From earliest times, hominids were gripped by a sense of the sacred, of an otherness that stood over against them. This religious dimension is evident in burial customs and rock and cave paintings.

      Our ancestors did not distinguish themselves from the natural world. They were in a situation analogous to that of a baby, or very young child, who has no sense of self separate from her environment. They were not aware of any duality between me and not-me. They operated on their environment through magic. Magicians, like the sorcerer of Trois Frères, an etching in a Palaeolithic cave site in Trois Frères in France, worked their sorcery, or voodoo in order to effect the result they desired, such as success in a hunt. As the dimensions of human consciousness expanded, magic gave way to myth as the principal means by which individuals and communities understood their cosmic embededness.

      With the advent of reason as the predominant mode of consciousness, people were finally able to separate themselves, in their thinking, from the broader environment. This transition was equivalent, in developmental terms, to the emergence of the ego.

Dissociation

      There was evidence, early in the Mental-Egoic era (from 2500 BCE), of a growing dissociation between mind and body. This was partnered by a parallel dissociation between humankind and the physical environment. Any sense of sympathetic connectedness with the eco-system was lost. This resulted in a de-sacralization of nature. It also prepared for the development of science, which set out to investigate nature dispassionately and objectively. Developments in science led us to believe that we [179] could control, even subjugate nature.

Reaction

      During the 19th century a reaction began to build in response to the superior claims being made for reason as the exclusive arbiter of what counted for knowledge. This was accompanied, in the same circles, by lament over the fact that the natural world was suffering abuse.

      With the advent of the 20th century, perceptive individuals became aware of the extent of the ecological threat. Women have been at the forefront of this movement. There were several reasons for their prominence. First, they experienced themselves as the victims of the male-dominated, rationalistic, patriarchal society responsible for the ecological damage. Second, they were far more in touch with their bodies than were men. Furthermore, their bodies, through such processes as menstruation, conception and giving birth, reminded them of how much they were part of a gestating universe. Third, the fact that their feelings, and their capacity to intuitively communicate with others, and with the environment, were well developed, meant that they experienced, in their bodies, the suffering endured by nature. ¹

      While this reaction was initially resented, and dismissed as regressive, it soon became obvious that the world was facing a crisis. Humanity was confronting the possibility of extinction.

Web of life

      A number of those reacting to the rape of nature viewed the natural world as divine. It was a saviour that would rescue us if we were willing to surrender to its embrace. These twin assumptions were often accompanied by the suggestion that humans needed to backtrack, to return to ways of relating to nature that had atrophied as a consequence of industrialisation. It was also suggested that all elements of the natural world were inter-linked into a giant, egalitarian web of life. This notion was partially a consequence of the fact that many women felt that it was the hierarchical perceptions of a male-dominated society that were [180] responsible both for the discrimination from which they suffered and for the fact that humanity was facing potential oblivion.

Ecological responsibility

      I endorse the view that we need to be ecologically responsible. I also want to stress that we must repair past damage, to the degree that this is possible. Nevertheless, I cannot accept the notion, on which these imperatives are often based, that we, the human species, are one strand of a vast egalitarian web of life.

      We are certainly part of an interconnected eco-system. But that system, as Ken Wilber has argued, is organised into a series of hierarchies, natural hierarchies. To overlook the hierarchical structure of the natural world will frustrate efforts designed to address the ecological threat.

      I also have difficulty accepting the idea that we need to head back into the past, to return to some sort of golden age. The reality is that there was no golden age, and we cannot return to the past, even if we wanted to. We must go forward.²

      It would be foolish for us to descend into un-reason, to surrender our rationality, as some argue we should. While reason has yielded enormous benefits, and will continue to do so, the way forward is not to retreat from reason to unreason, but to proceed forward, beyond reason, to a trans-rational consciousness, a form of consciousness that incorporates but transcends reason.

      While regression into the past is impossible, and pointless, it is important for us to recover elements of human experience that were jettisoned by our ancestors in their embracing of reason. Just as we have recognised the importance of reclaiming those elements of the mythic that are vital to our psychological health, it is also important for us to re-connect with nature, and to place high on our list of priorities the maintenance of a symbiotic relationship with the ecosystem that supports us.

