical is the source of strength and determination – Faith. Faith is action rather than experience. The man of faith is often not aware of it; although he knows what he must do. I-P gives confidence in rationality and significance.

 

3. T-A Curiosity
Need and theory together = curiosity. Also discrimination: to assess needs and make right use of resources.

 

4. P-A Skill
Practicality and Ability = Skill.
Seen as a tetrad, man is an activity: more than Function, Being, Will. He is the activity in which the three are manifested.

 

 

The Mind as Ordering Activity
Anthropology will link mind with body; but also connect with the world of value and spirit.

 

The mind is not to be identified with the brain. The mind is an activity: therefore, a tetrad.

 

The mind is an activity that connects the body as a structure of vital energies and the spirit as a structure of cosmic energies:

 

Cosmic energies Creativity E3
Consciousness E4 Supra-conscious mind

———————— Mind consciously called ‘Conscious Mind’

 

Vital energies Sensitivity E5 Sub-conscious mind
Automatism E6

 

The mind is an ever-changing flux of energies. But it is bounded in its lower-limit by the transition of sensitivity to automatism, and is unable to penetrate true creativity: thus, sub-conscious, conscious, and supra-conscious.

 

The role of the mind between vital and cosmic energies is made possible by the coalescence of sensitive energy (E5) to produce the sensorium or perceptual instrument. The mind links two tetrads: vital and cosmic. It is brought into action by automatic and creative impulses. It responds to sensitive and conscious judegments.

 

Creativity (Goal)

 

Sensitivity (Instrument)———–(Co-operative Activity)———Consciousness (Direction)

 

Automatism (Ground)

 

Mind can acquire a stable structure – a soul.

 

The limitation of the tetrad is that it presents us with a picture of activity from which the actor himself is lacking. The four selves are in the tetrad. But, there must also be the ‘I am’ to hold them together (even if it is a false ‘I am’ of ego).

 

The tetrad is non-centred. To find man at the centre, we must pass from the tetrad to the pentad. This is the spirit of man: more than an activity; endowed with potentialities.

 

The Human Spirit – Pentad
We have stdied order: the structure of purposeful activity of man. Purpose implies significance: the reality of value depends an activity in the world of fact.

 

The true act is a creative transformation within the being that does it: the focus is the point of significance – it is the ‘there’. How do we place this point of significance in the structure of human activity?

 

Significance is more concrete, more substantial than activity.

 

The pentad includes a property of sameness, difference, whereby existence can, without losing itself, be more than itself.

 

The pentatd is significant potentiality: we connect the notion of spirit as the link of essence and existence that transforms both and makes them real.

 

The search for human significance is the search for the Spirt of Man.

 

There is a special significance in the central point where the line of motivation from the Actual and Ideal intersects the line of instrumentality between theory and practice. Maybe man must be there. No, because the the tetrad is concerned with activity, not entities. The central point determines the focus of harmony of the activity. This is the ‘centre of gravity’ of the activity: rightly adjusted to the inward and outward, the right balance between actual and ideal. True as the self-hood of one person, a group, a family, a society, government, country or historical event. This is not the degree of significance of an event, but its degree of ‘righness’.

 

We need to pass on to the pentad: not four terms, but five independent terms which contribute an element of significance to the situation as a whole. Five point pattern of significance:

 

5. Upper Outer Limit (Master) – the highest level for which the entity has a significance.

 

4. Higher Part (Higher Nature) – Maximum deployment of potentialities in herent in an activity.

 

3. Centre (Ipseity) – Intrinsic character of what the entity is.

 

2. Lower Part (Lower nature) – minimum deployement of the powers of the entity consistent with the retention of its identity.

 

1. Lower Outer Limit (Nourishment) – the lowest level which directly affects the nature of the entity – providing it with elements of its construction.

 

The five terms combine to determine what can be said of the significance of the entity: what it is, where it is, whence it is, and why it is.

 

Man depends on the biosphere in two ways: green vegetation as prime source of vital energy; germinal essence, as source of sensitivity. He is dependent on vegetation for existence, and germ for the realization of essence. Thus, two contradictory principles. Man’s finitude and infinitude; conflict of existence and essence is the root of his being. We need two pentads, therefore: Man as Individual and Man as Self.

 

The Nourishment
The nourishment of essential man is given by the Germinal essence – the vital energy concentrated in the germ. The germinal class in the universe is all life with the urge towards Individuality. In the germ, it is potential only (distinguished from the plant).

 

The nature of man seeks realization and is not satisfied by vegetative existence. This primary urge is unconscious and undirected. The realization of form is the focus on significance: the search – the same characteristics as germinal essence and man destined to attain Individuality.

 

The nourishment of Existential man is given by vegetative essence and the constructive energy concentrated in the plant.

 

The characteristic significance is the longing of existence: the vegetable seeks to plant the root in the ground to draw sustenance, to hold a place in the sun. The is the same as the man centred on self-hood. He is a transformer of energy – a builder in his world. His needs are the ‘have and to hold’. He acts like an animal – his contribution is unconscious and involuntary. His outer limit of vegetative processes of life. As he is alive, his significance cannot fall below this.

 

The Higher and Lower Natures
The highest deployment of human potentialities consists in fulfilment of cosmic duty to order and regulate regions of existence entrusted in his care: Demiurgic Intelligence.

 

The lower nature of Esential Man is his instrument for adaptation to the circumstances of earthly life: psychic functions and their powers. When man is fully developed, these powers are exercised by the lower selves and do not interfere with higher purposes pursued by individuality.

 

The Divided Self is the existential dyad in man; a projection on the plane of existence of the fundamental dyad, and gives him unlimited possibilities. It is the seat of the upper and lower limits of significance of the existential man. He has the potential for transformation given by being of human form. He has this possibility: the foundation of his existential significance. If he has not reached the True Self: this possibility is the upper limt of his inner significance: the higher centres of function.

 

At the other extreme is the driving force that makes him seek for satisfaction of his natural urges: desire – libido, the urge of the subconscious, hidden motives, animal passions – at the root of his animal nature. They have their own pattern and character.

 

Now: the higher outer limits of the two kinds of men ….

 

pp. 143- 149 

 

The Element of Will
Will is the active function of the triad: ‘Function-Being-Will’.

 

All separate parts of the world are moved by their own Will, and all partial ‘wills’ are fragments of one Total Will.

 

For man, Will is a multiplicity: within any present moment, there are a multiplicity of Wills according to function, the conflicting Wills of several centres, changing Wills of habits, memories, and expectations. Man has many Wills.

 

These Wills are grouped under ‘Will patterns’, or personalities; traces are features, that is unconscious.

 

Will patterns occupy definite regions of the mind and acquire a particular energy pattern. This can lead to separate lives in pathological states; mutually closed regions of the mind.

 

There is no unity of Will in normal men and women until they develop a soul. However, specific combinations of Will produce the Selfhood.

 

The four selves – Material, Reactional, Divided and True Self represent different modes of coalescence of the Will.

 

The undivided state of the Will, personal and free from existence is called the Individuality.

 

Personal Individuality is self-limited of the Essential Cosmic Will, and therefore different from existential Wills. Will in man is dispersed in fragments according to a changing present moment: concentrated and unified in Personal Individuality. This enters his personality when he acquires stability and permanence.

 

Each of the three elements of man is therefore associated with his present moment. To understand their forms and structures, we must pass from the triad to the tetrad.

 

Man as Ordering Agent
Man is a cosmic agent for creating order. His activity depends on the ordering of sense impressions and mental images in the mind; his life depends on the ordering of chemical substances and energies. Self-realization depends on ordering the mind, as the vehicle and sinstrument of Individuality.

 

We move from the triad of Function-Being-Will to the tetrad of Ground-Goal-Direction-Instruments.

 

Example 1: Food

 

Nutrition (Goal)

 

Metabolic System (Instrument)—————-Instinctive Brain (Direction)

 

Food Stuff (Ground)

 

The ordering process separates the raw foodstuff into more highly ordered proteins. The ordering process cannot operate without direction. Direction cannot be assimilated into the instrumental term.

 

The brain directs functions and provides the Instinctive Centre for the integrative work of the nervous system and blood.

 

Example 2: Selfhood

 

True Self (Goal/ Creative/ E3)

 

Reactional Self (Instrument/ E5 – Sensitive)——————–Divided Self (Direction/ E4 – Conscious)

Material Self (Ground/ Automatic – E6)

 

The Divided Self is the source of direction/ Personal Ego or Psyche: it seeks to bring order to the present moment.

 

A vertical line from top to botton is the ‘line of motivation’ = order
The horizontal line from left to right is the ‘line of activity’ = operation

 

The Four Sources of Man’s Activity
All activity takes place in a present moment, but is not all actual. Ground energy changes according to cause and effect; Creative energy is spontaneous and unpredictable (i.e., not limited by the conditions of predictability. It is ideal because it has its own laws.

 

The two operational terms (from left to right) are theoretical and practical:

 

Ideal (Goal)

 

Practical (Instrument)——————-Theoretical (Direction)

 

Actual (Ground)

 

All ordering activity derives its meaning from the state towards which it is striving; although the goal is not in sight..

 

It is a pattern or structure to be realized; it cannot be defined in the limits of an existing situation because unknown factors enter from other worlds. The ideal cannot therefore be fully known.

 

The actual is not just the state of affairs but the constantly changing process of time and space. The actual remains actual although unchanged. The Theoretical is knowing what to and how do it – to make the necessary adjustments.

 

The theoretical acts within man himself: with it, he can criticise and reflect on himself, but only if he connects with different worlds to which he belongs. The theoretical must be aware of the goal of the activity, but also direct the instruments and take account of the actual situation as it constantly changes.

 

The Practical term includes more than the instruments of man’s activity, but also his functional powers, bodily organisms, his strength and ability.

 

Levels of Order in Man
There are ‘three levels’ in the tetrad.

 

PT is the scene of the activity we call ‘stream of consciousness’ or conscious life, but only when conscious and sensitive energy are kept separate. In a normal state, man cannot hold these apart, and sensitivity collapses into consciousness. Then, he loses the power to watch himself and activity. The theoretical then dries up, and man is dominated by the Material and Reactional selves. Separation is therefore the key to right working of the tetrad, i.e. Self-remembering(Gurdjieff), Philokalia (Greek fathers), neepsis (sobriety).

 

Separation is therefore weak in the natural state. Nevertheless, PT is always present: a single state of awareness, or clearly separated states (True Self – located as presence in the Divided Self). This is similar to the essence of consciousness (E4) and existence of sensitivity (E5). The state is painful when the Divided self interprets its own experience as reality. When it see that it is only an instrument and becomes conscious of ‘I’, then the end merges into the form. True self becomes the ruler of Self-hood. The True self is not experience but it is the seat of experience.

 

The Structure of Human Activity
The theoretical and practical must work in harmony.

 

The right action is subordinated to the ideal: neither is an end in itself.

 

Theory is for seeing: not doing. Practice is for action: not knowing.

 

The needs of the actual situation must be separated from the ideal. The actual situation must must be considered separately from the ideal.

 

Only an assessment of actual position with respect to the ideal situation will keep the activity on course.

 

IA – Ideal/Actual can be viewed as creativity and automatism. Creativity can by-pass consciousness and creativity (which can astonish the self).

 

IA is also the separation of the True Self and the Material Self.
The material self sees needs as aims. When it does this, it usurps the position of the True self.

 

Four Connectivities

1. I-T Respect
Ideal and theory preserves values. Conscience entered the sub-conscious and was therefore preserved. Conscience is the operation of creative, spontaneous response. The breakdown of the connection between conscience and understanding (what is right and true), turns theory into mere knowledge.

 

2. I-P Faith
The connection of Ideal and Practical is the source of strength and determination – Faith. Faith is action rather than experience. The man of faith is often not aware of it; although he knows what he must do. I-P gives confidence in rationality and significance.

 

3. T-A Curiosity
Need and theory together = curiosity. Also discrimination: to assess needs and make right use of resources.

 

4. P-A Skill
Practicality and Ability = Skill.
Seen as a tetrad, man is an activity: more than Function, Being, Will. He is the activity in which the three are manifested.

 

The Mind as Ordering Activity
Anthropology will link mind with body; but also connect with the world of value and spirit.

 

The mind is not to be identified with the brain. The mind is an activity: therefore, a tetrad.

 

The mind is an activity that connects the body as a structure of vital energies and the spirit as a structure of cosmic energies:

 

Cosmic energies Creativity E3
Consciousness E4 Supra-conscious mind

———————— Mind consciously called ‘Conscious Mind’

 

Vital energies Sensitivity E5 Sub-conscious mind
Automatism E6

 

The mind is an ever-changing flux of energies. But it is bounded in its lower-limit by the transition of sensitivity to automatism, and is unable to penetrate true creativity: thus, sub-conscious, conscious, and supra-conscious.

 

The role of the mind between vital and cosmic energies is made possible by the coalescence of sensitive energy (E5) to produce the sensorium or perceptual instrument. The mind links two tetrads: vital and cosmic. It is brought into action by automatic and creative impulses. It responds to sensitive and conscious judegments.

 

Creativity (Goal)

 

Sensitivity (Instrument)——-(Co-operative Activity——Consciousness (Direction)

 

Automatism (Ground)

 

Mind can acquire a stable structure – a soul.

 

The limitation of the tetrad is that it presents us with a picture of activity from which the actor himself is lacking. The four selves are in the tetrad. But, there must also be the ‘I am’ to hold them together (even if it is a false ‘I am’ of ego).

 

The tetrad is non-centred. To find man at the centre, we must pass from the tetrad to the pentad. This is the spirit of man: more than an activity; endowed with potentialities.

 

The Human Spirit – Pentad
We have stdied order: the structure of purposeful activity of man. Purpose implies significance: the reality of value depends an activity in the world of fact.

 

The true act is a creative transformation within the being that does it: the focus is the point of significance – it is the ‘there’. How do we place this point of significance in the structure of human activity?

 

Significance is more concrete, more substantial than activity.

 

The pentad includes a property of sameness, difference, whereby existence can, without losing itself, be more than itself.

 

The pentatd is significant potentiality: we connect the notion of spirit as the link of essence and existence that transforms both and makes them real.

 

The search for human significance is the search for the Spirt of Man.

 

There is a special significance in the central point where the line of motivation from the Actual and Ideal intersects the line of instrumentality between theory and practice. Maybe man must be there. No, because the the tetrad is concerned with activity, not entities. The central point determines the focus of harmony of the activity. This is the ‘centre of gravity’ of the activity: rightly adjusted to the inward and outward, the right balance between actual and ideal. True as the self-hood of one person, a group, a family, a society, government, country or historical event. This is not the degree of significance of an event, but its degree of ‘righness’.

 

We need to pass on to the pentad: not four terms, but five independent terms which contribute an element of significance to the situation as a whole. Five point pattern of significance:

 

5. Upper Outer Limit (Master) – the highest level for which the entity has a significance.

 

4. Higher Part (Higher Nature) – Maximum deployment of potentialities in herent in an activity.

 

3. Centre (Ipseity) – Intrinsic character of what the entity is.

 

2. Lower Part (Lower nature) – minimum deployement of the powers of the entity consistent with the retention of its identity.

 

1. Lower Outer Limit (Nourishment) – the lowest level which directly affects the nature of the entity – providing it with elements of its construction.

 

The five terms combine to determine what can be said of the significance of the entity: what it is, where it is, whence it is, and why it is.

 

Man depends on the biosphere in two ways: green vegetation as prime source of vital energy; germinal essence, as source of sensitivity. He is dependent on vegetation for existence, and germ for the realization of essence. Thus, two contradictory principles. Man’s finitude and infinitude; conflict of existence and essence is the root of his being. We need two pentads, therefore: Man as Individual and Man as Self.

 

The Nourishment
The nourishment of essential man is given by the Germinal essence – the vital energy concentrated in the germ. The germinal class in the universe is all life with the urge towards Individuality. In the germ, it is potential only (distinguished from the plant).

 

The nature of man seeks realization and is not satisfied by vegetative existence. This primary urge is unconscious and undirected. The realization of form is the focus on significance: the search – the same characteristics as germinal essence and man destined to attain Individuality.

 

The nourishment of Existential man is given by vegetative essence and the constructive energy concentrated in the plant.

 

The characteristic significance is the longing of existence: the vegetable seeks to plant the root in the ground to draw sustenance, to hold a place in the sun. The is the same as the man centred on self-hood. He is a transformer of energy – a builder in his world. His needs are the ‘have and to hold’. He acts like an animal – his contribution is unconscious and involuntary. His outer limit of vegetative processes of life. As he is alive, his significance cannot fall below this.

 

The Higher and Lower Natures
The highest deployment of human potentialities consists in fulfilment of cosmic duty to order and regulate regions of existence entrusted in his care: Demiurgic Intelligence.

 

The lower nature of Esential Man is his instrument for adaptation to the circumstances of earthly life: psychic functions and their powers. When man is fully developed, these powers are exercised by the lower selves and do not interfere with higher purposes pursued by individuality.

 

The Divided Self is the existential dyad in man; a projection on the plane of existence of the fundamental dyad, and gives him unlimited possibilities. It is the seat of the upper and lower limits of significance of the existential man. He has the potential for transformation given by being of human form. He has this possibility: the foundation of his existential significance. If he has not reached the True Self: this possibility is the upper limt of his inner significance: the higher centres of function.

 

 

At the other extreme is the driving force that makes him seek for satisfaction of his natural urges: desire – libido, the urge of the subconscious, hidden motives, animal passions – at the root of his animal nature. They have their own pattern and character.

