Just finished reading Ptolemy Tompkins "The Modern Book of the Dead" (yes, I should just eliminate the Book section and keep it on the Blog) and was driven to some thoughts as I stumbled down to the mailbox for the newspaper in the frigid pre-dawn. Tompkins is the son of the author of "The Secret Life of Plants," a book that I read in the early 70's that had a considerable effect on me. In it, it was claimed that plants, that all living things (and perhaps the non-living) were feeling entities that shared a shocking array of human emotions. This conforms to the new age selection of quantum mechanics that posits that all points (or energy quanta) are connected throughout space and time - that is, that nothing that WE are or do or think is exclusive or sealed off from the rest of existence (with the now-common notion that the intent of the experimenter helps determine his results - a major blow to objectivity in science). But we also learn in the first few chapters that Ptolemy's father lived a chaotic, often harmful life, and that near death he feared his demise as much as any gross materialist who fears the soundless, lightless void. This observation was not meant to hurt his father, but to underscore that in our world society, we have been deeply effected by scientific materialism, whether we believe in it or not. His book is an attempt to convince us that there is much more, and that there are startling material-realm facts to help prove it.
His book is a walk- through of the literature on the afterlife that arrives at a conclusion intended to reach into our materialistic mindset. He begins with several religious interpretations of the afterlife, especially those which focused intently on this theme - particularly the ancient Egyptian and Tibetan religions and their books of the dead. He ends with varying accounts from mediums since the 19th century who have purportedly talked to the dead and brought back their impressions. What he found was of startling consistency. The afterlife, as it turns out, is much more complex than many of us had thought. There are stages that we have to go through - the "going to the light" part and meeting of old friends and relatives is only the beginning. According to his research, the stages can be counted as "7" - the seven heavens - with the first 4 concerned with form, and the latter three with essence (the last, union with Godhead). His thesis is that our long - lives struggle (he insists that reincarnation is essential for the learning process, although not the endless rounds of the Buddhists or Hindus) have an evolutionary aspect to them - that is, that our lives are a learning process where, in the end, we join God, but not as a drop in the endless sea - but rather as a drop that has been altered by its experiences and brings with it a personal flavor - meaning that what we are as individuals is actually important, in contrast to many of the mystical notions throughout the world (in Christianity, many mystics have said much the same as Ptolemy - that somehow we become MORE ourselves as we chuck, or burn off, the ephemeral persona of the material world). Thus he sees that, in our current era, we might reformulate a new, relevant world religion that speaks to our pentient for objectivity and individuality while still including the vastly more important realms in which we exist beyond this objectified mortal coil.
An interesting book, but that is not really why I write - it is, rather, because something struck me while reading the book - terror. Not of the meaningless black void, but of a vast universe in which, after this world and life, I am not done with struggle and work - and lots of it. The single most unpleasant aspect would be the two reviews of our former lives that we apparently would have to endure - with all the pain that we might have inflicted on others felt by ourselves. This alone is depressing. Just as bad, there are dangers and misdirections that can snare us in the after-worlds, just as there are here, but spookier. Good Lord, do I have to continue this struggle for eternity? Well, says the author, not for eternity, but for a long, long time - and in a place where time doesn't matter as it does here, perhaps for a perceived eternity. Just as I learned in Catholic catechism as a child, about purgatory. And now, just when the Church is de-emphasizing this land of the dead, the new New Age is bringing it back!
Sorry to say, he might well be right, in general if not on particulars. The world and the world religions point to this - that the struggle of one kind of another continues until a final purity, or essence, is reached. And that is the point to this blog. I have read, ad nauseam, how atheists believe that Believers are cowards who cannot face up to the fact that we are simply material beings who came about by chance, live pointless lives, and then die absolutely with the death of the body. Ah, they say, we need our heavenly bottle to suck on before the flat, final face of reality! Now, that may be true, to an extent, of some squishy New Agers and their philosophies, but not with the followers of the true religions and with those, like Tompkins, who have researched the subject broadly. Pitfalls and demons to surmount after death? It certainly seems so. Can't I just die?
Of course, this is what scientific materialism (though not necessarily the scientific method as a research tool) has always been about - to reduce, and then annihilate, the unknown. Purportedly about "understanding reality" without the vagaries of myth and religion, it is really about making the complex issues of life and death simply go away. It is, really, all about locking up the boogy man that makes us cry at night. Except, in this case, the boogy man is real. Science cannot answer the most fundamental questions - this is known to all who are truthful about it - while evidence exists by the cosmic boatloads that there are many, many things beyond the materialist grasp, including, life - of some kind - after death. But the atheist will not look at this, but merely brush it away with the hand saying, ah, but some day we WILL have an answer to these bizarre phenomena!
No you won't. And just as the cancer sufferer may at first have hope that his diagnosis was all a mistake, so the atheist will persist in his denial - not out of ignorance, but out of fear. Yes, it is the fear of those unknown world that drives his denial, for he knows, somewhere inside, that there is a big, spooky universe out there. Really, I sympathize. After reading Tompkin's book, I had the same sense of fear as the atheist, and the same impulse - just make it simple! Let us just live and die, flatly, without meaning perhpas, but peacefully! And yet - that would be wishing away reality, much as the atheist claims the believer does, for as odd as some of their beliefs are, they all point to that something more - that something more we all really know is out there, but may fear. But fear does not make reality go away.
