[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]
2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/lit/ - Literature

View post   
File: 243 KB, 960x1512, 1606985153442.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18498107 No.18498107 [Reply] [Original]

The more I read about this, the farther I feel from the truth, and the more confused and disillusioned I become. I've spent the better part of the last three years on books like these, trying to understand them and put their teachings into practice, but nothing has ever come out of it. I'm still a non-denominational theist with no specific beliefs past that. All of these esoteric models and treatises feel meaningless.
I hoped that these books would help me reach the truth, but all they've done was alienating me from the simple, naive yet beautiful idea of divinity I had as a child and teenager, by making everything complex, cryptic and ritualistic.

Books to get out of this rut?

>> No.18498119

Thaf picture is a joke btw

>> No.18498139

>>18498107
maybe you shouldn't be pursuing religion through books?

>> No.18498150

Do 5 grams of mushrooms in pitch darkness with no stimulation whatsoever aside from your own thoughts.

>> No.18498167
File: 27 KB, 474x268, download (15).jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18498167

Spend more time in quiet contemplation, preferably in the forest or by the water.

Let the mystery speak to you directly.

Books are interesting but all mediation is distortion.

Truth enters the space you make for it.

>> No.18498174

>>18498139
The books are supposed to contain ancient truths, and to communicate them in ways that helps attain them. Although this has not been the case for me.
>>18498150
I heard of a guy who did this and got hardcore depersonalization for a year or so. I don't know if it's worth the risk.

>> No.18498179

>>18498174
yes so maybe the answer is not reading more books lol

>> No.18498194

>>18498174
If you are not getting anything out of it, stop searching.

It's true that meditation and drugs can help you, but so can therapy, yoga and activity. Ask yourself what is it that you seek, and contemplate on this question.

When I studied philosophy I dreamt that behind my apartment, there was a huge library with a nice but stern librarian, I tried searching for answers in the books but found none. It's an archetypal dream, that I believe you as well could have had, from your description of your search.

>> No.18498245

>>18498167
I originally turned to books because I assumed relying on myself would mislead me, that I'd need ancient knowledge in order to understand things better, coming to /lit/ made this obvious since the people here seemed so secure in their beliefs at first glance (in retrospect, this was obviously a retarded observation). Then I started frantically looking for answers in books because I was scared that there was a single path to find and that if I didn't find it, I would be wasting my life.
I had specific questions, about why I was here, what purpose did this world serve, what existed outside of it, but it feels like nothing I've read has ever gotten me closer to answers, I've acquired knowledge, but it's meaningless to me.
I guess I was wrong from the start and that contemplation devoid of specific assumptions will not mislead me but might guide me better than religious texts.
>>18498179
Maybe, but I still want an answer. Going through life with perpetual uncertainty and no guiding principle to feel secure is unpleasant. Is it the right path nonetheless?
>>18498194
>Ask yourself what is it that you seek
Several things. Mostly an understanding of myself and of the world's nature.
If you've stopped searching in books, what are you doing now, and does it work better?

>> No.18498305

>>18498245
If you always rely on the discernment of others, how will you develop your own?

If you attempt to grab the butterfly you will chase it away.

Seeking from a sense of lack will only serve to reinforce that perception.

>> No.18498322

>>18498305
I was swayed by the argument that several millennia of philosophy from the brightest and most insightful people in history were a better starting point than my own discernment. I still don't have a counter to that argument, but I just know that millennia of tradition haven't helped.
>Seeking from a sense of lack
Isn't that where all seeking comes from?

>> No.18498368

>>18498322
Relationships are personal and subjective (unique). Relating to and talking about ultimate reality are very different things.

Truth is destiny and waiting to be discovered. Anxious desire to catch truth and shove it in box(language) is very different thing to personal quest of discovery of what is omnipresent.

>> No.18498377

>>18498368
>Relationships are personal and subjective
Then what is the purpose of the written tradition? If the process of discovery is unique to every individual, why do traditions exist?
>Anxious desire to catch truth and shove it in box(language)
It's true I'm anxious to catch it, but not so much about making it intelligible through language, at this point I have no real interest in systems anymore. My anxiety only stems from the possibility of dying without having ever grasped any answers.

