So TVU presented their completion of procedures letter to me by email which I have now forwarded to the OIAHE the Government Quango Ombudsman that ensures fair play for students. The strange thing gentlemen, is that I am making an appeal now very simply because nobody wants to read the whole story, and Homo postmodernus has an 8 second attention span, stay with me, on an Article 6 violation of my fundamental inalienable rights as un citoyen d' Europe. So my case rests on whether the University suspended my student status withdrawing all priveleges for 18 months for a very serious allegation towit major breach of the student code and failed to provide me with an opportunity to hear the case against me and present a defence at a duly constituted tribunal within a reasonable time. The University in their final completion of procedures letter appear to confirm that is what they did. Now they have decided to comment on my preference for profanity in my correspondence with them. Amusing as this may be, the chief legal officer seems to admit the charge. So I forwarded the email to the senior reviewer at OIAHE acting per pro the Deputy Ombudsman as this is currently on appeal to them. What will be of interest to those with a canon law bent or interest in office politics, is why they will refuse to consider the case now. It looks like they have already done some sort of deal but not on paper, I tend to feel that deals like that won't amount to much. There is no reason to stick your neck out for a minor official of a new university. But let's see. I can still appeal to the Company Secretary.
Oh the consequences if I am right, Article 6 violation is that I should be compensated, or the Prema Seva Ashram should receive compensation. I refused the 1500 pounds course fees plus legal costs offered without prejudice by TVU, and I always understood if it's without prejudice they shouldn't then refer to it again but there you go. If OIAHE offer me that I'll take it and then proceed with the complaint to the BPS. But I'll ask for the delay to be taken into account so either interest or the cost of the course at an alternative British University pushing it up to 3-4k and then some money for disappointment vexation and distress as my profanity in the correspondence surely displays. I don't think they'll be able to offer loss of earnings during the suspension but if you don't ask you don't get.
The senior reviewer has for now merely ignored my last request because TVU missed another of their deadlines to respond. I got the CoP the day she returned from her hols so I am assuming she pressed them to send me something. The model of the petulant widow and the unjust magistrate holds good for prayer and other things.
As for the cousins, I don't tink vampyre carrion pigs is really a title I want to give those overcome by the invincible illusion. Though I am drawn to the Scotist view of Haecitas defining inviduality. Scotus argued Aquinas misunderstood Aristotle in making matter the prime cause of individuation i.e. matter outwith form. The difference between individuals becomes one of quantity of matter in essence. Haecitas is undefined, but has a mystic justness to it. The individualness of an individual is essentially their thisness. Apart from that Uncle John has agreed to provide a bridging loan. If the boys here get my OCI I can afford to stay in Injia on my share of the house sale. And after next term I am keen to try for Kottayam Seeri and improve my Syriac. Widows are all well and good but I'll never find one by waiting. Much more likely to find one when researching some document in its original Syriac.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
second assignment for Fr Cyriac
Religion: a means of integral liberation (moksha) through dharma sadhanas.
For Rev Fr Cyriac Kanichari CMI
by Desmond M Coutinho
I am going to have to tidy this one up and soften it. It comes across as a little too smarmy know-it-all west is best, but I just want to say the same thing in a more shaky shaky head gentle Indian way.
Borrowing from the Rev Dr Ian Paisley former First Minister of Ulster, Never Never Never. This is clearly a trick question. The course distinguished between the artful particulars of Faith and the general call of Religion. Since the dharma sadhanas are the fons et culmen of the Sanatana Dharma known today as Hindutva to which some unkindly add Fascism then it clearly cannot be a means of integral liberation unless the Lecturer is referring to the occasional attempts at genocide by this movement. A better question then is why does a Roman Catholic ascripted in the Syro-Malabar rite wish to propose a Hindutva model of theology as universally liberating. There are several possibilities.
First to continue the struggle for Indian Independence against colonial and neo-colonial cultural predators. Aristotle and Aquinas, gifted though they are, are artful interpreters of Religion. Thus the introduction of equally sound principles from another angle from ancient Indian thought can by weakening their stranglehold on formation theology allow Roman Catholics in India to breathe and consider afresh the fundamentals of Religion. Thus the reason for the question was not for students to embrace Hindutva values but to question their Greek and European one.
The foundation techniques of Brahminized India come from Pantajali's Yoga Sutra. As a basis for integrative liberation or salvation any one could be taken and explicated meaningfully. Ahimsa non-violence in word thought deed or ommission either personal or through an agent or through silent complicity appears harmless enough.
Ghandhi-Ji is presented as pre-eminent among the practitioners of Ahimsa. Ghandhi-Ji is only a man regardless what Einstein thought. Ghandhi-Ji's non-violence in theory did not prevent him from urging war with Pakistan because a United India was more important to him than contingent peace. Ghandhi-Ji also deliberately held back the movement for Dalit Liberation, threatening fasting unto death at Poona unless the Brahmin cause was upheld.
The model of Moksha theoretically offered by Hindutva observances flies in the face of all the evidence. The example of Nicholas of Cusa is relevant. He began his legal career as a member of the Conciliar Party at the Council of Basel. The Conciliar movement was democratic, God working from within rather than from on High, Cusa defended it because he wanted a more just world. He believed in Religion that derived from God's call in the human heart applied equally to all although interpreted better by the more intelligent. In order to preserve this vision Cusa switched sides and supported the minority party with the Pope. A counter-intuitive result occured then and the freedom for the lecturer to think and break free from Western Thinking models was provided by his sound basis in Western Thinking.
There is a deeper problem in the Brahminized view of a true and ancient Indian Philosophy. And the Eastern mind should not be put off by the Western concept of problem solving. Until the British came Indians were not aware of this History because they didn't have a history. History belongs to a people and Indians are only now becoming a people once more. Brahminization is essentially individualistic. Although it offers yoga with Brahman it offers it to individual practitioners. None of the Sadhanas suggested in the Vedanta-sutra or the Sankara-Bhasya or the Pantajali's Yoga are what we term liturgical. They all require one student one master.
