Hi Chris, I started toying with the idea of writing letters to loved ones again . I feel like there is something valuable that has been lost in the transition to more technologically mediated forms of communication . what is your take on this ? For me , it’s only at the level of an intuition (I feel like something valuable has been lost) but I can taste articulate what that is . Maybe you have some ideas .
I think people would really appreciate it. If you think about it, hand-written thank you notes and postcards are still seen as incredibly thoughtful, so full letters would be seen in an even more favourable light.
Hi Chris: I really related to what you said about writing. In this terrible hot summer I've enjoyed reading your Substack, also Rod's and various other writings. In "days of yore" people waited years between books, but in these days we can know you a little bit, have a connection of some kind.
The clear talk on Marxism was good. Conditions create ideas rather than vice versa is the claim. This accounts for the attempt to impoverish and divide the West. These conditions create the ideas of revolution. I actually do not think it is either, but that there is a circle. Ideas bring conditions which bring ideas which bring conditions, on and on. Like you, I thin, I believe that the material world (if it is "real") precipitated from ideas, from words, from Logos.
As I've mentioned before, my comments could be "I agree, I agree" but that would be boring. Just know that I agree with a lot.
OK, China. To what extent do you think your perceptions could have been formed by Chinese ex-pats and those descended from them, in Singapore? I'm in touch with a friend in China but obviously, she could be censored and that could be why I've not heard of this suffering. I know of the sufferings of the poor -those living in "slots" not much longer or wider than a person and half as high as a person, for instance, and spending their days in factories. But - there are somewhere around 100 million Christians in China. Fulan Gong had as many as 70 million adherents before open and extreme persecution and now we do not know how many there are. I'm an Epoch Times subscriber. We both know it is the CCP and not the Chinese people themselves that are the problem. My Chinese friend is a Buddhist and took me to Buddhist temple with her when I visited China. We know Muslims are persecuted in Western China but there are many millions. So I think a significant percent of the Chinese people in China have a spirituality. For many, it is Confucius. His teachings have been revived and allowed for quite some years now, and are important to a majority, I have heard. Also, despite most famiies still having one child for economic reasons, they love their families and family is important to them. (Though I am not sure how the CCP controls Confucian teachings.)
As for the future, I don't know if China will be Hegemon or will fall from within . It is a difficult problem about which to make predictions. But I lean toward Hegemon. This because so many morals and ethics are strong - no all, but many - in China among the "common" people, despite Communism, and weak in the West. A moral people with a government that wants Hegemony has seen success in world history
Morals, you say? They are faithful to their spouses and almost all stay married. They work hard. They value learning. Crimes, like theft, murder and rape are quite low.
I will have things to say about Revelation and the number seven and Jewish mysticism in another post.
The Epoch Times may be a decent source, though they are Falun Gong-affiliated, which may present its own problems. I found them useful during the pandemic.
It is true, that I am informed mostly be overseas Chinese people, but not exclusively. I used to date a girl from Wuhan, which is the centre of the fashion industry. She told me the story of how they had to import Italian specialists to make silk, since the Chinese have forgotten how to make and appreciate it properly. Her boss was Italian and knew more about silk than any Chinese person, a result of the cultural revolution, which eradicated all ancient knowledge. Something similar happened in Hungary. For instance, if you want real, traditional Hungarian salami, you have to import it from Italy, which some Hungarian restaurants do, where it is called Salami Ungheresa. Hungarians have forgotten how to make it, due to the destruction wrought by communism.
I also follow Chinese dissident youtubers, like China Observer, which I would highly recommend, or Westerners who once lived in China but have since had to leave, like SerpentZA. Theres's a lot of info out there, but finding it is tricky due to censorship.
My experience with Chinese has been, that they are by and large atheists, with some still having folk beliefs, to do with health for instance (the four elements, subtle wind, feng shui, etc...), but there are very few people there who actually believe in God the way we understand it. A growing number of Christians, that is indeed true and very hopeful for the future. Historian Niall Ferguson wrote about the rise of Christianity in Asia, which I found interesting, he thinks that makes them better than the West and the new centre of gravity for the world economy and eventually, culture. I have my doubts, but we shall see.
