The Descending Process
Mon, 01/28/2008 - 18:33 — admin
TEACHER: The descending system has nothing to do with knowledge based on sense perception, either by direct sensual experience, or by reasoning or hypotheses which proceed from it. Unlike the ascending process, the descending system of receiving knowledge is not based on one’s endeavor to enter the spiritual world on one’s own strength, but is based on receiving information which has descended from the spiritual world.
The Supreme Person is not subject to the mental processes of the living entities. It is not that one can see Him or know Him simply by acquiring a certain amount of knowledge about Him.6
MICHAEL: But how else can we come to know Him, except by acquiring a certain amount of knowledge about Him?
TEACHER: It is true that knowledge is seeing, so let me clarify this point. Is it not a fact that the cause of all causes has a mind and will of His own?
MICHAEL: We seem to have determined that this is the case.
TEACHER: And isn’t it also true that the cause of all causes is all-powerful?
MICHAEL: I don’t know if I can comprehend the meaning of all- powerful, but in view of the very magnitude of the material creation, I would say that this power is exceedingly great and that it far exceeds anything in our present range of experience.
TEACHER: Do you also accept that I, too, am powerful, or that I possess some degree of power?
MICHAEL: Yes, you obviously have some degree of power, as each of us does. Your power, of course, has limitations, but your implication, I think, is that God’s power hasn’t.
TEACHER: That’s correct. Now, if you want to learn about me, or come to know me, will it be easy for you to do so if I don’t will it?
This is why people in modern Western societies are still not satisfied, even though they are so economically advanced and thus have so much facility for sense enjoyment. They always want more. As the late British economist E. F. Schumacher points out:The Descending Process
Is there enough to go round? Immediately we encounter a serious difficulty: What is “enough”? Who can tell us? Certainly not the economist who pursues “economic growth” as the highest of all values and therefore has no concept of “enough.” There are poor societies which have too little; but where is the rich society that says: “Halt! We have enough”? There is none.*
What’s really needed is to recognize the need for spiritual as well as material happiness. A society that has great material prosperity but lacks spiritual purpose is really a poor society. A body without the soul is a dead body — even if it is nicely decorated with fancy ornaments.
Science of Identity Foundation – Siddhaswarupananda
*E. F. Schumacher, Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered (New York: Harper and Row, 1973), p. 25.
TEACHER: The descending system has nothing to do with knowledge based on sense perception, either by direct sensual experience, or by reasoning or hypotheses which proceed from it. Unlike the ascending process, the descending system of receiving knowledge is not based on one’s endeavor to enter the spiritual world on one’s own strength, but is based on receiving information which has descended from the spiritual world.
The Supreme Person is not subject to the mental processes of the living entities. It is not that one can see Him or know Him simply by acquiring a certain amount of knowledge about Him.6
MICHAEL: But how else can we come to know Him, except by acquiring a certain amount of knowledge about Him?
TEACHER: It is true that knowledge is seeing, so let me clarify this point. Is it not a fact that the cause of all causes has a mind and will of His own?
MICHAEL: We seem to have determined that this is the case.
TEACHER: And isn’t it also true that the cause of all causes is all-powerful?
MICHAEL: I don’t know if I can comprehend the meaning of all- powerful, but in view of the very magnitude of the material creation, I would say that this power is exceedingly great and that it far exceeds anything in our present range of experience.
TEACHER: Do you also accept that I, too, am powerful, or that I possess some degree of power?
MICHAEL: Yes, you obviously have some degree of power, as each of us does. Your power, of course, has limitations, but your implication, I think, is that God’s power hasn’t.
TEACHER: That’s correct. Now, if you want to learn about me, or come to know me, will it be easy for you to do so if I don’t will it?