A true integrative liberation can only come for a people. The people of India having rid themselves of British rule (which through the coincidentia oppositorum also created the people of India from bickering small kingdoms governed by petty tyrants) cannot now yield again to the rule of another rich efete intelligentsia.
India is multi-dimensional and is a fertile earth for the discovery of an integrated salvation. However for too long has the European Orientalist determined what counts as philosophy. Zoroastrianism is dying in India but it's Word has long been silenced. Eastern Theologies need to take their proper place in the discussions. And the newer insights of Dalit and Tribal theology have a Word to bring. Although these latter groups claim a more eco-friendly non-patriarchal democratic and communitarian approach time will tell.
It seems to me that an integrative theology of liberation that has no place for the Exodus story cannot be said to have anything to do with the Reality of Religion. The Exodus story is not a mere artful representation of Faith it is in the Ecology of Salvation, and therefore structurally so, the means of God's self-revelation in our midst. It is the Dalit and Tribal Theologians who embrace with heart mind and soul this Biblical typos. The Church is always too Quietistic because people with power and money can be quite pacifying. However the spiritual techniques of Sadhanas being spiritual techniques are a heavy anchor towards Quietism.
Ghandi-Ji provides a counter here also. His Gram Swaraj was at least an experiential and fully lived attempt at bringing out Asteya and Aparigraha among the people whose rights he had abrogated.
For Rev Fr Cyriac Kanichari CMI
by Desmond M Coutinho
I am going to have to tidy this one up and soften it. It comes across as a little too smarmy know-it-all west is best, but I just want to say the same thing in a more shaky shaky head gentle Indian way.
Borrowing from the Rev Dr Ian Paisley former First Minister of Ulster, Never Never Never. This is clearly a trick question. The course distinguished between the artful particulars of Faith and the general call of Religion. Since the dharma sadhanas are the fons et culmen of the Sanatana Dharma known today as Hindutva to which some unkindly add Fascism then it clearly cannot be a means of integral liberation unless the Lecturer is referring to the occasional attempts at genocide by this movement. A better question then is why does a Roman Catholic ascripted in the Syro-Malabar rite wish to propose a Hindutva model of theology as universally liberating. There are several possibilities.
First to continue the struggle for Indian Independence against colonial and neo-colonial cultural predators. Aristotle and Aquinas, gifted though they are, are artful interpreters of Religion. Thus the introduction of equally sound principles from another angle from ancient Indian thought can by weakening their stranglehold on formation theology allow Roman Catholics in India to breathe and consider afresh the fundamentals of Religion. Thus the reason for the question was not for students to embrace Hindutva values but to question their Greek and European one.
The foundation techniques of Brahminized India come from Pantajali's Yoga Sutra. As a basis for integrative liberation or salvation any one could be taken and explicated meaningfully. Ahimsa non-violence in word thought deed or ommission either personal or through an agent or through silent complicity appears harmless enough.
Ghandhi-Ji is presented as pre-eminent among the practitioners of Ahimsa. Ghandhi-Ji is only a man regardless what Einstein thought. Ghandhi-Ji's non-violence in theory did not prevent him from urging war with Pakistan because a United India was more important to him than contingent peace. Ghandhi-Ji also deliberately held back the movement for Dalit Liberation, threatening fasting unto death at Poona unless the Brahmin cause was upheld.
The model of Moksha theoretically offered by Hindutva observances flies in the face of all the evidence. The example of Nicholas of Cusa is relevant. He began his legal career as a member of the Conciliar Party at the Council of Basel. The Conciliar movement was democratic, God working from within rather than from on High, Cusa defended it because he wanted a more just world. He believed in Religion that derived from God's call in the human heart applied equally to all although interpreted better by the more intelligent. In order to preserve this vision Cusa switched sides and supported the minority party with the Pope. A counter-intuitive result occured then and the freedom for the lecturer to think and break free from Western Thinking models was provided by his sound basis in Western Thinking.
There is a deeper problem in the Brahminized view of a true and ancient Indian Philosophy. And the Eastern mind should not be put off by the Western concept of problem solving. Until the British came Indians were not aware of this History because they didn't have a history. History belongs to a people and Indians are only now becoming a people once more. Brahminization is essentially individualistic. Although it offers yoga with Brahman it offers it to individual practitioners. None of the Sadhanas suggested in the Vedanta-sutra or the Sankara-Bhasya or the Pantajali's Yoga are what we term liturgical. They all require one student one master.
A true integrative liberation can only come for a people. The people of India having rid themselves of British rule (which through the coincidentia oppositorum also created the people of India from bickering small kingdoms governed by petty tyrants) cannot now yield again to the rule of another rich efete intelligentsia.
India is multi-dimensional and is a fertile earth for the discovery of an integrated salvation. However for too long has the European Orientalist determined what counts as philosophy. Zoroastrianism is dying in India but it's Word has long been silenced. Eastern Theologies need to take their proper place in the discussions. And the newer insights of Dalit and Tribal theology have a Word to bring. Although these latter groups claim a more eco-friendly non-patriarchal democratic and communitarian approach time will tell.
It seems to me that an integrative theology of liberation that has no place for the Exodus story cannot be said to have anything to do with the Reality of Religion. The Exodus story is not a mere artful representation of Faith it is in the Ecology of Salvation, and therefore structurally so, the means of God's self-revelation in our midst. It is the Dalit and Tribal Theologians who embrace with heart mind and soul this Biblical typos. The Church is always too Quietistic because people with power and money can be quite pacifying. However the spiritual techniques of Sadhanas being spiritual techniques are a heavy anchor towards Quietism.
Ghandi-Ji provides a counter here also. His Gram Swaraj was at least an experiential and fully lived attempt at bringing out Asteya and Aparigraha among the people whose rights he had abrogated.