Nature and God

      The notion that nature is God, some sort of independent Gaia (Mother Earth), is a misperception entertained by nature [181] devotees who confuse nature with God. This confusion has led those who are committed to eradicating superstition root and branch to conclude that all who associate God and nature want to argue that God can be equated with nature. This is far from the case.

      The rich tradition associating God with nature, a tradition that is reflected in the world's religions, and in the philosophical tradition that surfaced in the writings of Plotinus, Schelling and Emerson,³ does not equate nature with God. What such traditions argue, however, is that God is the underlying reality sustaining the natural world. Nature is not God, but God can be powerfully experienced through a deeply intuitive engagement with nature. It can be further argued that "animistic" religious traditions did not equate nature with deity, in spite of the fact that they appeared to do so.

      The presence of the Spirit in the ecosystem is intuitively discerned. "Primitive" peoples, in responding to their discernment of a Spiritual Presence, filtered their intuitive apprehensions through pre-rational modes of consciousness. They did not confuse nature with God, in the sense of logically equating the two. They did not have the rational means of distinguishing between nature and God, so they could not have equated them. What they were doing, in their religious observances, was magically, or mythically, celebrating a potent intuitive awareness of a God-Presence in nature. These intuitions were distorted when they were interpreted literally by others who were immersed in a different, rational consciousness.

      The intuition that the universe is an interconnected whole, and that God is its sustaining energy, was captured by Alexander Pope, who commented that we are all part of a comprehensive whole, of which nature is the body and God the soul.⁴

      Explaining the concept of Spirit in the Native American tradition, Clyde Hall explained that Spirit was regarded as a power that moved. It was part of everything in the universe. It was an energy that people could tap into for good or evil. In itself it was neutral. He went on to contend that it has been personified as gods [182] and spirits.⁵

      Expressing this insight in different terms, Adi Da described God as the foundational entity that is modified as everything.⁶ Approaching the issue from a different perspective, Andrew Harvey spoke about a Divine Mother, about the maternal aspect of this Spirit.⁷

The mystics

      Two factors emerge from the testimony of Eastern and Western mystical traditions; factors that tease out the skeins of intuition embedded in the insight that there is a divinity associated with nature.

      The first is the conviction that everything is connected to everything else. It is sometimes argued that this process becomes self-conscious in human reflection. As Teilhard de Chardin argued, it is in the human person that the universe consciously celebrates itself.⁸ The intuition of interconnectedness is most clearly present to those who have explored the deeper reaches of human consciousness. In these, as Adi Da has argued, this awareness becomes a permanent realisation.⁹

      The second insight, also deriving from contemplative experience, is that God is in everything. For those given to genuine contemplation, as Meister Eckhart contended, it is impossible to avoid discerning the presence of God in all things because it stares one in the face.¹⁰

      There is a wonderful Zen story that illustrates this insight. A young monk approached a Zen master and asked: "What is the meaning of the Buddha-dharma?" The master replied: "The cypress tree out front." The novice quickly responded: "Please, don't talk about concrete objects." "Okay", master responded, "I won't refer to anything concrete." The young monk once again pressed his question: "So, what is the meaning of the Buddha-dharma?" The Zen master again answered: "The Cyprus tree out front."¹¹

      Recovery of the dimension of the Spirit does not involve regression to ignorance and superstition. What it does involve, [183] however, is an honouring of feeling, intuition and embodied discernment, alongside reason, as critical modes of perception and evaluation. It is the disparaged modalities that give us access to the divine within nature. In the context of this access, as James Joyce commented, any object, approached in the right manner, can give us access to the gods.¹²

Introspection

      If we are to explore alternative ways of knowing, we will need to engage in more rigorous introspection. The Sufi path to enlightenment and transformation emphasises the importance of inner reflection. Preceded by a period of withdrawal from the outer world, introspection involves a descent into the unconscious, a breaking of old patterns of thought and behaviour and the relinquishing of an exclusive identification with one's ego. The alchemists described this process as putrefaction, the rotting away of the old self so that a new self could be born. The process of putrefaction demands concentrated attention and effort, and therefore a period of deliberate withdrawal from the normal pressures of daily life.¹³