 

Now: the higher outer limits of the two kinds of men ….

 

pp.149 – 163 see pages 154, 157 for diagrams

 

The Master
The Essential Man aspires to Individuality; whilst Cosmic Individuality is the true Master of Man.

 

Man cannot go higher than this; his destiny is the Union with Cosmic Individuality. We cannot describe the highest limit of Man’s significance in existential terms: it is beyond his nature and all nature. Here, he is ‘food’ for the Cosmic Individuality.

 

Existential Man’s centre of gravity is Selfhood: he seeks his fulfilment within the limits of Selfhood. His outer limit lies beyond Selfhood. He is not orientated towards Individuality; he therefore seeks significance in other ways.

 

Demiurgic Essence is between Man and the Cosmic Individuality in the Pentad. There are Beings which are of a Higher Order than man but limited (somewhere in the universe, perhaps).

 

The Master of Existential Man exists for the benefit of Demiurgic Powers. Man is dust and returns to dust – transformations are limited to those on this level.

 

Experience must be taken into account: Man exists as a body (physical mechanism) and a mind (sensitive complex). We might say this is all that man is, but we could also say that Existential Man must be significant for a Natural Purpose – even if they have not reached Individuality. This follows Gurdjieff’s doctrine of Universal Reciprocal maintenance.

 

Ipseity
This is the core of every being: where dominating motives and concerns are concentrated (this combines Selfhood and Individuality).
In Man there is a longing for this concentration, but it is not easy to recognise since it is found in parts of Selfhood not easily part of our awareness: something which we know is precious and which we would fight to preserve.

 

There is a deeply rooted need to ‘have and the hold’ a place in the scheme of things.

 

The Selfhood is rooted in existence; if it loses its hold on this, something is lost. Existential self-love is therefore important (MG: loss of ego can mean madness!). The True Self (World 12) need to awake, to hold a reality beyond existence – where there is no need to hold the line**

 

When sensitivity and consciousness are merged, man cannot stand back from himself to have an objective awareness in order to see a higher nature that does not depend on existence. But, this does not outweigh the thirst for existence coming from Self-hood. A profound inner change is necessary to break down the barrier between higher and lower selves. Thus, Ego or Self can live in different ways: it can be close to Cosmic Individuality or degenerate to destructiveness.

 

The Ipseity or Central Significance of Essential Man is Individuality (Will) – Man as Individual. Personal Individuality can never be satisfied by mere existence. It longs for integration with Cosmic Individuality – love of union. This is the real ‘death of egoism’. The move from Existential to Essential independence is the transformation of Ipseity. Existential man depends on a body; Essential Man can produce his own vehicle and instruments. Individuality can project into existence; Selfhood cannot penetrate the essential state.

Two destinies: Existential self can only be an instrument; because it is not an instrument of its own Individuality, it is used by the Demiurgic powers. This can be blissful, but it is not reality. Reality for the self has to come from the completion of the inner Triad: when the Personal Individuality is established. This Ipseity is ‘I AM’. I = Individuality; AM=Self as vehicle and instrument.

 

Ipseity is the pentad of Existential Man Egoism. There can be good and bad egoism.

 

The upper limit, or Master of Essential Man, is the Cosmic Individuality. Potential union with Cosmic Individuality.
The corresponding part in Existential Man is to be merged with the Demiurgic Intelligence. Two parts of the soul.

 

The Essential Spirit of Man

I Cosmic Individuality

II Demiurgic Intelligence

III Individuality (I AM)

IV The Selves

V Germinal Forces of Search

 

The Existential Spirit of Man

A Demiurgic Intelligence

B The Higher Centres

C Selfhood (Egoism)

D The Lower Centres

E Vegetative Forces of Conservation

Existential Man remains as he is; Essential Man transforms (germinates).

Ipseities: Existential Man can be the ‘natural human soul’.

 

The Ten Connections

 

Essential Man
Ipseity – bridge between natural and supernatural
Consummated in the Cosmic Individuality
Embraces material world and Demiurgic Intelligence
II-V: shows how a man who has achieved Individuality draws directly on life energies. Made one with Cosmic Individuality makes him free from problems of selfhood

 

Existential Man
Limited by earthly conditions
No Personal Individuality
Ipseity is part of the soul world
Dependent of external nature.

 

Will as Coalescent Agent
We have treated Will as an irreducible element of experience; associated with Individuality on all levels and Selfhood (Will involved in existence).

 

To offer a coherent scheme:

 

Let us keep the notion of relatedness, but deal with essential and existential operations of Will.

 

Will is One, but also transcendent and incomprehensible to finite understanding.

 

Two interlocking Triangles: The Structure of the Human Will

COSMIC INDIVIDUALITY

Self (SELFHOOD)……………….I AM (TRUE SELF)

UNIVERSAL INDIVIDUALITY…………..PERSONAL INDIVIDUALITY

MANY ‘I’s

 

We begin with the Logos, the Word, supreme Will: Head of Universal and Personal Will.

 

Against the Essential Will stands existential or incarnated Will. Here, Will is fragmented, the reverse of Essential Will. It influences his passing moods, sates, impulses, functions, and sub-functions. Wills of hearing, touching, thinking – or with every emotional state, thought and idea. These are many ‘I’s.

 

All Wills have a common apex in the Cosmic Individuality.

 

The perfect Infinite Will cannot act within existence without a vehicle and the Universal and Personal Individualities represent two finite modes of will-action that complete the essential will-structure of man.

 

The inverted triangle has its lower apex in the multiplicity of material forms. The multiplicity of Wills arises by generation born of the supreme Will.

 

For the existential man, we have the Selfhood and the true ‘I’ – each being one aspect of will modes of man.

 

Everything that exists has its own will – this is its affirmation of reality. Inanimate objects have not reactional freedom – they can only be what they are at a moment of place and time.

 

Each of the many ‘I’s in Man have a moment of freedom: ‘I want’, ‘I think’ – these result in transient impulses, but they may affect the whole of man. Because only one ‘I’ is operative at a time, we have the illusion of a single ‘I’. We have neither permanence of will, nor continuity of consciousness. This is why he does not grasp the reality of the situation.

 

The operation of will is to bring about events – coalescence. We discuss the terms of the hexad in the form of the six triads: this gives us both the characteristic behaviours patterns and the principal types of human beings.

 

1=Feeling; 2=Sensation; 3=Mind

 

Man as Person. Identity 2-3-1
Centre=Inner Spontaneity of mind.
Initiating factor=sensation/presence
We do not see the force of mind in a person of presence because we are influenced by the force of feeling.
This person combines the spontaneity of ideas and images with a direction based on memory and foresight (intellectual centre). This man makes himself felt – he has a strong personality.

 

Man as Member of Society. Interaction 1-3-2
Power of thought is hidden link.
Feeling=Affirming impulse=initiating factor (must be directed by the mind-needs flexibility of the intellectual centre).
External manifestation=Presence
We enter social relationships (passive and active) through sensation. The driving force is feeling.
Quality of interaction depends on the level of awareness.
He enters into good relationship with fellow men.

 

Man as Governor. Order 3-1-2
Power of thought=governance. When allied to force of feeling, it gives man power over environment, human and natural.
Presence is dominant.
Receptivity may take the form of grasping, or love of power.
Operates different in man of True Self than lower forms.
Power comes from seeing what others cannot see.
Power of thought is in initiating relationships.

 

Man as Free Agent. Freedom 3-2-1
Freedom is spontaneity. Power of thought.
The force of unconditional feeling through the mediation of presence.
The man who can see himself and others enjoys freedom..
But, it is only really freedom if it is made concrete through sensation.
Identification can be a fictitious freedom of thought in isolation from feeling and presence: lost touch with oneself, in daydreams.
Positively, it can be spontaneous dynamism – the power to evoke a new situation.

 

Man as Creator. Expansion 1-2-3
Through feelings, Man has three kinds of contact: 1) that with surrounding world; 2) that between sexes; 3) that with Individuality and Higher Worlds.
This corresponds to three modes of feeling experience: reactive, sexual and positive.
Creative dynamism: feelings and sensation in harmony.
Creative activities: 1) successful action; 2) procreation; 3) transmission of influences of the Higher Worlds.
There must be right presence.
Organisms must be in tune with the influence that enters through the feelings.
Conception in all things possible.

 

Man as Evolving Self. Concentration 2-1-3
Human organism is a field for the growth of latent powers.
It responds to the forces liberated in the feelings.When the affirmation of feelings evokes the right response, there is a concentration of energy, or the raising of potential.
Here, evolution or transformation is the power of thought transferred from one stage of Selfhood to another, until the True Self is awakened and prepared for union with the Individuality.
The coalescence of concentration with expansion transforms the man’s connections with his own present moment. By the manifestation of spontaneity and freedom in his relationships with others he becomes a channel for the transmissions of creative influences.

 

Project for a Structural Anthropology

 

I. The Total Man
Man and the Twelve Energies
Man as material Structure
Man and Life
Man as Self
Motives in Human Life
Historical Humanity
Man and the Non-rational

 

II. Man as Dyad
Essence and Existence
Private and Public Life
The Sexual Nature

 

III. Man as Three-fold
Function, Being and Will

 

Being
a) The Present Moment
b) Mind
Three Modes of Existence
i) Automatic
ii) Sensitive
iii) Conscious
Three Mental Levels
i) Conscious Mind
ii) Subconscious Mind
iii) Supraconscious Mind
c) Soul
i) Mind and Soul
ii) Soul and Individuality

 

3. Function
a) Three Groups: Sensation, Feeling, Thought
b) The Centres of Function
c) The Powers
i) Presence
ii) Force
iii) Direction
d) The Higher Functions
i) Higher Personal Reason
ii) Higher Objective Reason

 

4. Will
a) Three Cosmic Impulses
b) The Multiplicity of Wills in Man
i) Personalities
ii) Features
c) The Selves
d) Personal Individuality

 

IV Man as Agent of Order
The tetrad as principle of order

The Organic Principle
a) Nutrition
b) Renewal
c) Reproduction

 

3. Order of Psychic Mechanism
a) The Four selves
b) The Four energies
i) Automatic
ii) Sensitive
iii) Conscious
iv) Creative

 

4. Human Ordering Activity
a) The Four Sources
i) Actual
ii) Ideal
iv) Practical
v) Theoretical
b) The Connectivities
i) Order and Activity
ii) Respect, Faith, Curiosity, Skill

 

V. Human Significance
1.Man as Entity
a) The Basic Pentad
b) The Pentads of Essential and Existential man

 

2. The notion of spirit
a) The Outer Limits
i) Nourishment: Vegetative and Germinal
ii) Master: Natural and Supernatural
b) The Inner Limits
i) Higher Centres and Demiurgic Nature
ii) Self as desire and Self as instrument
d) The Ipseity of man
i) Egoism and Individuality

 

Human Will-Power
Will as Coalescent Agent
The Six Modes of Existence
a) Man as a Person
b) Man as a Social Unit
c) Man as a Governor
d) Man as a Free Agent
e) Man as Creator
f) Man as Evolving Self

 

The Individuality
a) Personal Individuality
b) Universal Individuality
c) Cosmic Individuality
The bodies or vehicles of the self and the Individuality
Body, Soul and Spirit
The states of the soul
i) Lower Soul
ii) Higher Soul
iii) Perfected Soul
The Higher Powers
a) The Demiurgic Nature
b) Evil, Sin and Suffering
c) The Cosmic Individuality as Redemptive Agent
d) Man and God

 

This structure if not complete. We need to set up different modes of existence and experience, as multi-term systems. We cannot avoid complexity – it is manageable because of its organised structure. Every element and connection has its place. Man must be understood as a whole – there is no other way!

 

pp. 164 – 177

 

The Human Life Cycle

 

The Total Present

 

Every human is the ‘coalescence’ of a number of distinct elements – they come from independent sources: they come together in an instant when an individual is conceived. From that point, an individual has a particular body, psychic and spiritual character – with a specific potential. At the other end is the dissolution of elements: Death. Between, we have the Total Present Moment. This is experienced as a series of linear moments but, when seen as a totality, it is a structure where every part exists together. It includes timeless consciousness and acts of will made possible by the determining conditions of hyparxis.

 

When the structure is regarded as an action, it appears as a cycle entering into itself – like the symbol of the serpent devouring its own tail (MG: Gnostic symbol).

 

We experience life as a series of discrete events: these make up the ‘seven ages of man’.

 

At conception, man is formed by the gametes of the man and women and thus inherits a certain psychic potential.

 

We must distinguish between existential man and essential man; self-hood and individuality – in every life, there is the possibility of transformation.

 

The present moment is made up of Function-Being-Will. Man requires complex Functions; he begins with an undivided Personal Individuality but this gets fragmented into innumerable large and small ‘wills’; Being hides in the unconscious and extends over many levels and cuts off from the higher nature.

 

Here, we look at man as a temporal process.

 

The Sources of Man’s Totality

 

Man’s life cycle is dramatic: not as a matter of the values to be realized but the power and will to realise them; it concerns the Domain of Harmony or Realization, and man’s place in the Universal Drama.
Here, we look at the personal drama.

 

Totality refers to man’s cycle of existence as well as his essence. This draws attention of the potential of transformation from Self to Individual.

 

The Totality of man refers to his Functional activity, Being and Will – both existentially and essentially.

 

Totality may seem to begin at conception, but is in fact prior to that.

 

There are six sources of Human Totality: made from two (Essence and Existence) times three (Function, Being, Will).

 

Essential Function
Almost a contradiction since function is knowable and essence is unknowable. It is the right pattern of life that can be followed: a place in the scheme of things; duty.

 

Pattern is eternal rather than temporal in form; hyparchic in content (degree of fulfilment that an individual can attain in their life).

There is a place for creative enrichment and adaptation: so, life of the individual is linked both to its own destiny and also to the total pattern of events in which it is a part.

 

Essential Being

 

Soul-stuff is the raw material of Being drawn to an individual at the point of conception. This allows him to be a centre of experience/ or mind (NB. Gurdjieff uses the word ‘essence’ to describe this: the basis of mind and possible experiences).

 

It is a mass of energies allowing the possible formation of a soul. They enter the Totality at conception. They consist mainly of sensitive (E5) and conscious (E4) energies.

 

There is also a Soul-stuff-pool: a repository of man’s common experience.

 

Essential Will
Every individual totality is unique: it is the seat of an autonomous will. Will parts itself into separate wills because of self-limitation. When this is repeated, it leads the Supra-essential Supreme Will into limitations of existence – becomes Universal Will (Universal Individuality). But remains essential/ not existing. Universal Will also enters into separate beings as Personal Individuality.

 

This is sometimes referred to as a ‘particle of the deity’, a Divine Spark – that links man to the infinite.

 

Personal individuality is always linked to the Totality, but not ‘present’ in time and place with undeveloped men. Personal Individuality is the same as spirit – in the mind-body-spirit scheme.

 

Will is authority; but needs a vehicle and instruments to carry/ realise it. These are part of the Soul-Stuff but have to be developed before they can play a part. It is disembodied and unconscious.

 

Existential Function
The Man Triad Function: the source of this part of the Totality is Heredity; transmitted by parents.

 

Existential Being
The source of existence must lie within existence. External influences acting on the Totality produce a pattern – the existential part of the soul. This is personality. It begins under the psychic influence of parents; it stops when the psyche ceases to assimilate influences from the external world.

 

Existential Will
There is a mode of Willing for each of the four selves.
Material and Reactional Self – formed by action of the environment.
Divided Self – latent character (fate)

…………….Destiny
…………(Essential Function)

Personality…………….. Fate
(Essential Being)……… Existential Will

Soul-stuff……………….. Individuality
(Essential Being)……………. (Essential Will)

……………Organism
………..(Existential Function)

Here are the six constituents of human Totality:

 

Nature….Element…….Source………Constituent

 

Essence…..Function…….Reality……..Destiny
…………Being……….Soul-stuff…..Pool Soul stuff
…………Will………..Universal……Personal
………………………Individuality..Individuality

 

Existence…Will………..World pattern..Character
…………Being……….Environmental..Personality
………………………Influences
…………Function…….Heredity…….Organism

 

 

Conception, Gestation and Birth
The life-cycle of a man should be a Hexad: it is a complete event. Man is a six-term Totality, and his life cycle is a six term event. Totality and Event are inseparable.

 

One moment is a cross-section of his life: an abstraction.

 

At conception, man is wholly potential. True of body and nature which have to be actualised – governed by laws of existential processes. The essence nature of man has to be realised: soul-stuff, personal individuality, and destiny. The laws of such realization are different from the existential actualization and belong to the Domain of Harmony. However, both processes are involved in making a Perfected Human Individual.

 

This is foreshadowed by the sensitive energy field that surrounds the parents and which draws them together. It is shared by the parent and the gametes which are destined for union. The ovum gathers its own energy around it when it is fertilised – the soul-stuff of the new human activity.

 

Parents’ role is to transmit heredity patterns carried in genes for body-building. This is a functional factor.

 

Soul-stuff is not influenced by heredity – but still shared by two parents in a field of energies; they influence its content.

 

There is a common field of experience in the sexual act. The intensity of sensation during it makes it almost certain that the new totality is then directly influenced by the state of the parents. The psychic state of the parents at the moment of conception influences that of the child formed. The soul-stuff has, as a consequence, a tendency to a certain forms of experience: Jealousy => suspicion, possessiveness, insecurity. Fear => nervousness, digestive problems.

 

Parents often have to deal with the psychic disturbance of their children inherited by their heedlessness during the sexual act.

 

But parents have only a superficial influence on soul-stuff.