Friday, September 4, 2009
one more assignment
My understanding of Religion as integral relationship in Christ.
For Fr Cyriac Kanichai CMI
By Desmond M Coutinho
As Nicholas Cusa suggested to his parishioners in Brixen where he was appointed Bishop in the quattrocento, my relationship with Christ is mediated by Word. The difference he argued between integral relationship in Christ and integral relationship in Buddha or Brahman is the difference in the integration into Philosophy mediated directly by Plato or Aristotle and indirect mediation via students of their Scuolae. But even if I were to develop a Time Machine and travel back half a millenium and shook the hand of Nicholas spoke with him and shared his table I could take away only my version of him. What he can pass on is the desire to philosophize and challenges to philosophize more authentically.
I took a sensual attraction to the explanation of Maya which avoids even panentheism and retains creaturely independence through its conincidentia oppositorum of Sad and Asad. It’s corrollory is Aquinas’ differentation between earthly inviduation and freely communing personhood of the New Earth. Thus the unreality of Maya depends on the invincible illusion of individuality that my distinctness is maintained only through remaining separate and self-contained. The reality of Maya is the grace knowledge that distinction is enhanced when I love the Lord my God with all my heart with all my mind and with all my strength, i.e. personhood in full communion occurs loving knowing and willing intercommunication with God who is All in All.
But I cannot affirm authentically any religion that does not give honour to St Therese’s chocolate eclair. Most commentators dismiss her deathbed request as something older hagiographies would have failed to remember. I stand accused of a basic error in the formation of a theologizing mind. Concessitur. The sinful joy in the senses takes pleasure in their enjoyment and a second pleasure in the knowledge that my enemy does not. A purer joy takes secondary pleasure in sharing a chocolate éclair with the one whom my soul loves. But as Cusa suggests Humanity is her Intellect and her Intellect is her fundamental organ of sensuality. Homo est suus intellectus, ubi contractio sensualis quodamodo in intellectuali natura suppositatur, intellectuali natura existente quoddam divinum separatum abstractum esse, sensuali vero remanente temporali et corruptibili secundum suam naturam. De docta ignorantia III 4 (ch 1 p 132).
My deviancy from Cusa in my own Christic integral religion is to plea for the Temporal and Corruptible nature of creation to be raised to eternal and incorruptible enjoyment. For just as the personhood offered by Christ enhances the distinctness of individuality by breaking down the barriers between life love and knowledge outwith destroying any of our distinctiveness. I now ask God on behalf of Creation for a similar transformation of the World so that the sensual pleasure instead of being defined as things that I can deprive others of, or share with others, becomes the pleasure of all by right, by their existence. What prevents our enjoyment of heaven now would be the inability of our Intellectus to process that kind of pleasure, it might instead perceive it as pain or faint or die.
Just as Christ hominizes the World. Being the God-Man he takes all into himself to unite all with the Father and with each other. The corrollory of this act is that God is hominized in Christ. To worship God is to worship Humanity. To worship Humanity is to worship God. We no longer live in a world where heresy is a charge determined by dates. The meaning of this Christology is not to denigrate God but to reintegrate a love honour and worship for God’s creation.
The idolatry of the Eucharist prefigures anidolatry of Creation. God’s having is God’s being. And this is his ultimate gift, his ultimate self-sacrifice. This is God’s love requiring our loving acceptance. If he takes it back it is not a true gift. If he gives up his solitary individuality, Indivisus in se autem divisum a quolibet alio, then he truly becomes a person capabale of integrating with Creation. Do not be afraid, My Lord God, for you will not lose your distinctness. We however Your Creation will know the ultimate non-bargaining folly of unconditional Love.
Traditional theology takes God’s creation, maintenance and disolution of the World as functional only. Once it has been achieved God reverts to Deus Complicans, inexpressable. Cusa felt Intellect is limited by the concrete, hence even the Conincidentia Oppositorum is the Wall of Paradise beyond which God resides in utter simplicity. My view is even if the true pleasures of the senses derive from anticipation romance imagination and altruistic love from empathy solidarity, and that deferral and hastening of pleasurable acts are like cookery or dancing, their fons et culmen lie in the Flesh. I will not live in a virtual world. Such a view of God by seeking to enhance and liberate has imprisoned him in a Hell of mere existence outwith true life. In such a heavenly paradise one can enjoy only the idea of a chocolate éclair, although there is no need to fax the ideas to your friends, because we all share each others joys hopes and dreams, there is now no chocolate éclair to share, only it’s unforgettable memory.
Sod that for a game of soldiers.
The other requirement for my integrated religion must force action where Christians can stand by listless. I saw a Lambadi girl hobbling in pain on one foot. The priest in charge of the Mission theologized that it would be unethical immoral and some other negative construct to provide medical aid for her. Religion integrated in Christ must provide visceral anger to the Caste system that poisons the minds and hearts of all whom it has contaminated. Of course it is irritating for any foreigner to come to a strange land and offer to sort our their problems if they have not already done so for their problems at home.
But a Religion that stands by supine and listless while those of lower castes or non-castes suffer is not even a genuine Faith. As fascinating as Vedic knowledge is, as a matter of integral religion I would sacrifice it for the intellectually impoverished theologies of Tribals and Dalits. This is where Religious integration calls me in my new home. I do not believe this is an arrogance of the West come in neo-colonial clothes to add finishing touches to the innate perfection of the Sanatana Dharma. This is Love furious that you mock one with giant's wings and cannot walk and then provide me with lectures on Xtian morality. (By you I mean no one in particular).
To answer the question my understanding lies in the sharing of chocolate eclairs, the wearing of blue powder on my forehead, and dressing in black as a colour of celebration until You come again in Glory, my sun-burnt Jew, my Lover, and my God.
