From Morality to Mysticism
Meditationtime Forum Post
Date: Posted 3 years before Jun 20, 2016
Jettins 3 years ago
From Morality to Mysticism
Located @ http://www.beinginthenow.org/enlightenment-and-the-body-of-light/
What are your thoughts on the information below?
Morality, or the moral dimension of life, is the foundation for the process of higher human development to enlightenment. However, the process only begins there. As a person practices spiritual disciplines—prayer, meditation, or esoteric psychotechnologies—to deepen his or her relationship with God, the person ascends in consciousness to higher and higher planes of existence. Mystical experience and arcane metaphysics come to the forefront of the person's consciousness, and the light of God shines ever more brightly through every aspect of the person's life. Ultimately, the quest for enlightenment leads one to actually becoming light—attaining the body of light and becoming a being of light. Morality and virtue are then understood to be the human reflection of divine attributes, and the practice of mysticism is understood as a process of becoming, quite literally, more and more Godlike.
The important thing in the process is, as the Bhagavad Gita puts it, to "fix your heart on God," submit your will to the Divine Will, and then invoke the Holy Spirit, the Shekinah Glory, the Goddess Kundalini, etcetera, as the entry point for your spiritual practice. Support that with moral behavior, cultivation of the body and mind, works of social goodness and civic responsibility. In other words, live a life of integral practice, so that your entire being—body, mind, and spirit—is oriented to the attainment of enlightenment. God will take care of the rest. Through spiritual refinement, the psychophysical dross of your humanity is removed. Then you can "cast off" the flesh body through the death process. You put on the "seamless robe of light." You no longer cast a shadow because you do not have a Shadow.
MiBeloved 3 years ago
I looked at the information at the link you provided.
It is hard to comment on it because his definitions are not clear in every case and until we can agree on the same meaning for a certain word, like God for instance or even Enlightenment, it is futile to comment.
He is assuming, and perhaps you are too, that everyone has the same definition for those touchy terms like God and enlightenment but that is not a fact.
A sane fair discussion must begin after settling for specific definitions otherwise it is just a nice speech and mental satisfaction from imagined meanings which have no place in the real world.
Jettins 3 years ago
Michael Wrote: He is assuming, and perhaps you are too, that everyone has the same definition for those touchy terms like God and enlightenment
Jettins Reply:
Actually I am the reverse. I am inclined to make my own definition of things. It appears to me that he tries to unify things. I think this is just fine if that’s what he wants to do. I will pick up on the positive and ignore what is not useful to me. If there is something I don’t understand for whatever reason, I won’t dismiss it as imagined meaning. To me it would be someone else’s reality, however insane I don’t have to understand it. Posting something doesn’t mean I necessarily agree with it by the way.
MiBeloved 3 years ago
You asked for thoughts on the information and I was replying to that, as to why thoughts cannot be given. If something is vague, I am not going to waste my time with it. If he begins by making clear his definitions, or if is willing to do that, then a discourse can start in earnest, otherwise he is speaking about mangoes and I am speaking about guns and that will get nowhere.
Marcia Beloved 3 years ago
Jettins posted from the link:
Ultimately, the quest for enlightenment leads one to actually becoming light—attaining the body of light and becoming a being of light.
Marcia Beloved’s Comment:
Maybe we can agree that “enlightenment” in the context of the article, means to attain a body of light.
The definition of God seems to be less important to the discussion since God is given a different name and / or persona in all the various spiritual traditions.
This quote caused me to think of Babaji, who is said to have a body of light.
Also, I recently watched a video in which Yogi Hamsa says he experienced in his own meetings with Anandamayi Ma, that she cast no shadow:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odrxh3gwSok
He called her an avatar on the basis of having a “light body”.
I see it as a matter of which process one will follow to become a “body of light”.
And if the process one follows is actually able to deliver a “body of light” to a dedicated and skilled aspirant.
Morality is definitely a factor, being the yama and niyama requirements of ashtanga yoga. All religious traditions incorporate some version of the golden rule: doing unto others as you would have them do unto you.