I like the books by the saints (the deep mystics) better, for they are more comforting. Although many go through excruciating trials to get there, they are triumphant in THIS LIFE. They bypass the seven heavens in a very limited time (the ordinary lifetime) and find glory and peace. And while in my own religion, we have only to believe in Jesus and he will do the work for us (very comforting), we must still believe absolutely in him and his message - something as trying as the seven heavens.
Looks like we all have a lot of work to do. FK
His book is a walk- through of the literature on the afterlife that arrives at a conclusion intended to reach into our materialistic mindset. He begins with several religious interpretations of the afterlife, especially those which focused intently on this theme - particularly the ancient Egyptian and Tibetan religions and their books of the dead. He ends with varying accounts from mediums since the 19th century who have purportedly talked to the dead and brought back their impressions. What he found was of startling consistency. The afterlife, as it turns out, is much more complex than many of us had thought. There are stages that we have to go through - the "going to the light" part and meeting of old friends and relatives is only the beginning. According to his research, the stages can be counted as "7" - the seven heavens - with the first 4 concerned with form, and the latter three with essence (the last, union with Godhead). His thesis is that our long - lives struggle (he insists that reincarnation is essential for the learning process, although not the endless rounds of the Buddhists or Hindus) have an evolutionary aspect to them - that is, that our lives are a learning process where, in the end, we join God, but not as a drop in the endless sea - but rather as a drop that has been altered by its experiences and brings with it a personal flavor - meaning that what we are as individuals is actually important, in contrast to many of the mystical notions throughout the world (in Christianity, many mystics have said much the same as Ptolemy - that somehow we become MORE ourselves as we chuck, or burn off, the ephemeral persona of the material world). Thus he sees that, in our current era, we might reformulate a new, relevant world religion that speaks to our pentient for objectivity and individuality while still including the vastly more important realms in which we exist beyond this objectified mortal coil.
An interesting book, but that is not really why I write - it is, rather, because something struck me while reading the book - terror. Not of the meaningless black void, but of a vast universe in which, after this world and life, I am not done with struggle and work - and lots of it. The single most unpleasant aspect would be the two reviews of our former lives that we apparently would have to endure - with all the pain that we might have inflicted on others felt by ourselves. This alone is depressing. Just as bad, there are dangers and misdirections that can snare us in the after-worlds, just as there are here, but spookier. Good Lord, do I have to continue this struggle for eternity? Well, says the author, not for eternity, but for a long, long time - and in a place where time doesn't matter as it does here, perhaps for a perceived eternity. Just as I learned in Catholic catechism as a child, about purgatory. And now, just when the Church is de-emphasizing this land of the dead, the new New Age is bringing it back!
Sorry to say, he might well be right, in general if not on particulars. The world and the world religions point to this - that the struggle of one kind of another continues until a final purity, or essence, is reached. And that is the point to this blog. I have read, ad nauseam, how atheists believe that Believers are cowards who cannot face up to the fact that we are simply material beings who came about by chance, live pointless lives, and then die absolutely with the death of the body. Ah, they say, we need our heavenly bottle to suck on before the flat, final face of reality! Now, that may be true, to an extent, of some squishy New Agers and their philosophies, but not with the followers of the true religions and with those, like Tompkins, who have researched the subject broadly. Pitfalls and demons to surmount after death? It certainly seems so. Can't I just die?
Of course, this is what scientific materialism (though not necessarily the scientific method as a research tool) has always been about - to reduce, and then annihilate, the unknown. Purportedly about "understanding reality" without the vagaries of myth and religion, it is really about making the complex issues of life and death simply go away. It is, really, all about locking up the boogy man that makes us cry at night. Except, in this case, the boogy man is real. Science cannot answer the most fundamental questions - this is known to all who are truthful about it - while evidence exists by the cosmic boatloads that there are many, many things beyond the materialist grasp, including, life - of some kind - after death. But the atheist will not look at this, but merely brush it away with the hand saying, ah, but some day we WILL have an answer to these bizarre phenomena!
No you won't. And just as the cancer sufferer may at first have hope that his diagnosis was all a mistake, so the atheist will persist in his denial - not out of ignorance, but out of fear. Yes, it is the fear of those unknown world that drives his denial, for he knows, somewhere inside, that there is a big, spooky universe out there. Really, I sympathize. After reading Tompkin's book, I had the same sense of fear as the atheist, and the same impulse - just make it simple! Let us just live and die, flatly, without meaning perhpas, but peacefully! And yet - that would be wishing away reality, much as the atheist claims the believer does, for as odd as some of their beliefs are, they all point to that something more - that something more we all really know is out there, but may fear. But fear does not make reality go away.
I like the books by the saints (the deep mystics) better, for they are more comforting. Although many go through excruciating trials to get there, they are triumphant in THIS LIFE. They bypass the seven heavens in a very limited time (the ordinary lifetime) and find glory and peace. And while in my own religion, we have only to believe in Jesus and he will do the work for us (very comforting), we must still believe absolutely in him and his message - something as trying as the seven heavens.
Looks like we all have a lot of work to do. FK
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