For Fr Cyriac Kanichai CMI
By Desmond M Coutinho
As Nicholas Cusa suggested to his parishioners in Brixen where he was appointed Bishop in the quattrocento, my relationship with Christ is mediated by Word. The difference he argued between integral relationship in Christ and integral relationship in Buddha or Brahman is the difference in the integration into Philosophy mediated directly by Plato or Aristotle and indirect mediation via students of their Scuolae. But even if I were to develop a Time Machine and travel back half a millenium and shook the hand of Nicholas spoke with him and shared his table I could take away only my version of him. What he can pass on is the desire to philosophize and challenges to philosophize more authentically.
I took a sensual attraction to the explanation of Maya which avoids even panentheism and retains creaturely independence through its conincidentia oppositorum of Sad and Asad. It’s corrollory is Aquinas’ differentation between earthly inviduation and freely communing personhood of the New Earth. Thus the unreality of Maya depends on the invincible illusion of individuality that my distinctness is maintained only through remaining separate and self-contained. The reality of Maya is the grace knowledge that distinction is enhanced when I love the Lord my God with all my heart with all my mind and with all my strength, i.e. personhood in full communion occurs loving knowing and willing intercommunication with God who is All in All.
But I cannot affirm authentically any religion that does not give honour to St Therese’s chocolate eclair. Most commentators dismiss her deathbed request as something older hagiographies would have failed to remember. I stand accused of a basic error in the formation of a theologizing mind. Concessitur. The sinful joy in the senses takes pleasure in their enjoyment and a second pleasure in the knowledge that my enemy does not. A purer joy takes secondary pleasure in sharing a chocolate éclair with the one whom my soul loves. But as Cusa suggests Humanity is her Intellect and her Intellect is her fundamental organ of sensuality. Homo est suus intellectus, ubi contractio sensualis quodamodo in intellectuali natura suppositatur, intellectuali natura existente quoddam divinum separatum abstractum esse, sensuali vero remanente temporali et corruptibili secundum suam naturam. De docta ignorantia III 4 (ch 1 p 132).
My deviancy from Cusa in my own Christic integral religion is to plea for the Temporal and Corruptible nature of creation to be raised to eternal and incorruptible enjoyment. For just as the personhood offered by Christ enhances the distinctness of individuality by breaking down the barriers between life love and knowledge outwith destroying any of our distinctiveness. I now ask God on behalf of Creation for a similar transformation of the World so that the sensual pleasure instead of being defined as things that I can deprive others of, or share with others, becomes the pleasure of all by right, by their existence. What prevents our enjoyment of heaven now would be the inability of our Intellectus to process that kind of pleasure, it might instead perceive it as pain or faint or die.
Just as Christ hominizes the World. Being the God-Man he takes all into himself to unite all with the Father and with each other. The corrollory of this act is that God is hominized in Christ. To worship God is to worship Humanity. To worship Humanity is to worship God. We no longer live in a world where heresy is a charge determined by dates. The meaning of this Christology is not to denigrate God but to reintegrate a love honour and worship for God’s creation.
The idolatry of the Eucharist prefigures anidolatry of Creation. God’s having is God’s being. And this is his ultimate gift, his ultimate self-sacrifice. This is God’s love requiring our loving acceptance. If he takes it back it is not a true gift. If he gives up his solitary individuality, Indivisus in se autem divisum a quolibet alio, then he truly becomes a person capabale of integrating with Creation. Do not be afraid, My Lord God, for you will not lose your distinctness. We however Your Creation will know the ultimate non-bargaining folly of unconditional Love.
Traditional theology takes God’s creation, maintenance and disolution of the World as functional only. Once it has been achieved God reverts to Deus Complicans, inexpressable. Cusa felt Intellect is limited by the concrete, hence even the Conincidentia Oppositorum is the Wall of Paradise beyond which God resides in utter simplicity. My view is even if the true pleasures of the senses derive from anticipation romance imagination and altruistic love from empathy solidarity, and that deferral and hastening of pleasurable acts are like cookery or dancing, their fons et culmen lie in the Flesh. I will not live in a virtual world. Such a view of God by seeking to enhance and liberate has imprisoned him in a Hell of mere existence outwith true life. In such a heavenly paradise one can enjoy only the idea of a chocolate éclair, although there is no need to fax the ideas to your friends, because we all share each others joys hopes and dreams, there is now no chocolate éclair to share, only it’s unforgettable memory.
Sod that for a game of soldiers.
The other requirement for my integrated religion must force action where Christians can stand by listless. I saw a Lambadi girl hobbling in pain on one foot. The priest in charge of the Mission theologized that it would be unethical immoral and some other negative construct to provide medical aid for her. Religion integrated in Christ must provide visceral anger to the Caste system that poisons the minds and hearts of all whom it has contaminated. Of course it is irritating for any foreigner to come to a strange land and offer to sort our their problems if they have not already done so for their problems at home.
But a Religion that stands by supine and listless while those of lower castes or non-castes suffer is not even a genuine Faith. As fascinating as Vedic knowledge is, as a matter of integral religion I would sacrifice it for the intellectually impoverished theologies of Tribals and Dalits. This is where Religious integration calls me in my new home. I do not believe this is an arrogance of the West come in neo-colonial clothes to add finishing touches to the innate perfection of the Sanatana Dharma. This is Love furious that you mock one with giant's wings and cannot walk and then provide me with lectures on Xtian morality. (By you I mean no one in particular).
To answer the question my understanding lies in the sharing of chocolate eclairs, the wearing of blue powder on my forehead, and dressing in black as a colour of celebration until You come again in Glory, my sun-burnt Jew, my Lover, and my God.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Last day with the Old Man
Four lectures in the morning and one in the afternoon. Then that's it till next year if I am back. I found a really readable book on Nicholas of Cusa though which makes up for the Duns Scotus. It might be interesting to read a few lines in Scotus Latin, the guy is very precise ordered. But be even nicer to find a readable intro to his thought, precursor of Ockham, precursor to the Counter-Tomist thingamebob, apparently.