I am so happy you told me how to get good tasting telisalami - Pick salami is good in the core but almost always has a very hard, bad tasting layer on the outside - I don't mean the paper-like part you remove, but underneath that part. Other Hungarian salamis aren't too good at all, I think. But I never knew what good salami tasted like until I got a good Pick one here, which happens sometimes, and just happened to be my first one. I hope I can find salami Ungherese for purchase in a store somewhere.
Yes, fascinating about the silk. I hope authentic Confucianism was not lost in the same way. I think it probably was not, since all the old did not die before it was again allowed.
Yes, I know about Epoch Times and Fulan Gong. I enjoy their spirituality. I only hesitate because I have a problem with karma - I think believing in re-incarnation is a reason the poor are left to suffer by most who believe in it. But I know a lot of good people who do believe in it. I think Christians have almost entirely missed true meditation which is so important, but I follow a group called the World Community for Christian Meditation. https://wccm.org/ You will see me from time to time on Rod's Substack trying to describe meditation (as distinct from mindfulness, a different spiritiual practice as I understand it. ) - Gosh I am getting off topic.
I just
That is encourging about Niall Ferguson, I'd like to find what he is saying and writing about that.
Niall married Ayaan Hirsi Ali, an ex-Muslim and atheist at the time, as well as one of the greatest defenders of the West in my view. She has recently converted to Christianity, probably partly due to her husband's influence. Niall has many books, but this particular thought came from Civilization: The West and the Rest
He has since expressed his views in articles as well.
The entire human world is now patterned and controlled by the anti-culture of scientific materialism which has deprived humankind of all profundity of view relative to the nature and significance of the Cosmos, and relative to the Divine Nature of Reality Itself.
Scientific materialism is a global cultural program which has effectively supported the separate and separative ego's motive to achieve a perfectly independent state of self-sufficiency that, as a result, the human collective has brought itself to the point of global destruction and universal despair
It is at root a "culture" of death.
As such it could be argued that the leading-edge vector of this death-saturated anti-culture is the military-industrial-complex which has 700 or more bases all over the planet and some kind of military presence in almost every country. The US is permanent warfare state! It also has hundreds (even thousands) of military bases in the US too. Almost every US State relies heavily on its continued prosperity on the presence of companies that supply the needs of the Pentagon death machine - everything from paper clips to nuclear submarines.
None of the above has anything remotely to do with the dreaded Marxists.
This now world-wide "culture" of death is the cultural extension of the spirit-killing left brained thinking that Iain McGilchrist has written about, beginning with his book The Master & His Emissary. The Emissary now rules to here.
At another related level this "culture" of death is an extension of Western utopian idealism - an impulse toward life things, an impulse toward bringing order to the material appearance of life, so that this life (in and of itself) is made fulfilling, made complete, made happy, and made deathless even.
Western people systematically eliminate death and suffering from their view. Western philosophy and "theology" is the always-wanting-to-forestall-the-day philosophy that does neither understands the significance of death nor takes it into account. As such we reject death and suffering, and, therefore, reject the necessity to surrender and be sublimed by What Is Truly Great,
Right life which is necessarily Spiritual is not based on the rejection of death. It is based on taking death into account, and making the fact of death the framework and the fundamental basis of ones understanding of life and its intrinsic purpose.
A philosophy and by extension culture based on the rejection of death becomes materialism, utopianism, gross-level worldliness. Philosophy based on the acceptance of death, and, thus, on the understanding of this life, associated as it is with death, with ending, with suffering, with limitation , is an entirely different kind of philosophy. It is the basis for profound Spiritual practice, for the profound surrender and transcending of the separate and separative self.
The usual religious life is a calling and/or search for help, for service, for attention, for goods, for things to turn out out the way you want them to turn out. Such conventional religiosity always looking to avoid death, suffering, self surrender, self transcendence, renunciation even.
