The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. Herein lies the germ of all art and all true science. Anyone to whom this feeling is alien, who is no longer capable of wonderment and lives in a state of fear, is a dead man. – Albert Einstein
For millennia, mystics’ explorations of reality were considered a religious quest. This changed during the Victorian era, when researchers began redefining mystical experiences as psychological phenomena.
No longer strictly religious, mystical experiences came to be seen as grounded in anomalous perceptions, involving experiences or events that provide a breakthrough from our everyday view of reality to another more insightful level.
Keith Hill proposes that anomalous experiences lie at the heart of the new mysticism. In this illuminating study, he examines the historical and cultural developments that have contributed to a radical shift in mystical practice. He also weighs what is required for the fostering of what Einstein called “mystical wonderment” to be sustained.
Keith Hill is a New Zealand writer whose work explores the boundaries between mysticism, history, science, religion and psychology. He is a three-time winner of the Ahston Wylie Award, New Zealand’s premiere prize for spiritual writing.
विषयसूची
THE STATE OF MYSTICISM TODAY
1 Clapping With Two Hands
In Search of a Separate Reality • The Miraculous and India’s Enigmas • Experiencing the Non-Ordinary • Clapping With Two Hands
2 A Brief History Of Western Mysticism
The Five Qualities of Technical Mysticism • Historical Waves of Mysticism • Two Waves of Christian Mysticism • The Occult Philosophy • The Impact of Eastern Mysticism • Victorian Spiritualism • A Confused Intertwining
3 The Problem With Mysticism
The Dalai Lama Stirs Angry Scientists • Jumping the Fence vs Religious Orthodoxy • The Impact of Cartesian Dualism • Ken Wilber on Modernity • The Problem With the Problem With Mysticism
4 Contemporary Confusions
Chemicals Gurgling, Synapses Flashing • No One is Counting • The Varieties of Mystical Experiences • Opening Up Mysticism • Clumping, Not Dancing
TRADITIONAL APPROACHES TO MYSTICISM
5 The Symbolic Language of Alchemy
Three Strands of Technical Mystical • The Need for Symbolic Languages • The Rise of Esotericism • The Uses of Mystic Initiation • Alchemy as a Mystic Quest • The Hermetic Corpus • As Above, So Below • The Chemical Wedding • The Spread of Alchemy • The Demise of Esoteric Languages
6 Self-Transformative Asceticism
Mystical Incubation • Shamanic Origins of Askèsis • Askèsis Among the Desert Mystics • How Original Sin Changed Ascetic Practices • The Fall of the Whip
7 The Metaphysics of the Occult
Our Need for Meta-Explanations • Top-Down vs Bottom-Up Meta-Explanations • Sankhya as Bottom-Up Meta-Explanation • Tantra as Occult Askèsis • Iamblichus and the Neoplatonic Milieu • Iamblichus on Theurgy • The Allure of the Occult • The Victorian Occult Revival
8 Magic and its Dissenters
Being Transported by the Magical • Magic is a Changing Commodity • Acknowledging Cognitive Dissonance
THE SCOPE OF NEW MYSTICISM
9 Bursting Reality’s Boundaries
The Anomalous and New Mysticism • The Nature of Agreed Reality • When Agreed Reality is Punctured • Psychic Insight • Dreaming the Future • Not Dying, Flying • Challenging Agreed Reality
10 The Paranormal as Outlier
Phantasms of the Living • The Pain of Doing Nothing • The Ganz-feld Experiments • Remote Viewing • Going Out-of-Body • Meeting Mescalito • The New Mystics • It’s All in the Mind • Metanoia as Gateway
11 Talking to Ghosts
Hooves in the Darkness • Ghosts of the Tsunami • Talking to the Deceased • Acknowledging the Extra-Living
12 Spooky Stuff at a Distance
Spooking Agreed Reality • When the Spooky is Rejected • Scientism vs the Scientific Method • The Medium Delivers the Message
THE MUSIC OF TWO HANDS
13 Requirements for Future Progress
Three Problems for Naturalism • Embracing the Anomalous • The New Mystical Approach • Advancing the New Mysticism • The Music of Two Hands
एक ही लेखक से अधिक ईबुक / संपादक
6,666 इस श्रेणी में ईबुक
