Aristotle’s Three Laws of Thought, Part 2

September 23, 2014
In this brief article, I will argue that Aristotle’s Three Laws of Thought also hold true for Spiritual, or Ultimate, Reality. Here are the three Laws again:

1) A thing is what it is (the law of identity).
2) A thing cannot at once be and not-be (the law of non-contradiction).
3) A thing cannot neither be nor not-be (the law of the excluded middle).

I say that God, or Ultimate Reality, is the Thing-Itself, the single Existent, or Being, from which all existents derive. This Being Is What It Is – Consciousness-Energy –and it can Be nothing other than Consciousness-Energy, because Consciousness-Energy is Being: the uncreated single, irreducible, timeless, spaceless Context or Source of all created content, or existents.

Being cannot Be and not Be. If Being could not Be, then it would no longer Be Being; it would be Non-Being. But Non-Being is a Non-Existent, a Zero.

There can be no middle ground between Being and Non-Being. Being either Is, or Is Not. And as I have made clear, Being Is (Consciouness-Energy).

Ayn Rand Objectivists would argue that an all-subsuming Divine Being (the two “Vines” being Consciousness and Energy) is a Floating Abstraction.… Read the full article

Aristotle’s Laws of Thought, Part 1

September 21, 2014
I have just finished reading (and reviewing at Amazon) Avi Sion’s book “In Defense of Aristotle’s Laws of Thought,” (available for under $2 on Kindle). Sion does an outstanding job arguing for the irrefutable truth of these three axiomatic statements that form the base of standard logic. These three laws of thought are:

1)    A thing is what it is (the law of identity).

2)    A thing cannot at once be and not-be (the law of non-contradiction).

3)    A thing cannot neither be nor not-be (the law of the excluded middle).

As Sion makes clear, these laws are not arbitrary, and any attempt to deny their axiomatic primacy in the practice of logic (non-contradictory identification of the facts of reality) is fanciful. Sion writes:

“The validity of logic is thus itself an inductive truth, not some arbitrary axiom. Logic is credible, because it describes how we actually proceed to distinguish truth from falsehood in knowledge derived from experience. No other logic than the standard logic of the three laws of thought is possible, because any attempt to fancifully propose any other logic inevitably gets judged through standard logic.… Read the full article

Dissing the Da Avatar, Part 4

September 12, 2014

Was Adi Da just a brilliant synthesizer of the Great Spiritual Traditions, or also a true innovator, upgrading Dharma for all the ages? My vote is for the latter. Although my viewpoint is that Da is dishonest, or not transparent, about what he appropriated from the Great Spiritual Traditions, he deserves credit for his seminal insights and and exegeses.

First and foremost among Da’s seminal revelations was his teaching on radical understanding. Although he doubtless developed this teaching on the basis of J. Krishnamurti’s teachings, Da took radical (or gone-to-the-root) understanding to an unprecedented level. His exegesis of the understanding and transcendence of one’s moment-to-moment activity of self-contraction is pure genius. According to Da, the self-contraction (the formation of awareness that is suffering) is generated by one’s ego, which is not an entity, but rather an activity – the complex avoidance of relationship.

To one who has “cracked the cosmic code,” there isn’t a clearer, more precise description of the root-ego (the complex avoidance of relationship) and the “method” to transcend it (relationship, as Be—ing).… Read the full article

Igor Kufayev: A True Guru?

September 7, 2014
I’ve had a number of people ask me about Igor Kufayev, a rapidly emerging spiritual teacher who twice has appeared on Buddha at the Gas Pump and who has posted 150 + Youtube.com videos. I replied in the affirmative to these people, letting them know that I thought Igor was good and interesting.

Even though I thought that Igor was good and interesting (at least as a spiritual speaker), I didn’t think he had “cracked the cosmic code,” because, unlike me, he doesn’t integrate the consciousness process and conductivity. Thanks to his Capricorn Sun and Gemini Moon, he’s an agile and loquacious communicator (as attested to by his multitude of Youtube.com videos) – but is he a fully Enlightened one? Never one to shy away from asking such direct questions, I posted the following question at one of his YouTube videos:

L. Ron Gardner: “Igor, have you cut the Heart-knot, meaning that you now perpetually abide in Sahaj Samadhi and radiate unbrokenly to Infinity via Amrita Nadi? Or are you still on the "path," and periodically experience the Hridayam?”

Igor’s evasive, muddled response, which follows, answered my question, and told me all that I need to know about him:

Igor Kufayev:  “Whatever I reply, L.… Read the full article

Dissing the Da Avatar, Part 3

August 31, 2014

Although I couldn’t have “cracked the cosmic code” without the help of Da’s Dharma, particularly his early teachings on radical understanding, over time, as I expanded my study of spirituality beyond Da’s teachings, Advaita Vedanta, and Zen Buddhism, I began to encounter the principal sources from which his Dharma derives.

When I read the first edition of the “Knee of Listening” in 1973, I thought it was oh so cool and original when Da asked the Shakti to stay with him and likened spiritual seekers to Narcissus. Then, ten years ago, when I read the Gnostic classic “The Secret Book of John” (translated by Stevan Davies), I discovered where he got the Narcissus metaphor and the idea of asking the Shakti (the Gnostic equivalent of Spirit) to stay with him.

In the “Paradox of Instruction,” which I read shortly after it was published in 1977, Da discoursed on Divine Ignorance, the idea that we don’t know what anything really is, we only know about things.… Read the full article

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