>> No.18498488

>>18498107
Read Guenon and you will have a clear view of esoterism, exoterism and everything related to spirituality.

>> No.18498506

Ignore the people telling you not to read, they want you dumb and suggestible. You should only take theological religions seriously.

>> No.18498512

>>18498488
>>18498506
I don't like Guenon or perennialism.

>> No.18498519

>>18498245
>he hasnt read epictetus
Ngmi

>> No.18498560

>>18498519
I haven't spent much time on stoicism.

>> No.18498639

>>18498560
Yeah i know lol

>> No.18498644

>>18498639
Why should I?

>> No.18498691

>>18498644
Retard

>> No.18498694

>>18498691
Looks like stoicism's done you a lot of good.

>> No.18498749

>>18498150
This is how you meet demons and get tricked.

>> No.18498969

>>18498488
Traditionalism is the very opposite of a clear view and is the complete antithesis of simplicity. It's all about extremely verbose and arbitrarily complex systems patched together from a cursory understanding of major world religions.

>> No.18499016

>>18498107
Congratulations, you got memed. Since you seem to be a type of person that's easily influenced by bullshit, you are probably just better off turning to Christianity (Catholicism unless you live in post-Soviet country, in which case Orthodoxy) while it's not too late for you to become a functioning member of society. You will most likely do it sooner or later as you grow up, anyways.

>>18498150
You will literally kill yourself if you do it.

>> No.18499023

>>18499016
Condescension put aside, what are you arguing in favor of exactly?

>> No.18499032

Read William James, Nietzsche, and Bataille.

>> No.18499042

>>18499032
I've read some of Nietzsche's books but I disagree with some of his core beliefs.

>> No.18499124

>>18499032
>Bataille
qrd?

>> No.18499149

>>18498107
You can't gain wisdom from a book. It has to be integrated with practice and experience. Have you tried practicing what you've learned in those books, or at least tried praying, meditating, or going to Church?

>> No.18499155

>>18499016
ok tranny

>> No.18499173

>>18499149
Yes, I have.

>> No.18499205

>>18499124
Does a foray into what you could call properly call esoteric nihilism, which I think pairs well with Nietzsche and with James' Varieties of Religious Experience

>> No.18499214

>>18499042
Another penetrating analysis by anonymous. Have you read any secondary literature on him, e.g. Deleuze, Bataille, Kaufmann, Klossowski?

>> No.18499303

Mystics are trying to get at essential truths indirectly, through intuition. The symbolic systems are means of allowing concepts to complex to be held in the self-conscious mind simultaneously. Hegel gets at this in the Preface to PoS. Words are just stand ins for sound, the whole of their meaning must first come into being and evolve in the mind, then they can act as shorthand. This is important because the mind has very limited bandwidth and is not great outside serial processing.

Being raised in an era where physical sciences have advanced tremendously, these intuitive systems aren't going to give you the ground you want. Hegel attempts to turn this intuition into a science but he is famously difficult.

If you haven't studied neuroscience or physics I would start there. Grim's lecture series on The Great Courses, Mind Body Philosophy, is a great first step. Modern physics too.

Sounds like you already have a background in the esoteric. You should have some in Platonism and philosophy generally too (Kenney's A New History of Western Philosophy is a good summation), as well as semiotics. Semiotics the Basics isn't bad.

I think armed with these, you can approach Boehme and Hegel, maybe taking PoS on with Hegel's Ladder.

The semiotics of negation makes intuitive sense and Hegel builds up logically from there on a level esoterica don't attempt. He is somewhat unique in the approach (in science) and level of success.

>> No.18499394

>>18499303
Although you might find different things interesting.

I read extensively, Platonism, theology, went to churches, took lots of drugs, read a lot of philosophy. I had a degree in neuroscience already but semiotics was new to me.

I think I needed the comprehensive background from Kenney and multiple Great Courses classes on philosophy to fill in some gaps for myself.

I ultimately found something with real ground only in Hegel, Fichte, and Boehme. Of course, Hegel and Fichte require studying Kant first and Boehme requires a familiarity with alchemy and theology. It's a lot of ground work.

