From: Phaedrus Wolff (PhaedrusWolff@carolina.rr.com)
Date: Sun Dec 12 2004 - 17:27:16 GMT
Hi Sam, dmb, and all,
Socrates is my favorite mystic. The way he defended himself in the Apology,
and the way he faced death in Phaedo by themselves show a man who's fear was
absent from the hear-and-now, prior to any Bibles being written. Throughout
the stories of Socrates we know he hears divine voices, and he goes into
deep trance states, but out of these deep trance states seems to come
nothing to add to the dialogues as to the nature of the current dialogues.
There is no denial that Socrates thoughts came from intuition -- is there?
Would you not describe intuition as Mystic? (I'm not posing this question as
a statement, but a question) Throughout the dialogues, he spoke of
immorality in the form of a soul and reincarnation.
I think some of our problems with the way we look at the ancients is that we
are looking at them in a Western 'intelligence' mastery as opposed to an
Eastern 'spirituality' mastery. If we look at Socrates as a spiritual master
(midwife), and he himself claims this in some of the dialogues, "Theatetus"
being one of the strongest, then he is saying that his students (disciples
or whatever you want to call them) do not learn from him. He says something
to the nature of their concepts are born into their own minds and not from
his, through a spiritual awakening from the silence of the mind.
I would find it quite difficult not to see Socrates as a mystic, and I could
carry this argument further if needed, but I feel the answer to the idea of
Socrates or other mystics might come from Western or Eastern definition of
'Mystic' -- or maybe even how we define mystic as dependent on each of our
different cultures that make up Western or Eastern thought. I think maybe I
am defining mystic as something other than 'sense' intuition which confuses
intuition as I see it, sense the word 'sense' comes from an already defined
experience, and may be where Pirsig says Western thought confuses intuition.
Raw intuition would appear to me to be a form of mysticism as it holds no
limits to what is taught, or what Socrates called 'Imitative poetry'.
I will stop there as I don't see that anything I have offered really adds to
the discussion.
Chin
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sam Norton" <elizaphanian@kohath.wanadoo.co.uk>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Sunday, December 12, 2004 6:46 AM
Subject: Re: MD Is the MoQ still in the Kantosphere?
> Hi DMB,
>
> > dmb says:
> > I could have jumped in before this point but picked this late one out of
> > mercy for the readers. There are two main objections that spring to
mind.
> > The first one concerns mixing Kant's epistemology with the assertions of
> > mysticism. ....
>
> The point I was making hinges less on Kant's conception of the
transcendent than what Schleiermacher
> does with it - for it seems to me that Schleiermacher's position is James'
position is Pirsig's
> position is your position. That is, it was Schleiermacher who, so far as I
understand it, took the
> Kantian system and 'outflanked it' by resort to special feelings etc, and
it was he who transferred
> the label 'mystical' to the result.
>
> > And so the distinction
> > between Kant's phenomenal and noumenal is just a particular form of
> > subject-object metaphysics. <snip>
>
> Yes indeed. My worry is that the MoQ still retains an inheritance from
that conceptual shape. As I
> asked at the end of the essay, isn't DQ just the 'noumenal' - as described
by Schleiermacher? And
> the static levels, the phenomenal? If not, why not? You've asserted that
Kant's system doesn't make
> the transcendent into the ineffable - fine, I'll run with that for the
time being - but it does seem
> to be what Schleiermacher has done. Hasn't he?
>
> > dmb says:
> > We have language and concepts available to us that didn't exist in the
past,
> > but I'm quite certain that philosophical mysticism existed LOOOOONG
before
> > Schleiermacher. Socrates spoke of that "divine madness" and the new
> > testament is littered with references to it. I could dig up a gazillion
> > ancient descriptions of the mystical experience and you'd still
recognize it
> > as the same experience we talk about today. Its only natural that we use
> > modern language to discuss it today.
>
> Well, I think you're making a mistake here, and this is the absolute heart
of our disagreements. I
> do not believe that we can simply say that Socrates was talking about the
same thing that
> 'philosophical mystics' today are talking about, without further
explanation and justification. You
> think that we can, and so you bring in 'a gazillion ancient descriptions'
thinking that they support
> your case, whereas I think that you have simply assumed your conclusions
before you start
> investigating. Whenever I have challenged you to justify your position
with reference to the
> tradition that I know a bit about, ie the Christian one, you've evaded the
issue (despite claiming
> to be a Christian mystic yourself! That still astonishes me). Frankly I
think you know that you're
> wrong on this and you're just afraid of exposing your assumptions to
scrutiny. Why don't we explore
> Eckhart together, for example - he's even been given Pirsig's imprimatur,
so surely you can't be
> that frightened of what you might discover? And if you claim to be a
Christian mystic, is there
> anyone else who qualifies under that description with whom you would
agree? I don't care who you
> pick, as long as it is pre-Kant, so let's say anyone before 1600. There
are lots to choose from. If
> you continue to run away from this sort of serious engagement then I will
be confirmed in my
> conclusion that you're argumentation is driven by fear not by a love of
truth.
