Autobiography - Part 6

NOTE: I will indicate the new inclusions (which may also be current thoughts in italics and blue to differentiate this writing from its earlier incarnation. Those in italics and green are comments made by my grading professor. Those in italics and purple are comments made by my Humanities professor whom I shared this paper with.)

In an attempt to write a paper such as tis, it is most difficult, even impossible, not to include however briefly, the ontological concept. Since it is not the primary purpose of this paper to deal with the question of whether there exist a divine being, I will try my best to avoid falling into the discussion of whether a god in the form of a REAL being exists. However, allow me here to bring in a diagram we have already used and discussed in class, and skim through, if at all possible, the part that deals with this idea of a god.

Diagram 1

From Diagram 1, we see right in the middle is what is termed the SOURCE, SELF, NATURE, FORCE, OR GOD … or whatever other names have been given IT/HIM/HER. From this SOURCE comes forth or is “created” beings (we will deal herewith only two human beings). The dotted line connecting the SOURCE with each being, be it Adam, Eve, or whoever else, indicates our relationship and, hence, access to the SOURCE of LIFE, TRUTH, KNOWLEDGE, … etc. (thus it was mentioned earlier that all man [woman] are equal; all being a part of this SOURCE and having the same potential in accessing and becoming this POWER or FORCE.

Moving from this SOURCE we will proceed to the “extended” being; a part of that SOURCE, never equalling IT, but always an extensification [I don’t know how I came up with such a word. Apparently it doesn’t exist – but it was in the original text so I have maintained that.] from IT. From this extended being, called Adam, is projected his World, Self, and Reality (all actually being one and the same). In his World (his patterns), exists another being called Eve. To him, Eve is real and rightfully so since Eve exist within his Reality. Eve to him, then, is a source of identity. He sees himself as the “I” in his World and his personality is symbolized by the “Me.” However, to our left we have Eve. She too is a Real being; an extensification from the SOURCE [independent of Adam]. Like Adam, she has her own World, Self, and Reality. And rightfully too, she sees in her world another being called Adam who is all real and solid. As I said, rightfully so that each should see the other in their own individual World as being real, but I said much earlier that what we see are unreal or perhaps I should use unreal. While they do exist [independent of each other] (we will not deal with the ontological issue here), they are still unreal.  Again I stress that being unreal does not constitute non-existence. As TRUE-beings, they are unreal only because of Adam’s [or Eve’s] incorrect or imprecise perception of Eve and vice-versa. Therefore, each hold a part of REALITY but never total REALITY; a part of the SOURCE, but never equalling IT, but always an extensification of it. The “Self” is one measure of the ‘WHOLE’ that is the same in each and is of the quality of the ‘WHOLE’ (Babcock, p. 7).

[I highly recommend the following book to you. (It is not about working on motorcycles, but about values and quality.) Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig.]

To be continued …

Peace
Syl