 

Soul-Stuff is really the ‘atavistic legacy’: accumulated experience of mankind. The Soul-Stuff-Pool is a hypothetical collective reservoir: the remains of all men who have not achieved Individuality in their lifetime. Jung called it the ‘Collected Unconscious’.

 

It is hard to accept that moral qualities are transmitted. Sin is a psychic, and not an organic, defect and, if it is transmitted at all, it must be through soul-stuff.

 

It can also be called mind-stuff because mind is also created out of it. The personal and collective minds are therefore the same material.

 

It is collected at birth and is dispersed at death. It returns to the pool: the repository of men’s experiences.

 

It consists of sensitive and conscious energy. It may become the great soul of humanity.

 

Three comments about SSP:

 

1) It is not the world soul but a soul in early life formation: not yet the vehicle for man’s undivided Will. There is no evidence of such a thing existing. If it did it may attach itself to some divided, imperfect will or group of wills and so fail to integrate itself into the Universal Purpose or Destiny of man. This could seem like disobedience: impregnating the soul-stuff with a multitude of Personal Wills. This might be why men often show incomprehensible perversity in front of the serious problems of life.

 

2) Former lives? The philosophy of reincarnation can hardly be without foundation. However, there is a difference between ‘indeterminate reincarnation’ (Buddhism) and the ‘determinate theories’ of the west. Individual men do not reincarnate in Buddhism.
The ‘endless cycle of lives’ refers the mass of humanity – Karma. Within the SSP, there may be varying degrees of coherence of ‘Self-hood’. Strongly formed selves who have not fashioned an Individuality may be drawn back into a new human totality. Determinate theories are not plausible.

 

3) We must distinguish between Cosmic Energy as Cosmic and the same energy associated with a particular mode of existence. Conscious energy is placed in the Tetrad of Cosmic or Universal Energy; many mystics claim that man can break out of the personal limitations of consciousness to participate in the ‘Cosmic Consciousness’. SSP is still limited – more like ‘Self-consciousness’. Only when conscious souls have made their contribution to the awakening and integration of the Soul of Mankind will mankind participate in the Cosmic Consciousness.

 

Why is a particular portion of soul-stuff attracted to a particular conception? Two conflicting influences operate:

 

Fate: eg. Astrology – that the character and life-cycle of a human totality is affected by planets and stars at the point of birth. We know that there can be a similarity of eternal patterns within a given region of space and time, and that there should be an interaction between patterns through properties of hyparxis. So, at the point of conception, there must be the imprint of a specific pattern or structure. This will affect character of ‘fate’.

 

Destiny: also a pattern – but essential (belongs to the Domain of Values).
Values exert an influence upon factual actualization through the medium of consciousness. Destiny is connected with Creative Energy (E3) transmitted through Soul-Stuff as Conscious Energy. If this was not interfered with, the Personal Individuality (Totality) would be able to enter into the soul-stuff from the moment of conception (a soul complex exactly corresponding in its qualities to the task to be accomplished).

 

Such special individuals are prepared specifically to accomplish a certain task. They are not ‘immaculate’ since its draws on the SSP – past human experiences. But, it does explain someone like the Blessed Virgin Mary (associated with a unique personal destiny).

 

In ordinary cases, the Personal Individuality must wait until the soul-stuff has been purified, developed, organised to produce a vehicle with which it can be united. This is not a form of existence: Individuality is not in time and space. It is not even in eternity and hyparxis. It is a state of personal potency. It is connected with the new totality but not yet realised. There are no means of verifying that the connection is made at the moment of conception, but on systematic grounds, it seems likely.

 

The genesis of a human totality at conception:

1. The fertilised ovum with its potentiality for development into a human organism (Body). Functional powers and instruments.
2. The soul-stuff brings with it SSP traces of (Soul):
a) The total human experience (Collective Unconscious)
b) Personal experiences and memories (indeterminate reincarnation)
c) The pattern of destiny
d) The pattern of fate
e) The influence of the psychic state of the parents
3. The personal Individuality (Spirit).

 

These are the Body-Soul-Spirit of the human being.

 

Soul-stuff is only the potentiality of a soul; individuality is the spirit of man only as a possibility to be realised.

 

The stage is set – the action not started.

 

The father has a special responsibility to exert a positive influence on the psychic state of the child from the point of gestation.
The fourth month: the interpenetration of soul-stuff and growing organism. From now on, the foetus is sensitive – it is alive.

 

Birth is more than separation from mother and drawing first breath; it is the definitive fixing of soul-stuff. This is why horoscopes take the point of birth as being most significant.

 

The moment of birth and the taking of the first breath marks the beginning of a process of energy transformation. Here, the soul-stuff begins to form the Self.

 

 

pp. 176 – 191 see page 190 for diagram

 

The Formative Years
The Self is the precursor of the soul. The soul-stuff becomes a soul when the essential and existential natures of human totality coalesce.
This requires an effective contact – from the material World to the True Self (World XXIV). Here, essence and existence are balanced. The development of selves takes until the formative years: it proceeds along with the development of functions and the acquisition of knowledge/ skill and experience for dealing with soul-stuff.

 

The Will is located in the Personal Individuality. This lacks an integral vehicle and coordinated instruments. Therefore, it cannot exercise integral authority within the Totality. The Will, because it cannot be idle, therefore projects itself into various sub-totalities. Independent Will arise as a result – the Multiplicity of ‘I’s.

 

There are two ways that the Will can act as a Multiplicity:

 

1) That the unity can be broken or parcelled out so that each piece is a reproduction of the whole.
2) That a single Will can ‘project’ itself into separate centres – each with a degree of independent authority.

 

Both exists, and man through self-limitation allows the Supreme Will to project its freedom into Creation.

 

Personal Individuality enters the human totality at the time of conception and ‘makes man in the image of God’- that is, endowing him with the essential attributes of Individualised Will – not limited by the conditions of existence.

 

However, this is only a possibility. In order to fulfil destiny and become real, man must acquire instruments and a vehicle.

 

Self-creation of man proceeds by partition and blending; his single will and undifferentiated mass of soul-stuff are divided into separate parts. Each develops the required properties and is welded into the Complete Man (a Single Individuality).

 

The separation begins at birth when the inner and outer are separated. New-born children are conscious of the Essential Reality, as well as elements of states of the physical organism (sounds, gestures, expressions). Next comes recognition of differences in the external world: food-non-food, mother-non-mother.
There is then a partition of Will: one part goes out into the external world; the other part forms the ‘higher consciousness’.

 

The first four years of life are mainly devoted to adaptation to the external world. Once the instinctive, moving centres are formed (including sense perception, motor skills, language, recognition of the material world), there is a primary organisation of soul-stuff, and hence the beginning of the Material Self. This forms in order to exert authority in the material world but, in doing so, weakens the link with the soul-stuff and the Personal Individuality.

 

The Will is dispersed in the soul-stuff in transient and disconnected impulses: no attention, no sustained interest, and only simple ‘I-feelings’.

 

Momentary liberation of Conscious Energy (E4), permits functions even when the corresponding instrument is undeveloped. This is because Conscious energy produces temporary structures.

 

The Reactional Self appears between the fourth and fifth year. The Personal Individuality continues to withdraw with soul-stuff. Essence and Existence degenerates into like and dislike, etc. In some children the Reactional Self is weak (sensitivity remains attached to the material self); leads to people identified with the material world. In others, it is strong (people become emotional types, self-indulgent and lazy – instinctive; or moving – active, sporting types, automatic loyalties, like and dislikes, but little true feeling).

 

It is important for teachers to balance experience for children, therefore. Material experience must be counterbalanced by emotional ones.

 

Great communication develops between the ages of four and seven: reflection and self-knowledge become possible as the soul-stuff is structured. Dreaming, day-dreaming, fantasy and story-telling are aspects of the awakening of self-hood in the soul-stuff.

 

Between the ages of seven and twelve, there is a need for security – assurance of a place in the world. Here, soul-stuff links to Destiny – the essential patterning in the Human Totality. Communication between parents and children should be maintained during this time; otherwise, there is loss of confidence, and resultant isolation.

 

The Divided Self forms between the ages of twelve and fourteen. Here, ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ parts are typical and act upon the existential and essential. Good and bad behaviour emerges (a sense of the moral). A sense of responsibility emerges.

 

Functional powers develop especially between the ages of seven through to puberty. The Primary Stage of Education should be directed to:

 

1) Easy communication, confidence in relationships;
2) Behaviour based on right and wrong: the proper development of the Divided Self;
3) Full development of the powers of the moving and emotional centres;
4) Knowledge that does not need the intellectual centre: skills and powers.

 

Learning is over-emphasised in most educational systems. We need to develop the powers of the mind – not just its content. The efforts of educational reformers are frustrated by an ill-informed society which insists on exams, grading, classification.

 

The True Human Self should be born at the time of puberty. However, because of the pressure of external procedures and an un-development of the psyche, most boys and girls reach puberty with an over-developed personality and an uninformed self-hood. Hence, children in industrial societies tend to be immature compared with their peers in Asian countries. The situation seems advantageous since it offers power over the material world. However, this results in too much strength in dealing with the Material World, rather than the social problems in it.

 

The discrepancy between actual practice, and that which is desirable and possible, is clear if we set out the needs of an ideal education, based on the six elements of the Human Totality:

 

Existential Function – the Organism
Determine the specific abilities of each boy and girl and group them into classes, so that such powers as the sensory-motor, emotional and intellectual can be developed in a balanced way. Health and the transition of energies is important. Ability to put up with physical hardship.

 

Existential Being – The Personality
The content of personality should include what is necessary for life and no more: trained in reactions. In harmony with destiny; allowing for the hazards of fate.
Acquired though teaching what is needed in the physical world: spoken and written word, knowledge of the world, facts, history. The personality should be able to adapt to every situation. These requirements are acquired by group activities – mainly.

 

Existential Will
The existential will is exercised through the right development of the four selves: the challenge and response by which they are developed.
Feelings are important: not everyone should be forced into a mould.
Uniqueness of the human person is in the pattern of character.
Between the ages of nine and thirteen, the Divided Self requires particular care. If things go well, this is followed by transition to True Human Self. (awakening of sexual powers). The development of the right ‘I-feeling’ requires many years.
False steps need to be avoided: boys and girls should not be fixated with either higher or lower selves.
This needs to be done under careful environmental conditions. By knowing that skills and factual information are not the most important, attention can be on the True Selves.

 

The Essential Nature
We will take together the three essential elements because their development during the formative years does not belong to education.

 

During this time, the essential nature of young human beings does not require direct intervention; indeed, it may be dangerous to awaken deeper sources. Serious injury to the psyche can occur: for example, religious conversion followed by sudden loss of faith.

 

Two things are important in the essential nature of the child: disposition and
discrimination.

 

The first is a group of attitudes that prepares the young adult for the essential role of life: dispositions which counteract the pressures of the external world. It directs towards the domain of values. Cultivating these starts with fairy stories, folk tales, the idealization of parents. Later, disposition is given shape by religious instruction. There is a need to develop dispositions of essential reality: Need, Discrimination, Serenity. Higher values of Transcendence, Holiness, Love and Fulfilment cannot be directly communicated. These are developed through works of art, religious ritual, and the lives of saints.

 

Discrimination needs to be developed in the self-hood: it is the precursor of the ‘I’. It is the projection of the Divine Cosmic Impulse into the Self-hood. The existential and essential are recognised and appreciated.

 

Disposition is a quality of Being; discrimination is a form of Will.

 

Discrimination grows by exercise: through practical work requiring care and attention, household tasks, personal responsibility, care of material objects, undertakings carried through to an acceptable conclusion. From puberty onwards, these can be undertaken through exercises.

 

Combining disposition and discrimination ensures the establishment of the True Human. Then, the link to the Personal Individuality will be unbroken; the ‘I’ will be at the core of the Self-hood; an immortal soul will form in fulfilment of Destiny.

 

The five stages of the development from birth to responsible life:

 

1) the period up to the fourth year;
2) from four to nine;
3) puberty
4) puberty to seventeen or twenty (girls and boys);
5) up to twenty (girls) or twenty four (boys).

 

Most books written on these confuse Personality, Self-hood and Individuality.

 

There are periods in the history of mankind where certain powers are dominant; other shorter periods where concepts of human destiny are accepted and result in certain forms; still others where customs and traditions influence particular communities. However, there is a basic requirement for this essence class: to play a special part in the Spiritualization of Existence; by the transformation of energies by the link between the human individual and the Cosmic Individuality.

 

The idea that man is only responsible for himself is pernicious – whether coming from individuals, nations, or races.

 

The Meaning and Nature of Transformation
Man is confronted by a complex task involving the division of his Function-Being-Will (Body-Soul-Spirit).

 

We need to develop powers so soul-stuff becomes True Human Self and unites with the Personal Individuality – to produce a Complete Man.

 

There are many global problems; but the development of soul-stuff is a private matter. It profoundly influences human societies. Each of the four selves of man plays a different role in social relationships. A society where the Material Self is dominant could be self-destructive; Reactional Self – unstable. The problem with Self-hood is that it includes everyone. The development of men of the True Self is important for themselves and everyone.

 

The fulfilment of the Spiritual destiny is making a contribution to the Spiritualization of Existence. Human destiny can range from family obligations to the highest limits of human destiny. We cannot change our destiny, but we are not bound by our fate. The situation is complex and the outcome uncertain. This is reality but it is also the way that essence is realised. Every life is a search – conscious or unconscious – for this realization. Without disposition and discrimination, the human self can go astray – at variance to their destiny. A life that is apparently uncreative and insignificant may leave the world with a destiny fulfilled; another that is full with achievement may be an essential failure. The soul-stuff here loses its link with Individuality.

 

Men and women are therefore confronted with a complex array of needs and obligations – very few guess at their potentialities. Many people are dissatisfied with their worldly limitations, but few ask themselves the price that destiny demands. Those who have acquired disposition and discrimination see it as a lack in themselves – and seek a solution. But, if they do not understand soul-stuff, they may seek it only in creative work. This is OK, but it risks getting someone caught up in external activity rather than the Higher development of the Self-hood. They reach the Divided Self and go no further. They may seem like men of destiny, but, in reality are merely a pattern of ego motivations. The true seeker looks for a complete way of life that will transform his own nature.

 

Men and women sort themselves into different categories. These can be seen in the form of societies: some are dependent, or productive, or creative, Some are destined to attain Individuality.

 

Let’s look at the Middle Life of Normal Men and Women (no saints, or the exceptionally gifted, or those born to occupy particular important places in the community):

 

The simple requirement of Life is: to maintain one’s body; develop one’s powers, acquire a soul, achieve its completion, fulfil one’s destiny, help others in their need. He must be able to deal with the problems of his world. He makes use of instruments of sensation, feeling and thought – the skills acquired in his personality. ‘He’ is the dominant part of selfhood; although he has many wills. There is no less some continuity of presence due to persistent traits in his personality.

 

The problem here is that his inmost core is tainted by egoism. He does not know this, or the fact that the full horror is beyond the reach of his mind: the mass of mind-stuff reflecting the stream of images thrown by sensations, memories, and occasional glimpses of consciousness.

 

He is probably dominated by the Material or the Reactional Self – under the influence of the material world or a slave to emotional states. He may be successful – he even produces the illusion that he is successful/ self-controlled. But, he knows nothing: his reactions are automatically set.

 

He still searches for Reality. His religious beliefs lack conviction; his life does not correspond to the precepts of the Founder. This dissatisfaction appears to be existential – lacking something that can be found outside himself. But, actually its roots are in the essential dissatisfaction in the soul-stuff that craves unity with the Individuality. The three parts of man need to form a Union.

 

Transformation
The complex action whereby man is changed from existential self to an essential Individual. All six elements of the human Totality need to be brought into harmony if this is to occur. We can represent this as the Tetrad:

………………..Individuality (Will) I

Being (Soul) B………………………….Knowledge (fact) K

………………..Organism (Knowledge) O

 

The processes involved in the complete action:

 

The Organism
The Human Organism is more than an animal body; it is a field; a workshop – with instruments for the maintenance of existence and the attainment of essence.

 

The instruments are: instinctive-motor, emotional, sex, and intellectual functions.
In the average man, powers are only developed to a minimum extent necessary for life. There are also latent powers. Powers are not coordinated and work at low efficiency. All must be worked upon by appropriate methods:

 

O-B (Work on functions through energies and soul-stuf);
O-K (coordinating influence of knowledge and especially self-knowledge);
O-I (signifies the powers of attention, decision, and persistence that reside in the will); This needs to be brought to bear upon the organism in order to convert it into an effectual instrument of the higher parts of self.

 

Knowledge
We must know that Transformation is Possible. Then, we learn what we must do: acquire objective knowledge of man, the Universe and God. It begins with awareness of contingency – hazards of existence. Many stages have to be passed before Objective Reason is reached: the power to grasp his own real nature and the world.
Knowledge can take many forms: instinctive, motor, emotional, intellectual, intuitive, conscious, creative. Or, combinations of all of these.

Supreme knowledge only comes when the Transformation s complete.

 

pp. 191 – 207

 

Being
Soul-stuff is man’s capacity for experience: but the energies involved do not do their proper work while organisation remains at the level of the body. Soul-making is the conversion of this material into an independent, organised – Immortal Soul.

 

The soul is likely to be made up of two parts: sensitivity (E5- Vital) and consciousness (E4 – Cosmic). There are then 3 bodies available:

 

1) Physical Body: Tetrad of Material Energies – for contact with the Material World.
2) Life Body: Soul Principle of life (first part of soul) (Body Kesdjan).
3) Second part of the soul: Immortal. Being transformed by energy beyond life. Not subject to life and death. Higher Being Body. The bearer of objective reason –returns to source.

