Thursday, March 17, 2011

Counterfeit Theophany and Genuine Theophunny

Enough with the sowers of scandalous schism in the valley of violent vendetta. On to the counterfeiters.

Why counterfeiters? According to Upton, "implicit in this sin is the degradation of knowledge from the sacred to the profane."

And now that I think about it, this sin ought to be a biggie, because of the essential sanctity of Truth from which all truth is derived. In reality, there can be no "profane truth," unless one has a priori profaned oneself and the world with it.

We interrupt this broadbrush for an armor-piercing bullet in from Don Colacho: If one does not believe in God, the only honest alternative is vulgar utilitarianism. The rest is rhetoric.

The word counterfeit has some interesting etymological implications. The Oxford dictionary says that it is derived from the Latin in opposition to + to make.

Thus, we are once again dealing with a kind of perversion of man's deiform creativity. When God creates, It. Is. Good. But when the counterfeiter creates, it is not just worthless, but generates a kind of negative value -- for example, inflation in the case of counterfeit money.

But counterfeiting in every domain creates inflation and negative value. For example, there is both knowledge (k) and its opposite (-k).

Importantly, (-k) isn't just the absence of knowledge, but the active presence of "false knowledge," most notoriously, leftism in all its mixed up guises and dollsies. There is also love (L) and (-L), gnosis (n) and (-n), reality (O) and (Ø), divine energies (↓) and (-↓), etc.

And while I don't have a handy pneumaticon for it, there is also "false" or "minus beauty," which is not mere ugliness, but a terrestrial beauty devoid of goodness, of transcendence, of the noetic Light that shines through true beauty.

Female beauty is one of the most metaphysically transparent phenomena in all of creation, but think of the countless ways it can be perverted by both men and women for purposes of manipulation or domination or titillation or whatever.

Yes, The sensual is the presence of a value in the sensible (Don Colacho).

On the one hand, The unforeseeable grace of an intelligent smile is enough to blast away the layers of tedium which the days deposit. On the other, there is The destructive capacity of the imbecile’s smile (DC).

Either way, The quality of an intelligence depends less on what it understands than on what makes it smile (DC).

Guffah-HA! For verily, the Raccoon's laughty revelations are mighty, they are wise, they are silly!

In Genesis, the Jehovial One provides big LAUGHS to old Abraha-ha-ham. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Jest!

Do you want to know what goes on in the core of the Trinity? I will tell you. In the core of the Trinity, the Father laughs and gives birth to the Son. The Son laughs back at the Father and gives birth to the Spirit. The whole Trinity laughs and gives birth to us (Eckhart).

And When the inferior scholar is told of Tao / He laughs aloud at it. / If it were not laughed at, it would not be sufficient to be Tao (Tao Te Ching).

So anyway, Dante makes reference to a spiritual huckster who claimed to be able to teach people to fly. Not only was he a prototypical Deepak, but a footnote on p. 157 mentions that Deepak's own guru, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, "made the same claim... to teach students how to levitate."

But you will have gnosissed that there is no genuine levity in the new age in general or Deepak in particular. Both are as pre-ironic and un-funny as the most unfunfundamentalist. The only humor in Deepak is strictly unintentional. No wonder he is featured in the deeply unfunny (-F) Love Guru!

That fellow who pretended to teach people to fly, according to Upton, "manifests the sort of spiritual inflation [there's that word again] or hubris that is visible to all, while hidden in his soul was a much more serious transgression, the sin of pseudo-alchemy [-A?], a counterfeit of inner spiritual transformation." Such spiritual con artists generally have a kind of meretricious charisma that draws others into their web of deiceit.

I remember being impressed a number of years ago by something Joseph Chilton Pearce mentioned in one of his books, that culture often provides a "counterfeit model of development" that prevents the real thing. Every counterfeit cultural object or activity is a kind of parasite on something real, so we have counterfeit love, counterfeit sensuality, counterfeit literature, counterfeit art, etc.

And as Deepak and other (-L)ove Gurus farcibly demonstrate, the hardest to attain is the easiest to counterfeit.

What's next, a counterfeit President?