I would like to ask Michael, if the siddha body he is trying to attain, is the same type or similar type of body of light.
Does a fully purified subtle body, transform into a “body of light”, which casts no shadow and is of a vibration which corresponds to a destination which is beyond impermanence?
MiBeloved 3 years ago
I do not get a clear view of how they are using the terms “light body.”
There is only one astral body and it has various phases. In all cases it is composed of light or light energy, like radio waves, light waves etc. When it is in a lower energy state, that is in the lower astral world, when it is in a very high energy states, that is the higher astral world.
A siddha body is the same astral body in a very high energy state.
I do not follow the bit about shadow.
If the person speaks of the shadow of a material body being missing then that does not make any sense, because in all cases the material body will have a shadow.
If he speaks of the astral body having a shadow, that does not make any sense because in all cases, the astral body in its low or high energizations will have no shadow.
Evidence of this is direct, in that we do not see light having shadow, sunlight or electric light. On the atomic level, things usually do not carry a shadow but they do carry an effect which might be regarded as a shadow. Or they are followed by waves which might be regarded as shadows.
If someone says that a saint’s material body has no shadow, then what is the value of that? Because ultimately that material body has to die anyway. There is no one single case of anyone from prehistory who has a material body which is present right now on the planet. So if even the saint has a material body which has no shadow, then that mystic display leads nowhere, if in fact that material body had to commit itself to the laws of nature for its death.
In the kriya yoga system, there is no interest in transmuting or changing the physical system into a spiritual system but all the same some kriya teachers, like Sri Paramhamsa Yogananda guruji, did give people the idea that he may or would transmit or transfigure his body as Christ is said to have done.
Rishi Singh Gherwal was a contemporary of Yogananda and was in California writing books and teaching at the same time. According to Arthur Beverford in a private conversation I had with him, Rishi, went to see Yogananda’s dead body because it was claimed that it was in samadhi and that Yogananda would come back out of it transfigured in so many weeks just as Christ is said to have done.
Rishi said that it was a farce and that the body was dead. He said this on the basis of his experience in pranayama controlled samadhis of his own and of his teachers when he was in India. Rishi was against this idea of resurrecting or trying to resurrect a material body. It seems that Paramhansaji wanted to do this to prove that he was on par with Christ in so far as the story says that Christ transmuted his material body.
Again and again many others from the lineage which Yogananda represented tried to diddle dawdle with this transfiguration stunt but actually it is not part of kriya yoga.
Kriya yoga had nothing to do with keeping the material body in a transfigured condition. It has to do with what Patanjali described as checking the cittavritti mental projection system and bringing the psyche to order under control of the core-self.
The material body is not part of that system.
There is already a subtle body which will exist for the duration of the solar system at least, so why would anyone waste time trying to make a second subtle body which he will have to maintain and keep going by his will power? Why not just use the subtle body that nature is already maintaining free of charge without any investment of will power.
The whole idea of resurrection of a material body if done by Jesus Christ or by a kriya master is to me a completely wasted effort. There is no need for it. Everyone, even the trees already have a subtle body, if only everyone would become aware of it.
devaPriya Yogini 3 years ago
I notice new agers using the "light" body terminology, I use it sometimes too, as part of a description of the astral. I wonder if it makes people more comfortable to use the word light because the word astral can induce questions that many of these people can't really answer except with the typical abstract vague new age speak. The word light carries less responsibility and need for real knowledge than 'astral'...there's many a light worker around, but few who are taking yoga seriously and most still eat meat so....im aware of a few cigarette smoking reiki 'master's'.
Ultimately, the quest for enlightenment leads one to actually becoming light—attaining the body of light and becoming a being of light.
Im more comfortable with saying: Ultimately the quest for enlightenment leads one to actually realize one is already light.
I think that part about not casting shadows is silly but who am i too say...
Jettins 3 years ago
Interesting post!
