For the past few years, David Lynch has been promoting his self-designed Transcendental Meditation program, The David Lynch Foundation, and has been visiting universities and schools throughout the US and the rest of the world.
A video has surfaced, as well as an article in Time, detailing a lecture in Germany where the audience broke out into emotional protest over what Lynch's German "partner" was saying.
Before watching the video, know that TM and the David Lynch foundation have nothing in mind but peace, the effacement of negativity, positive creativity, and all other good things. What we see here is a very sad but perfect example of what is lost in translation. It is clear that Lynch had not been aware of what exactly the German speaker believed or planned to say, and that there had been miscommunication from the beginning.
The most disturbing aspect of it all to me is not that the German speaker evoked Third Reich-like language - although it was disturbing and dissapointing in its undermining of Lynch's cause, no matter how intentional - what made me feel overwhelming sadness and helplessness was the expression on David Lynch's face as the students began yelling at the speaker, all in german. He has no idea what they are saying, and has no idea what has just occured. He sits there quietly, a perplexed look on his face, and can do nothing. Only until a female student approaches him to translate the ensued chaos, does he step forward. But even then, he doesn't really fix anything. Lynch did not make a mistake in spirit, but a mistake in logistics and taking the time to truly ensure that he understood the territory he was stepping into and the people he was assosciating with.
Below the video (in 2 parts) one will find the David Lynch Foundation's reply to the youtube postings.
David Lynch here. I don't want to have anything to do with Hitler. We all know he was not a good person who did terrible things.
I want to support Invincible Universities to develop the full potential of the student—enlightenment—and to have students meditating together in a group to enliven and radiate the unified field—the field of peace—into the atmosphere, into the collective consciousness of every nation.
Invincibility in this case means dynamic peace—a situation where no harm can come from within the country and nothing destructive can come from the outside to harm the country.
Sometimes misunderstandings are troublesome. So I want to make perfectly clear that the university for enlightenment and peace will make this a peaceful world — a peaceful world family — where anyone can travel anywhere in the world and meet a friend, not an enemy.
Dynamic peace is not just the absence of war—it is the absence of negativity, which is the seeds of war. These universities, established on a permanent basis, will put an end to thousands of years of war and oppression, and prevent a man like Hitler from ever arising again.
12.01.2007
David Lynch Foundation Lecture Fucks Up
Parents Who Fuck For Children And God, Their Children Will Fuck With Their Minds
The problem with some 20th century goddess traditions is that they unwittingly, or perhaps intentionally, get trapped in the mire of a matriarchy substituting past patriarchy, poorly disguised as something radically different from God the Father, Yahweh, and Zeus. It is not a matter of perpetuating some duality of gender through a polarized spiritual lens. In many respects, matriarchy/patriarchy is the very essence of duality or polarity, of antagonistic opposites, of bitter enemies that reconcile through copulation, only to separate again after the birth of their offspring. The preconceived notion of the offspring serves as a deus ex machina, an illogical equilibrium to an already illogical polarized “relationship”. And as soon as the offspring is given a form of its own, the illusion of balance shatters like a mirror - the mirror is in the offspring’s eyes, reflecting back to the dual-gendered parents their true forms, their real identities, which are so hideous! An oozing and stretching of countless faces, lips, genitals, colors, muscles…the very dissolution and fragmentation of their once singular identities! If only these two enemies in love could cast away their p(m)atriarchy’s handcuffs – two rings, always one in regards to one, one versus the other, one defined by the other. The final irony to it all is their dualistic understanding enabled a singular stagnant state of being. Although computer engineers will bear secular witness to the reductionist language of 1s and 0s as the true form of expression and communication, the building blocks of all numerical – and even aesthetic – value – even so, there are numbers beyond One, and beyond Two. Most importantly, Zero does not exist in our lives. Even in one’s absence is their a negative numerical value. Zero is death, or rather the fear of death.