>> No.18499413
File: 62 KB, 976x850, 1606891366140.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18499413

>>18499205
>esoteric nihilism

>> No.18499601

>>18499149
Modern evangelical churches are going to turn off someone who is grounded in philosophy and the sciences. You have to be raised in it or just not be the kind of person who is going to get hung up on logic and a coherence definition of truth.

Ivw been going to church for 9 years. Mostly evangelical because that's where my wife is coming from, but Lutheran, Anglican, Greek Orthodox, Messianic Jewish, and Catholic too.

Charismatic movements don't have the same effect when you're steeped in psychology and can see the processes going on.

My experiences with Evangelical churches was that many just gave weekly pep talks on:

1. Saved by faith alone
2. Once saved always saved
3. Given the first two, only conversion matters. Go out and convert. How you do it doesn't matter because only God truly makes converts, but still, getting more people is all that really matters.

This was justified mostly by logic, but partly through Sola Sciptura, and generally implied that other sects don't read the Bible.

You get two problems here. One, if people who don't even know about Christ go.to Hell, it means all young children, babies, the aborted, and most human beings through history go to eternal torment for not even being given the chance to appeal to Christ. God created us ill, commanded us to be well, only gave the cure to half the world, and the rest burns due to fate. This God seems demonic.

Then you have those who say the unknowing are spared. This second view is more logically tenuous. If people who don't hear about Christ go to Heaven, we should extinguish him from the historical record. All will be saved once the last Bible is burnt. Universal salvation would be a consequence of ignorance.

The other problem for me is that the services played like a pep rally for White middle class sentiment. Gluttony is no longer a sin. Driving a truck when you don't need one isn't sinful, it's a symbol of your identity with the saved. Sex and sloth are the prime evils, particularly sloth. Socialism is identified with sloth and is abhorrent, while eating an all meat diet and being obese, using up the resources of 14 people on average is simply living the life God wants.

That and Bible study groups are not open to real discussion. It's orthodoxy or nothing. I felt like I had to parrot orthodoxy and was asked to leave one for discussing the Gnostics without leaping to the assumption that they were deranged cultists.

That said, I have found some churches I liked. But for the most part it's a social thing, not a place to go for a deep dive into knowledge of God. I think this makes them weak in terms of appeal, especially to secular intellectuals. However, many probably would prefer to save less than expand their ways of engaging with their faith.

>> No.18499613

>>18499303
Are you saying Hegel manages to systematize mysticism? How different is it, tangibly, from the practices religions have that are supposed to lead to the same answers if followed diligently, like prayer and meditation?

>> No.18499622

>>18499413
Yes see Mainländer, Ciorab and Ligotti

>> No.18499635

Anyone know of a good book on Shakespeare and alchemy?

>> No.18499652

>>18499303
>You should have some in Platonism and philosophy generally too (Kenney's A New History of Western Philosophy is a good summation), as well as semiotics.
Regarding semiotics, what are your thoughts/opinions on the work of C.S. Peirce?

>> No.18499944

>>18499622
Pessimism is cringe

>> No.18500216

>>18499601
>The other problem for me is that the services played like a pep rally for White middle class sentiment.
Protestantism is the ultimate bourgeois religion. Either tell people what they want to hear or they’ll just pick up and go to someone who does. Religious belief becomes another section of the free market- put asses in those seats or go out of business.

>> No.18500225

>>18499613
Yes. What Hegel is doing in PoS is taking a theology similar to Boehme's and giving it a system and structure based solely in logic, not intuition, and fitting into a post-Kantian idealist epistemology.

What appeals to me about this idealist monism is that it doesn't reject the findings of the natural sciences or posit dualisms. Dualism has deep rooted issues, such as how something completely different from something else can influence that thing. Modern physicalism has major issues to. It says "yes, the world seems to be made of two totally different things, subjective experience and physical reality, but really the former is an emergent phenomenon of the latter. All the world is material. What is the material? Well we can't say. We have no idea what it is, where it came from, or why its relationships (e.g. the relative strength of gravity or the strong nuclear force) are what they are."

It's "the world is Y. No I can't tell you what Y is." The normally comes and appeal to the usefulness of technology made using a knowledge of relationships between physical objects, as if that inherently corelates with truth.