So had the first spiritual direction with yer man. I didn't cry at all which for me is progress. Having listened he seemed to ignore all the oh the shame the ingnominy, the infamy the infamy they've all got it in for me, and went with, if you are serious about a widow you have to see things from their point of view and insisting that they live the life of Gandhi-ji's wife is probably not going to get you very far considering anyone who wanted a life like that would probably opt for a convent have you not thought more about religious life me son. I countered with I think monastic life will probably suit me more than any active religious life, for when you are pressed upon by superior forces always charge, it confuses them.
That and he suggested take things easy for a year, he tends to attract orphans and widows, he has someone in mind if I could see my way clear to getting a job and possibly allowing her more than three saris for the rest of her life. Now you and I know I am not serious about the whole three sari thing, once they figure out that I don't say No and mean it there is that whole scarcity of resources unlimited need thing that the Buddha tried to sort out with the eightfold, they really like the number 8 here.
Oh and he said I could almost publish that essay if I worked it up a bit, which is I think an Indian way of saying he liked it. Good narrative style but not really academic, Hell yeah.
I want to live in a world where people fear the raising of Tapa more than a Trust Court Writ. I worked only at a low level at a magistrates court for seven months, but that was enough to rid me of any residual respect fear or awe for the Law Courts. I guess that is why people don't fear the raising of Tapa, they live among spiritual holy men and women. Ne'er mind, I shall continue to raise the Tapa, tread the grapes of wrath, as my GP would say if I mentioned Tai Chi or any alternative health remedy, by all means go ahead it won't do any harm.
And then to prepare some more Telugu. If I can learn enough to get by at a bus stand and read Bus notices I'll be confident enough to turn up Oct 4 at the Ashram. Fr Jose will get me to Kazipet which can't be more than a few hours away from Nellikuduru and if I am lucky it isn't far away at all. Oh and he added he will get one of the many lawyers of the priests at DVK to fish out a local shyster who can handle my OCI for me. Now that would be a result. At least they'd understand the whole bribery system and will definitely get me the ting.
And I could well be married to a youngish widow with I get the feeling at least one child possibly a Shamanic childe, they might be a little more twubble but I do like a Shamanic childe and if it's a gel childe, she may always stay at home, and well that's not such a bad life, take it from one who knows. And in twenty years I shall have perfected the Tai Chi Form so I can make us all invisible if twubble comes close.
No news about Gitanjali and the Syriac Grammar but tomorrow I intend to purchase that blue/black Kurti with a tub of Padam Soam halwa the yellow kind with the cardamum. Best head off for that day with the old man then.
So had the first spiritual direction with yer man. I didn't cry at all which for me is progress. Having listened he seemed to ignore all the oh the shame the ingnominy, the infamy the infamy they've all got it in for me, and went with, if you are serious about a widow you have to see things from their point of view and insisting that they live the life of Gandhi-ji's wife is probably not going to get you very far considering anyone who wanted a life like that would probably opt for a convent have you not thought more about religious life me son. I countered with I think monastic life will probably suit me more than any active religious life, for when you are pressed upon by superior forces always charge, it confuses them.
That and he suggested take things easy for a year, he tends to attract orphans and widows, he has someone in mind if I could see my way clear to getting a job and possibly allowing her more than three saris for the rest of her life. Now you and I know I am not serious about the whole three sari thing, once they figure out that I don't say No and mean it there is that whole scarcity of resources unlimited need thing that the Buddha tried to sort out with the eightfold, they really like the number 8 here.
Oh and he said I could almost publish that essay if I worked it up a bit, which is I think an Indian way of saying he liked it. Good narrative style but not really academic, Hell yeah.
I want to live in a world where people fear the raising of Tapa more than a Trust Court Writ. I worked only at a low level at a magistrates court for seven months, but that was enough to rid me of any residual respect fear or awe for the Law Courts. I guess that is why people don't fear the raising of Tapa, they live among spiritual holy men and women. Ne'er mind, I shall continue to raise the Tapa, tread the grapes of wrath, as my GP would say if I mentioned Tai Chi or any alternative health remedy, by all means go ahead it won't do any harm.
And then to prepare some more Telugu. If I can learn enough to get by at a bus stand and read Bus notices I'll be confident enough to turn up Oct 4 at the Ashram. Fr Jose will get me to Kazipet which can't be more than a few hours away from Nellikuduru and if I am lucky it isn't far away at all. Oh and he added he will get one of the many lawyers of the priests at DVK to fish out a local shyster who can handle my OCI for me. Now that would be a result. At least they'd understand the whole bribery system and will definitely get me the ting.
And I could well be married to a youngish widow with I get the feeling at least one child possibly a Shamanic childe, they might be a little more twubble but I do like a Shamanic childe and if it's a gel childe, she may always stay at home, and well that's not such a bad life, take it from one who knows. And in twenty years I shall have perfected the Tai Chi Form so I can make us all invisible if twubble comes close.
No news about Gitanjali and the Syriac Grammar but tomorrow I intend to purchase that blue/black Kurti with a tub of Padam Soam halwa the yellow kind with the cardamum. Best head off for that day with the old man then.
