Section VI
3. Consciousness, Light and Knowing
Together
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Western psychology has treated
consciousness as
non-substantive, as nothing apart from the activities of the mind and
the
functions of knowing. This was noted by Natsoulas (1978)
who predicted that “psychology will not again define consciousness as a
substance or entity again:
"... (the behaviorist upheaval ... was) due to fear, on the part of
psychologists who aspired to be true scientists, that the study of
consciousness
was nothing less, after all, than the (disguised) pseudoscience of the
soul that was to have been forestalled: Consequently the psychology
without
a soul ... is now attacked on behalf of a psychology without a
consciousness,
on the ground that the latter standpoint alone can give assurance
against
entangling alliances between psychology and metaphysics." (1978, p.906)
A view of a substantive consciousness links the study of consciousness
to metaphysics and the human soul. Of the many issues in the literature
on consciousness, the question of the substance of consciousness is one
of the most mysterious and fundamental. The scientists of new
formation,
described by Beelzebub, assume that there is no soul life and have
strong
prejudices, ignorance and fears of entangling materialist views with
metaphysics
or objective science.
Within mystical and esoteric teachings the substance
of consciousness is often equated with light. This equation is not
simply
a
metaphor but coveys deep truths about the nature of
consciousness.
Consciousness illuminates the inner world, the varied activities of the
minds or centers. Just as external light illuminates the
outer
world for human perception, so also there is an inner light which
allows
for illumination and awareness within the inner world. The
counterpart
of light is darkness, which corresponds with notions of the unconscious
or subconscious where there is a lack of the light of awareness.
Humans asleep live in relative darkness and do not realize the inner
light,
and how this light might be increased. |
Ouspensky (1957) provides
a number
of statements relating consciousness to light and to the illumination
of
the inner world:
"(Psychic) functions can be compared to machines working in varying
degrees of light. ... Consciousness is light and machines are
functions.
(p. 55) ... Consciousness is light, light is the result of a certain
energy;
if there is no energy there is no light. (p.68) ... Attention acts like
a light, and imagination is like a chemical process that can only go on
in the dark and stops with light." ( p. 371)
"This sensation of light ... is experienced at the moment of the
expansion
of consciousness ... ." (Ouspensky, 1922, p.233)
From a psychological point of view, consciousness is light which
illuminates
the psychological functions. The aim within the Work is to
increase
consciousness bringing greater light into the darkness of
ourselves.
This light allows insight, internal sight, realizations, illumination
and
enlightenment. Increases in consciousness have chemical and
alchemical
effects within the inner life of human beings.
Maurice Nicoll (1975), psychologist and student
of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, provides profound
commentaries
on the equation of consciousness with light, and on the manner in which
the work acts within the inner world:
"... in this system ... what we seek above all things is Light-and
Light means consciousness. We seek to live more consciously and to
become
more conscious. We live in darkness owing to lack of light-the light of
consciousness-and we seek in this work light on ourselves.
Everything
this system says about work on oneself-about self-remembering, about
struggling
with negative emotions, about internal considering, about self
justification,
and so on, has as its supreme aim to make a man more conscious-to let
light
dawn in him. And it is a very strange thing, this light. It is first to
become more conscious of oneself and then more conscious of others.
This
is a strange experience. I mean by this that the direction in which the
work leads you through increasing consciousness, increasing light, is
not
at all the direction you might imagine as a person asleep, a person who
knows only ordinary consciousness-that is, the first two states of
consciousness
in which humanity lives. To become more conscious of yourself is a
strange
experience. To become conscious of others is just as strange and even
more
strange. The life you yourself lead with passions and jealousies,
meannesses,
dislikes and hatreds, becomes utterly ridiculous, You wonder, in fact,
what on earth you have been doing all your life. Have you been insane?