This search is typical and characteristic of the Western disposition altogether - the gross, body-based, materialistic disposition made into a culture, a society, politics.
It could be said that this project http://www.project2025.org is a very stark manifestation of this materialistic disposition, even while pretending to be "religious"!
About Revelation: John was a Jew. He wrote with vast knowledge of Jewish Scripture. (And if he was not the author, the a Jew was the author.) I didn't know all this until I started going to Chabad, but I know a lot more. Still I can't explain it all or even a small part.
The number seven is important to Christians but there is no concept of chakras in Christianity. I am not saying chakras are wrong, I am just saying I don't think it is part of Christianity nor Judaism. I know in the Bible seven represents completion or perfection. Btw, it has a completely different meaning for Greeks, not chakras and not completion.
Revelation chapter 5 and 6 are recommended reading on the seals. But...this book on Jewish teaching and Revelation is amazing. You can get a pdf but you have to give an email. So maybe you have a "junk email" (like my yahoo mail) for when you have to give an email Or send me a message in chat if you want to share your email with me and I'll send you the Pdf directly. I think this booklet will appeal to the mysticism in your soul a lot. I am not saying you not I will agree with everything, but I think it is pretty amazing.
Well, doesn't that stem from reading Revelation 5, in which the fact that there are seven seals is mentioned in the last verse, but then not going on, not reading Revelation 6? The seals are various plagues and disasters that will be unleased on people, it talks about each of the seals in turn in Revelation 6. Chakras and plagues being unleased on people are not related.
Seven is a sacred number, but ever seven in sacred literature does not refer to chakras.
Hi Chris, I started toying with the idea of writing letters to loved ones again . I feel like there is something valuable that has been lost in the transition to more technologically mediated forms of communication . what is your take on this ? For me , it’s only at the level of an intuition (I feel like something valuable has been lost) but I can taste articulate what that is . Maybe you have some ideas .
I think people would really appreciate it. If you think about it, hand-written thank you notes and postcards are still seen as incredibly thoughtful, so full letters would be seen in an even more favourable light.
Hi Chris: I really related to what you said about writing. In this terrible hot summer I've enjoyed reading your Substack, also Rod's and various other writings. In "days of yore" people waited years between books, but in these days we can know you a little bit, have a connection of some kind.
The clear talk on Marxism was good. Conditions create ideas rather than vice versa is the claim. This accounts for the attempt to impoverish and divide the West. These conditions create the ideas of revolution. I actually do not think it is either, but that there is a circle. Ideas bring conditions which bring ideas which bring conditions, on and on. Like you, I thin, I believe that the material world (if it is "real") precipitated from ideas, from words, from Logos.
As I've mentioned before, my comments could be "I agree, I agree" but that would be boring. Just know that I agree with a lot.
OK, China. To what extent do you think your perceptions could have been formed by Chinese ex-pats and those descended from them, in Singapore? I'm in touch with a friend in China but obviously, she could be censored and that could be why I've not heard of this suffering. I know of the sufferings of the poor -those living in "slots" not much longer or wider than a person and half as high as a person, for instance, and spending their days in factories. But - there are somewhere around 100 million Christians in China. Fulan Gong had as many as 70 million adherents before open and extreme persecution and now we do not know how many there are. I'm an Epoch Times subscriber. We both know it is the CCP and not the Chinese people themselves that are the problem. My Chinese friend is a Buddhist and took me to Buddhist temple with her when I visited China. We know Muslims are persecuted in Western China but there are many millions. So I think a significant percent of the Chinese people in China have a spirituality. For many, it is Confucius. His teachings have been revived and allowed for quite some years now, and are important to a majority, I have heard. Also, despite most famiies still having one child for economic reasons, they love their families and family is important to them. (Though I am not sure how the CCP controls Confucian teachings.)