      This almost feminine work also requires of us a capacity for patience, sufficient patience to allow the mud to settle.¹⁴

Other means

      Introspection is not the only means of exploring alternative ways of knowing. The more we are in touch with our bodies, the more will we be in touch with their wisdom. Meditation also opens out into a form of transpersonal knowing. Furthermore, there are intuitive apprehensions of reality that comes by way of creative expression. As Thomas Merton argued, music and art, in the givenness of the inspiration that is their source, open us up to God. Creative activity gives us unique access to the Creator, the source of all creativity.¹⁵ When asked for an explanation of why we experience music so powerfully, Joseph Campbell argued that life, like music, is rhythmic. As Schopenhauer argued, the rhythms of life, reflected in music, have the capacity to awaken the will.¹⁶ [184]

Disciplined effortlessness

      The path to enlightenment and transformation is paradoxical.

      On the one hand, it is an effortless path. As Vaughan-Lee explained, with reference to Naqshbandi Sufism, the heart chakra, which plays a central role in spiritual transformation, is energised and carries one along effortlessly, ridding the system of those things that stand in the way of this transformation.¹⁷ At the same time, this path requires our greatest effort. It represents the greatest demand that can be laid upon us.¹⁸

      Vaughan-Lee goes on to suggest that this path, that is both effortless and rigorous, is an individual path, unique to each individual.¹⁹

Stages of enlightenment

      While we can experience significant breakthroughs, as we travel towards enlightenment, enlightenment, itself does not necessarily derive from a single experience. It can be argued that there are stages of enlightenment, and that each stage must be consolidated before we proceed to the next level. Different religious traditions describe these stages in different ways. However, there is sufficient commonality in their descriptions for us to recognise the phenomenological bases of each of the stages.

      Ken Wilber has identified these stages and the transitions between them.

      Those who have entered deeply into the experience of God as Presence have progressed through a range of sub-stages. This progression is marked by increasing interiority and decreasing narcissism.

      Vision-logic, or network logic, is a transitional stage that transcends formal operational thinking. People at this stage are becoming aware that they are citizens of the world, rather than of particular cultures that are marked by exclusivism and self-serving ambition. Those at this level are on the verge of the transpersonal.

      The first of the transpersonal levels, the psychic, is that in which [185] there is recognition of what Emerson described as the Over-Soul, the fact that we are part of a much larger Universal Self. This experience does not diminish our individuality, but enhances it. At this level, the moral imperative becomes less a matter of shoulds--an imposition--and more a natural expression of the way we are.

      At the subtle level we intuit this Universal Self directly in an experience of the unity of physical matter, biological life and human consciousness. We feel at one with the total environment and with the Spirit that is its ground, or foundation. This stage is represented by the sixth mansion in Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle, where the Lover and the Beloved, God and the human soul, enjoy occasional intimacy and where all creatures are embraced by the love and joy that are generated within one's inner being.

      In the realm of the causal the uniting of the soul and God is felt so powerfully and consistently that experience of union with God is overtaken by an identity with Godhead. One discovers, as Eckhart suggested, that God and the self are one,²⁰ which was earlier reflected in the comment of Jesus that "I and my Father are one."²¹ This is an experience of absolute being. The Hebrew Scriptures capture its essence in Yahweh's self-designation as "I AM THAT I AM."²² This experience, which should not be interpreted as suggesting that the person making the claim is arguing that they, and none other, are God, cannot be adequately described. It borders on a total overcoming of the subject-object dichotomy.

      When we break through the formless causal, we re-experience the phenomenological world from a totally new perspective. In its matter of factness, its phenomenological givenness, the universe is seen to be a manifestation of Spirit. Furthermore, we no longer experience it as "it", as apart from us. What is being done to others, and to the world, we experience as being done to us.²³

      Underlining the importance of pursuing the path of enlightenment, Andrew Harvey argued that we are all inherently divine and that the whole point of human existence is to know and to be what we are.²⁴ [186]

Parallel discoveries

      One of the first lessons we learn, after committing ourselves to the path of enlightenment, is that self-awareness, and an awareness of divinity, go hand in hand. The more we get to know ourselves, the more we come to know God. Self-discovery and the discovery of God are part of the same process. The bodyself is constituted by the energy of God. The maturational potential that expresses itself in our development is sourced by divine energy. The whispers, and inclinations, deep within the soul of every human being, that incline them to act in ways that will benefit themselves, others, and their world, represent the healthful urges of this Divine Presence.²⁵ The deeper we go into ourselves, the more profound and overwhelming is our experience of this Divinity. Furthermore, we find the Divine Presence to be non-judgmental, accepting and compassionate. We are also driven to the conclusion that there is no way that we can separate ourselves from this Presence.

