“Vom Tode und nur vom Tode fängt alles Erkennen an.” — Schiller
(Roughly translated, “The presence of Death is the beginning of all knowledge.”)
Carlos Castaneda: Death is the Benefactor
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Carlos Castaneda: The Warrior’s Way
I wish to return, today, to the beginnings of that thread I began earlier with the reproduction of Carlos Castaneda’s definitive statement concerning his extra-ordinary experiences as an apprentice of the Indian “sorcerer” don Juan Matus. Every now and then, I’ll be interweaving comments about events and issues in our shared contemporary social life to demonstrate its relevance, and why it is truly a pragmatic statement about our human condition which is universally corroborated in the experiences and testimony of others.
The Disintegration of the Modern Self, II
While looking up something else today, I happened across a Seth blog that contains the full context for the quote about the biological/physiological changes that must occur in the human race if the species is to endure. The whole passage is fascinating, and is apparently extracted from a book called The Unknown Reality , which I have yet to read.
Here’s the full text, as posted on a blog called “Gestalt Reality”. I highly recommend that you read it, as it explains some of the more puzzling issues about how such biological changes are necessary for the race to endure.
http://www.gestaltreality.com/2012/12/12/2012-to-%E2%88%9E-a-new-spiritual-paradigm/
You Are Being Manipulated, II
Some time ago, I posted a piece in the long-since-retired Dark Age Blog entitled “You Are Being Manipulated” about the more or less covert propaganda system that subtly shapes and drives thought and behaviour in contemporary democracies.
I woke up this morning to this interesting piece in The Guardian about “the hidden propaganda system“. Worth a read.
And, actually, if you Google up the words “you are being manipulated”, you get quite a bit more on this.
A Passing Remark on William Blake: The Song of My Wheels
“Error is created. Truth is eternal. Error, or Creation, will be Burned up, & then, & not till Then, Truth or Eternity will appear. It is Burnt up the Moment Men cease to behold it. I assert for My Self that I do not behold the outward Creation & that to me it is hindrance & not Action; it is as the dirt upon my feet, No part of Me. “What,” it will be Question’d, “When the Sun rises, do you not see a round disk of fire somewhat like a Guinea?” O no, no, I see an Innumerable company of the Heavenly host crying, `Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty.’ I question not my Corporeal or Vegetative eye any more than I would Question a window concerning a Sight. I look thro’ it & not with it.”– William Blake, A Vision of the Last Judgment
Carlos Castaneda
The 30th Anniversary Edition (1998) of Carlos Castaneda’s first book The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge (1968) included a new and remarkable final summary accounting of the author’s experience as “sorcerer’s apprentice”. Since Castaneda died in April of 1998 (reportedly of liver cancer) this summation must have been his definitive statement, testimony, and final witness to his controversial life and work. Even the style of the commentary itself is concise, economical, direct, and uncompromising; or, as one might say, “impeccable”.
I’ve taken the liberty of reproducing it here (with some editorial corrections) from another website identified as “Toltec Total Freedom“. For those who want to engage both eyes and ears, and follow the text along with a voice-over (by an anonymous narrator), an mp3 file is located here.
Andrew Coyne on “the Nasty Party”
Amongst conservative commentators in Canada, the Postmedia columnist Andrew Coyne has been (usually) quite outstanding and exemplary. Here is his “Last Judgment” on the Conservative government of Stephen Harper and its Nastyism. I concur with every word of it…