Duns Scotus
Call me stupid but I hadn't realised that John Scotus Eriugena is one and the same as Duns Scotus, for whom I have long had a secret admiration. I hadn't realized he was dodgy mind. The old man has one more class this afternoon then one day tomorrow and that's our lot. He is finishing with a comparison between some Western thinkers such as Scotus and Nicholas of Cusa and Vedantic Philosophy of the Sanatana Dharma. It's not easy even for the bright. If the boys and gels get annoyed with my questions and comments screw them I am having fun. In some ways really complex ideas, leave the mind a bit numb. Every now and then I think I understand comment or question. But I am pretty sure when I do understand I don't. It's mysticism. I sort of took Duns four stages in the process of God from Natura Creans sed non creatur via Natura Creans et creatur (the world of forms) I'll go for it, these two share dynamism, it's sort of qabalistic but a way of understanding emanations in a creaturely dependent manner, technically non pantheistic, and theoretically because God works in and through the world more empowering. But in the West with the God in Heaven issuing commands we get liberal secular democracy and in India with this beautiful empowering theology we get the caste system. He didn't appreciate my pointing that out, perhaps I was a little too strong in suggesting India needed the West to save it from its backward thinking caste based reactionary theology but I wasn't judging. And the last two from Scotus, Natura non creans et non creatur the manifest world, and God at rest share Stability. Yep it does dismiss the problem of evil, it isn't suited to social justice, and liberation theology will not grow in this ground. But as he suggests it is a beautiful place to theologize about Religion aside from Faith. In the pure and abstract it is more liberating, combined with Buddhist concepts of not-being of no-thingness. The potential is like a painting just begun. It can go anywhere. With dogma we are stuck with solution. Here we find multiple meanings. I buy into it. But most of the lads and lasses just want to get their MA and a new job. As one put it it has no relevance in the mission field. Maybe, but they are also intellectually lazy or dishonest. It's hard work thinking theologically. If you have no eros, no desire for it then there is no point attempting it. Anyway found a book on Scotus, that wasn't hard, but it will be hard to get something written by him. For a Catholic Library of 1 lakh books well mustn't complain. Now must check that reference for Cusa.
The rest will sort itself out. I'll check out Yahoo next week build up my tapa for now. See what the priest says if there is no change. He is offering to enrol me on an MA course so I can get a five year visa (two years extendable) but I can study as much or as little as I please. For this I was offering 1400 pounds a year, which is twice the rate, but half was for scholarships etc. I don't think it's a bad deal. I am up to date on payments thus far. He has booked me a return flight to Colombo to get my visa for another six months (M A courses start in June). I have train tickets to Kazipet which is near Nellikuduru to visit my people. I tried mentioning to the old man that Brahmanic Vedanta Theology is not the only kind of Indian Theology but given that the Dalit and Tribal theology I have read so far does seem like it's written by an angry 12 year old and not a prodigy I left it comparing them to the Jews and Moses God chose the illiterate wanderers over the Theology Technology and Science of Egypt. But he just replied that God chose Humanity all of us. He has a point and I have nothing interesting to say about Dalit or Tribal theology yet though there probably is some relation to the non-Pantheistic it only seems that way religion given it is earth mother based what used to be called animist.
Anyway plan after first MA is to go to Kottayam and pick up an MA in Syriac. Then I could return and do another MA here, or Chennai or Pune. That's a six year plan which is rather more planning than I have ever needed to do. Telugu test tomorrow which I shall fail. But no harm in more revision beforehand. And then next week I hope the dancing singing Kerala nurses will return possibly with some books on Malayalam. Odd many seek me out to improve their English Accent but whereas I can understand everyone's English here some find it impossible to understand me no matter how slowly I speak. Oh and if the Syriac text book and my own copy of Gitanjali turn up then my joy shall be complete. Off to pin down that Cusa.
The rest will sort itself out. I'll check out Yahoo next week build up my tapa for now. See what the priest says if there is no change. He is offering to enrol me on an MA course so I can get a five year visa (two years extendable) but I can study as much or as little as I please. For this I was offering 1400 pounds a year, which is twice the rate, but half was for scholarships etc. I don't think it's a bad deal. I am up to date on payments thus far. He has booked me a return flight to Colombo to get my visa for another six months (M A courses start in June). I have train tickets to Kazipet which is near Nellikuduru to visit my people. I tried mentioning to the old man that Brahmanic Vedanta Theology is not the only kind of Indian Theology but given that the Dalit and Tribal theology I have read so far does seem like it's written by an angry 12 year old and not a prodigy I left it comparing them to the Jews and Moses God chose the illiterate wanderers over the Theology Technology and Science of Egypt. But he just replied that God chose Humanity all of us. He has a point and I have nothing interesting to say about Dalit or Tribal theology yet though there probably is some relation to the non-Pantheistic it only seems that way religion given it is earth mother based what used to be called animist.
Anyway plan after first MA is to go to Kottayam and pick up an MA in Syriac. Then I could return and do another MA here, or Chennai or Pune. That's a six year plan which is rather more planning than I have ever needed to do. Telugu test tomorrow which I shall fail. But no harm in more revision beforehand. And then next week I hope the dancing singing Kerala nurses will return possibly with some books on Malayalam. Odd many seek me out to improve their English Accent but whereas I can understand everyone's English here some find it impossible to understand me no matter how slowly I speak. Oh and if the Syriac text book and my own copy of Gitanjali turn up then my joy shall be complete. Off to pin down that Cusa.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Fr Cyrian
I remember the knickerbockerglory on my first date. The explosion of tastes and life in more abundance. It's nothing compared with haagan daaz or ben and jerry but I never got close with them. So he explained how Indian Xtian Theology in its understanding of creation, incarnation and the eschaton is neither pantheistic nor panentheistic. Mind blowing in a way I suspect great sex might be. Not for everyone. I doubt most in the room understood him. A few would have been interested educated enough to go for it but who knows. I know I was wowed. And as a Lancastrian put it so well when teach had said God is love in several languages, Le Dieu est Amour, Deus caritas est. It's beautiful in any language, like McDonalds. It doesn't attract me more that few care for it, but it doesn't attract me less.
It's simple enough. First Maya is real and unreal. It's not illusion. Real and unreal is a corrolary to the idea of Creaturely dependence. Creation's unreality is because only God is really real, only God has independent existence as part of God's being. However God can know and have things. God's knowing and having creation give it dependent reality which is also unreal. It's an alternative to the Platonic/Cartesian matter/spirit dichotomy, and doesn't work with western logic.
