02-05-2011, 12:00 AM
Hi Jessicar and everyone,
Excellent analogy Jes.
The map analogy as all analogies only go so far, but let me show you a few ways that, in my own understanding, it became more clear. I was taught that the Bible was a "road map." What I was not taught was how it "Worked" as a map. I highlighted some of your statements in red.
Legitimate points which I will try to make clear as I understand them.
""But here’s the weird thing---I was absolutely dependant on that system while also knowing that in the end the system was not the real deal! Yet, I had the awareness that the system itself would prevent me from getting where I wanted to go if I didn’t set it aside at some point and strike out on my own. Once I reached my end point, I’d better be prepared to stand on terra firma and start walking. Turn the GPS off and connect to the land.""
One thing that I found out was that I did not realise about the "map" was that it worked in 20/20 hindsight. First I would have an experience and only after an experience would I recognise that experience written in the "map." This would be analogous to your "standing on terra firma and start walking."
Long ago, probably before you were born, I was visited by an angel. I was sitting meditating in my chair and suddenly it was right there in front of me. White robed and hovering above the floor. The colors were "out of this world" and the word hovered is not well chosen because I could feel such strength there that I was sure that if it wanted it could have stopped the earth from revolving and pushed the sun out of it's course through the cosmos. It was made of light. The light was alive and conscious. There was no mistaking that. It stayed for a short time, put it's name in my mind and was gone.
Looking back on that experience as time went on I began to see that it was in both the bible and Qabala literature.
I first found it in the story of Jacob wrestling with an angel.
I had been having trouble for months when trying to meditate. I could not relax my left leg. There was an agravating feeling on the inside of my thigh that would not allow me to relax. Now days they call it restless leg syndrome.
The first thing that hit me was the phrase, "He halted upon his thigh."
It hit me that that was exactly what had happened to me. I had stopped my meditations. I had Halted.
I asked my teacher the next day whether I was reading that correctly. What had happened to Jacob was happening to me.
He said it was!
There are other things in the story that also made sense. Pieces to the puzzle, so to speak.
Jacob's name changed to Israel. That is a change in awareness. A person who experiences these thing in never again the same. Jacob's name changes to Israel every time he has a spiritual experience.
The "wrestling" is trying to understand what has happened.
The "breaking of day" is coming to an understanding or acceptance of what has happened.
These stories concerning the Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph etc., are allegories that explain our own spiritual journey.
We are Jacob and Israel and Joshua, etc.
These characters described in allegory are a direct lineage to Jesus Christ on our way to Christ consciousness.
Ge 32:24
And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.
Ge 32:25
And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him.
Ge 32:26
And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.
Ge 32:27
And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob.
Ge 32:28
And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.
Ge 32:29
And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there.
Ge 32:30
And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.
Ge 32:31
And as he passed over Penuel the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh.
In most cases where I recognised this happening it was After the experience. I like to call it 20/20 hindsight. I also like to call it "Finding myself in scripture." Because that is what it really is.
Later, I found in the Qabala (the study of the tree of life) that the first initiation, the "Spiritual Experience of the 10th (lowest) Sephirah on the Tree of Life. It is called "Vision and Conversation with the Holy Guardian Angel". Once again the idea of a roadmap seems to apply.
This same type of thing has happened again, later also but I used this example to show how it first began to dawn on me just what exactly what the "bible as a map" meant.
And it's funny, the next thing that happened (years later) was just a few chapters later in Genesis and it told me exactly what happened to me ten minutes before.
""So I wonder if the old seers got lost in their own internal GPS system and claimed that they’d arrived at their destination.""
So many do think they have arrived. After 30 + years of knowing and studying some of these things, I feel like just a novice.
""Dreaming became their downfall. They had so fused the method with the mystery that they couldn’t differentiate the two. Mapping the territory can become the end point, as can discussing the map, or staring at a small onscreen navigational tool.""
True, and the study of the bible is certainly that way for many people. They get one thing out of a verse and they think that is all it says. They miss more than they understand.
""When do we stop “mapping”, swapping maps, comparing maps, and simply start walking the unknown? Our maps, our navigational systems, our dreaming---all of it---is brilliant!! We’d be lost without them. At the same time, we must know when to turn them off and take a step into the unknown.""
We never stop. We do both. We try to understand the maps and we explore. And sometimes we rest from one or the other or both.
My teacher didn't tell me everything. He let me find out things for myself. And he corroborated some things that I went through and some ideas and conclusions that I had come to. Otherwise it would just be words.
We have to learn by actually experiencing. Only that is true knowledge.
It is good to have someone corroborate what happens to you concerning spiritual things. That is what the maps are for. So that you don't think you are going crazy. But instead you see you are on the right (or wrong) Path.
Maps are made by those who have come before for those who will come afterwards.
It's the Hermit Tarot card. A lone man standing, looking into the unknown holding a lamp.
