This evening I was spending some time with friends and family, and an offhand comment was made about the Western ignorance of Eastern concepts such as Interdependent Arising.  Here is perhaps the best relation of the concept I have ever seen, provided by Jack Kornfield in his book A Path With Heart.

"As we open and empty ourselves, we come to experience an interconnectedness, the realization that all things are joined and conditioned in an interdependent arising. Each experience and event contains all others. The teacher depends on the student; the airplane depends on the sky.

When a bell rings, is it the bell we hear, the air, the sound at our ears, or is it our brain that rings? It is all of these things. As the Taoists say, "The between is ringing.” The sound of the bell is here to be heard everywhere—in the eyes of every person we meet, in every tree and insect, in every breath we take.

Holding up a piece of paper, Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh expresses it this way:
If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud there will be no water; without water the trees cannot grow; and without trees, you cannot make paper. So the cloud is in here. The existence of this page is dependent on the existence of a cloud. Paper and cloud are so close. Let us think of other things, like sunshine. Sunshine is very important because the forest cannot grow without sunshine, and we as humans cannot grow without sunshine. So the logger needs sunshine in order to cut the tree, and the tree needs sunshine in order to be a tree. Therefore, you can see sunshine in this sheet of paper. And if you look more deeply, with the eyes of a bodhisattva, with the eyes of those who are awake, you see not only the cloud and the sunshine in it, but that everything is here, the wheat that became the bread for the logger to eat, the logger's father—everything is in this sheet of paper. . . ."

It sounds impressive to be sure, but of course it's only a concept, right?  Intriguing, but of course just a philosophical construct to be examined and eventually discarded.

Think about it a bit more.

Your physical body is as indistinguishable from the environment as your awareness that lies in the instant of experience before the first thought has arisen is indistinguishable from that of any other person? Or any other living thing? Or all things? So there isn't any ownership of anything, even the thought of a self. Things just are, and when things happen we do what we do and life goes on.

Do you know what kindness is? Kindness is when you see the spark in everyone's eye is also your own.

Spiritual Authority

Recently, I have heard the term Spiritual Authority being used in the local magical and pagan communities, and the term is being used misused to the detriment of all.  Just to set the ground straight, let us define authority as “The power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behavior. “. Examples might include your employer, your elected officials, even the transit authority that runs the buses. Another example of interest in various occult communities might include someone who by sheer dint of charisma, force of will and confidence can command others.

Much popular understanding of spiritual authority attempts to reconcile this definition of authority to the spiritual realm. It leads to the notion that spiritual authority is 1) a position held by someone else that possesses access to abilities or knowledge inaccessible to you, and 2) measured by quantity (i.e., the number of people over whom they have power, the size of the corporation they manage, their income level, etc.). But this is nothing more than natural authority renamed.

Unfortunately, that is just too broad a definition for spiritual authority. Why? Because nobody stands between you and larger realms of existence, but ironically you. The implicit or explicit notion that priests or other “spiritual authorities” stand between mankind and their search for the inexpressible is a notion wholly religious in nature. This is exemplified in the various ordination ceremonies for priests of various (typically monotheistic) religions, which are supposed to confer or confirm one's connection to deity and thus presumably their power. Tell me, is your sincere confession “better” if the Pope flies to to hear it, or whether an old man with shaking hands and a white collar listens in a small chapel in El Paso? Is the amulet someone claims was made by Grand Poobah Hufflepuff more effective than one made by your best friend, who was worried enough about you to assemble and charge a lucky mojo for you?

This is distinct from ritual authority, common to almost all forms of magical, religious and many philosophical traditions. One of the most common roles of ritual authority is as a leader or officer in initiatory traditions of religious, magical or mystery nature. Also, it includes rites of passage in many or all cultures. Using the Golden Dawn rituals for example, various officers are present who perform various roles in the rituals. These rituals are designed to lead to certain insights which are shared in common among the members of the group. The Rosicrucians have them, and the greek mystery schools did also. It is a common magical understanding that by ritual and images are all powers awakened and re-awakened, and in this case the spiritual authority of the officers and participants/celebrants in a ritual are designed to create spiritual growth in a certain fairly predictable way. Initiatory rituals can be immensely transformative and are the cornerstones or hidden bones of every religion as well as many occult paths. Ritual authority typically lasts for as long as a particular ritual or even requires to be completed, and is generally considered as an “acting role” whether drawing down the Young King or officiating a wedding.