Michael Wrote:
There is only one astral body and it has various phases. In all cases it is composed of light or light energy, like radio waves, light waves etc. When it is in a lower energy state, that is in the lower astral world, when it is in a very high energy states, that is the higher astral world.
Jettins Query:
Do you use specific names for the various phases of the astral body?
MiBeloved 3 years ago
Generally speaking it is named according to the dimension it is in, like license plates on cars. Instead of the name of the car and its condition, it is regarded by the plate which carries the name of the state in which it is issued.
The change in the astral body is based on the dimension it is keyed into. Even in astral projection this is true, where you find that if you are in a lower astral world, the subtle body acts in a certain way and behaves according to the facilities permitted in that type of dimension. If it is in a high heavenly world, it appears to have a different energy content and have different abilities according to the laws of appearance and the laws of existence in that world.
Patanjali gave the texture of consciousness as determining where a person goes in the afterlife. Krishna did the same thing. It is the same person but the energy content of the psyche determines the destination in the afterlife.
For the astral body, there might be a classification of 5 levels but in those five ranges, there are thousands of sub levels.
From the bottom up:
============
- Subterranean lower astral world (dense astral existence)
- Median astral world (near the earth’s vibration)
- Higher heavenly astral world (attained by social merits)
- Siddha world
- Highest astral heaven where planetary creator god lives
==========
MiBeloved 3 years ago
See this diagram:
Alfredo 3 years ago
I watched the video. Anandamayi Ma was a great saint, but what the Swamiji was saying regarding light body and not casting a shadow, is not believable here.
She was a close friend of my former Guru Swami Hariharananda and a frequent visitor to Karar Ashram in Puri where he lived, but these characteristics were never mentioned by him.
As per being an Avatar, I don't think so. There have been very few of them and they are measured by their afflatus. They come, as Lord Krishna said in the Gita, for a specific purpose, when Dharma is at a low ebb, like Rama, Krishna, Buddha. She has the characteristics of the Vibhuti, though.
A beautiful saint she was. I can testify to the tremendous peace that emanates from her Samadhi in her ashram in Haridwar, Uttarakhand, as I have meditated there alone.
Jettins 3 years ago
Great image here, there is something to it. I like this scale much more than the new age equivalent. It's in terms of function. I will print this.
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Continued from above.......
Alfredo 3 years ago
This is the cosmology proposed by Mirra Alfassa, the Mother of the Sri Aurobindo ashram.
I have asked Michael about what they defined as the Mental Plane and he equates that with the higher astral, being the "vital" the lower astral.
Jettins 3 years ago
Seeing this reminds me I’ve been closed off to a lot of good info. I think I am finally ready to really understand some of this chart. I am going to require the entire download on this one. Which is the book that specifically talks and categories all these states? I need to learn every possible angle to these two charts. This is a good topic for the live chat as well.
“Pure White” hmm, this reminded me of the ancient being that I saw a few weeks ago. It looked as if spray painted all in white! Not what I would expect. Maybe this ancient being was from this realm. I called it "
Encountering Ancient Being - Astral Mission "Is it even possible to see one of these beings while in a medium to medium high astral level? I’ve seen a Gold one also. She had an elite vibe to her indeed. Maybe I should write on more interesting stuff. Lately I’ve been talking much about the lower astral stuff. I do this because I don’t want people getting stuck there.
Marcia Beloved 3 years ago
Does anyone know about Babaji's body of light?
I've heard that he appears here and there in his light body (not in a physical body).
I figured that a spiritual "body of light" would be totally different than a normal subtle body such as my own.
There must be a certain infusion from the highest zones, to get a body of light which is all spiritual or which does not have any affinity to the material energies.
As far as Anandamayi Ma, who is to say if she was totally purified?
I am full of doubt but I also am not willing to say that Hamsa Yogi did not see her as a spiritual body of light either.
I just thought this was relevant to the discussion of becoming a body of light in terms of enlightenment.