 

There are different versions and numbers of souls in different traditions. These can be explained by the significance attached to different vehicles and their relative independence. Survival, Immortality and Union – each corresponds to different soul states.

 

Characteristics of the Perfected Man:

Integration and autonomy of different parts of totality (the first part is body; the second part is mind – lower part of soul between sensitivity and consciousness; higher part of soul between consciousness and creativity). The latter is set free from personal existence; it participates in the cosmic consciousness. It is linked to Individualised Will. Personal Will and Universal Will are linked

 

He is the union of body, soul, and individuality.

This state is brought about by ‘right living’.

 

The soul-stuff of the average man is not in a state to be moulded into a permanent vehicle: there are three defects: egoism; traces of past lives; state of parents at time of conception. This means the soul-stuff begins with great handicaps.

The defect on Being is of two kinds: contamination with undesirable elements and disorganisation/ lack of structure and coherence. They need to be ‘cured’, first by purification, and second by organisation. Something is purified by the higher level energy: sensitivity (E5) by consciousness (E4); automatism (E6) by sensitivity (E5); consciousness (E4) by creativity (E3). The latter is not under man’s control – help is required.

 

There can be a danger of a Egoistic Soul forming.

 

The Vital Soul is formed by life experience, but this does not produce a ‘second body’. Lower soul powers include Extra-sensory-perception (ESP). When this body is malformed, schizophrenia can result, or someone who uses their clairvoyance to impose on seekers.

 

The purification of soul-stuff is indispensable and must include all three constituents: obedience to external rule (purification of automatic energy E6); self-discipline (self-knowledge and repentance – purification of sensitivity E5); worship (purifies consciousness E4).

 

Correct conditions for each of these are required. Very few individuals can purify themselves. So, a man of high soul-quality is needed, and the companionship of fellow seekers. Or a School: this will only succeed if under the authority of an experienced teacher or spiritual guide. An individual’s defects require obedience and discernment. The need for personal guidance is greatest at the automatic level.

 

Purification of sensitivity begins with instruction and guidance. With instruction, discipline becomes self-discipline. Finally, consciousness is needed. This third purification can only be carried out by Saints and Walis since they can transmit creative energy (E3) to those in their influence. This is the conscious orientation of energy towards an ideal, which connects with creative energy. An ideal is not a sensitive construction. So, worship may be sincere but it does not affect the soul.

 

Purification involves more than the removal of defects. Some good things are misplaced and get in the way: gentleness turns to weakness, firmness to hardness, patience to loss of initiative. Even repentance may be wrong unless it is corrected by superior wisdom. This is why self-observation and guidance is desirable.

 

Purification may not take long, but then there is ‘back-sliding’. The soul-stuff, by its nature, seeks purification. However, there can be delay and even failure as a result of the six negative triads: Imagination, Self-worship, Fear, Waste, Subjectivism, and Identification. The Reactional self is always prone to these triads until dominated by the higher parts of self-hood. Individuality needs to fulfil its destiny: all judgements of right and wrong must be made in terms of what helps or hinders this fulfilment.

 

After purification, the second stage of soul-making is ‘crystallisation’ – the means of which is sacrifice.

 

All reiterated actions produce fixed patterns in soul-stuff. ‘Yoga is constraint on the fluctuations of the mind-stuff’: these precepts refer to accelerated formation.

 

If a developed soul is produced by persistent moral actions directed towards an objectively right aim, the result is ‘good soul’.

 

A well-formed soul is the greatest prize of the existential life (the lower part of soul relates to existential life).

 

The man with a ‘well-formed-soul’ has power over his physical body. But, this does not assure man of his destiny. This and the attainment of the Individuality require the higher part of soul: the Conscious Soul, or Higher Being Body.

 

The lower part of soul forms by action; the upper part by inaction. For the second part to form, firmness of purpose, persistence and sacrifice are necessary. The second part needs stillness, contemplation, worship and love.

 

Individuality
This is the transformation of man in Will – the highest form. This entails the transfer of authority from the lower to the higher self. How is this done, since Will cannot change itself? The simplest form is ‘attending’. Will is authority. Will is only manifested in concrete situations.

 

When one will is active, we cannot Will otherwise. Only when two wills are in conflict will a third emerge. Will manifests in relationships. The transformation of Will must therefore occur in circumstances where there is a choice of relationships. This is possible with the True Self.

 

So, in the early part of reconstituting the Will, external conditions are required. Work on Will only occurs in the performance of tasks. We cannot work directly but we can put ourselves in conditions where work occurs.

 

Personal Individuality is associated with the Totality; without this man could not work on the Unification of Will. The Personality Individuality hides behind consciousness, but is still an affirmation of individual essence. So, man can choose his own reality, even if it goes against the will of his lower self. Early on, however, there is little possibility of choice.

 

Choice presents itself in different ways:

 

Life itself: to live we must choose what is needed by the body (overcome inertia/ likes and dislikes).

 

Relationships confront us with a choice of wills.

 

Usually choice comes from the Reactional Self: based on existent patterns.

 

More serious acts of choosing occur when the Divided Self is involved, and thus challenged. This happens in exceptional life situations – deaths, failures, sickness, etc.

 

There are many stages in the reconstitution of the Will: simple tasks involving decision (we learn to be totally honest with ourselves in our obligations). We must be ready to expose contradictions and defects of nature.

 

The stages correspond to the four levels of Selfhood and to the Union of Self-hood and Individuality. Further transformations are possible but only through the intervention of the Universal Individuality.

 

There are conventionally seven stages from Material Man to Perfected Man (Cosmic Individuality). The first three belong to existence and the second three to essence.

 

The fourth stage is the True Human Self (Self-hood to Individuality). Each are marked by particular powers and modes of functioning (level of being) – a form or manner of willing.

 

Stage 1 The Will in the Material Self is the urge to dominate. Its role is to help man work with the material world but, if under its control, he will seek domination. It is necessary for children to help their development but, in later life, it can lead to one who is unfeeling, determined to have their own way. The development of the Reactional Self helps attenuate the ruthless Material Self. The fragmented Is (more numerous than the selves), include impulses which allow man to work on himself, but the Material Self will still dominate without an experience of sensitivity (E5). Physical pain and emotional distress are needed to breakdown the material self. Discipline and obedience are still needed for the less stubborn material selves. The higher parts of self accept the need for suffering to be free from domination by material influences. Usually, with the man of the Material self, his body is stronger than his emotional of intellectual life. Therefore, struggle with the impulses of the body.

 

Stage 2 With the Reactional Self, he is dominated by likes and dislikes: self-love expressed in extremes. Here, self-discipline is needed; it can stabilise the instability of the Reactional self. He can hate himself. He is free from the need for Material objects. There are many transformations of the Will: disposition and discrimination grow stronger and the Will is conscentrated in fewer areas of the Self-hood. It is necessary for the Complete Man, but it must be instrument not master of Self-hood . When mastered, there is a sense of freedom and achievement, but this can be an illusion – further work is still needed.

 

The remorse that drives the Reactional Self must give place to the awakening of Conscience. Then the Divided Self is set in train.

 

Stage 3 The Divided Self is aware of its own higher and lower nature: it is accomplished by ‘right living’. Objective Service belongs to this stage: higher aim. As a servant of individuality, the self-will learns to serve an external aim. Here, understanding emerges from knowledge. Self-directed work is possible.Greater unity of Will. There is a danger in that the greater unity is associated with the Totality – this is influenced by fate and cannot correspond to the needs of the Individuality. So, one dominated by the Divided self may find his fate but not his destiny. Fate = deep seated traits (earlier, the struggle was with wrong instruments; now it is with oneself). But, still existential (fate, type and character are a pattern of existential structure). Man must refuse to be the slave either of his fate or his own character. But, he is ignorant of both: he must learn to turn towards Conscience and recognise illuminations that come when consciousness separates from sensitivity. Men of the Divided Self often worship knowledge. They can work with more conscious intellectual centres than men of the first two stages. Key enemies are self-love and imagination (inner egoism). The move towards True Self requires a break from the negative triad, which then no longer influences will.

 

Stage 4 True Self: here, egoism is at the very core of self-hood. The main problem of human transformation is showing how a will corrupted by egoism can achieve destruction of it. This is necessary for the union of existence and essence. Egoism is the denial of other reality, and the any other will. There can be obedience and self-discipline, and this can be directed against the ego, but not necessarily. The existential unity of will can be attained within the limits of the True Self: one acquires one’s own will but remains a slave to egoism.

 

Ironically, work such as obedience, discipline, self-knowledge, understanding which takes man to the centre of his own will, is useless to rid him of egoism. Here, only humility, love of god, worship, and formless contemplation can open the way to grace. Here, egoism is converted into Individuality. Up to this point, he can do his own work – or with a school. However, he does these without Faith, Hope and Love. Now he needs them. For those following a religious way, the move from the ascetic to the spiritual is not difficult. It comes before the final illumination which reveals the relation between man and god – existence and essence. Those not following a religious path are in great danger here, however. We cannot know will; so, knowledge does not help here. Experience cannot help us with the next step either. It is new for every man. This is hard for those with a lot of knowledge or experience in spiritual matters. Neither will stop them confusing Egoism from Individuality. The humble and contrite heart of the psalmist can make the sacrifice of egoism; but the contrition must be that of the True Self, and the humility must be that supr-conscious self-denial that bewilders the self.

 

Stage 5 Here let’s note Gurdjieff: ‘learn to bear the unpleasant manifestations of others’. These are unavoidable. Most put up with them, but do not ‘bear’ them. We can profit from them if we seem them as a mirror of our own egoism. Each such manifestation is a dagger in the heart of our egoism – if consciously accepted. This is ‘love your enemies’.

 

Stage 6 The final overthrow of egoism is ‘self-naughting’: here, Egoism dies and Individuality is born. There is a death and resurrection in an objective sense. The Individuality now becomes immune to the events of the material world. If the soul-stuff has not reached the state at which the ‘second crystallisation’ occurs (formation of the higher part of the soul), the death of egoism may cause confusion and distress. The soul needs to be completed before there is a transition from egoism to Individuality.

 

If all goes well, the next step is made: Man of the Resurrection: six elements of his Totality are united without a danger of return to the former divorce of existence and essence. The Individuality now exercises authority over the soul and the functional powers allotted to it for the fulfilment of the destiny.

 

The Complete Man chooses his own path – is not obliged to fulfil his destiny. He is fulfilled but not fulfilling. The Universal Individuality may adopt the Complete Man: this happens when the latter surrenders his freedom, and he is chosen for a special task. This individual is not a ‘private person’ but belongs to humanity. A profound change happens in the soul: it expands beyond consciousness (E4) to embrace creativity (E3). With this expansion comes liberation from space, time, eternity, hyparxis (they govern existence of existential man). The manifestation of this creative power is miracle working; freedom from the limitation of number; he can project his image to more than one person at different times and places- a Saint or Wali. These powers are often not recognised in their life time.

 

Stage 7. The is the utmost limit of perfection possible for an incarnate man. Here, the soul is raised to the level of Unitive Energy (E2). His nature is love. He is united with the Cosmic Individuality – the Buddha. They are called prophets in Islam. Universal Saints in Christian theology. They have a special job to restore the right path to man after deviation and distortion. A saint of the seventh order is known only to a small group of individuals, and then only by his influence. The soul-stuff pool can be distorted; this can only be put right by redemptive action: here, souls of the highest order of purity and perfection draw upon themselves the consequences of the deviation. They participate in the redemptive sacrifice – traditionally only made by the Incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity of Jesus of Nazareth. This contradicts the notion of the uniqueness of the Incarnation; but enables the implication of ‘Union with Christ’ – inasmuch as all who reach the seventh or prophetic status are united with Cosmic Individuality. Unity of Will is not the same as Unity of Being. The seventh degree of man belongs to world VI: here, the limitations of Presence, Successiveness, Potentiality, Recurrence (distinctions of Space, Time, Eternity and Hyparxis) –are superceded by the Law of Cosmic Order: that is, the same as Cosmic destiny – the divine purpose in Creation. He is more than immortal – he exists forever. He is out of existence but able to enter existence – at will, when required by the cosmic purpose.

 

This is the limit of limits of the transformation of man – in existence. We cannot express the realities beyond existence. Redemption only comes from beyond existence. Faith is beyond expression. Faith takes over from knowledge when the first cross from existence to essence is made in the Human Self.

 

This is still not an adequate account of Human destiny. There is a general and a personal destiny. The general destiny is like the return of waters to the ocean. The constitution of the will comes from innumerable small acts. It must be constantly renewed or will come to a stop.

 

In all transformations, there is a three-fold transformation: one part is used in the process; one part enters into the transformer; the third is set free. The last energy, when produced consciously, serves the needs of the Universal Individuality. Man must produce the substance – this is his destiny. When he does not do this consciously, it must happen by the destruction of the body. As mankind produces a Great Human Soul, it becomes more important that this task is performed consciously and not involuntary. Transformation is not just for an individual but the whole of mankind. Every man can attain Individuality and an Immortal soul.

 

pp. 207 – 222 see page 208 for diagram

 

The Active Life

This section deals with JGB’s view of the period of a lifetime; in particular, adult years. It also deals with Old Age, dying and souls.

 

For JGB, once a man (sic.) reaches responsible age, a certain life pattern is set. He only knows it in part, but he still ‘has to live’ it.

 

There is a pressing need to introduce men and women to the purpose and potentialities of their existence. We can find this significance in the Pentad. The five terms are: Necessity; Destiny; Completion; Spontaneity; Satisfaction.

 

Destiny

Completion

Spontaneity

Satisfaction

Necessity

 

Necessity
The body must be fed and clothed; exercise; care of children; care to his parents. These first obligations are often not dealt with in education. Also, necessities often differ one from another. These obligations are shared in married life – right distribution of duties.

 

Satisfaction
Man can bring order to his environment, which gives satisfaction. Pursuing a certain satisfaction develops the personality and Self-hood. There is a danger in only seeking satisfaction. Satisfaction can be found in work in the home, taste, music, literature and art.

 

Satisfaction requires discrimination: strengthening the disposition towards essential Reality.

 

There are also harmful satisfactions: those that overfeed the personality and cut off from essential nature. For example, the Material Self (excessive enjoyment of possessions); the Reactional Self (excessive pleasure). There can be no pleasure without pain.

Few restrict their satisfaction-giving activities to those that dispose the Self-hood towards Individuality; these apply choice of profession, enjoyment of leisure, studies, travelling, social activity.

 

Spontaneity
This is the opposite to mechanicalness: it distinguishes the ‘I’ from Individuality. It can show itself in wit and humour. It is a source of joy with no desire or cause. It is the mark of a healthy mind. It cannot be created, but it can be stifled. It is needed for the ‘I’ to meet Individuality. When people stifle it, it does not make them more ‘serious’ or ‘pleasing to God’, but renders their lives still-born. They need a sense of humour. Men who cannot laugh at themselves are at sea.

 

It is also connected with purity. The spontaneous mind is a pure mind. It receives illumination by its openness. It allows for the power to act: a non-striving striving.

 

Completion
Part of Transformation of Man: transcending human nature.

 

Destiny
A life is in balance when it fulfils its destiny. It has work in the inner work of energies. It is to be accomplished by an active life. Part of the Cosmic task: conscious evolution of humanity.

 

It is not the same as realising potentialities. Man is free to choose up to the fifth level: this involves surrendering his freedom in the active life. He gains essential freedom in return.

 

The Stages of Life
Age 24-32: man establishes himself; normally marries; pursues satisfaction.

 

Age 32: traditionally the birth of the soul; transformation.

 

Age 32-40: spontaneity is important.

 

Age 40: Destiny discloses a pattern; the man destined for Individuality acquires own ‘I’; frees from pressures of necessities; one needs to avoid fixation – for example, of lower selves (material success for example).

Age 50s: Transformation must be taken seriously.

 

Age 60: it is rare for the course of life to be changed after this age.

 

Age 63: enter fullness of life if the Five Strivings have been kept in balance.

 

Old Age
The principal interest in childhood is Function.
The principal interest in the active years is Will.
The principal interest in old age is the consolidation of Being.

 

Fate affects man until the age of 63 (Grand Climatic) 9X7
At this point, there is a withdraw of energy from the Personality and a strengthening of the soul.

 

With men and woman who have worked with the Five Strivings, after 63, defects of the Personality become less evident. Life runs in a smooth channel. There is a more conscious longing for Being – this is not a fear of Death. Oddly, the study of old age is confined to the disturbed mental and physical effects, which require medical attention; not much to the positive potential of the last 10-20 years of life. Scientists are more interested in Function than Being. To undertake medical work to prolong sex, pituitary, and thyroid activity is at the expense of soul-stuff.
People with such medicine often lose their sensitivity, and become dependent on coarse stimulations in life. It is the reverse with those who have worked with the Five Strivings: sensitivity and understanding increases; they acquire serenity (consciousness is detached from sensitivity).

 

The Lower part of the soul should be completed by the age of 60; but the higher part can scarcely receive the conditions of tranquillity and withdrawal that it requires until activity is reduced to a minimum. Such retirement of souls is necessary for those with a special task (contemplatives): they restrict their activity to the First Striving (maintaining life) and the Second Striving (satisfactions) – sufficient for the development of the True Self.

 

The Higher Part of the soul grows as part of a process beyond the Will. It has three stages: Meditation; Contemplation; Union.