So God is composed of both being and not-being. The not-being is a potential within God for self-expression in Creation. Nothing can exist apart from God so this potential cried out for expression, the cry itself emanating from God, like Grace. The Vedas speak the prayer let my darkness become light my not-being being etc. It's a well famous passage really annoys those looking for heresy. Although most western theologians dismiss Indian Theology as not being good enough to produce even a decent heresy.
So God then as an act of sacrifice, creates and imbues creation with his spirit, his love, his knowledge, his life. It's not an emanation, not pantheistic or panentheistic. The Maya principle retains creaturely dependence. However it is Scotist (Duns Scotus). The purpose of this creative sacrificial act, Love yes, was to provide a means for God's self-expression. Thus the Word, Jesus is the purpose of all Creation. Creation follows this idea to its conclusion in the incarnation. The theology is like symbolic causality. God does not sit in heaven issuing commands for things to happen on earth in this theological model. Having created the world out of his negative potential. God's Word arises from the World naturally, it evolves through Creation. And at the end of Time all Creation will draw back into God whence it first emerged.
It's not even process theology. It's another way of looking at Theology that isn't Western. God is not Roman Catholic. God is not a Westerner. But people get worked up about Faith as if it is Religion. It's the chips we bring to the poker table so we can play with others and learn their tells, their stories. He didn't quite put it that way. Damn shame too because just as I begin to realize how fascinating all this Brahminical stuff is, those fat oppressors really knew their stuff, I feel a more urgent call to Dalitology. It'll be more what they call fast and dirty, but in a gypsy way and I am not sure if I am really going to lose out here boys.
He did get upset mind when some started chatting half way through the difficult section and said sometimes I think some priests and religious are sent here purely because there are no available jobs for them in community. They don't really want to learn anything apart from get another MA. We don't ask a true Yogi for his degrees. But priests are introduced all the time by their degrees.
The other thing that impressed me though in a different way was the Jain monk initiation. It's the same for a Jain Nun and we honoured to see some of it. It's usually done in private. I forget to mention it before. They pull out their hair. It sounds freaky but is a bit like a bikini wax, without the wax. What was interesting was that the man didn't flinch. I didn't see him flinch once. Now the Jains they aren't as incarnational as we are supposed to be. They have a ritual of fasting to dispose of the body when they are ready to ascend to their true spiritual home.
As for all the excitement back home. Once a Yogi was feared because his word could end worlds. But you have to develop Tapa for that. Tapa is the heat of the spirit. With it you can summon God or raise the Kundalini. It is generated by withdrawal. I gave one of the chappies a seven day deadline. So I figure I'll go back to Yahoo next week having generated Tapa. They also describe it as ascesis but it's too constrictive a term.
Either way I was just given a paradigmatic shift in theological understanding, he cancelled the afternoon session coz the gang asked because it's Onam today. He didn't seem that phased by the request. I tried to purchase his book and I found one priest there beating me to it. But it's in Malayalam. Be a while yet. I am working on Telugu script for this week. A Student will give me a dictation Friday. I hope to get a Syriac grammar soon if not I'll revert to Hebrew because I can get books for that easy enough. And next week some more Malayalam. The dancing nurses will be back from Kerala.
Oh and Fr Jose has agreed to be my Spiritual Director. Who knew. I sent him an email explaining it wasn't really for spiritual direction but to enable him to find a widow strange enough for me who wouldn't be disappointed during the courtship expecting a grown-up. So what if he says Oh after the first session. God has given me a most splendid gift in humiliation so that no matter how spiritual non-worldly and wonderful I act, I always retain humility. Which is also why i am purchasing that extra Kurti PJ for Our Lady's birthday, I thought i need something darker, blue and black, which is also the colour of Dalits, and people won't think that I am an ascetic. It's sort of like the maya real-unreal thing. The way to be ascetic and not attached to fashion is for me to buy another Kurti. As I said it doesn't work with simple western logic. That and Ollie's cogent argument of neo-Keynesian multiplying responding to the drought crisis up north. Rains here all the time mind, I should get an umbrella.
It's simple enough. First Maya is real and unreal. It's not illusion. Real and unreal is a corrolary to the idea of Creaturely dependence. Creation's unreality is because only God is really real, only God has independent existence as part of God's being. However God can know and have things. God's knowing and having creation give it dependent reality which is also unreal. It's an alternative to the Platonic/Cartesian matter/spirit dichotomy, and doesn't work with western logic.
So God is composed of both being and not-being. The not-being is a potential within God for self-expression in Creation. Nothing can exist apart from God so this potential cried out for expression, the cry itself emanating from God, like Grace. The Vedas speak the prayer let my darkness become light my not-being being etc. It's a well famous passage really annoys those looking for heresy. Although most western theologians dismiss Indian Theology as not being good enough to produce even a decent heresy.
So God then as an act of sacrifice, creates and imbues creation with his spirit, his love, his knowledge, his life. It's not an emanation, not pantheistic or panentheistic. The Maya principle retains creaturely dependence. However it is Scotist (Duns Scotus). The purpose of this creative sacrificial act, Love yes, was to provide a means for God's self-expression. Thus the Word, Jesus is the purpose of all Creation. Creation follows this idea to its conclusion in the incarnation. The theology is like symbolic causality. God does not sit in heaven issuing commands for things to happen on earth in this theological model. Having created the world out of his negative potential. God's Word arises from the World naturally, it evolves through Creation. And at the end of Time all Creation will draw back into God whence it first emerged.
It's not even process theology. It's another way of looking at Theology that isn't Western. God is not Roman Catholic. God is not a Westerner. But people get worked up about Faith as if it is Religion. It's the chips we bring to the poker table so we can play with others and learn their tells, their stories. He didn't quite put it that way. Damn shame too because just as I begin to realize how fascinating all this Brahminical stuff is, those fat oppressors really knew their stuff, I feel a more urgent call to Dalitology. It'll be more what they call fast and dirty, but in a gypsy way and I am not sure if I am really going to lose out here boys.