MiBeloved 3 years ago
Regarding seeing bodies of light, there is an essential rule which should always be kept in mind. It is this:
You cannot see on any higher level unless you have perception on that plane of existence.
This means that the important thing when seeing some apparition is to realize that during the vision (darshan) you are using a body which is on the same level as the apparition.
For instance Arjuna saw the Universal Form because he was relocated to that level. It is impossible to see on a higher level just because the deity or guru is on that level. You cannot see any deity or guru on any higher level unless you are taken to that level or unless your subtle body is upgraded to that level. It may be temporary but it has to happen or you cannot perceive it.
The universal form presently exists right now and we cannot see it. Arjuna could not see it at the time when he asked for a repeat apparition in the Anu Gita even though it existed then just the same.
This means again that it is not the deity or guru which you should be attentive to but the level of consciousness of the person who is allowed to see that deity or guru.
Again when Krishna first displayed the form, there was an oversight in Krishna because Arjuna had to bring it to Krishna’s attention that even though the form was displayed, Arjuna did not see it.
It was then that Krishna energized Arjuna’s subtle body to the level on which the form existed and Arjuna saw the form.
Again in the same chapter of the Gita, Arjuna could not see the four-handed Narayana God form of Krishna, He begged Krishna to please let him see that but this does not mean that Krishna let Arjuna see that higher existence. It means that Krishna energized Arjuna to the spiritual level where that form is always in manifestation.
It is very important to get this through your head, otherwise you will keep on with various superstitions about the apparitions.
=============
Regarding Babaji he uses a sunlight body form. Jesus Christ also uses a similar sunlight body form. This means that their forms are such that it is made out of sunlight just as our physical bodies are made out of material elements from the earth.
Babaji does not appear here and there. Most of the talk about that is by people who do not understand anything about these forms. In the first place if Babaji was standing right in front of you, you would not see him and that would be an appearance. Therefore it is not his appearance which is the issue. It is your subtle body’s perception of him.
Suppose a blind man began to think of the appearance of the sun. How would that be?
So the sun is always in the sky. It does not appear now and then. It is always visible. The changes are not in the sun but in the blind man. If he suddenly has vision he will see the sun and then what should he say that the sun appeared to him.
So when someone sees Babaji, if that is actually a fact, then it means that somehow by deliberate action or by a fluke, that person’s subtle body was energized to the same plane in which Babaji exist and so the person saw Babaji.
Babaji is not appearing and disappearing as is something portrayed even by Kriya teachers. What is happening is that some yogi or a student of a yogi might suddenly find himself or herself in an energized subtle body which on that level can see Babaji.
When Krishna refused to give Arjuna a repeat of the Bhagavad Gita experience, Krishna said that he would not do that again because that was something special. The special thing about it is that he had to uplift Arjuna’s subtle body and He was unwilling to do that again.
After this Arjuna followed behind his eldest brother Yudhishthira who did austerities at the end of his life for the purpose of elevating the subtle form. In fact it is said that Yudhishthira was translated directly into the level of the Swarga heavenly world by the effort of his yoga practice at the end of life, meaning that his subtle body was already on that level before he passed from the physical form.
Even so, because of some flaws during his life, his subtle body temporarily sunk down to a lower astral place for a short time immediately after he left the physical body. So this means that it is the status of the subtle body which causes a person to see someone else in a light body. It is not the light body of the god, saint or yogi which causes the vision. It is the condition of the student or devotee.
Jettins 3 years ago
In one occasion I made a hole in the stomach area of my astral body as a test to show someone our non-physical state. Then bright light started coming out of it. Another time I nearly ripped off the outer layer of my astral body and light emitted from within. Another time I ripped off the tip of my finger to use it as a flash light but it didn’t work, no light.
Most of the times that I’ve done stunts like this there is no light just invisible space. But I do know there is light sometimes. I can’t predict when there would be light inside in advance while in the astral, I can’t scale this yet. I am talking about “body of light” in the literal sense, as seen on the astral. I don’t know about it in regards to enlightenment.