 

Meditation is for those whose consciousness is not yet free from sensitivity (who cannot still the mind).
Contemplation is true soul-forming work (our part is consent and cooperation).
Union comes when the soul has formed and Personal Individuality is established. Man must devote part of his day to one of these – this requires withdrawal from activity. The final transformation – separation of consciousness from the physical body – can only happen if part of the day is spent in retirement.

 

Contemplation is not possible for long (here, lower parts of soul are brought into stillness). Retirement needs to be made up of meditation, study of sacred texts, verbal prayer.

 

The transformation of consciousness acquired through Contemplation is consolidation. Here, a new relationship to time and space is acquired: minutes seem like hours; the past ceases to be dead; the soul can re-enter it.

 

Such souls radiate a beneficent influence: they concentrate sensitivity and other finer energies – they can heal body and psyche. It can continue after death.

 

It is different for the soul who has done good work but neglected contemplation. Here, the ‘I’ may have formed, death of ego and union with Self-hood. But, Individuality is without a rightful dwelling – and unable to complete its formation. These people die with an important part of their earthly existence incomplete.

 

Some die with their lower soul incomplete; for example, premature death, or death after neglect of transformation. They need to do in old age, or even after death, the work they should have done in life. It is one of the states of purgatory. There are, however, worse states:-

 

If the Material Self remains dominant, then the soul-stuff remains unproduced. There is nothing but a shrivelled up self after death – lost when no longer in contact with material objects.

 

If the Reactional Self dominates in old age, individuals seem selfish; they demand attention to themselves; their old-age is not tranquil. However, if there is a good disposition, there may be a remarkable change and they become serene, tolerant and undemanding towards the end of their lives. There is the possibility that they will be purified after death. However, the lower part of the Divided Self remains requiring some awkward moments.

 

If the Divided Self remains dominant, individuals do have a greater sense of values than the two cases above. They remain intellectual, active, but they are determined to have their way and can be difficult. They understand the need for meditation but do not bring it to themselves. Those of the Divided Self will not find it difficult to devote their old age to the attainment of Being. However, they are unlikely to go beyond the transition to the True Human Self until the point of death. With such people, the great step is made at the end of life and they do attain Individuality. But, the higher part of the soul will be weak.

 

For those who have ‘found themselves’ during their active lives, this is still not a guarantee of completion. The True Self is the stronghold of Egoism and many men and women have acquired the strength from the conquest of the three lower selves, still fail at the last test. Three states are possible for True Self of man.
1) If the lower part of self is strong and ego dominates, then the man or woman is said to have an evil nature. They do more harm to other than weaker people. If they reach old age in this state, there is little hope of salvation. If there is intense suffering, the Individuality may yet act within the soul.
2) For those whose enemy is egoism but who are not cruel or vicious (they have a disposition for Truth) – in other words, they sought the truth but for ego’s sake – it is important that they work on contemplation and do not have dominion over others. They cannot be humble, so they must act humbly. There is hope for them: they will bear the death pangs of egoism.
3) These people are True Selves: they live their lives in the Higher Part of the Self: they are virtuous, humble, and only missed Individuality because they allowed life’s activities to occupy too much of life. They enjoy old age but do not make the great step to Individuality. But, they can do so at death or soon after.

 

Death and Beyond
Death is the separation of soul stuff from physical organism.

 

Death is not the simple cessation of vital activity. It has stages:

 

Cessation of breathing; soul-stuff disconnects from physical body. However, it does not do this entirely, but sometimes only after many hours, or weeks. Usually, after three days, the soul-stuff is liberated from the local field and is drawn into the soul-stuff-pool (SSP). This is the First Death.

 

After a moment, or years, or indefinitely, the soul-stuff disintegrates. When this happens, the higher part of the soul is set free and, with Individuality, enters the Hyparchic future. If the higher part of the soul has not formed, the Individuality returns to the Universal states – nothing of a personal condition

remains. This is the Second Death.

Death is complex – it is different in different ways.

 

When it occurs before the self-hood has begun to form, the Personal Individuality returns to the Universal Individuality from which it came. The soul-stuff returns to the SSP and the physical body returns to earth and decays.

 

There are generally two reasons for death before of soon after birth. There is an effect on the parents, which is needed for their transformation. Or, some souls require to re-enter a human Totality in order to achieve completion, but do not need a selfhood. Such a transient life may be very important.

 

Death in childhood is usually a matter of destiny. Such unformed souls are instruments of the Personal Individuality, which returns to the source having accomplished a definite task. So, the death of the child is not tragic. There is no failure in not having formed a soul. These are not individualised and will be drawn into another conception.

 

The same can apply to early death.

 

However, there are tragedies of early death. Destiny is not guaranteed. This may still not be a disaster – something good can come out of it. The only real tragedy is those that, whilst knowing better, cling to egoism and harm others. Fate can only touch the lower levels of existence in eternity (cause and effect). In the higher levels, there is the possibility of hyparchic exchange, where Personal Individuality may pass from one soul to another.

 

Death during an active life, usually means a half-formed soul. During life, soul-stuff linkages are made (husband and wife, for example). A lasting contact is made which cannot be eradicated. There is, however, no union without an act of will: this cannot come from Personality or from lower parts of the Self-hood, but only from the ‘I’ or ‘point of freedom’ within the Self.

 

So, true marriage is a connection at the level of the physical, fusion of soul-stuff and union of wills. When this happens, the two become one. If one dies, the transformation continues in the one.

 

The state of soul coming from union of soul-stuff of husband and wife is called the Secret Abode. It is created by a human will and the creative energy (E3) associated with the sexual act. The indispensable elements in it are:

 

1) The soul-stuff organised to the level of the True Human Self;
2) The act of Will where there is union of Individuality.

 

Therefore, those men and women whose destiny is to be realised by way of contemplation, can come to the same soul state through love and worship directed towards a sacred image.

 

The Secret Abode is not necessarily monogamous; a man whose soul is of the right quality can be united – without sex – with women who are unmarried but in agreement of will to accomplish a common destiny.

 

The Secret Abode can therefore enlarge and permit contacts between more souls than a married pair.

 

Soul Expansion is reserved for those whose Individuality is wholly surrendered to the Cosmic Individuality. The transformation of will is accompanied by a vast expansion of the soul. This is for saints. It is raised in energy from consciousness (E4) to creativity (E3). This brings space and eternity into unity leading to an expansion of the soul. This is the Sanctified Abode, where saints can meet and communicate (the Communion of Saints).

 

Far beyond, is the soul of the Prophetic rank (the Abode of the Lord), receiving Revelation from the Supreme Being. This soul is raised to the Unitive Degree (Love E2).

 

The concepts for a full account of death – seven types of situation:

 

1) Lost Souls
Inveterate sinners: acquired a soul by directing to an aim, but only to feed egoism; they cannot escape retribution; they can change in life, but once dead the soul-stuff loses its instruments and can only suffer the pangs of impotent egoism.

 

2) Null Souls
Material Selves whose soul-stuff has lost touch with objective value; essence; slaves of the material world; they are ghosts; without sensitivity.
Ghosts of the Reactional self are attached to emotional situations.
Soul stuff returns to the SSP. Experience is automatic.

 

3) Half souls
These souls are partly formed on the sensitive level, but no development at the conscious level.

 

Lower art of soul forms automatically as a result of sensitive experience. Here, consciousness is caught up in sensitivity, and sensitivity is captured by automatism. Man-machines. Weakly developed self-hood, over-weighted personalities.

 

Soul stuff takes the shape of the physical body without developing higher powers. Then death comes.

 

Soul-stuff separates from the body, but it does not disintegrate, as it does not need renewal by food, air, and impressions. It is drawn to the soul-stuff pool. It retains its coherence. It imagines itself still in the material body. The lower part of the soul is composed of sensitive energy. It therefore undergoes experiences pleasant and unpleasant – they nullify those of preceding life. In this way, the soul-stuff is washed clean, retaining only those impressions that cannot be erased by sensitivity alone. There may be consciousness but it is inactive. The instruments of action are lacking.

Once the capacity for experience is exhausted, the soul disintegrates, and is taken to the SSP.

 

This condition is Sheol or Hades: neither retribution not transformation. Souls may here be blissful: husbands and wives re-united, parents find children. But, it is not reality and it cannot lead to reality. Soon, the soul-stuff loses its coherence and structure, consciousness withdraws, and the Second Death occurs. Nothing has formed which cannot exist without sensitivity. Therefore, nothing remains.

 

A half-soul may be drawn into a Secret Abode with one who has attained completion (the formation of a higher part). The link may not be strong enough to draw out the half soul from the SSP. Strong souls sometimes sense a half soul knocking on the door for help. All that can be done is to find those near to it in blood or affection. This is really what happens in Spiritualism: communication with half-souls in the SSP.

 

pp. 222 – 238 pages 226 – 228 for diagrams

 

This section completes the account of seven types of situation of death.

 

Purgatory
Souls continue to transform if they have a small degree of coherence on the level of consciousness. When consciousness separates from sensitivity, Individuality can work on the will of the Self-hood. After death, the process continues as the soul enters purgatory. Purgatory is a noble state earned by a soul when it is disposed towards the Truth.

 

The lower-soul is drawn to the soul-stuff pool: consciousness is the link between the lower soul (sensitivity) and Individuality. There is suffering but not like half-souls, aware only of life having ended; it is aware of its own separation from the Individuality. Much unknown or unrecognised in life is made known to the soul in purgatory. It sees the nature of the suprasensible world

 

What was not done by conscious work, now is done involuntarily by sensitive experience. A soul may re-enter the material world for a short period. There is then a unification of consciousness at the expense of sensitivity.

 

The transformation of man is the spiritualisation of existence . Animal essence is transformed into Human essence by the formation of the lower soul. Human essence is then transformed into Demiurgic essence by the formation of the higher soul. Each is achieved by the sacrifice of the preceding form. The second or vital body is constructed out of sensitive energy, set free by bodily experiencing. The Third body (Higher soul) grows by the sacrifice of the cravings of existence (lower soul). When sensitivity is purified, it can release its hold on existence. Then, the Conscious Individuality can be established and enter the State of Harmony (fact-value/ existence-essence). Purified sensitivity returns to the Soul-stuff pool to help the Great Human Soul develop.

 

The purgatory condition is a disposition of the will at the time of death. So long as the soul remains in the physical body, there is the possibility of a disposition being developed that allows for the conception of the Higher soul. Generally, however, only those that have worked on themselves during life can enter the purgatory condition: attainment of Reality and eradication of Ego. This occurs through ‘sincere longing’ which leads to the sacrifice of ego. Souls can also be drawn to purgatory by the love of other souls.

 

Harmony
Harmony is the state of the Individualised Soul liberated from all ties with existence. Here, fact and value are reconciled, as is existence and essence. It is where Individualised Souls reside, but is not paradise. Paradise imagined as is the House of God; eternal bliss – but this is a dream state. Harmony is different. Here, souls become ‘servants of the most high’. They are of three degrees:

 

1) Personal Individualities (Consciousness – E4) – Lowest Universal Energy
2) Universal Individualities – Saints (Creativity – E3) – Second Universal Energy
3) Cosmic Individuality – Prophets (Unitive Energy – E2) – Universal Love.

 

Beyond this is Universal Love (E1) – Supreme Being

 

Souls that have attained Individuality in life do not pass through purgatory: second death occurs before first death. Soul-stuff has already formed, purified, acts as life-giving source for the Great Soul of mankind.

 

Individualised souls (First Kind) are real after the second death: there is no separation of existence and essence. Each is a free, creative will. They perform tasks that no others can. They are free from the determining conditions: space, time, eternity, hyparxis. They form whatever vehicle is necessary for the task in hand. They are still Personal Individualities: however, they work within the limits of the purpose of creation – directed to the welfare of humanity.

 

Saints belong to a higher order. Their Individuality is of World VI. The only limit is what is possible. There is no distinction of one and many/ I and thou. They are in communion of consciousness and will. They are not limited by number and magnitude, but form whatever functional vehicle they require.

 

Solar Beings (Second Kind of Souls) are active throughout the solar system. Their vehicle if creativity (E3).

 

Cosmic Individualised souls are grounded in Universal Love – Unitive Energy (E2).. The limits of what is possible do no apply t them – they are instruments of the power of God.

 

 

The Completed Life
Here, we look at man from conception to completion. The Octad is useful here:

We begin with man’s life as an Activity (Tetrad)

…………………………………………….Mind…………………………………………

Death ………………………………………………………………………………Birth

……………………………………………..Body……………………………………

 

Here, the activity of life is actualised in time from birth to death, and as a process of transformation of body and mind.

 

Rotating the square gives us an activity as purposive and motivational:

…………………………………………….Destiny…………………………………………

Death ………………………………………………………………………………Mind

Fate…………………………………………………………………………………Creativity

Body…………………………………………………………………………………Birth

……………………………………………..Nature……………………………………

 

We can take the two squares as representing the Value Life or the Invisible Man, and Factual Life or Visible Man. We need to extend the symbol to includethe conception and final separation.

…………………………………………….Spirit 7…………………………………………

Destiny 6 ………………………………………………………………………………Creativity 8

Union 5 …………………………………………………………………………………Conception 1

Fate 4…………………………………………………………………………………Mechanicalness 2

……………………………………………..Matter 3……………………………………

 

 

Sevenfoldness of Conception

1-5 Conception-Union. Life cycle: birth, adolescence, maturity, old age, death, final liberation of spirit.
1-2 Conception-Mechanicalness: Genetic constitution – inherited from parents.
1-3 Conception-Matter: Entry to the world of existence.
1-4 Conception-Fate: Influence of energetic field at moment of conception.
1-6 Conception-Destiny: Essential nature and cosmic role of human individual.
1-7 Conception-Spirit: Spirit of Man as uncreated particle of Divine Will.
1-8 Conception-Creativity: Supra-conscious powers present out of time and space.

 

 

Cycle of Life

There is then the complete octad symbol. Two features in particular: seven points, a, b, c, d, e, f, g (Horizontal axis) and A, B, C, D, E, F, G (Vertical Axis).

 

a: Conception; Coalescence of Elements.
b: Birth; Entry into Life.
c: Adulthood – Completion of Preparatory Age. Structure of human self-hood complete (18-21 years).
d: Maturity. Age when soul is completely formed (32-48). Centre of path of life. ‘I’ of True self awakens.
e: Old age. Task of life completed. Acts through others. Age of Wisdom (63-81 years).
f: Death. Separation of Soul from physical body. Cessation of activity in material world. Exit from arena f life (73-100)
g: Union. Individuality or Spirit of Man is set free from intermediate soul nature and is united with Cosmic Individuality. Can be conscious of unconscious. Time measure unknown.

 

Cycle of Person
A: Material Self – Organism without consciousness or sensitivity. Outside arena of life.
B: The Reactional Self – (World 96) Entry into arena of life by sensitivity and consciousness – no inner freedom/ soul.
C: Divided Self (World 48) – Selfhood active in arena of life. Crosses line 1-4 which links Conception and Fate with line 2-5 (condition of completion by connection of Mechanicalness and Union.
D: True Self (World 25) Man centred in arena of life. Maximum deployment of natural powers (2-6). Meeting of spirit and matter (3-7). Conquest f fate (4-8) mezzo del camin’ di nostra vita (1-5). Soul grows to maturity. Individuality enters self-hood.
E: Personal Individuality (World 12). Still in arena. Individual is now psychoteleios and creativity linked to divine purpose (5-8). Fully in destiny (1-6). Free from influence of Fate and Mechanicalness.
F: Universal Individuality (World 6). Point of exit from arena of life. Ceases to be an actor in life. Vehicle for manifestation of Universal Will. Lateral connectivity – links Destiny and Creativity (6-8).
G: Cosmic Individuality (World 3). Beyond life, and beyond nature of man. Source of Individuality. Link between the ends and means of life.

 

Four points of external domaine = 2-4-6-8.

 

4-6: seven influences that determine the course of man’s life (material forces, genetic pattern, character, personal choice, commitment, guidance and destiny).
2-8: levels of man’s functioning (mechanicalness to creativity – ‘scale of energies: constructive E8 (Body of an engine); to unitive energy E2 – highest level of human experience.

 

Human Societies

Organised Complexity is a key phrase to describe our immediate experience. Here, structure is ever present.

 

Structures can be represented by systems. Laws of nature consist in the determining conditions – space, time, eternity, and hyparxis: these alone do not account for organised complexity

 

Systematics is limited by its requirement that complex situations are reduced to a set of terms each identified by character.

 

A system is a set of independent but mutually relevant terms; but this does not lead to artificiality. Systems are found in every situation – so structures do seem to conform to a simple series of models.

 

A construction is where the mutual relevance of systems is significant. However, systematics is limited where structures preclude the assignment of fixed characters and unchangeable content to the terms.

 

We need to take account of diversities and relevances within as well as between the terms of a structure. This takes us beyond constructions to societies.

 

A society has an indefinite number of members, but they do fall into distinguishable groups that have term characteristics. Societies are usually not units but groups f units. Therefore 3-fold set of relevances:

 

1. The mutual relevances of the groups which forms the terms;
2. The relevance of the members within each group for one another;
3. The relevance of the systems of the society to one another.

 

Symbiosis refers to the relevances of a society within a family of societies. That is mutually dependent forms of life within a well-defined environment: with reference to the mutual relevance of member groups and the world process in which they occur.

 

Symbiosis is in a process of transformation. It has extension and distribution in space and duration and process in time. It has eternal pattern and an ability to maintain identity by its own characteristic force.