      It is little wonder that Thomas Merton commented that the first stage in discovering God is to unearth the truth about oneself.²⁶ Augustine, before him, was no less insistent that God was not an objective reality, but a spiritual presence in the depths of the self.²⁷ Joseph Campbell has similarly commented that the Grail romance is about contacting the transcendent power that supports one's life.²⁸ It is a little wonder that the medieval mystic, Meister Eckhart, suggested that we should dwell in our essence, where we will discover God, intermingled with that essence.²⁹

      The Hindus used the expression "Atman" to refer both to the self and to God as experienced within the self. Recognising the need for people to experience Atman, Sankaracharya suggested that we should dwell in this God-essence, this Atman, free from outward attachments³⁰ and from exclusive identification with the ego.³¹

Self-deceived?

      How can anyone be certain that the Presence of which I have [187] spoken is real and not merely a longing, a projection, or the result of neural excitation? We cannot be certain. Freud argued that God was no more than an internalised image of a once all-powerful father--a combination of accusing super-ego and exalted "deity". He contended that many adults, intimidated by forces beyond their control, cultivate this image of an omniscient, omnicompetent, and omnipotent father figure, which they project onto the cosmos.³²

      Few would debate that our earliest image of God is based on the experience of a caregiver, a mother, father, or a combination of both.³³ This experience remains a foundational element of our experience of God.³⁴

      Jung was always reluctant to confess to a belief in God. He argued that he was a psychologist, not a theologian. While he spoke of an inner divinity, and of the need for a religious outlook on life, he would rarely be drawn on the question of whether he considered there was a God. Some of his statements, if taken in isolation, convey the impression that he considered that, for many, "God" was the projection, onto any image supplied by a religious tradition, of one's life energy.³⁵

      There can be little doubt that our libidinal energies play a role in our experience of God. The more we are in touch with ourselves, the more we are in touch with those energies. On the other hand, those who have difficulty relating to themselves, those who have never ventured beyond the security of an egoic consciousness, project the energy of these libidinal forces, their life energy, onto objects external to them. Most frequently, the projection objects are religious metaphors, which receive, not only the feisty energy of the libido, which glows with a divine-like essence, but also the self-detestation and self-depreciation, which are a part of the negative material in the unconscious.

      However, to recognise that our experience of God involves us experiencing our basic libidinal energies is not equivalent to reducing God to these energies. If our life-energy has some kinship with its source, one would expect that the energy of the self and the energy of God would be experienced together, in the one [188] experience.

      I have argued, elsewhere, that our experience of God can progress through four phases. In these God is experienced, progressively, as Parent, Projection, Subjectivity, and Cosmic Presence.³⁶

      Transition through the four phases is a possibility, not an inevitability. Many go no further than the first, or second, of these phases. Few progress to the third and fourth phases. Those who do, feel a deepening affinity with those of other religious traditions who have reached a similar stage. They are often more comfortable with these that they are with members of their own religious traditions who are stuck in the second phase, for whom God is little more than a projection of unconscious energies.

      There is no way of determining the degree to which higher forms of contemplative experience are associated with neural excitation. However, to reduce these experiences merely to neural excitation is reductionist and unjustified. On the other hand, there is no way of conclusively proving that such experiences are anything more than neural excitation. The results that flow from them, the development of wisdom and compassion, while suggestive, do not constitute absolute proof. Neither position is capable of "proof". The question must be left open. Each of us makes a determination by the way we choose to live.

Surrender

      If we are serious about discovering an answer to this question, we must maintain a degree of openness and be willing to surrender to a Divine Presence, should such be encountered.