He did get upset mind when some started chatting half way through the difficult section and said sometimes I think some priests and religious are sent here purely because there are no available jobs for them in community. They don't really want to learn anything apart from get another MA. We don't ask a true Yogi for his degrees. But priests are introduced all the time by their degrees.
The other thing that impressed me though in a different way was the Jain monk initiation. It's the same for a Jain Nun and we honoured to see some of it. It's usually done in private. I forget to mention it before. They pull out their hair. It sounds freaky but is a bit like a bikini wax, without the wax. What was interesting was that the man didn't flinch. I didn't see him flinch once. Now the Jains they aren't as incarnational as we are supposed to be. They have a ritual of fasting to dispose of the body when they are ready to ascend to their true spiritual home.
As for all the excitement back home. Once a Yogi was feared because his word could end worlds. But you have to develop Tapa for that. Tapa is the heat of the spirit. With it you can summon God or raise the Kundalini. It is generated by withdrawal. I gave one of the chappies a seven day deadline. So I figure I'll go back to Yahoo next week having generated Tapa. They also describe it as ascesis but it's too constrictive a term.
Either way I was just given a paradigmatic shift in theological understanding, he cancelled the afternoon session coz the gang asked because it's Onam today. He didn't seem that phased by the request. I tried to purchase his book and I found one priest there beating me to it. But it's in Malayalam. Be a while yet. I am working on Telugu script for this week. A Student will give me a dictation Friday. I hope to get a Syriac grammar soon if not I'll revert to Hebrew because I can get books for that easy enough. And next week some more Malayalam. The dancing nurses will be back from Kerala.
Oh and Fr Jose has agreed to be my Spiritual Director. Who knew. I sent him an email explaining it wasn't really for spiritual direction but to enable him to find a widow strange enough for me who wouldn't be disappointed during the courtship expecting a grown-up. So what if he says Oh after the first session. God has given me a most splendid gift in humiliation so that no matter how spiritual non-worldly and wonderful I act, I always retain humility. Which is also why i am purchasing that extra Kurti PJ for Our Lady's birthday, I thought i need something darker, blue and black, which is also the colour of Dalits, and people won't think that I am an ascetic. It's sort of like the maya real-unreal thing. The way to be ascetic and not attached to fashion is for me to buy another Kurti. As I said it doesn't work with simple western logic. That and Ollie's cogent argument of neo-Keynesian multiplying responding to the drought crisis up north. Rains here all the time mind, I should get an umbrella.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
What do you think
I really want to buy into the whole karmasannyasi ting. Arjuna starts the Gita in a just war to have his kingdom returned from Usurpers from his extended family who had humiliated his wife. He figures pre-philosophically, if I have my own land not under the Kauravas I shall be free. But he realizes then that the land will own him. We cannot be free if we remain bound to things even the good.
My cousins do not appear to believe that they are doing anything wrong. I think they are vampyric carrion pigs. The trigger is simply I need 700 quid to stay on next term and they are saying now that they don't want to entertain the request, and that John the Just is a mental bully for relaying the message to them. I believe the only way this matter will be resolved is for me to confront them in a Trust Court. It may cost a little to set up but they don't have to listen to John. They do have to listen to the judgement of a Trust Court. Although it isn't the best thing to settle a family dispute like this in court usually. I think one settlement should end the matter.
I want a just settlement. I will not conduct myself in a dirty manner. I don't think I have to. If I don't get the money by November I'll come home. If the house isn't sold I have a place to stay and if it is I have money to rent a place till the settlement is finalized. If anyone feels they have a better solution please let me know. But unfortunately I am unable to let the petty greed of people who have far too much go unchallenged.
And that is what is irritating me. Their continued belief that I will do nothing because I would have to pay a solicitor to get an audience at a Trust Court. If I had done this the day my mother died I would have saved myself a small fortune.
And for Our Lady's birthday I intend to purchase a new dark Kurti PJ, unless of course my Syriac textbook arrives by Friday it would probably cost a bit more than a Kurti but it looks a good edition. Robinsons a name you can trust, at least for jam. I was never offended by the gollywog but if Noddy had to let go with grace perhaps there is a lesson there.
So may see some of you in November, else if they pay up under pressure I figure I'll still go to court on my return in March next year. Onam Ashamsegal
My cousins do not appear to believe that they are doing anything wrong. I think they are vampyric carrion pigs. The trigger is simply I need 700 quid to stay on next term and they are saying now that they don't want to entertain the request, and that John the Just is a mental bully for relaying the message to them. I believe the only way this matter will be resolved is for me to confront them in a Trust Court. It may cost a little to set up but they don't have to listen to John. They do have to listen to the judgement of a Trust Court. Although it isn't the best thing to settle a family dispute like this in court usually. I think one settlement should end the matter.
I want a just settlement. I will not conduct myself in a dirty manner. I don't think I have to. If I don't get the money by November I'll come home. If the house isn't sold I have a place to stay and if it is I have money to rent a place till the settlement is finalized. If anyone feels they have a better solution please let me know. But unfortunately I am unable to let the petty greed of people who have far too much go unchallenged.
And that is what is irritating me. Their continued belief that I will do nothing because I would have to pay a solicitor to get an audience at a Trust Court. If I had done this the day my mother died I would have saved myself a small fortune.
And for Our Lady's birthday I intend to purchase a new dark Kurti PJ, unless of course my Syriac textbook arrives by Friday it would probably cost a bit more than a Kurti but it looks a good edition. Robinsons a name you can trust, at least for jam. I was never offended by the gollywog but if Noddy had to let go with grace perhaps there is a lesson there.
So may see some of you in November, else if they pay up under pressure I figure I'll still go to court on my return in March next year. Onam Ashamsegal
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