As for the future, I don't know if China will be Hegemon or will fall from within . It is a difficult problem about which to make predictions. But I lean toward Hegemon. This because so many morals and ethics are strong - no all, but many - in China among the "common" people, despite Communism, and weak in the West. A moral people with a government that wants Hegemony has seen success in world history
Morals, you say? They are faithful to their spouses and almost all stay married. They work hard. They value learning. Crimes, like theft, murder and rape are quite low.
I will have things to say about Revelation and the number seven and Jewish mysticism in another post.
The Epoch Times may be a decent source, though they are Falun Gong-affiliated, which may present its own problems. I found them useful during the pandemic.
On chinese irreligosity:
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/08/30/is-china-a-religious-country-or-not-its-a-tricky-question-to-answer/
It is true, that I am informed mostly be overseas Chinese people, but not exclusively. I used to date a girl from Wuhan, which is the centre of the fashion industry. She told me the story of how they had to import Italian specialists to make silk, since the Chinese have forgotten how to make and appreciate it properly. Her boss was Italian and knew more about silk than any Chinese person, a result of the cultural revolution, which eradicated all ancient knowledge. Something similar happened in Hungary. For instance, if you want real, traditional Hungarian salami, you have to import it from Italy, which some Hungarian restaurants do, where it is called Salami Ungheresa. Hungarians have forgotten how to make it, due to the destruction wrought by communism.
I also follow Chinese dissident youtubers, like China Observer, which I would highly recommend, or Westerners who once lived in China but have since had to leave, like SerpentZA. Theres's a lot of info out there, but finding it is tricky due to censorship.
My experience with Chinese has been, that they are by and large atheists, with some still having folk beliefs, to do with health for instance (the four elements, subtle wind, feng shui, etc...), but there are very few people there who actually believe in God the way we understand it. A growing number of Christians, that is indeed true and very hopeful for the future. Historian Niall Ferguson wrote about the rise of Christianity in Asia, which I found interesting, he thinks that makes them better than the West and the new centre of gravity for the world economy and eventually, culture. I have my doubts, but we shall see.
I am so happy you told me how to get good tasting telisalami - Pick salami is good in the core but almost always has a very hard, bad tasting layer on the outside - I don't mean the paper-like part you remove, but underneath that part. Other Hungarian salamis aren't too good at all, I think. But I never knew what good salami tasted like until I got a good Pick one here, which happens sometimes, and just happened to be my first one. I hope I can find salami Ungherese for purchase in a store somewhere.
Yes, fascinating about the silk. I hope authentic Confucianism was not lost in the same way. I think it probably was not, since all the old did not die before it was again allowed.
Yes, I know about Epoch Times and Fulan Gong. I enjoy their spirituality. I only hesitate because I have a problem with karma - I think believing in re-incarnation is a reason the poor are left to suffer by most who believe in it. But I know a lot of good people who do believe in it. I think Christians have almost entirely missed true meditation which is so important, but I follow a group called the World Community for Christian Meditation. https://wccm.org/ You will see me from time to time on Rod's Substack trying to describe meditation (as distinct from mindfulness, a different spiritiual practice as I understand it. ) - Gosh I am getting off topic.
I just
That is encourging about Niall Ferguson, I'd like to find what he is saying and writing about that.
Niall married Ayaan Hirsi Ali, an ex-Muslim and atheist at the time, as well as one of the greatest defenders of the West in my view. She has recently converted to Christianity, probably partly due to her husband's influence. Niall has many books, but this particular thought came from Civilization: The West and the Rest
He has since expressed his views in articles as well.
The entire human world is now patterned and controlled by the anti-culture of scientific materialism which has deprived humankind of all profundity of view relative to the nature and significance of the Cosmos, and relative to the Divine Nature of Reality Itself.
Scientific materialism is a global cultural program which has effectively supported the separate and separative ego's motive to achieve a perfectly independent state of self-sufficiency that, as a result, the human collective has brought itself to the point of global destruction and universal despair
It is at root a "culture" of death.