So what is spiritual authority? It varies from person to person, but in my experience people assign spiritual authority to someone whom they feel has a larger spiritual perspective than their own, whether one might have a close reationship with the spirits in a house festooned with altars and ancestor shrines, has had various transformative experiences, pursuit of various paths of enlightenment or mystery traditions. One quality of spiritual authority is that is voluntary. It is very similar to the willing suspension of disbelief when watching a movie. One has to give permission for others to exercise spiritual authority.

Second, that authority is fragile, in that as soon as that individual feel that the person is now acting outside of the spirit, authority is taken back. Spiritual authority and the directives that issue forth from that authority are conditioned on acceptance of each directive.

Finally, that spiritual authority must eventually be surrendered. When the rite is done, and the world and the sense of “I” are no longer observed but believed, the spiritual authority must be set down. Even a mighty Magister may still make a complete ass of himself.

So, what is not spiritual authority? Spiritual authority is not being a high ranking member of a specific school or tradition. Some of you know my background, but I am the greatest living magical adept of the tradition of Michael A. Eckhard. And you, dear reader, are almost certainly the greatest known adept of your own unique brand of practice. You might have started out in one tradition, or pursued the path of Jack of All Traditions (and master of none). So what? Every tradition has it's great and not-so-great aspects, from cultural blind spots to frankly bizarre practices that people agree are “traditional” but don't serve any practical or even ritual purpose anymore.

Spiritual authority is not being told what to do. If someone is telling you how “it works”, perhaps you should be wondering why they don't seem to be interested in how “it works” for you. A spiritual authority wants to hear what is going on, and will probably have questions. And may have advice. Or not. And if they offer it, you are free to take it or leave it, just like if it came from anyone else.

Finally, spiritual authority is not concerned with changing you. Rather, it seeks to help you manifest what is growing inside you, to assist you in reaching the full blossoming of your spirituality. Not theirs. If the man or woman you have decided has spiritual authority tries to wield actual authority over you, look somewhere else.

Transpersonal

"Transpersonal" means that some sort of process is occurring in the individual that, in a sense, goes beyond the individual. The simplest in-stance of this is extrasensory perception, or ESP. Parapsychologists rec-ognize several forms of ESP: telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, retrocognition. We might also include out-of-body experiences, experi-ences of a transpersonal self or witness, peak experiences, and so on. What all of these events have in common is an expansion of the self/not-self boundary beyond the skin-boundary of the organism.

Saturn

I was talking about the restraining power of Saturn the other day with someone. I wonder which is more frustrating, enforced change toward an unknowable goal or preservation of an arbitrary standard?

Conditioning

It has not been yet demonstrated that all conditioning can be absolutely released into consciousness. This is the shining strength of the various paths of enlightenment in the western traditions; by shaping the course of the awakening with critical themes concentrated on, it is also possible to shape which remnants remain. Thus one might create archetypes such as Fates, Seers, the Western and Eastern magi and so forth. Where the East concentrates on the goal of total formlessness, the west offers individuation into an archetypal form before formlessness.

Abyss Mysticism

There is That which watches the arising and passing away of consciousness. When consciousness arises there then arises Thought, of which the first is I. Thus arises duality with Not I. And this is the Fall of Man. And the path again.

There it is folks, the secret of enlightenment in the Western Magical Tradition. When you understand it fully, the sleeper has awakened.

Magick vs. the East

The Western Magical Tradition has been criticized by adherents of Eastern enlightenment traditions such as Buddhism and Zen as not containing a valid initiatory path within the various systems extant today. Moreover, some critics continue, since almost all major religions contain at least one form of initiatory path, the modern earth-based religions such as Wicca that are common in the United States today which by dint of being created out of whole cloth do not contain such a path of development are doomed to not even being able to function adequately in those roles which religion has historically been noted for. 

In response, the  Western traditions note that the transcendental paths of Christianity, Judaism, Islam and others concentrate on removing those aspects of mortal man that obscure the hidden divinity. As those mortal thoughts are understood and purified, the faithful achieve the moment of Union where there is no will, but God’s will be done. By contrast the tradition of magic seeks to obtain knowledge and understanding of all, so that all may fall within the grasp of the Magician and he becomes One with all, creating and sustaining all and indeed inherent in all while being also separate. When all the starry sky is but a gleam in the eye of the Absolute, the adept has no will in any direction.

Said the Adept of the West to the Adepts of the East, “We both point to the same moon. Why are you staring at my finger?”.