Comedy? Comedy how? What's comedic about it?

17 comments:

Gagdad Bob said...

Perfect: state-caused status inflation (HT Vanderleun): "Subsidizing the markers of status doesn’t produce the character traits that result in that status; it undermines them" (The View From Alexandria). When everyone is above average, no one is.

Anonymous said...

Just saw your response from yesterday wherein you called me a kook, a drunk and blowhard.

All I can say is, you should have seen me before I read OCUG!

Seriously though, I obviously rub you and likely others here the wrong way in a fairly major way. I'm not all that surprised as I often tend to be a bit of a jerk. Nevertheless I'll at least continue to read OC as the posts are in general uniquely illuminating.

Best of luck!

JWM said...

Counterfeit.
I am reminded of groups like international ANSWER, Code Pink or so many other groups in the so-called "peace" movement. They howl, and chant all their faux hippie peace n' love crap, but they are hate mongers of the worst order
.
wv says: aicults= anti intelligence cults

JWM

julie said...

JWM - and they're only peaceful when it suits their purposes. How chilling it was to see that video a couple of weeks ago where they were menacingly mobbing the Republican in Wisconsin, shouting "F*ck you!" until someone noted the presence of cameras. At which point their shrieking switched to, "Peace! Full!" as though anything in their behavior had to do with peace. They were definitely full of something, though...

Unknown said...

GB wrote: "Dante makes reference to a spiritual huckster who claimed to be able to teach people to fly. Not only was he a prototypical Deepak, but a footnote on p. 157 mentions that Deepak's own guru, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, "made the same claim... to teach students how to levitate.""

Here's a delicious source:

[From the Fall 1991 issue of ScienceWriters: http://www.aaskolnick.com/naswmav.htm
The Maharishi Caper: Or How to Hoodwink Top Medical Journals by Andrew A. Skolnick]

"From time to time, even the most prestigious science journals publish erroneous or fraudulent data, unjustified conclusions, and sometimes balderdash. Balderdash was the right word when The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published the article, "Maharishi Ayur-Veda: Modern Insights Into Ancient Medicine," in its May 22/29 issue. Discovering that they had been deceived by the article's authors, the editors published a correction in the August 14 issue, which was followed on October 2 by a six-page expose on the people who had hoodwinked them. [...]

"..The authors, Deepak Chopra, MD, president of the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine, Lancaster, Mass., Hari M. Sharma, MD, professor of pathology at Ohio State University College of Medicine, Columbus, and Brihaspati Dev Triguna, an Ayurvedic practitioner in New Delhi, India, represented themselves as disinterested authorities and had signed a statement that they were not affiliated with any organization that could profit by the publication of their article. (JAMA's conflict-of-interest policy requires authors of accepted manuscripts to declare all such connections.)

[...] At the time, I didn't know anything about Maharishi's medical claims, but I was aware that the TM movement widely uses deception to promote its $3000 courses in TM-Sidhi or "yogic flying." TM promoters claim that, by mastering this technique, people can develop the ability to walk through walls, make themselves invisible, develop the "strength of an elephant," reverse the aging process, and fly through the air without the benefit of machines. In addition, TM promoters claim that by yogic flying in large groups they can prevent bad weather, traffic fatalities, and even war.

[....] Few people are aware of how far the TM movement has been able to penetrate into the halls of medicine and academia. According to the letterhead for the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine, its research council and advisory council include physicians at many prestigious medical schools and institutions. [....] [N.B.: In the summer of 1992, Deepak Chopra and two TM associations filed a $194 million libel suit against the AMA, JAMA's editor, and me. The suit was dismissed without prejudice in March 1993. -AAS]"

Cousin Dupree said...

Ayurbusted!

Anonymous said...

Steve, and also NB, Bob is rude and heartless.

Imagine his psychology practice. Would you want to be a hapless leftist referred to RG, unaware of his deep contept for leftists?

I'll call a spade a spade. RG is an egomaniac.

Those who makes good money, write intelligently and sell well, are connected in government or high in the corporate echelon, receive his automatic spite because he can't stand being or having less than someone else.