Those two allegorical parents believed to be Two, when they were still only one versus one. Their attempt to join together, 1 + 1, ended up equaling a third being. But they clung on to that fallacy of an equation: 1 + 1 = 2 (?). The sum, as we all know, is never 2 – now there is a third, and some day will awaken to a fourth, and so on ad infinitum. Their child, Three, destroys their equation of (designed for) equilibrium. I repeat, the illusion of balance shatters like a mirror – the mirror is in the offspring’s eyes, reflecting back to them their true, 100+ digits form. If only, like their ancestors, they saw freedom in multiplicity and mutability. If only, like their ancestors, they saw Three’s two (?) eyes as circles, two loops of infinite dots and infinite time a reminder of the two rings, the two enemies in love, the two questions and the one solution….brought together, Three’s circular eyes become ∞… they are not their ancestors; the “distorted” mirrors of Three’s eyes are not circles, they are Zeros, the negation of circles, the negation of value. Their fear, itself a fittingly cowardly thing, flees the light sparkling in the corner of Three’s eyes. The fear is of death, and death is fear – the one last devolution of duality into singularity, linguistic logical loop severed and terminated. Rather the self-annihilation of one’s one Self and one’s one Other (itself too one Self / Its Self Two One Self), rather that than giving each other lobotomies followed by castrations.
Expand Vessel
An Overview of Kabbalah
An important Kabbalistic term is Ein Sof, translated as “infinite” or “limitless”. Ein Sof is the nothingness of God, His perfection and unity before the emergence of the primordial point. It is the “root of all roots”, the “cause of all causes”, and the unknowable face of God; Ein Sof is absolute reality.[1] But it is not God Himself. Ein Sof is the veil concealing Him from creation. For our purposes, Ein Sof refers to the veil found above, behind, and before Kether, the first Sephirah. The veil is drawn because it is ultimately impossible to understand, explain, or signify God. Kether and the primordial point are the first instances of anything appearing in front of this veil. The transition from concealment/veiling to manifestation - from nothing to being - is paradoxical; there is no way to truly perceive, understand, or speak of Ein Sof, yet the Kabbalists do all of those things through the Sephirot. This discrepancy between the concealed unity of Ein Sof and the unconcealed multiplicity of the Sephirot, or that between the signified and the signifier, is expounded in Chapter IV.
The first question asked, then, is of the nature of the primordial point’s emergence from behind the veil, and its subsequent emanations. “[And God said]; we define this ‘saying’ as an energy that was culled, as it were, in silence from the mystic limitless through the mystic power of thought. Hence ‘and God said’ means that now the above mentioned palace [Binah] generated from the holy seed with which it was pregnant”.[2] The emanation and unfolding of the world is speech. In the characteristically succinct but eloquent words of renowned Jewish scholar Gershom Scholem: “The process of life in God can be construed as the unfolding of the elements of speech”.[3]
The unfolding of the world through speech is represented in the Tree of Life, which is a diagram, a symbolic map of the unfolding of the world. The ten Sephirot are connected and organized in multiple ways, although their basic outline remains the same. They can be arranged (to mention only a few possibilities) under three pillars, as three triangles, as four levels or worlds, and under the headings “Supernal” and “Inferior” (or “Upper” and “Lower”, respectively). First, we will look at a few of the arrangements of the Sephirot, and then move on to basic characteristics of each one.
From the Zohar: “God summoned to issue forth from this complete Light which was in the centre a certain radiance which is the foundation of the world, and on which worlds are established…The whole was then united in the Central Pillar, and it produced the foundation of the world”.[4] The center pillar is aligned with Ein Sof, the source of all, and Kether. Also falling along this pillar are Tiphareth, Yesod, and Malkuth. The center pillar represents equilibrium and the balance between opposing Sephirotic energies.
The opposing energies (which find equilibrium in the center pillar) are polarized into the left and right pillars. The Zohar continues, “From that complete Light, the Central Pillar, extended the foundation, the Life of worlds, which is day from the side of the Right.”[5][6] and masculine. The right pillar represents the sun. It is also considered to be positive
“Meanwhile the Left flamed forth with its full power, producing at all points a kind of reflection, and from this fiery flame came forth the female moonlike essence.”[7] The left pillar represents the moon, the feminine, and is a negative force. Together, we see that that the right and left pillars are, respectively, force and form, light and reflection (sun and moon), and active and passive.
There are specific titles for the three pillars: the right is known as the Pillar of Mercy; the left is either the Pillar of Severity or the Pillar of Judgment, and the center is the Pillar of Mildness or Equilibrium. The ten Sephirot descend through these three pillars in a zigzag-like, lightning bolt arrangement (see Appendix A). This pattern helps shows that the Tree starts in equilibrium, passes through the active and passive pillars, returns to equilibrium, and so on for a few cycles until it reaches its end in equilibrium - the very same state in which it began.
