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population is alienated from authentic self-awareness. This alienation has been described as a
psychological/spiritual stultification of the evolution of consciousness, brought about by mass
subservience toward external socially oriented goals, which disregard knowledge of human spiritual
essence. As the great Hindu sage Sri Aurobindo maintained, authentic knowledge begins when we probe
beyond appearances, beyond ossified traditional belief systems and sterile scientism. The quality of
knowledge this book is concerned with is, as the scholar Henri Corbin wrote, “knowledge that changes
and transforms the knowing subject.”
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"How do we go about this weeding of distorted influences that have shaped us since birth, and
throughout formative years as a child, teenager, young adult? The key is the acceptance of the
struggle to live an existence on the planet earth as free of as many illusions and delusions as possible.
To truly know yourself is to struggle to overcome psychological weaknesses and develop inner strength
through knowledge and understanding, to learn to grapple with what you've been taught to believe
about life, God, politics, love, art, and much more—and keep on struggling till you know what is true
and what is based on inadequate knowledge and distortions of tradition and custom."
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"There have been volumes written about mind, from the most entrenched materialistic point of view to
astounding mystical vision, from standard psychological explanations to bizarre occult and
theosophical descriptions. So many descriptions, so little time. When you consider them all, it seems
somewhat ridiculous to attempt any description. But if one is lost in a forest, coming across a mark on a
tree indicating a possible trail is better than no sign at all. It is reassuring knowing someone passed
this way who knew the territory. Such markings by fellow humans who have made earlier excursions
help keep us from feeling hopelessly lost. We have trailblazers from varied cultures, who, each in their
own way, have left cairns of varied sort which help us understand our situation in the immense
wilderness of the deeper dimensions of mind, of Being, revealing how our ego-conscious mind is
constantly influenced by the ceaseless oceanic movement of the mind's greater unconscious depths and
heights, and how we can discipline ourselves to both experience and direct such influences, rather than
be helplessly under their sway."
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"This quest we are delving into is not some frivolous social-psychological phenomenon of current New
Age fashion. Western civilization can trace the concept of the inner quest to Hellenistic Greece and
ancient Hermeticism, which taught disciplines to enhance the mystic’s pursuit. In the East, the
mysticism of Hinduism goes back thousands of years. No one should take such a profound universal
impulse lightly. Mysticism denotes the exploration of spiritual mystery."
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"Somewhere between the Charybdis of zealous skepticism and the Scylla of New Age credulity lies the
firm higher ground of cohesive awareness.
There are many positive elements within the New Age ambit, which have injected a fresh vitality into a
half century and more of religious narrow mindedness, soulless materialism, and spiritual blandness.
And there are teachers and gurus of integrity and capability who can be very beneficial to those with
certain spiritual and psychological needs. Yet, like mining for gold, as one approaches the genuine
mother lode, there is always more eye-catching fools gold scattered about than real nuggets."
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"We've got thousands of theologians mired in literalism and bias, spouting their limited
interpretations of God and the Bible to crowds just as gullible as those Voltaire called the “credulous
rabble” three hundred years ago. Not that the other four of the Big Five religions don’t have their
mouthpieces to convince everyone their way is THE way. Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism,
Christianity, together create an immense hermeneutic absurdity of vast scope, a chaotic mind collage of
abstract concepts, delusions, distortions and embellishment mixed with genuine vision and meaningful
myth. The only saving grace, and I cannot stress this too often, is the stream of Sophianic wisdom, clear
and pure, flowing through the flotsam and jetsam of it all, which, if we are careful, attentive, sincere,
meticulously eclectic and persevering, we can partake of."
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"Anyone concerned at all with comprehending the truth of the human situation must recognize, as that
noteworthy contemplator of our religious situation, John MacQuarrie, put it, "the need to guard
ourselves against uncritical acceptance of false or inadequate views of the world."
Let us not forget, as I have repeatedly emphasized in the last chapters, that religion possesses
significant meanings that need to be brought to light. Only a materialist lost in the sterile halls of the
analytical intellect, cut off from significant intuitive knowledge of the depths of things, would deny
that something substantial must surely be present within the compelling numinous impulse upon
which all religions have been built. There has never been a culture anywhere on earth without ritual
and worship relating to a higher spiritual power. No matter how vulnerable to delusion, illusion and
anthropomorphic projection the Big Five religions have been subject to, they have certainly been signal
flares in the immense psychic-cosmic night that engulfs this tiny planet on which humanity struts and
frets its bewildered history—flares signifying something other, entirely other, wholly other, existing
within the depths, obscure, paradoxical, astonishing, yet there. But, once again, what the nature of this
“something other” is, we have no idea. The ways and means of the Absolute Infinite—whether you call
it God or not—will forever re-main beyond the grasp of human comprehension, despite all the
theological volumes which claim otherwise. That an individual can, through persistent spiritual
discipline, personally have epiphanic contact with emanations of the Absolute Infinite, does not imply
comprehension. In the pages of the theological encyclopedia, the Sacramentum Mundi, we find the
phrase, 'God is held knowable, but incomprehensible.' "
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"The world of the New Testament is essentially a religious tributary of a mythological matrix, and as
such we must consider it neither as a mythologist or demythologist, but as a seeker of
archetypal/psychological truths. As Karl Jaspers said, 'The real task, there-fore, is not to
demythologize, but to recover mythical thought in its original purity.' "
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"Wherever truth seems to be distorted or lost, it is waiting in the wings, available to acute intuition of
its presence. As William Barrett says of Heidegger's use of the word “aletheia,” truth occurs when
what has been hidden is revealed. Sartre wrote that significant truth doesn't come by chance, that it
requires the task of deciphering. Though attunement to deeper universal truth comes to the seeker by
way of inner cultivation, the seeker should also become skilled at the art of deciphering scientific facts,
theological and philosophical concepts, academic rhetoric, ancient mythology, separating wheat from
chaff within various schools of psychology, as well as detecting the worth or worthlessness of various
avenues of political information coming through modern media. The quality of such deciphering de-
pends upon the extent to which a person has developed his/her radius of comprehension.
So here we are, dwelling within a perplexing paradoxical sphere rife with illusion, hallucination, even
madness, from which we must derive truth when and wherever possible—a most significant and
meaningful task."
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"Does it seem the demands of the quest for self-knowledge are more than you are able to take on? You
would be surprised what you are truly capable of. Just begin by taking on what you can, and you will
find your capabilities expanding as you develop. If you make it too easy for yourself, your inner
potential will never reach the tension that ignites the alchemical fire. You have to stretch, sacrifice,
act."
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"Why would people even begin to commit themselves to the all-consuming challenges and trials the
quest for genuine self-knowledge demands? Just the fact of being alive, conscious of the haunting
immensity of existence, knowing we are born in mystery and die in mystery, is a fairly significant
reason. But it gets even deeper, for the more truth of our existential-spiritual predicament we creatively
bring forth through our hearts and wring from each moment of life, the more the numinous presence
dwelling within the depths of existence, in subtle reciprocal response, shall disclose its enriching
meanings."
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