 

There are five kinds of collectivity:

 

1. Class: no mutual relevances of the members. Unifying principle – class concept. No relevance.
2. System: single set of relevances as between terms. One-fold relevance.
3. Construction: mutual relevance of systems. Two-fold relevance.
4. Society: groups both internally and externally relevant as well as the construction. Three-fold relevance.
5. Symbiosis: outward relevance of the organisation. Four-fold relevance.

 

Here, we study societies as men and women.

 

We need three sets of description since three sets of data are required.

 

The first prescribes the form of the society and is composed of mutual relevances of its various groups. In a society of nomadic hunters we have a tetrad of elders, children, hunters and women – each having relevance to each other that determine the activity of the societies.

 

Man as a social being is characterised by sexual reproduction. The human dyad is a society in which members play distinct roles but are not simple entities. The inner organised complexity of man and woman is a wholly relevant factor in understanding marriage as a social phenomenon. Marriage has a diverse inner life that derives from cosmic significance of male-female, yang-yin, positive and negative – these are the forces of the world.

 

Marriage is not confined to men and women: it is also a dynamism in which all kinds of relationship are possible. Man-woman-child is only one triadic possibility of men and women. The family and home are tetrads in which the activity of marriage takes place. The spiritual content of marriage can only be exemplified in the pentad. The sacramental aspects of marriage come from it representing Heaven and Earth.

 

The various systems that are relevant to marriage are relevant to each other. There is then a superordinate structure.. There is also a marriage symbiosis in which the family takes its place as the primary constructional element in the total human society. So, marriage is an institution linked to cosmic process of generation and transmission. Mankind s a society and is in symbiosis that is relevant for the Biosphere and essence classes up to and including Cosmic Order. Two styles of investigation are needed: one, establishing the structure of an ideal human society; two, the place of human community within the biosphere.

 

The Idea of a Total Society of Mankind

 

Mankind appears as a complex structure made up of groups rather than a totality. Groups have a heritage that societies do not, or at least until comparatively recently. Large groups are not permanent but undergo constant change in extent and content. Smaller groups are often more stable – tribes, nations. However, rather than contribute to social integration, they can be isolated, or even mutually hostile.

 

It is better to seek group in terms of functional activities. It is in the last 150 years that functional activities have been organised globally (post – internet!!). Isolated groups have tended towards becoming a society. However, this is still early – it is difficult to construct a scheme from current observational data. We shall therefore work from anthropological principles and systematics and conjecture what the structure might be like: we can then compare the ideal with reality.

 

The ideal social order should direct the course of human evolution towards its highest perfection. Such a structure would have three subordinate tasks, corresponding to man’s three-fold nature, soul and spirit. Each is relevant to the other two and together produce life on earth. The second subfunction is the formation of the soul. The third is fulfilment of spiritual destiny. The task is the Conscious Evolution of mankind. This requires to continuance of the Human Race; the formation of the World Soul; the Spiritualisation of the Biosphere. Because there is three parts to this task, three social groups are required – each related to one of the impulses in the triad.

 

Psychoteleios Group: Completed souls united in the Individuality.
Psychokinetic Group: Selves in course of transformation to Souls.
Psychostatic Group: Selves stationary at one of the four levels of Self-hood.

 

In each of these is an activity that corresponds to he function of the group. The structure of the activity is the tetrad. There are four sub-groups within each group. This gives a dodecad of the structure of human society. This maintains existence, self-realization, and spiritual fulfilment.

 

The Idea Human Society

 

GROUP SUBGROUP

 

Psychoteleios Messengers 12
Prophets 11
Saints 10
Guides 9

 

Psychokinetic Initiates 8
Counsellors 7
Specialists 6
Candidates 5

 

Psychostatic Leaders 4
Craftsmen 3
Producers 2
Dependents 1

 

Each has a field of activity and a four-term structure. The subgroups correspond to the motivational and instrumental terms of the tetrad. However, they have a relevance beyond the group. The entire dodecad therefore needs to be studied if we are going to understand society.

 

At the moment, we consider the internal harmony of mankind as a self-contained society; omitting accounts of interactions with non-human groups (the biosphere, for example).

 

Nevertheless, it is quite difficult to exemplify the ideal structure: as the three great groups are not fulfilling their proper functions to the degree that they should. Still, we shall consider it as an ideal structure.

 

The Psychosomatic Group 
There are two motivating terms – Dependents and Leaders; and two instrumental terms – Workers and Craftsmen.

…………………………………………..Leaders……………………………………………

………………………….Producers……………………..Craftsmen………………………….

………………………………………….Dependents…………………………………..

 

This shows that the Psychostaic activity of mankind is motivated by the pressure of bodily needs (dependents) and the motivation to gain domination over others (Leaders)..

 

The two middle sub-groups are instrumental in function. According to the tetrad, one term is operative and the other directive: Skills (Functional and acquired without the Selfhood – not easily adaptable; outwardly passive, fixed to one job) and knowledge (not effective on its own in front of the job – we know what to do but cannot do it).

 

Dependents
Dependents are those who cannot provide what they need: because of congenital defects, accident, illness, senility. Whatever the reason they are dependent on the work of others. Often they need food and shelter, and are not even responsible for their relationships. They can, under certain conditions, become, criminals, the insane, prostitutes, etc. This should no happen in an ideal society. Every soul has a positive destiny, but some can only fulfil it if others help. Such individuals may not be able to help themselves. However, they may have sensitivities, which are needed for conscious an creative work. “God’s fool’ can help with the transformation of souls. They do not need to acquire an independent soul, but they can unite with a soul of high order and participate in Individuality. Saints know of such companions.

 

This is not the case in most dependents. To place each Human Totality in the environment necessary for their transformation, would require profound understanding of human nature, a readiness to make sacrifices – mankind s not ready for this. More psychostatic people would also be needed.

 

Dependents are an important part of human society – they are entitled to the necessities of life and the opportunities of transformation. Because the soul-stuff is tainted, there are more dependents in the world than required. This becomes more of a problem as medicine prolongs the life of people. If old people do no have the necessary ‘radiation’, they take more than they receive. There is a realisation that dependents need to be given what they need by other group members.

 

pp 237 – 252 see page 242 for diagram

 

Producers
Next stage up from Dependents is Producers: society is dependent on these to produce what is necessary – material constructions necessary for the functional activities concerned with transformation. Society is becoming more specialised – man’s direct action on the world: housewives to factory workers.

 

Actions of the automatic energy (E6) are increasingly being taken over by machines. But, these cannot work at the required level of Sensitivity (E5). There will always be a productive function in society – though less and less the product of labour.

 

Sensitivity is connected with two forms of knowledge: what (knowledge) and skills (skills) (MG: In cognitive theory, this distinction is known as ‘declarative’ and ‘procedural’ knowledge.) Skill may mean that the producer does not know what he is doing: so, a certain initiative is lacking – inwardly passive. Existentially conservative, and essentially static. Material aims only. Rewards are almost entirely material: Economic Man. Facts. Dominated by Reactional and Material Selves. They are less capable of independent action; they are therefore prone to exploitation. They might need protection by the Psychokinetic group. The latter group should also preserve justice in society. Producers should not be denied their material satisfactions. At the moment, the Psychokinetic group is weak; protection is therefore sought elsewhere.

 

Being a producer should not be a permanent state; rather individuals should be able to move from this group to higher groups, if only temporarily. Production will become less human in future.

 

Craftsmen
More than skill is needed, but education involving the higher centres. Functional development is required: coordination, meeting new situations, organisation of production activity, administration other than that which is provided by the Psychokinetic group.

 

Men of learning with disposition and discrimination are led to the path of Transformation, and may enter a sub-group of the Psychokinetic group. But, they are also needed in the existential world for technical progress. This group are designated the ‘craftsmen’. They are more than the traditional tradesmen and include people in administration, business, science, technology, education, and the professions. They work in different fields: engineers, technicians, planners, designers, artists, executives: they ‘live by their craft’. But, they may have no sense of ‘Being’ and do not look beyond the lower part of self-hood (wealth, sensual pleasure, fame, influence). Yet, they are concerned with quality and are not satisfied with material gain. They take on external responsibilities.

 

Leaders
These men and women are assertive inwardly and outwardly: they have initiative and organising ability. They develop the attributes of the Divided Self: strong character. They confront serious choice: it is possible that they may enter the Psychokinetic group and come to Individuality.

 

However, they may be taken over by the lower self and seek domination over others. It may be directed by egoism, even if it seems to come with an amiable nature. Or, it may come from Material, Reactional or Divided Selves. However, the Leaders are necessary, as the other lower groups are too passive for there to be initiative, material progress, enterprise. The Demagogue will be necessary until an effectual Psychokinetic group is established. It is right that their powers be exercised in the Psychostatic group. Such a leader may become corrupt and wicked, and betray the power; or, they may yet gain sensitivity in old age and enter tranquillity, enjoying the fruits of their labours.

 

The ideal leader exercises his functions, and relinquishes his power as soon as possible. Such an individual may go from Psychostatic to Psychoteleios group by a death of egoism, and the attainment of Individuality. Education is the key to determining which course is correct for each.

 

The Psychokinetic Group
At the end of the formatory years, man may respond to the call of his Personal Individuality and search for a soul. This search may effect his outer life, which alters his place in society: he moves from Psychostatic to Psychokinetic Groups. Many state that they are concerned with the ‘questions of the soul’, but it remains in their mind only; consequently, they remain in the psychostatic group. Two things are needed for one to acquire a soul: a disposition and decision. The first is a beginning; the second an end – decision separates from ego. We express it as a tetrad:

 

…………………………………………Motivation…………………………..

………………………………………..Initiates…………………………..
………………………Specialists………………….Counsellors……….(Instruments)
…………………………………………Candidates…………………………

 

The points of the vertical line refer to motivation; the points on the horizontal line refer to Instruments.

 

There are two basic motives: the need for reality and the awareness of destiny.

 

Candidates represent the basic Psychokinetic situation: the Initiates at the point of transition from Self-hood to Individuality. These are the aim and the goal of the activity (Motivation). The two instrumental sub-groups are the Specialists (Operative Skills – productive work of the tetrad – concerned with soul-stuff rather than material world – specialist function on the part of society) and the Counsellors (Directive Wisdom – inner transformation has brought about broad understanding of problems of human self-hood/ soul stuff soas to affect both individuals and communities). Their job is to study evolution of mankind and support the action of the psychostatic and psychokinetic groups. The four subgroups all realise that human destiny lies in Transformation. They belong to the Domain of harmony; they are not static and final, and cannot return to the Psychostatic group.

 

In the Psychokinetic Group man seeks his soul and destiny. However, even the Initiates (the highest level) have not yet died to self to be born in Individuality. There may not be a clear line between the individuals in the Psychokinetic group and others; but, there is a clear distinction between Self-hood, Soul and Individuality.
The Self-hood forms automatically by the interaction of the mind-stuff and the environment after conception.
Individuality is the mark of the Perfected man. Man has Individuality of egoism at his centre – and this is how it appears from the aspect of the Will. With Individuality there is soul-making: the freeing of the soul-stuff from its automatic manifestations – purification, organisation, structuring, and final unification to give Individuality a vehicle and instrument. This is Psychokinesis – the way of the soul. The Psychostatic man has not entered this process (either because he does not have the potential or has not received the impulse to follow).

 

The Spiritual Life of Mankind depends on an interaction between the groups. The impulse for the Psychostatic group comes from the Psychokinetic group, who are replenished and renewed by its own activity. The Psychostatic group cannot be entered automatically, but requires an act of acceptance. They have to be shown: ‘the light’ upon the path. The psychostatic man must awake to the insecurity of his security, must renounce the support of existence, with no assurance that he will make essence. He is in the dark – not assurance that light will come/ he will succeed. Yet, he is different from the man who has seen nothing: he has seen the truth that eventually will come and set him free. He knows not his destiny, but knows that he cannot remain where he is. He is not so much concerned with what he has not but what he is not.

 

Psychokinetic man is the pilgrim to the soul. It begins with the Psychostatic and Self-hood and leads to Psychoteleios and Individuality.

 

Candidates
The awakening of the soul is rarely clear and decisive. Some individuals go to sainthood with little help from those who have gone before. Most, however, enter the psychokinetic path with hesitation, confusion, and austerity. Often, there is little more than a passing awareness of hidden depths to one’s nature; a longing for reality over material support; an urge to do something about it. Help is needed.

 

The need for help must come from within a social framework: the transition from psychostatic (self-seeking) to psychokinetic (soul-seeking) is a social act. The recluse or hermit who goes it alone are rare.

 

There is the need for a region of experience where evidences of Values and their Realization in people can be found. This is the V-Region – orientated to Value but situated in Fact. The F-Region is situated in Fact and orientated to it. Psychostatic = F-Region; Psychokinetic = V-Region. Those drawn to the V-Region are on their way to being Candidates. Here, the chief influences are artistic, ethical, religious. Here, there is an objective morality that the lower self cannot distinguish from ‘conditioning’, standing apart from personal prejudice and belief and local customs, and are a guide to ‘right living’. Response to the influence of objective morality requires a preparation that deconditions the sensitivity and makes it less dependent upon taboos and social pressures. This requires V-Region conditions: artistic taste, literature, interest in human nature and destiny.

 

Who am I? Why do I exist? The psychokinetic answer is: ‘I am not what I am to be, and I, until I am that I, cannot know why I am at all’. Notions of transformation, knowledge beyond the world, spirit, all belong to the V-Region. The result is an automatic selective action. Some disposition towards the spirit is often necessary from youth. The V-Region strengthens this disposition until it results in action. The discrimination is required to follow the right trends. Disposition+Discrimination+V-Region =>Self-hood: power to enter the Psychokinetic Group as a Candidate.

 

At this point, there are two paths: The The Path of Objective Morality (conquest of egoism – disposition and favourable external circumstances) and the Path of Accelerated Transformation (higher knowledge – discrimination and right conditions for transformation).

 

Objective Morality
The conditions of life if things are to flow smoothly in human communities. They have different forms in different ages but they represent the general moral sense of mankind. It is progressively refined, harmonised, and liberated from negative influences. Its scope is general rather than particular. It sets general rules of behaviour; although cannot always answer personal problems. When ignored, social rigidity can result. If it is rejected, society degenerates. Those who live by this morality have to accept its limitations: this is a matter of education of the Material Self – that is automatic behaviour patterns based on the Objective Morality. The Material Self can thus be a good instrument for the Psychoskinetic man. The next stage is the orientation of the Reactional Self within the pattern of social morality. Here, the emotional self comes into harmony with the environment. After, comes discipline to develop a right state in the Divided Self. Finally, when both inward and outward are in favourable conditions, there is the Illumination of the True Self. Thus, the path of Objective Morality should lead to the top of the tetrad: the state of the initiate who has found the Truth.

 

It is connected with religious life: there is not much chance of achieving a psychokinetic state in isolation from other. Personal Individuality is rarely sufficiently strong to call strongly enough on the Self-hood unless reinforced by religious worship. The nearer the self comes to soul-state, the more help it needs from the Universal Individuality (this is transmitted in an act of worship).

 

Since the Path of Objective Reality is the only means of self-perfecting for the great majority of people, organised religion is the centre of Psychokinetic activity. All great religions lead to the overcoming of egoism and the establishment of the Individuality.

 

Accelerated Transformation
There is the belief that special disciplines can make for an accelerated transformation: through ascetic practice, self-sacrifice, heroic courage, martyrdom, devotion, meditation and prayer. Accelerated transformation may also involve abandoning ordinary human ties, withdrawal, solitude, teachers, communities, guides, exercises, etc.

 

There are three main branches of Accelerated Transformation: of Function, Being and Will.

 

The Functional Approach
Body
Here, the Candidate is drawn to a particular mode of life that corresponds to a predominant function. Usually, the Material Will is dominant and so the Material Man has to be disciplined/ trained – which can be long and painful. Or, the Emotions are dominant – and the Reactional Self strong. Emotions have to be directed into the right channels (for example, through devotion). Or, the Intellect is dominant – and the Material and Reactional Selves are strong. Again, these must submit to discipline.
Later, right action can harmonise the Divided and True Selves.

 

3 functional approaches to Accelerated Transformation:

 

First WaySelf-Mortification; Obedience; Ascetism; Hatha Yoga; The Way of the Fakir; The Conquest of the Material Self;.
Second WaySelf-denial; Love and Worship; Bhakti Yoga; The Way of the Monk; Devotion; The Conquest of the Reactional Self.
Third way Self-knowledge; The use of mental disciplines; Jnana Yoga; The way of the Yogi; The Conquest of the Divided Self.

 

The Being Approach
Psychokinetic Transformation of Energies. Here, the aim is to form soul-stuff into a soul rather than develop functional powers. Those involved share an awareness of non-enitity. The contact with a V-Region gives rise to a deep sense of revulsion against their existential nature; they feel themselves to be wrongly developed and given over to sin. ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom’. It is a religious state. The psychostatic man who glimpses his own nature, sees his own unworthiness. He needs to free himself from deep contradictions in his own nature. The Functional Approach may be helpful, but his true path is one of Being, and he must therefore find a way towards it. This sense of nothingness can be addressed through Raja Yoga; for example, the Shivapura Baba.

 

This does not mean that Function and Will can be neglected. However, it does mean that the individual concerned is likely to become a contemplative; although they may find it necessary to continue responsibilities in the world (something itself that can lead to disturbance). The Being approach is generally more personal than social, and does not usually lead to complete Psychokinetic Transformation. The successful contemplative may pass to the Psychokinetic through the three stages of the mystical life: Purgation, Illumination, and Union.