>
> The thing is, I believe it to have been demonstrated without any
possibility of further ambiguity
> that the way in which mysticism is understood by the William James strand
is radically different to
> how it was understood prior to Schleiermacher within the Christian
tradition. I could be wrong, but
> you haven't come close to demonstrating it yet. You keep on dismissing
this as the rantings of
> someone whose understanding is compromised by a religious faith. Well, I
don't know what else there
> is to say. If you bothered to study the matter, and break out of your
intellectual ghetto, you may
> (or may not) perceive that certain arguments have Quality, others do not,
and you might learn
> something as a result. You just seem to have discarded all the norms of
rational argumentation, ie
> looking at the original texts, giving some respect to what people say who
have spent a long time
> considering the texts, exploring the historical context, trying to
establish what the mystical
> thinkers meant by the words they were using - all trying to assess what
makes sense according to
> whatever flickering light of Quality exists in our own brains. Does none
of this carry any weight
> with you? If it doesn't, I think I'd better stop.
>
> Some briefer comments below.
>
> > dmb says:
> > I don't see how essentialism, Cartesianism or reductionism enters into
the
> > equation. The assertion is simply that people have reported and
described
> > the same experience and that they have done so regardless of their
> > particular culture, time and place. This is simply recognizing a
pattern.
> > The only thing that can be reasonable in dispute is the meaning of these
> > reports. Nothing needs to be assumed. One reads account after account
and
> > notices a common theme. Recognition of this common core is a conclusion,
a
> > point of view based on evidence, not an assumptiom.
>
> When you say 'one reads account after account' - who has been doing the
reading? If you have been
> doing the reading, does this include the Christian mystics? If so, please
take up my challenge
> above, and let us explore one mystic in depth, and see if your analysis
and description can be
> sustained. I don't think you've bothered to read them yourself, and I
think you're dependent on - at
> best - compromised third-hand selections for your information, as was
William James himself. Thing
> is, I'm no expert either, but I have read _some_ of the tradition in the
original (eg Julian of
> Norwich), and I've read a lot of secondary literature on the subject, and
it seems to me that you
> simply haven't bothered to investigate people who disagree with you.
>
> > dmb says:
> > I don't quite follow the reasoning here. But if I had to guess, you're
> > troubled by a seemingly inconsistent assertion that a mystical
experience is
> > both ineffable and noetic, that it is beyond concepts and it imparts
> > knowledge at the same time. Is that about right? As I understand it,
this is
> > only a problem is we are claiming that the knowledge we gain from such
an
> > experience is conceptual, but its not conceptual. This is why we usually
> > talk about it in metaphors or in terms of what it is NOT. And you may
recall
> > my explanations concerning epistemological pluralism. In those terms we
> > would say that concepts are seen with the eye of the mind rather than
with
> > the eye of flesh and that the eye of contemplation is a third kind that
is
> > neither. This 3rd one is the eye with which we "see" in a mystical
> > experience. So the apparent conflict here disappears when we say that
the
> > knowlege gained from a mystical experience cannot be expressed in
concepts,
> > but we do it anyway.
>
> In the above you are using the traditional vocabulary of apophatic
mysticism with great confidence,
> but I don't think you know what you are talking about. The point is that
when you use language to
> say that something is NOT something else, you are still making an
assertion, you are still making a
> conceptual claim. So the Christian mystics (for example) were moving
beyond that, making 'a negation
> of the negation' to get the mind to shut up. You're still operating within
the system that they were
> explicitly criticising. Again, I've asked you to explore these things,
take some time to investigate
> what I was saying further, but you've never bothered. You've had three
years to do it - and if it's
> not intellectual cowardice that has stopped you, what is it?
>
> <snipping a load of stuff which I am too weary to go through with you
again>
>
> > dmb says:
> > Well, yes, its pretty clear that Schleiermacher, James and Pirsig are
all
> > talking about the same experience,
>
> Great, we have some agreement
>
> > but this is not particularly modern, does
> > not begin with Schleiermacher
>
> This is what you need to JUSTIFY not simply ASSERT
>
> > and doesn't rest upon Kant's epistemology.
>
> It rests on Schleiermacher's take of Kant's epistemology, as I understand
it. See above.
>
> Sam
>
>
>
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