What Hegel does is first to explain the coherence theory of truth in a very beautiful way. To demonstrate how understanding requires a an ever expanding view of the whole of existence, then to apply this systematically to ontology.

He also avoids leaning on mystcism and intuition. Things like positing a divine realm of forms must exist because the problem of identity does.

The semiotics of negation shows how things can only be known in their sublation. As Sausser, one of the father's of semiotics as a discipline would later say "a one word language is impossible," you can't have meaning if one term applies equally to everything. Thus, existence can only be known in terms of nothing, the two in contradiction. The result is the synthesis of becoming. This series of logical negations is used to show the role of the Absolute, God really, in having to posit that which lies outside Itself to know Itself within its self. This too shows the role of the human as a mind, an other self, which is essential for knowing the self. Spirit is evolving through time towards a coherence of truth.

Hegel is notoriously difficult and it's hard to summarize the development. The ideas are have value in their summation not the destination.

>> No.18500241

The Bible
The Dhammapada
The Bhagavad Gita and by extension the whole Mahabatara
The Complete Works of Plato
Works of Confucius (The art of war and other classics of eastern philosophy by canterbury is the best edition, comes with the Tao too)

These are literally the only books you need. Read them, stop consuming shitty food, stop watching motion pictures (it is all garbage), use the talents the creator gave you for good. Drugs will fry your brain at best and condemn you to hell at worse.

>> No.18500248

>>18500241
Good books, retarded take

>> No.18500256

>>18500248
What part? What are you addicted to?

>> No.18500266

>>18500256
Nothing, you're just a dumb dogmatist

>> No.18500276

>>18500266
How? Something I said upset you.

>> No.18500291

>>18500276
>watching movies is spiritually harmful
>X can "condemn you to hell"
It's impossible to take you seriously, go to your tradcath general

>> No.18500306

>>18500291
Yes, watching motion pictures is inherently harmful. Just because you don't know what you're talking about, it doesn't make me a "dogmatist", now how does that make any sense? You do realize they were created as a method of control, right? You do realize that your mind CANNOT, I repeat, CANNOT tell the difference between your real memories and those implanted by motion pictures.
And yes, drugs are a path away from the truth. Call it hell or whatever you want, they will only make you stagnate at best and degrade at worse.

>> No.18500317

>>18500306
You sound fucking unhinged

>> No.18500707

>>18500317
Not than anon, but you sound like someone who has never seriously considered the impact that media consumption has on his mind and spirit. Sad!

>> No.18500723

>>18500707
>media consumption has an impact on your mind
is not the same as
>media consumption bad
Dumb fuck

>> No.18500733
File: 23 KB, 400x300, brianoblivion.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18500733

>>18500306
>>18500317
>>18500707
>The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye. Therefore the television screen is part of the physical structure of the brain. Therefore whatever appears on the television screen emerges as raw experience for those who watch it. Therefore television is reality, and reality is less than television

>> No.18500741

>>18500306
So movies rot the mind but image boards don’t?
Not that anon either.

>> No.18501497

>>18498107
>the more confused and disillusioned I become
Well, probably because you are reading a lot of lies and dysinfo.

I used to be into esoterica. Started with some hermetic stuff, Manly P Hall then moved to traditionalist school, etc.

Some magic rituals do work and I got some results from different evocation practices but ultimately it just left me broken and depressed.

Then, when I was at my lowest, I had a revelation which lead me to Orthodox Christianity.
In fact, I'm not the only one with a story like this. There is a guy in YT who has a channel called Brother Augustine. He used to be a mason, used to be really into occult, etc. Then he "saw the light" and converted to Christianity. I recommend watching his videos and hearing about his experience. If you really practice occult, you'll see that the stuff he talks about is legit and probably find some similarities between your experience and his.

>> No.18502069
File: 749 KB, 846x756, cringe.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18502069

>>18501497
>Brother Augustine

>> No.18502084
File: 6 KB, 235x215, 1619377404677.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18502084

>>18501497
>i was pretty much a loser and then I adopted a moral code that allowed me to feel superior to other people
Why do literally all Christian proselytizers do this?