 

The Will Approach
Here, the call is to understanding and action based on understanding. It is a challenge to service, but there is a lack of understanding what is required. He must understand what is needed and do it. Reality is work: Being is not enough.

 

There are problems with such an approach: individuals may do before learning to be. They are drawn back into the Psychostatic group: they imagine they are ‘becoming’ when they are really only ‘doing’. Their activity is premature. Another pitfall is to imagine that organised work for the betterment of mankind is necessarily progressive (a social fallacy). He may feel he is doing enough by working for mankind when he is, in reality, avoiding the work that is necessary for him to fulfil his destiny.

 

It is dangerous here:
Right disposition without discrimination may result in being at the mercy of false suggestions. There are traps for those drawn to the Will; no-one is safe if he cannot mistrust his own egoism. Right action cannot be followed on one’s own. There is the need for a brotherhood. They will be disposed to a guide or teacher or School. He will look to serve the Universal purpose, rather than personal salvation.

 

The three approaches have been associated with different geographical regions:

 

Functional: Africa, Egypt, Crete, Europe (leading t the science and technology of the modern world).

 

Being: India; Buddhism; Hinduism;

 

Will: Iran and Central Asia; Mediterranean – Judeo-Christian and Islamic cultures (emphasis on doing).

 

Those who would enter the Psychokinetic Group by the Will have special difficulties. Because it leads to the attainment of powers of action, it has to be specially protected from those who enter it for the wrong reasons. Therefore, it is never easy to find. Not only are discrimination and disposition needed, but Determination. Functional and Being Schools and teachers are not hidden, and their way to Psychokinesis is usually easily expressed. However, the demand that is made in the way of the Will is for Understanding, and one cannot understand without actual experience. Preparation is therefore needed; one that can be found in a Psychostatic group. Therefore, to become a candidate, one must first find a school or teacher beyond the student’s level: a society of specialists. By making himself useful to such a group, the candidate acquires understanding of the demands of the Will that entitles him to enter such a society.

 

pp. 252 – 266 pages 259 and 266 for diagram

 

Guidance

This section begins with a resume of the Candidate subgroup:

 

1. The psychokinetic group cannot be recognised externally.
2. Candidates are of 2 main categories: those on the path of Objective Morality; those on the path of Accelerated Transformation.
3. The path of Objective Morality is usually associated with religious observance (though not always).
4. The path of Accelerated Transformation is reached by three approaches: a) the Functional Approach; b) the Being Approach; c) The Will Approach.
5. The Functional Approach includes three principal ways: a) the Way of the Body; b) the Way of the Emotions; c) the Way of the Mind.
6. The Being Approach can be by Devotion or Sacrifice: its characteristic is transformation by soul-stuff.
7. The Will Approach is not accessible without preparation: it is concerned with doing.
8. Conditions: Functional Approach = strong disposition; Being Approach = keen discrimination; Will Approach = invincible determination.
9. The Paths, Approaches and Ways are usually interlocked; elements from more than one can be combined needed for time and place for particular Candidates or their groups.

 

Candidates generally need guidance – by one who knows what is required. This is the Great Science – the chief repository of which are those who belong to the Approach of Will. These individuals grasp the need to understand and this prepares them for the task of transmitting the Great Science.

 

Specialists – second level of the Tetrad.

 

The economy of human society falls to Psychokinetic Specialists: these individuals develop strongly in one particular field, while maintaining a stable disposition on Reality. This is different from the Craftsmen of the Psychostatic group, who are more self-centred/ directed towards the external world. Nevertheless, the Specialists are motivated by their own qualities and impulses. However, they are not free in relation to the Divided Self: they therefore do not act out of character.
They must come to terms to their fate before discovering their Destiny. They are engaged in self-fulfilment: the realization of Individuality. They have not entered ‘active transformation’.

 

Of the twelve subgroups in three-fold society, the upper six have direct perception of Individuality; the lower six only know it indirectly: those who know where they are going (active/ invisible/ spiritual); and those who only see it in others (passive/visible/ factual). The Specialists are highest of the visible six. These are the majority of the spiritual elite in society. They often form ‘Schools of the First Degree’: attracting those entering the Candidate sub-group. They may be schools of science – philosophy, history, archaeology; societies for human betterment; specialised groups – professional men and women, physicians, educationalists, lawyers, engineers, administrators; teams of explorers. But, no knowledge alone can lead to reality, outward help can do little without inward change, and discovery/ excitement is not an end in itself.

 

The specialist leader may have one, a few, or thousands of followers. No man dominated by his Material Self can be a Psychokinetic specialist. Money and reward cannot be his main motive. A man of the Reactional Self cannot be fit for the task. He must have impartiality: this only comes when like/ dislike, praise and blame, have ceased to sway him. He must be a specialist in his field: this is the only way he acquires understanding and communicates with the ‘higher subgroups’ of the psychokinetic group.

 

Their importance lies in their visibility rather than their ability to teach. Their work is recognised by the psychostatic majority: points of contact in the process of accelerated transformation. They also strengthen the forces of Objective Morality. People see that they are disinterested compared with those driven by egoism. This also applies to those with a psychokinetic aim: these may appear as teachers, they have specialised in some techniques of self-development. These individuals (even to themselves) may appear as members of Psychoteleios or the Complete Man. However, they risk becoming false teachers and can lead people astray. This is because they are not liberated from the Divided Self – character.

It is sometimes thought that those who are liberated from like/ dislike, praise/ blame, are superior in character and morality to ordinary people. However, moral perfection only comes with final extirpation of Egoism – this does not happen in the light of external activity. Also, he may not understand human transformations, and may even become an obstacle to progress. However, they are important in modern times: they can awake the Psychostatic group!

 

Counsellors – third level of the tetrad.

 

While specialists are concerned with learning, art, science and philanthropic works (and perfecting their activity in these), Counsellors are free from the urge to accomplish anything for themselves. They are concerned with the Objective needs of the Work. The Counsellor has freed himself from the domination of the Divided Self; therefore, not limited his own character. He has come to terms with his fate. Ordinary people live under the Law of Accident (Law of Cause and Effect – lower selves; Law of Fate – character). Fate is the influence of personality and habits and thus a restriction on possible events. Freedom from Divided Self is possible when a man acts according to principles rather than personal motivation. Freedom leads to stability of soul-stuff and the power of Independent Consciousness. This power is possible at this stage. The True Self also awakens – contact with Personal Individuality (no longer separated from it).

 

Because of this, the Counsellor can enter the situation of others and make objective judgements. He can help psychokinetic people and advise them when they seek help. However, his powers are hidden from those who do not see the inward. How then to recognise them?

 

A triadic relationship must be stabilised if the Counsellor is to fulfil his destiny. This is done by Specialists known as Witnesses: these individuals have directed their psychokinetic development through understanding. Therefore, they recognise and communicate with Counsellors even before reaching this level themselves. Being visible, they can draw Candidates to Counsellors. They also link between Psychostatic and Psychokinetic Groups.

 

Here, the Invisible Essence dominates over the Visible Existence. Some Counsellors have acquired the necessary properties by the Path of Objective Morality – the good and wise men to whom others turn. Natural Counsellors seldom exert an influence over a wide circle – they lack the Objective Knowledge of the Leaders of society. Their influence remains at the level of the personal – rarely going beyond the True Self. The Counsellor goes beyond the skills of their Specialist days. His interest has turned from the visible world – Civitas humana – to the invisible world – Civitas Dei. He is concerned with the accomplishment of a task that is not of his own choosing. The transition is primarily of the Will: as a reconciliation of Essence and Existence. A new understanding comes: a mark of the true counsellor or the bond of union amongst members of the sub-group.

 

In an ideal society, those men and women who have gone beyond the Divided Self would receive spiritual motivation from the Initiates (the highest level of the Psychokinetic group). However, the Great Soul of Humanity is still too undeveloped. Therefore, most Counsellors have retired to small groups, and contact with them is difficult. Those who are visible, are protected by having their true nature disguised (by appearing as what they are!) – possibly as part of a religious hierarchy. They appear as Counsellors in an existential sense, disguising their essential nature.

 

Communication between Counsellors is obstructed by defects and deficiencies of the True Self : they may not be free from Egoistic impulses. We must be careful about taking misdirection from one who is qualified to direct. Only a sincere desire to eradicate Egoism can safeguard against this.

 

Initiates – fourth level of the tetrad.

 

This is the man of the True Self – free from Ego, living under the direction of his own ‘I’. He is free from Existence without making the ‘great transition’ to the Realm of Essence. This is not man’s Will (he has reached the limit of self-perfection from his action alone), but a decision taken from the Universal Individuality.

 

Initiates are the link to the Psychoteleios Order: they are dedicated to the service of Individuality and await union.

 

Initiation and Union are different stages. In the mystical path, a distinction is made between Illumination and Union. Illumination gives consciousness of Essential Reality (removal of egoism). Union unites with that reality (entry into Individuality). Removal of Individuality is not enough to enter Individuality. The vessel of the soul must be strengthened. The Initiate receives a ‘vision’ and no longer has aims to accomplish. He has found what he set out to discover, but is still separate from it.

 

Initiation comes from Individuality, from ‘within’ the person but is not ‘of’ them. It is characterised by a release of Creative energy (E3): a Creative Field is produced for the Initiate. Whereby the whole Psychokinetic Group is inspired.

…………………………………………Initiates………………………………………………..
…………………………………………Creativity (E3)…………………………………….

……………….Specialists……………………………………….Counsellors…………….
……………….Sensitivity (E5)……………………………….Consciousness (E4)

………………………………………..Candidates……………………………………………..
………………………………………..Automatism(E6)…………………………………….

 

Characteristics:

 

Initiates…………………….Creative Power
Counsellors……………….Conscious Guidance
Specialists………………….Sensitive Activity
Candidates…………………Automatic Obedience

 

Each is the means to rise to the next level. Such initiate beings are not possible in the Psychostatic group. The Initiate communicates an illumination, not a Revelation; a creative power, not a redemptive action. Each is responsible for a special transmission; he is aware of the uniqueness of his message as the limitation of his role; he utters ‘one word’ – his word (only in Psychoteleios do the many words become one word). However, his understanding is not easily communicated to followers who take him to be unique – not uniquely significant. From this mistake comes divisions and exclusions. The initiate can often not remedy the situation, because he has abandoned his own will, but has not yet united with the Will of his own Personal Individuality. This is important for our understanding of ‘esoteric societies’. The Leaders of these are not always based on training and discipline; they therefore lack training and can make mistakes. The message can be distorted.

 

Co-operation in the Psychokinetic Group

A Psychokinetic Group requires integrated activity – the Initiate surrounded by undeveloped Candidates can lose his way. A Specialist who does not seek guidance from Counsellors will not go beyond his own limitations. The Counsellor who usurps the role of the Initiate will dry up and be in danger of fraud. The true Counsellor attaches himself to an Initiate – and may protect the latter from errors of judgements and enthusiasms of would-be Candidates. This job falls on Counsellors because they are still attached to the existential and therefore understand its activity. The Initiate is poised between Essence and Existence, and therefore cannot exercise power in either. This can lead to bewilderment: he understands things that others do not understand; he sees he has a special message. But, this may lead to him not seeing anything outside his own field. There is also a risk of exaggeration; believing in his own Illumination and vision above others. Better to be humble and unswerving in himself than in his mission!

 

When he has passed through the four stages of the Psychokinetic Group, the Initiate allows himself to be represented as a Psycholeleios Being. He will be aware that he needs help, and this affords him respect.

 

The interdependence of the four Psychokinetic sub-groups is necessary for the welfare of human society.

 

Initiates are united by an invisible bond of enlightenment; even though they may not recognise one another. This bond is rarely consciously accepted. So, Initiates often need an external structure such as religion. At this point, those of the Paths of Accelerated Transformation and Objective Morality discover their Community of Understanding.

 

The Psychoteleios Group

There should be four sub-groups in the Psychoteleios Group as well. However, the distinction in each of the three sets of sub-groups is different. Psychostatic Group – distinction by function (principle of unity – subgroups interdependent with respect to functional activity); Psychokinetic Group – concerned with soul-stuff transformation – the achievement of integrated being (unity of aim). Even here, there are possibilities of misunderstanding, disagreement and even opposition in the field of Will. These do no exist in the Psychoteleios Group where unity of Will dominates. For ordinary people – up to the level of Specialists – the society of perfected men is invisible and incomprehensible. The Psychoteleios Group is not concerned with action – control of bodies and energies – but sources from which actions flow. These sources – Consciousness, Creativity, Love and Transcendence – are beyond human perception. They are not in the constitution of man but are instruments of Cosmic Individuality: in connection with higher forces of Creation.

 

The connection between Will and Energy…
In Psychostatic man, consciousness (Conscious Energy E4) is merged with sensitivity, and is only separated involuntarily. In psychokinetic man, consciousness is separate but not controlled. Psychoteleios man can control and direct his conscious energy and produce results outside of himself. In the first of these, man is a passive receptacle of conscious energy; in the second, he works by conscious energy; in the third, he masters and makes use of conscious energy. We can use the example of creativity with the Initiate, the Guide, and the Saint. The first is the channel for creativity; the second is the instrument and the third the master.

 

The Will of Psychoteleios man is independent of his Self-hood and therefore not limited by Existence. Such men are not separated from other men by physical space and time. Their connection with the physical body is convenient but not necessary. So we can compare the three groups in terms of their mode of communication, their powers, and their bond of union:

 

Psychostatic Group: Ordering of material world; provision and enjoyment of the necessities of life; communication by spoken/ written word, images, symbols; powers = functions of instinct, feeling, and thought; skills and instruments of body; existential interdependence.

 

Psychokinetic Group: Ordering of soul-stuff; communicates as the psychostatic group; in addition, they have an understanding of art, extra-sensory perception ritual; higher powers of soul; some degree of illumination/ consciousness; process of soul formation; they share in this activity but are not united by Will.

 

Psychoteleios Group: Ordering of Will of humanity; they act through the instrumentality of those in the psychokinetic group; they do not require powers of extrasensory perception – clairvoyance/ telepathy; they are not separate individuals like ordinary men; they do not need existential support; there remains only one Will seated in the Individuality – beyond Selfhood; the body and its functions are no more than instruments; they are not comprehensible to ordinary people; they do not behave according to patterns of personality or Selfhood; societies not dependent on personal communication ; each knows what to do and does it; only rarely meet in one time and place; united with other groups in a greater way – parts of a single whole (the Will of the Cosmic Individuality).

 

All Individuality has one source: Cosmic Individuality. The Christ or Son of God – the Mystical Body of Christ (no division of the Individuality that unites all centres of will in the Cosmos). The union of Individualised Beings.

 

These three tetrads bring out the relatedness of three Groups in society.

 

There is also the division into two Hexads: one of Existence and the other Essence. The first knows; the second sees.

 

The Specialist stands at the head of the first hexad. Seeing begins with the Counsellor – a consciousness, which has been liberated from personal attachments and is capable of impartial judgements. This quality is not dependent on the work of the Counseller themselves.

 

The second hexad can be seen as a ‘spiritual symbiosis’ – its members participate directly and consciously in the Reflux of the Spirit. Man’s work in this can be called the ‘Great Work’. The Counsellor recognises this in the Initiate. The secret of the Great work has been revealed to the latter. Only when the Psychoteleios Group is reached can there be not merely conscious but creative participation in the Reflux of the Spirit. Each part of the sub-groups has here an individual part to play.

 

We again use the distinction between Instruments and Motivation. Each of the sub-groups is composed of Individualised Souls. Individuality in its first degree is personal. Here, doubt in the Reality of God is removed and is replaced by Faith. This is inherent in the Individuality, which brings itself into Selfhood – when it is free from egoism. The thread that links the Personal Individuality to its source is slender and cannot bear the full weight of the Cosmic Will. At the other extreme, there is a state of union between Individual Will and Cosmic Will – there is no distinction between them. The motivation of faith = attainment of the union; motivation of union = spread of faith. The two are in mutual complementarity: one directed from Cosmic Individuality as the source of spiritualising impulses; the other directed towards it as the assurance of the reality of spiritual values.

 

The Instrumental terms are distinguished by two attributes of the Universal Individuality: the unification of Being and the Integration of Will. The Saint transmits the power of the Cosmic Individuality and the Prophet the purpose:

 

……………………………………………Messengers……………………………………………

…………………Saints………………………….………………………………..Prophets…..

……………………………………………..Guides…………………………………………………

 

 

 

pp. 266 – 281 page 278 for diagram

 

This section begins with going through the four sub-groups of the Psychoteleios Tetrad:

 

Guides
Guides have attained Personal Individuality; Faith; they find the right path in all situations. An Initiate can make a mistake as he operates only according to the field of his own illumination. The Guide receives direction from the Cosmic Individuality; his actions are therefore not dependent on knowledge. His Will is linked to the Supreme Will.

 

Their role in the process is soul-formation and is great and direct (they stand at the threshold of Psychoteleios). From this point forward, progress is a matter of Grace, not work/ Self: they have the powers latent in ordinary man. Without men of certain faith, spirituality would languish in the world. Even Psychokinetic work is chaff compared with faith.

 

Guides can be simple men and women on the path of Objective Morality and have attained faith in a small environment; or those who have undergone an Accelerated Transformation (they acquire soul-powers beyond their limits/ personal contacts). Guides recognise each other. No-one who has not attained Individuality will know Guidance (i.e. knowledge beyond experience – subject to the illusions of existence, freedom, separateness – Ego!). Guides are secure in their Will – humble. He sees everything as an instrument of the divine will.