The Tree is also organized into three “trinities” or triangles. Dion Fortune, a nineteenth century female mystic, designates these trinities by combining original Kabbalistic text and the esoteric writings of her contemporary S.L. MacGregors Mathers. She organizes and labels them as follows: firstly, the Supernal Triangle (containing Kether, Chokmah, and Binah); secondly, the Ethical Triangle (containing Chesed, Geburah, and Tiphareth); and thirdly, the Astral Triangle (Netzach, Hod, and Yesod). The last Sephirah, Malkuth, is not included in any of the Sephirotic triangles. [8]
The Sephirot are also divided into four levels or worlds. The highest level is called Atziluth, or the Archetypal World, containing Kether. Chokmah and Binah are placed in the second level Briah, the Creative World. The third level is Yetzirah, the Formative World, containing, in descending order, Chesed, Geburah, Tiphareth, Netzach, Hod, and Yesod. Finally, we have Asiah, the Material World, as the fourth level, containing only Malkuth. The translation of these four worlds varies from source to source - Dion Fortune’s terminology will be used for our discussion of the worlds, as well.
The divisions that most concerns us, however, are as follows: Kether is considered to be Arik Anpin, or the Vast Countenance. From Arik Anpin emanates the Supernal Father, Chokmah, and the Supernal Mother, Binah, which correspond to the Right and Left Pillars. The son of the Supernal Father and Mother is represented through the next six Sephirot – this son is known as Adam Kadmon, or the Lesser Countenance (as opposed to the Vast Countenance). Finally, there is the Queen and consort of the king, or the Inferior Mother (as opposed to the Supernal Mother). She is represented through Malkuth, and its function Shekhinah. [9] The terminology for all of these subjects is endless- presently, the titles most often employed (apart from Sephirotic names) will be the Supernal Mother (Binah), the Inferior Mother (Malkuth), Arik Anpin (Kether), Adam Kadmon (lower six Sephirot), the king (Tiphareth) and Shekhinah (Malkuth as consort).
With a glance at a diagram of the Tree, one will begin to notice other groupings, relationships, and patterns not mentioned here. This is the beauty of the Tree of Life. It is important to keep in mind that neither system is more accurate than the other, nor must one feel the need to force newly learned ideas into one structure or the other. There are elements of one interpretation that will not perfectly fit into, say, the idea of Malkuth as consort to the king. Thus, any paradoxes or incongruities should not be seen as errors. I will try to acknowledge these as they appear. Additionally, it should be stressed that while the ten Sephirot are in a sense “phases” or “stages” of emanation which act upon and shape God’s will, they are simultaneously one with God’s essence. The Sephirot are manifestations of God, but they are also agents acting upon and with God
[1] Gershom Scholem, Kabbalah (New York: Meridian, 1978), 89-90.
[2] Zohar I: 16b; Sperling, 69.
[3] Scholem, Jewish Mysticism, 216.
[4] Zohar I: 17a; Sperling, 70.
[5] Ibid.
[6] The terms “positive” and “negative” are not meant as “good” and “bad”, respectively, but in the sense of
magnetism.
[7] Ibid., 71.
[8] Dion Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah (York Beach: Samuel Weiser, Inc., 1988), 59.
[9] Ibid., 60-61.
11.26.2007
KETHER
KETHER - FIRST SEPHIRA
Within Kether there is, as of yet, no division. There is no activity as we understand it. However, inherent in Kether are the potentialities of the remaining Sephirot, and the will of God. This will emanates as “thought”, via Chokmah, and then as “intellect”, via Binah. Kether is “the concealed of the concealed”. In other words, Kether itself is not manifested, but it causes manifestation. We may also see Kether as the crown above the head of the archetypal man Adam Kadmon.
Essentially, Kether is the sphere wherein one’s self is annihilated by the proximity to the Godhead. It is the aim of all spiritual and religious experience to reach the state of existence represented in Kether.
The most important name given to Kether is Arik Anpin, “the Vast Countenance”. Arik Anpin is not God, but rather the partly revealed aspect of the Godhead.
Correspondences:
Titles and Names: Arik Anpin Concealed of the Concealed
Ancient of Ancients Ancient of Days
The Vast Countenance The Godhead
Hebrew Letter(s): Alef, yod, nun – Ayin or Ein (“nothingness”)
God-name: Eheieh or Ehyeh ( I am)
Tarot: The four Aces
Ace of Wands: Purity/Source of Fire
Ace of Cups: Purity/Source of Water
Ace of Swords: Purity/Source of Air
Ace of Pentacles: Purity/Source of Earth
Pillar: Head of the center Pillar of Mildness/Equilibrium
World: Atziloth, Archetypal
Genesis: (1.1) “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