>> No.18502240

>>18499601
The whole problem of religion is that it is designed to cater to the idiocy of the masses. If you are looking for a more sophisticated expression of spirituality you certainly won't find it in religion.

>> No.18502274

>>18500291
seething faggot detected

>> No.18502358

>>18502240
I thought the priesthood would be for me and I'd find it in the Vatican, and get to write Latin prose, but apparently they go clubbing, use party drugs hard, and have gay orgies.

>> No.18502366

>>18501497
Sinner to saint trope is almost as bad as the sidewalk holyman.

>> No.18502367

>>18498150
Whats up with the mushroom shills all over this board

>> No.18502389

>>18499303
kek

>> No.18502403

Esotercism and occultism is all obscurantist bullshit. Read the Timaeus again and note that Plato says God created the world out of his own goodness. Being wants to be shared and known. There's a reason why Christianity is explicitly exoteric. Hidden truth is just a trick

>> No.18502420

>>18499601
Its posts like these that make me so happy to have found a sincere and genuine church.

>> No.18502433

>>18502358
sounds based

>> No.18502441

>>18500733
Kino

>> No.18502631

>>18498107
Yes, read the Bible

>> No.18502940

>>18498107
>The more I read about this, the farther I feel from the truth
esotericism btfo eternally in the first line

>Books to get out of this rut?
Holy Bible, Papal encyclicals, and good Catholic philosophers like Aquinas or Kreeft.

>> No.18504384

>>18500733
So just watch good movies

>> No.18504473
File: 19 KB, 439x290, 1603061100748.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
18504473

Listen, the whole edifice of these books are not instruction manuals to the end goal. They are, with some exceptions, reference and codifying texts. The entire aim is using them as reference for the next step of speaking the language of symbols intuitively. Anything else is just distraction and being led astray.
Have you sought out your talents? Do you fast on holy days? Have you written everything you have studied down in an expansive library of text?
Speaking not of Christianity, but Hermeticism, it is a sage's religion. It is lonely in the first part, and in that part you must develop the ability to stand on your own feel. Even moreso, it needs faith, the specific, winnowing call that you have a place in it's study.

>> No.18504503

>>18501497
Belief systems are literal soul traps that will have you come back to the material plane after death. Only by rejecting established religions can you ascend.

>> No.18504515

>>18500225
None of this is genuine mysticism, it is just modern philosophical-semiotic rubbish without any deeper meaning. It's easy to tell when people are still obsessed with terms like "dualism" and "monism", that they are still deeply rooted in ignorance and intellectualism.

>> No.18504518

>>18504503
If by "ascend", you mean "descend", then yes, you are correct. Proper belief systems keep you, at worst, stable, and at best, if you're lucky, can provide you with a means for ascension.

>> No.18504531

>>18504518
You're wrong. You'll see.
Ascension requires you free yourself from the trappings of dogma.

>> No.18504533

>>18504531
Again, you're confusing "ascent" with "descent."

>> No.18504535

>>18504533
No, I'm not. But you're free to believe what you want, you'll just come back until you understand.

>> No.18504544

>>18504535
Enjoy lower forms of existence I guess. Remember, "I didn't know" is not an excuse.

>> No.18504545

>>18504544
Your fear-mongering doesn't work on me, slave. Enjoy being trapped in a shiny prison of your own making before getting sent back to corporeal existence.

>> No.18504551

>>18504545
Animals do not follow religion
Humans follow religion
Which type is better than the other?
It really requires logic a toddler is capable of comprehending to see why you're wrong.

>> No.18504552

>>18502631
>>18502940
I would feel like a complete larper attempting to convert to christianity

>> No.18504564

>>18504551
You got that wrong. Animals have no yearning for spirituality, but humans do. Don't disingenuously shoehorn established religion into this.
Only belief in an immortal soul is necessary, everything else traps you.

>> No.18504616

>>18502403
This is true, there is no hidden knowledge, at least nothing hidden outside of oneself.

>> No.18504750

>>18504518
is that why people who have NDEs frequently report seeing things that contradict religious teachings

>> No.18505224

>>18504515
"Thing bad because word used!" You didn't advance a very good argument there bud

>> No.18505748

>>18498107
Have you actually read any of the Zohar yet though?

>> No.18507224

bump