 

Guides are channels for new influences in human life.. They initiate new activities because they are not limited by time and place.

 

Saints World XII
Saints are free from the limitations of the existing world.
Space and time are here merged with hyparxis and eternity; the actual and potential are not divided. Events are not limited by successive actualization. Saints are the agents of miraculous workings. They can intervene in human affairs after their death. They distinguish themselves from prophets by the exercise of power rather than the revelation of purpose. The human soul can be related to the Universal Individuality (Instrumental Nature of Cosmic Will) in two ways: by overshadowing (the saint is overshadowed by the Spirit of God – feminine condition – aware of presence of God – he is in a state of humility and bewilderment); or, by the unity of Will (beyond unity and diversity – therefore both unique and merged with the Universal Will). He is concerned with God: beyond Faith and security for himself. He is only concerned with the Union. He is not yet there so aware of separateness. The ‘Community of Saints” is a substantial unity – imperishable/ not subject to conditions of time and space.

 

Prophets
Here the Universal Individuality is infused in a human soul. The prophet is dedicated to the task of human evolution. There are both visible (declaring a code of morality) and invisible (working through initiates and Guides) prophets. The visible prophets of the Old Testament refer to the indwelling presence of Universal Individuality. They admonish people. Invisible prophets work through perceptions, feelings and thoughts of man, or channels of the will. They are in contact with the Universal Wisdom. There is sometimes a distinction between their utterances (from the Universal Will) and their personal conduct: role and person. They are not yet of the ‘Invisible Class’ – a price paid for intervention in human affairs.

 

We can associate the Universal Wisdom – Divine Wisdom – with Sophia (the Blessed Mary in Catholicism). Wisdom is a reality more concrete than knowledge. We can participate in it but not possess it.
In Will it is Universal Individuality.
In Being it is a spiritual organisation: the four Cosmic Energies – Consciousness, Creativity, Love and Transcendence.
In Function it is the Great Work/ Magnum Opus – the return of Creation to its source.

 

Prophets are an instrument of the transmission of the Holy Wisdom – prophecy is only incidental to this. We sometimes misunderstand prophecy because invisible prophets are hidden from us. Prophets include those of the past and future (waiting for their role to be needed) – they are a collective source or reservoir of Great Wisdom.

 

The Higher Wisdom is the Guardian and Directive Intelligence of the plan for the conscious evolution of humanity. At each time period, the plan is adjusted according to the opposing forces of materiality and spirituality. Such wisdom belongs to the Reconciling Principle: thus is neither active or passive. Thus, its actions are a mystery to ordinary men, trapped in the divisions of good and evil.

 

They are united in Love and light. They are Compassionate. They share in the vision of truth. They have been chosen.

 

We cannot accept the objection that we cannot verify their existence: this is the illusion of making sense perception the only measure of truth. Men are protected at critical moments, and ideas arrive at the appropriate time from various sources. Creation is thus directed by Unitive Wisdom – the Prophetic Circle. Only those who have experience of Individuality can experience this.

 

Messengers
Messengers, along with Saints and Prophets, are perfected human beings, sent to earth with the necessary qualities to act as representatives of the Cosmic Individuality: they set mankind an expression of sense and purpose. Such expression must accord with time and place in society; and is therefore prone to being understood as contradictory. A message is only a reflection of a reflection of the Truth, even though we sometimes see it as a pure expression. Men could not understand or accept truth in its pure form. Truth is tarnished by its forms of expression. Whether in science or religion, all utterances are only parts of one truth that cannot be spoken. Nevertheless, fragments of it are sent in order to enable the cosmic purpose to be realised. Truth is real with no need for realisation. When truth enters man, he can do nothing but obey – thus becoming a channel for the Supreme Will.

 

Messengers may be misunderstood or even persecuted; but they cannot be resisted. Such individuals can alter the course of human evolution. They may be invisible but, according to Sufi tradition, there is always one such individual in the world at any one time. He is the Axis of Humanity.

 

We will not find this structure of the twelve-term system of the Ideal Human Society present today. The elements are operating as best they can. An Integrated World Soul is a long way away.

 

Societies as Energy Concentration
All that exists is energy undergoing change (the capacity to do). Societies both consume and generate energy (engines and accumulators). All transformations involve at least three forms of energy.

 

In a completely dependent state, man is member of a society of dispersed energy (E12) with no integration.

 

The Psychostatic Group operates according to the four Mechanical Energies (although, of course, there are individual connections with Vital Conscious, and Creative energies). At the Mechanical level, human action is automatic, predictable, like machines.

 

The Psychokinetic Group manifests Vital Energies (although members may also exhibit Consciousness and Creativity). They are the ‘life and soul’ of humanity.

 

The Psychoteleios Group is concerned with the four Cosmic energies (although they also depend on material and vital energies).

 

There are various ways in which various groups make use of energies for the biosphere and human existence. They are of different kinds, duration, difficulty, level, etc.

 

Energies were previously classified in terms of their intensity, quantity and quality. We can associate intensity with hyparxis, quantity with time, and quality with eternity. An understanding of the structure of operations requires other factors: space, size, configurations, motions, generators, engines, and accumulators: the Present Moment.

 

Distribution can take the form of concentration (available for instrumental use – allows effective action), flux (an appropriate apparatus), or integration (of, for example, sensitive and conscious energy). Soul-formation is dependent on space, time, eternity, and hyparxis. Similarly, the soul-stuff pool needs to be understood in terms of an existing structure of energies. For there to be a World Soul, there is the need of a complex and dynamic structure – to unify the entire human race in a community of consciousness. Human society and the World soul must exist side by side until united by the Will of the Universal Individuality. So, the distribution of sensitive and conscious energies in the space field is as important as their intensity and quantity in human experience. This energy distribution continues in the Biosphere and beyond.

 

The Biosphere of Symbiosis
Mankind needs to be understood in terms of the great symbiosis with the biosphere of which we are a part: between the Autonomic and Hypernomic Worlds. Human beings are quite young; whilst the Biopshere is many millions of years old. It consists of life as we know it on the planet. The duration of man is quite small in comparison. Yet, his significance is in the task he has to perform in the evolution of life on earth. There are three major processes, which coalesce in the Grand Cosmic Cycle:

 

1. The Transformation of Human Selves into Individuals;
2. The Evolution of Humanity;
3. The Spiritualization of the Biosphere.

 

They each come from three independent sources.

 

Each source or ‘do’ leads into three stages before the need for blending appears

 

First Triplet
Initial Stage: The Human Person
Second Stage: The Family
Third Stage : The Clan or Nation

 

Second Triplet
Initial Stage: The Cultural Community or Civilisation
Second Stage: The Total Human Situation in Time, the Epoch
Third Stage : The Total Human Situation unlimited in Time. Humanity.

 

Third Triplet
Initial Stage: Man as a vehicle of Spiritualisation.
Second Stage: The particular form of life in which Spiritualisation is concentrated. Evolving Stem
Third Stage : Form of Existence Dominant in the Biosphere. Dominant Life Form.

 

These 9 stages form 9 elements of which three are sources and six are steps. We can place these on the Enneagram: although it only has 9 points but one appears twice – he point of entrance and exit:

 

Biosphere/ Individual Man -> Family -> Nation -> Civilisation -> Epoch -> Humanity -> Spiritualisation -> Evolving Stem -> Dominant Life Form

 

The first sequence enters into the international symbiosis here called Epoch (associated with the conscious evolution of mankind). They outlive several generations of mankind. Beyond Epoch is humanity at a major change in evolution. When the time comes, transformed Humanity will guide the evolution of life on earth to its great destiny. When humanity does assume its own responsibility, it encounters the challenge of the Spiritualisation of the Biosphere itself. Man has no separate significance; he must thus accept a different attitude towards life on earth.

 

Man’s essential nature is totally different to that of the rest of the Biosphere., nevertheless. The hyparchic significance of the symbiosis escapes us. But, we can deduce systematic principles. We do not know whether or not the Biospheric Symbiosis corresponds to the Destiny of the Biosphere. However, we can direct our attention to the societies exemplified in our experience:

 

The Family
The entire personal contacts of man – three generations. Recently family ties have weakened. Some contacts are close; others are distant. They are all kith and kin. Various sub-groups with functional differences.

 

It is the natural environment for the development of existential man. A family society shares a common fate. It exerts an influence on the four Selves.
However, it has an essential function in providing the conditions for discrimination and disposition.
It is in the family that the transformation of human life begins: it therefore has a symbiotic relevance to the Biosphere.

 

 

National Societies
Families share a common heritage, which holds them together: consanguinity, common experiences, possessions, language, beliefs, and traditions. They are not weakened when personal links cease. Forces pull like to like and form ties. These are nations or peoples. They are usually held by geographical boundaries. They usually include a common language and a marked endogamic tendency.

 

Although nations are existential, they include common attitudes and values: art, morality, obligations.

 

Nations are different from states, which are instruments for the exercise of authority and do not belong to the natural societies of the Biosphere. Modern states often embrace nations, and nations are divided into states. The institution of state is constantly changing: it should have a four-term system structure – because its function is to sustain harmonious cooperation between the four psychostatic sub-groups of the total human society. Political economy or state-craft is unfolding, and will continue to do so as mankind evolves towards structures that supersede the modern state.

 

pp. 281 – 290 pages 286/ 287 for diagrams

 

Civilisations
Civilisations are not held together by influences of a common origin – or economic and vegetative pressures. Normally, they extend over regions – and are geographically dissimilar. They can embrace nations living in different climatic conditions. They rise, grow and fall in ways different from families, clans, and nations. They are also different from the symbioses of the third and fourth stages: they do not belong to the stages of human evolution. They are channels by which Value-influences enter – associated invisibly with the soul-stuff pool, the state they reflect in the visible life of mankind. They have their origins in the evolutionary urge of mankind – not in the needs of men and women, the biosphere, or spiritual destiny. They are the strivings of the immature Soul of Man. They mark the transformation from Soul stuff pool to the future Cosmic Man.

 

They are characterised by specific value-structures: popular tastes, social moralities, human and religious values. A civilisation can last a thousand years or be limited in scope. They have a dyadic character. They are social and political outwardly. Their members have ambitions to impose their values on other societies. Inwardly, they are human and religious – seeking the realisation of essential revelation.

 

Civilisations are quite recent: Toynbee identified 40. Before civilisations, Schools were in Being (though confined to a minority). Civilisations will give place to new kinds of societies and value transmission systems – but only once the higher values enter the Soul of Man through the Soul Stuff Pool. We can surmise progress by the fact that ruthless cruelty is no longer accepted in human affairs as it was 2000 years ago. Also, that the strong should support the weak. The animal nature of the human soul is less evident (!). However, 5000 years of civilisation do not seem to have diminished the egoistic thirst for existence and domination. Many more years will have to pass for influences from the second source to come.

 

Epochs
The third great stage in transition from Man to Biosphere comes from the world society of Epoch (itself symbiosis). This is placed in evolutionary and involutionary transformation: more than the society of mankind existing over time. It has an environment that is the Destiny of Mankind. It is total for man, including vestiges of earlier periods. There can only be one – and lasting many thousands of year: it is therefore difficult to have measurable evidence for them. However, different value structures of different civilisations have recognisable elements that mark the stage reached in general evolution. Civilisations, cultures, states, and super-states, world religions are distinct terms in the total structure. Each epoch makes a different contribution to human progress. This is the Master Idea of the Epoch. Its concreteness corresponds to the elements that it combines.

 

Humanity
Humanity is any major cycle of human transformation. Its duration in the Biosphere may be a hundred thousand years: the essence class, capable of human transformation. The belief here is that man has a unique destiny, and that subordinate societies are involved in this.

 

Spiritualization
The realization of essence in existence: the spiritualization of existence through essence. We include it in the Biosphere Totality with the ‘Communion of Saints’ –
perfected individuals who have accepted responsibility for guiding the spiritualizing process of the earth, including the demiurgic essences.

 

Evolving Stem
Human totalities cannot, on their own, accomplish the task of transforming the Biosphere into a Conscious Creative Being. Many roles are needed for this -> the Evolving Stem (the growing point where the significance of life is situated).

 

Dominant Life-form of the Biosphere
We have expressed the Biosphere as an existential totality: occupying an indeterminate position between life and existence beyond life. But, humanity is in the course of developing a Great Human Soul. The Biosphere might also therefore be seen as being in the course of Evolution towards Unity. Man almost has no sense of responsibility to the Biosphere. He lives at the expense of life; forces unnatural processes, destroys germinal essence, takes and does not restore. He sees the future in terms of human mastery. At the same time, he longs for a destiny beyond nature. Not many – men, philosophers, statesmen, leaders – are really interested in the Biosphere, and this may not change for thousands of years. This is a mistake: the problems of man can only be solved through the spiritualization of the Transformation of the Biosphere.

 

There is no current, effective Psychokinetic group; which is why mankind is living out of harmony with the needs of the Community of Life on Earth. The Specialists have no authority, and are instruments of the psychostatic leaders.
Deterioration of relations with the Biosphere is inevitable for man. It is sometimes argued that man will dispense with all other forms of life – deforestation, loss of fertility, depopulation of oceans, adulteration of foodstuffs, loss of nutritive values, increasing population – this is folly.

 

Man is ‘anti-symbiotic’. There is a bigger danger: the rise of highly organised human societies ignorant of the true significance of man’s existence on Earth. This leads us from sociology to history; to the problems of impermanence and separateness.

 

The Completed Structure
We need a model to hold the complexity of human society. This is the Octad: which enables completedness to be represented in all aspects (although not hazard). We make the distinction between Fact, Value and Harmony by representing the factual or existential situation by a square and the value or essential situation by another. We have an eight term system:

 

 

See pages 286ff for diagrams

 

 

The eight terms all lie outside the working of human society; they are the eight aspects or perspectives from which it can be regarded.

 

The society of mankind is on earth for the accomplishment of a Cosmic task
– the Great Work. This is the work of Hamonisation: which lies within the Arena or octagon bounded by the two squares:

 

 

page 287

 

The eight designations represent stages at which human society enters and leaves the Arena of the Great Work.

 

Humanity and the Will
The seven terms correspond to the seven worlds in which man has a part to play. The line 3-7:

 

World III SUPERNATURAL WILL
World VI Higher Threshold or Upper Limit
World XII Region within which the three orders of society work.
World XXIV “ “ “ “
World XLVIII “ “ “ “
World XCVI Lower Threshold or Lower Limit
The Material World SUBSTRATUM

 

The three central worlds correspond to the state of psychostatic, psychokinetic and psychoteleios humanity when the entire society is ideally organised.

 

The Field of Action of Human Society
The seven terms correspond to the seven essence classes from crystalline earth surface to the Demiurgic Essence. The line is 4-8:

 

Demiurgic Essences
Human Essence
Animal Essences The Arena of Work
Germinal Essence “
Vegetable Essence “
Soil Essence
Earth Crust

 

Man is here at the boundary of the arena. Man can and should be a factual connectivity – master power: ordering life of the Biosphere (where man can control it). The Germ is at the central point: point of growth.

 

Development of Humanity
Here, the septenary is mainly historical: Line 5-1

 

Human Origins
Pre-Tribal Life
Tribal Systems with specialised activities
Civilisations and Higher regional Structures
World Organization
Integrated Human Symbiosis
The Realised Biosphere with Man as Ruler

 

Here, we have the basic principles of human society organization: the outer points are the gregarious instinct, the origin of society, the cosmic purpose of man. Threshold points give the initiation and culmination of man’s own effort to organize himself as a social being.

 

Tribal or National Societies are regionally determined: each contributes a special element required by the totality. Shared consciousness is here vital (E4) – specialization and integration of national groups.

 

Civilizations or Cultures are the expression of a system of values. They require creative energy (E3).

 

World Organization is possible where there is unitive energy (E2).

 

The three central points of human evolution are still embryonic. The attempt to create a world organization on the basis of lower energies is bound to fail.

 

Civilisations are still primitive compared to what will come: as structure evolves towards completion.

 

Societies of the Biosphere
The second factual element in the structure of human society. Diagonal 2-6.

 

Biosphere
Dominant Life Form i.e. Humanity
Evolving Stem
Mankind at given stage
Epochal Structure
Family, Clan and Nation
Man-Woman

 

Here, man has no power to change the situation he finds. The seven points are the basic facts of social experience.

 

 

Conclusion
The remaining connectivities are not to be treated because of lack of space.

 

The Octad is able to show how a completed structure is woven together and how its harmony is realised.

 

The structure is as much historical as social.

 

Mankind has evolved in his organism, psyche, personal life, culture, and social organisation. The 4-8 septenary will set up a structure for the study of history.

 

In conclusion, we can say that experience reveals a complex, integrated structure. We see our own complexity and significance – coming from a search for simplicity. We have looked at the structure of human evolution: the next volume looks at the history of evolutionary development.

 

But, an essential property of structure is its inherent incompleteness. Its cosmic aspect is seen in the Drama of the Universe. In human experience, it is seen in the search for integration into larger systems of human societies. This compels us to look beyond the Present Moment for a Purpose that will make sense of it all. Here, we encounter Destiny and Obligation. The universe seems to be riddled with hazard and uncertainty, rather than developed in a pre-set way. Creative and conscious beings are therefore required to provide a counter-balance against the unchallenged march of disorder and disintegration – the flow of time..

 

This returns us to notions of time, eternity and hyparxis, as a way of understanding the cosmic process. This, after our recent long excursion into the nature of structure and the principle of harmony. Although complex, man and his societies show that they are built to a plan, and we can understand it. By understanding it better, we understand ourselves better and our part in the Dramatic Universe.