So, raccoons, if you happen to be a bestselling author or musician, tenured professor, CIA officer, or corporate CEO, better hide your light under a bushel or RG will give ya a tongue lashing and a summary rejection. How dare you be successful.

That being said, RG is a good writer and fresh and entertaining. He does provide a needed counterbalance to leftist entitlement psychoses.

So..the good with the bad. Just like anything else.

Anonymous said...

Well, anonygoose:
Infrequent commenter here, but:
At one time Dr. Godwin offered his professional services to me free of charge in order to assist me in a sticky employment situation. Go out on the street, and find some clinical psychologists willing to do the same.
Are leftoids the frequent target of Bob's laser beam wit? You bet. But what is posted on a blog for public consumption is not the same as what is said in a confidential therapist/client session.

These trolls. Is there anything they don't know?

Magnus Itland said...

Humor is probably the most humane way to briefly dispel the illusion that all things are as they seem. All too often it takes a death in the family, or a tsunami or something, to crack the egg enough to let some Light in. But the glints of Light when you crack up are small and brief, so only found by those who look for them, and even then it may require a trained eye.

wv:gentscom - you should probably not connect the dot on this one...

Cousin Dupree said...

For what it's worth, I've noticed that Gagdad's mercy precedes his severity on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. On Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays it's the other way around. On Sundays he's just a jerk for no apparent reason.

SpiritFlyer Club Owner said...

Spirit-flying is indeed possible. My SpiritFlyer (TM) training enables students to levitate to over 3000 meters and bodily fly up to 75 km away (and return!)

That's right, you CAN physically fly in the sky with birds and aeroplanes, by the power of meditation.

Students are seated in a "realistic" twin-engine Beechcraft "simulation" during the sessions (to foster confidence).*

*(Disclaimer: Quote symbols may or may not have been placed according to standard English usage).

Flight plans are filed with the FAA and its all legal and legit.

So, this should lay to rests any doubts about the power of the human mind to create levitation.

Magnus Itland said...

Snake oil on a spirit plane...

Van Harvey said...

"Either way, The quality of an intelligence depends less on what it understands than on what makes it smile (DC)."

Excellent.

One of the first clues you get (assuming you didn't figure it out on your own first) that all the stuff you thought you knew, wasn't what you needed to know, is the first time you see the smile on the face of your child... or on the face of the one you helped make it with... both put a truly gnoing smile on your own face.

All the rest of the stuff you know pales in comparison. And then strangely enough, gains a strength of meaning it never had before.

hapless leftist said...

I have also taken advantage of R.G.'s free psychological services. I highly recommend him, very professional.

ge said...

Bataille = last century's P[p]oet of H[h]oly L[l]aughter [is Bob this c's?]
wv
sounds like someone i hope to meeet today
'Serapha'

ps
we're immersed in the darndest book these days: SANTA FE LIGHT of clairvoyant Leviton, who is the R.Steiner-est breathing guy I can think of

Sigmund Fraud said...

One of the bases of a professional therapeutic relationship is "unconditional warm regard." (Rogers).

A therapist could fake warm regard but people are pretty good at reading feelings which come out in various slips of the tongue and facial expressions, etc.

Once phoniness is detected by the patient it voids the therapeutic relationship and places the patient at jeopardy of worse harm, unless the therapist can be candid and say, "I don't like you, but maybe we can work through this, or you can get another therapist."

So, in my imagination at least, Bob must encounter, statistically, his share of atheists, leftists, and delusional new-age wackos, and maybe even some tenured faculty, in his patient load.

How is he going to handle his feelings for these people, based on what we have read on his blog?

It does not seem plausible that he can muster authentic warm regard. Or does it? I don't know.

Like a jew entering Dr. Mengele's office to have his sore throat looked at, one worries about the outcome.

PSGInfinity said...

S. Fraud:

Comparing Bob to Joseph Mengele?
(raises eyebrow)

Well, they *are* almost perfect opposites. And most Leftists would regard the Truth as a form of deadly assault...

wv: conaln, who would mock his enemies, see them driven in Yugos, and to hear the lamentation of their womanized men...

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