As such it could be argued that the leading-edge vector of this death-saturated anti-culture is the military-industrial-complex which has 700 or more bases all over the planet and some kind of military presence in almost every country. The US is permanent warfare state! It also has hundreds (even thousands) of military bases in the US too. Almost every US State relies heavily on its continued prosperity on the presence of companies that supply the needs of the Pentagon death machine - everything from paper clips to nuclear submarines.
None of the above has anything remotely to do with the dreaded Marxists.
This now world-wide "culture" of death is the cultural extension of the spirit-killing left brained thinking that Iain McGilchrist has written about, beginning with his book The Master & His Emissary. The Emissary now rules to here.
At another related level this "culture" of death is an extension of Western utopian idealism - an impulse toward life things, an impulse toward bringing order to the material appearance of life, so that this life (in and of itself) is made fulfilling, made complete, made happy, and made deathless even.
Western people systematically eliminate death and suffering from their view. Western philosophy and "theology" is the always-wanting-to-forestall-the-day philosophy that does neither understands the significance of death nor takes it into account. As such we reject death and suffering, and, therefore, reject the necessity to surrender and be sublimed by What Is Truly Great,
Right life which is necessarily Spiritual is not based on the rejection of death. It is based on taking death into account, and making the fact of death the framework and the fundamental basis of ones understanding of life and its intrinsic purpose.
A philosophy and by extension culture based on the rejection of death becomes materialism, utopianism, gross-level worldliness. Philosophy based on the acceptance of death, and, thus, on the understanding of this life, associated as it is with death, with ending, with suffering, with limitation , is an entirely different kind of philosophy. It is the basis for profound Spiritual practice, for the profound surrender and transcending of the separate and separative self.
The usual religious life is a calling and/or search for help, for service, for attention, for goods, for things to turn out out the way you want them to turn out. Such conventional religiosity always looking to avoid death, suffering, self surrender, self transcendence, renunciation even.
This search is typical and characteristic of the Western disposition altogether - the gross, body-based, materialistic disposition made into a culture, a society, politics.
It could be said that this project http://www.project2025.org is a very stark manifestation of this materialistic disposition, even while pretending to be "religious"!
About Revelation: John was a Jew. He wrote with vast knowledge of Jewish Scripture. (And if he was not the author, the a Jew was the author.) I didn't know all this until I started going to Chabad, but I know a lot more. Still I can't explain it all or even a small part.
The number seven is important to Christians but there is no concept of chakras in Christianity. I am not saying chakras are wrong, I am just saying I don't think it is part of Christianity nor Judaism. I know in the Bible seven represents completion or perfection. Btw, it has a completely different meaning for Greeks, not chakras and not completion.
Revelation chapter 5 and 6 are recommended reading on the seals. But...this book on Jewish teaching and Revelation is amazing. You can get a pdf but you have to give an email. So maybe you have a "junk email" (like my yahoo mail) for when you have to give an email Or send me a message in chat if you want to share your email with me and I'll send you the Pdf directly. I think this booklet will appeal to the mysticism in your soul a lot. I am not saying you not I will agree with everything, but I think it is pretty amazing.
https://lp.israelbiblecenter.com/lp-biblical-studies-ibc-revelation-campaign-en.html?via=3e6af93
feel free to email me. It's christian dot koncz at gmail dot com.
If you want a definitive explanation of the Book of Revelations by a God-illumined Sage, read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Second_Coming_of_Christ_(book)
https://www.amazon.com/Second-Coming-Christ-Resurrection-Within/dp/0876125577
Paramahansa Yogananda explains that the seals mentioned in the Book of Revelations correspond to the chakras.
wow, I haven't heard of that book, sounds really interesting, thanks. I shall have to check it out.
Well, doesn't that stem from reading Revelation 5, in which the fact that there are seven seals is mentioned in the last verse, but then not going on, not reading Revelation 6? The seals are various plagues and disasters that will be unleased on people, it talks about each of the seals in turn in Revelation 6. Chakras and plagues being unleased on people are not related.
Seven is a sacred number, but ever seven in sacred literature does not refer to chakras.