you ask yourself. Yes, exactly. In the deep sleep we live in, in the
light
of the Kingdom of Heaven, we are all utterly insane and do not know
what
we are doing. The work begins to teach you what to do. To awaken-that
is
the object of this work." (pp.35-6)
The influences of esoteric teachings and the fourth
way are to bring light into the inner world. Through
self-observing
and self-remembering, and dis-identifying from automatized personality
structures which typically engage awareness, the individual can enhance
the presence of light for experiences of expanded states of
self-consciousness
and objective consciousness. |
Consciousness, light and knowing
together are intimately
linked. Nicoll (1976) comments:
"... Consciousness means, literally, ‘knowing together.’A development
of consciousness would therefore mean knowing ‘more together,’and so it
would bring about a new relationship to everything previously known.
For
to know more always means to see things differently .... An increase of
consciousness is likened to an increase of light. But we shall see
eventually
that an increase of consciousness does not mean only that we see with
greater
clarity what was formerly obscure. The quality is changed. For the
moment,
the man who experiences it himself is changed. It is not merely the
quantity
of consciousness that is altered, but its very nature." (pp. 22-3)
A human can experience in a new light and know more
together in states of awakening. As the individual sees in a new
light, the usual difficulties, concerns and associative processes can
disappear
as if unreal and the stuff of dreams.
In moments of illumination, there is an increase
in light as one simultaneously knows together far more than is usually
experienced with a narrow focus of attention conditioned by personal
concerns
and identifications. Nicoll writes:
"We must imagine that to be conscious in a higher Hydrogen or by means
of a higher Hydrogen is similar to having a greatly increased light
shed
on everything. Whereas the ray of a candle illuminates feebly the
surroundings,
the light of an arc-lamp lights up what were mere shadows before and
makes
us see everything in an entirely different relation; ... seeing new
relations
sometimes occurs to us in times of trouble and distress when suddenly
everything
becomes transformed and we see things in an entirely different light.
...
This is a moment of illumination, of increased light, and so increased
consciousness, in the sense that we are ‘knowing together’far more than
we do in our contracted state. Everything falls into its right
proportion,
as it were, in the light of this increased consciousness, so we can say
that at that moment we were conscious in a higher Hydrogen. Actually,
at
such a moment we are conscious at a higher point in the universe
regarded
as a scale of qualities represented by Hydrogens. Quite simply, we rise
above ourselves for a moment and see things in a new light." (1975,
p.204)
As personality and false personality complexes are dissipated, energies
are released, allowing for expanded states of knowing together, of
insight
and illumination. The light of consciousness can be accumulated
and
increased, or wasted and depleted. Activities within the various minds
can occur within consciousness, or in the absence of consciousness and
the absence of light. Mystical teachings and the fourth way help
to bring light into the hearts and minds of human beings. This
light
is a very strange thing and of different qualities.
These are basic dynamics underlying the dissolution
of false personality, the development of self-consciousness and the
approach
to real “I.” Increases in consciousness are associated with light and
with
the accumulation of higher hydrogens, which have chemical and
alchemical
effects within the inner life of a human being. Self-remembering
and self-observation enhance the presence of light within the inner
world.
This is similar to the Gnostic Christian practice of light-gaining and
living in the light. The gospel of Matthew
states:
The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy
whole body shall be full of light. (6, 22) If a human’s
eye,
or “I,” be single, then s/he shall be filled with light! |
| The topics of consciousness, light and
metaphysics
are of profound importance to explorations of the nature of human
beings.
The modern scientific theories about consciousness, that most
mysterious
things in the world, amount to what Beelzebub describes as so much
rubbish
and twaddle. The equation of consciousness, light and knowing
together
provides important insights into the nature of the inner world and the
process of awakening. Humans can experience greater light within
the inner world and be conscious within higher, rather than lower
hydrogen
levels. The process of awakening involves the increase of light
and
the accumulation of higher hydrogens within the mind, heart and the
higher
being bodies--as the individual approaches real “I.” |
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