      However, because insecurity causes us to want to be in control of ourselves, and of our environment, we consciously resist capitulating to external forces. While this is positive, in the sense that it helps us be true to ourselves, it does make spiritual progress difficult. But there is a difference between forced capitulation, whether conscious or unconscious, and a form of surrender that is the gift of an alert mind, a flexible will and a grounded bodyself that recognises that discovering God is a matter of "Waiting for the [189] Beloved".³⁷

Grace

      The discovery of God is a grace that is bestowed upon us. While we are encouraged to seek God, with all that is within us, God, when God is discovered, comes to us self-disclosed. Once we have encountered God, however, we realise that this self-disclosure has been occurring continuously throughout our lives, in spite of our ignorance of potentially revelatory experiences.³⁸

      The more we become aware of this gifted Presence, the more we realise that it exudes a healing, affirming, forgiving love; a love that fosters our maturation and transforms us into reflections of itself. This energy also resonates with joy.³⁹

Health

      Jung argued that a religious outlook is necessary to psychological health.⁴⁰ Arguing that we are psychically interconnected, he went on to suggest that we are psychologically sick because we have lost our connectedness with the psychic life of humankind and with the spirit.⁴¹ As a consequence, he suggested that we need to rediscover, for ourselves, the life of the spirit.⁴²

      Jung's comment could be taken in a crassly pragmatic sense. We could attempt to coerce ourselves into believing that there is a God for the sake of our psychological health. However, while particular ideas of God must work, for them to be maintained,⁴³ any attempt at kidding ourselves that God exists, even for the sake of our well-being, is not only impossible, but duplicitous. Its duplicity undercuts its effectiveness and diminishes any chance we have of discovering God. In kidding ourselves, we have already locked ourselves into an atheistic mind-set. To discover God, as Karlfried Graf Dürkheim, the German psychiatrist, contended, we must become transparent to transcendence.⁴⁴

A spirituality that has integrity

      We need to develop a sense of the sacred, a spirituality that [190] has integrity because it represents the uniqueness of our experience. The spirituality of indigenous Australians is associated with the land. White Australians, who live in that same land, and are impacted upon by it, are not in a position to directly assimilate Aboriginal spirituality. They must discover their own resonance with the land.⁴⁵ There is also a sense in which each generation needs to create its own conception of God.⁴⁶ For some, like Paul Monette, this may involve creating a pagan vision of reverence and connectedness.⁴⁷

Crossing barriers

      It is important for us, at the beginning of the 21st century, to develop a shared spirituality beyond inherited traditions. To do this, it will be essential for us to recognise that, while metaphors point towards the Supreme reality, they are not that reality. We must reach beyond our images towards an apophatic knowing of God, an experiencing of God as sheer Presence. As John of the Cross argued, if we want to be sure of the road on which we travel, we need to close our eyes and walk in the dark.⁴⁸

Unknowable

      Ultimately, however, God--Yahweh, Brahman, Allah, the Dao, and the Father of which Jesus spoke--is unknowable. For this reason, it is important, as Eckhart suggested, to ensure that our idea of God does not become the ultimate obstacle to God.⁴⁹ The Dao that can be named is not the eternal Dao.⁵⁰

      Sam Keen suggested that God is not an object to be explored or a problem awaiting solution but the ultimate Ground of our quest for answers, indeed, of our very existence.⁵¹ Approaching the conundrum from a slightly different angle, Joseph Kramer suggested that God is the greatest of all vibrations, of all orgasms.⁵² The Hindus believed that the universe was brought into being through such primeval vibrations.⁵³

      The Vedas argue that Brahman created through his word.⁵⁴ Our words are created by modulations in vibration. The Hebrew [191] Scriptures also suggest that God created by his word, by means of vibrational energy.⁵⁵ This notion is picked up and developed in the Gospel of John.⁵⁶

The Attractor

      Ken Wilber, exploring the notion of a telos, an omega-point (final destination or climax) that exerts a pull on all processes built into the ecosystem, suggested that perhaps God was the great Attractor--an all-embracing, if chaotic Attractor working through love.⁵⁷ [192]

[LS 179-192]