I hope this helps you understand a little better where I am coming from.
Excellent analogy Jes.
The map analogy as all analogies only go so far, but let me show you a few ways that, in my own understanding, it became more clear. I was taught that the Bible was a "road map." What I was not taught was how it "Worked" as a map. I highlighted some of your statements in red.
Legitimate points which I will try to make clear as I understand them.
""But here’s the weird thing---I was absolutely dependant on that system while also knowing that in the end the system was not the real deal! Yet, I had the awareness that the system itself would prevent me from getting where I wanted to go if I didn’t set it aside at some point and strike out on my own. Once I reached my end point, I’d better be prepared to stand on terra firma and start walking. Turn the GPS off and connect to the land.""
One thing that I found out was that I did not realise about the "map" was that it worked in 20/20 hindsight. First I would have an experience and only after an experience would I recognise that experience written in the "map." This would be analogous to your "standing on terra firma and start walking."
Long ago, probably before you were born, I was visited by an angel. I was sitting meditating in my chair and suddenly it was right there in front of me. White robed and hovering above the floor. The colors were "out of this world" and the word hovered is not well chosen because I could feel such strength there that I was sure that if it wanted it could have stopped the earth from revolving and pushed the sun out of it's course through the cosmos. It was made of light. The light was alive and conscious. There was no mistaking that. It stayed for a short time, put it's name in my mind and was gone.
Looking back on that experience as time went on I began to see that it was in both the bible and Qabala literature.
I first found it in the story of Jacob wrestling with an angel.
I had been having trouble for months when trying to meditate. I could not relax my left leg. There was an agravating feeling on the inside of my thigh that would not allow me to relax. Now days they call it restless leg syndrome.
The first thing that hit me was the phrase, "He halted upon his thigh."
It hit me that that was exactly what had happened to me. I had stopped my meditations. I had Halted.
I asked my teacher the next day whether I was reading that correctly. What had happened to Jacob was happening to me.
He said it was!
There are other things in the story that also made sense. Pieces to the puzzle, so to speak.
Jacob's name changed to Israel. That is a change in awareness. A person who experiences these thing in never again the same. Jacob's name changes to Israel every time he has a spiritual experience.
The "wrestling" is trying to understand what has happened.
The "breaking of day" is coming to an understanding or acceptance of what has happened.
These stories concerning the Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph etc., are allegories that explain our own spiritual journey.
We are Jacob and Israel and Joshua, etc.
These characters described in allegory are a direct lineage to Jesus Christ on our way to Christ consciousness.
Ge 32:24
And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.
Ge 32:25
And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him.
Ge 32:26
And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.
Ge 32:27
And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob.
Ge 32:28
And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.
Ge 32:29
And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there.
Ge 32:30
And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.
Ge 32:31
And as he passed over Penuel the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh.
In most cases where I recognised this happening it was After the experience. I like to call it 20/20 hindsight. I also like to call it "Finding myself in scripture." Because that is what it really is.
Later, I found in the Qabala (the study of the tree of life) that the first initiation, the "Spiritual Experience of the 10th (lowest) Sephirah on the Tree of Life. It is called "Vision and Conversation with the Holy Guardian Angel". Once again the idea of a roadmap seems to apply.
This same type of thing has happened again, later also but I used this example to show how it first began to dawn on me just what exactly what the "bible as a map" meant.
And it's funny, the next thing that happened (years later) was just a few chapters later in Genesis and it told me exactly what happened to me ten minutes before.
""So I wonder if the old seers got lost in their own internal GPS system and claimed that they’d arrived at their destination.""
So many do think they have arrived. After 30 + years of knowing and studying some of these things, I feel like just a novice.
""Dreaming became their downfall. They had so fused the method with the mystery that they couldn’t differentiate the two. Mapping the territory can become the end point, as can discussing the map, or staring at a small onscreen navigational tool.""
True, and the study of the bible is certainly that way for many people. They get one thing out of a verse and they think that is all it says. They miss more than they understand.
""When do we stop “mapping”, swapping maps, comparing maps, and simply start walking the unknown? Our maps, our navigational systems, our dreaming---all of it---is brilliant!! We’d be lost without them. At the same time, we must know when to turn them off and take a step into the unknown.""
We never stop. We do both. We try to understand the maps and we explore. And sometimes we rest from one or the other or both.
My teacher didn't tell me everything. He let me find out things for myself. And he corroborated some things that I went through and some ideas and conclusions that I had come to. Otherwise it would just be words.
We have to learn by actually experiencing. Only that is true knowledge.
It is good to have someone corroborate what happens to you concerning spiritual things. That is what the maps are for. So that you don't think you are going crazy. But instead you see you are on the right (or wrong) Path.
Maps are made by those who have come before for those who will come afterwards.
It's the Hermit Tarot card. A lone man standing, looking into the unknown holding a lamp.
I hope this helps you understand a little better where I am coming from.