The Awakenings
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The Awakenings
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The Fourth Great Awakening And then in the 1960's the world exploded!People were questioning and challenging everything. Blind faith in the add-on tenets of materialism, consumerism, and the capitalist-bankrolled sciences were being regarded as unacceptable as traditional organized religion by more and more people. The nation was now adrift in a sea of uncertainty.
'A Brave New World' was again being formed by unseen social engineers and manipulators (note 35). The social trends they presented were generally accepted by the masses but an uneasiness was clearly present, just beneath the surface and not only among the protesting youth. People were sensing that an unnameable "something" was out of sync with history and with what it meant to "be American." Aldous Huxley, the well known member of the influential globalist family, shed light on this during his speech at UC Berkeley in 1962 when comparing the visions of Brave New World and George Orwell's 1984:
The Ultimate Revolution | by Aldous Huxley Brave New World, Aldus Huxley's Vision, (1980)-Full Film
People were again speaking of the dawn of a new era. This time the utopian "Age of Aquarius." People like Huxley and Orwell were insiders warning the world that this proposed New World Order would not be something humanity should pursue and embrace. But the world did not listen to them and they still do not.
1984, George Orwell's Vision, (1956) - Full Film
This growing cynicism and apathy, coupled with the idea of the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, lead to a new if short-lived Fourth Great Awakening.
Onward Through The Fog!
In the 1960's and 70's entry into this new age of expanded consciousness was not dependent upon traditional religious conventions nor on the cold logic of the Enlightenment. Filled with a spirit of universalism born during the Third Great Awakening with the World Parliament of Religions and carefully manufactured 'hope', many people took what worked for them from the existing beliefs and left the rest behind. In this brave new world it didn't so much matter what one believed as long as one believed in something that was politically correct. What was not politically correct was adherence to traditional Christianity or Judaism.
Again the established paradigms were being tossed aside but this time they were replaced by a previously unknown fluidity of perception and consciousness that was devoid of all known implications of what they lead to. The nation was rushing onward into a dense fog with no idea of the world that awaited them. This growing social transformation was not dependant on LSD and other artificial substances, although they certainly played their part! The US war against Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and other countries also fueled an already discontent nation into a cultural revolution that wiped away many of the previous paradigms. This Fourth Great awakening directly impacted everyone on the planet and laid the foundation for is happening today.
The Beatles summed up the mood of the day well: "Love is all you need." Other than being 'free' it was not at all clear what this overused word love meant however! Free Love, Free drugs, Free Clinics, Free Boxes, Free Lunches, Free STD's, free OD's... Freedom is good but it requires self and social responsibility.
In a land that was actively rejecting its past, marriages crumbled. Today over half end in divorce. Most of the nation's children live without one or both of their biological parents in the home, something unusual before the 1960's, and a large percentage of kids are today born to single mothers, something previously viewed as scandalous. A new age was indeed dawning.
Inspired by people like Dr. Timothy Leary (October 22, 1920 - May 31, 1996) thousands of young people 'turned on, tuned in, and dropped out' of society during the two decades of the Fourth Great Awakening. They hopped to 'find themselves' and yet most only became more lost. Some of these people went to the Hattiesburg district of San Francisco, others to Greenwich Village in New York, or similar places where self-discovery was promised and seldom if ever achieved. Others traveled to India in the hopes of finding their guru, or to the mountains of Peru. One of these seekers, Baba Ram Das (born Richard Al pert, April 6, 1931), spoke those immortal words, "Bite your fingernail and you're eating your guru alive!" and "Just BE HERE NOW!" (BHN).
A Jewish Awakening During a Time of Slumber
As with Christianity during this period, Orthodox (traditional) Judaism seemed cold and uninspired to many young American Jews. The Fourth Great Awakening inspired an awakening within the hearts and minds of many of these Jews. The initial flow of young Jews making aliyah (returning home to Israel) had now slowed, but the idea of working on an Israeli Collectivist Kibbutz was inspiring a new batch of young Jews to return to our ancient homeland. Jews everywhere were raising funds to plant trees in Israel. Stirred on my the renewed ancient Jewish music of people like Shlomo Carlebach (January 1,1925 - October 21, 1994) Judaism was beginning to flourish again. Jewish mystics like Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan (October 23, 1934 - January 28, 1983) was drawing Jews and non-Jews alike into the long concealed truths of the Kabbalah. Other Jews focussing on tikkun olam through social justice. Many of the leaders of Civil Rights Movement for racial and gender equality were Jews. A new age was dawning the Jewish youth were committed to being part of it.
Rabbi Meir Kahane (Z"L)
Rabbi Meir Kahane (August 1, 1932 - November 5, 190) was keenly aware that although Jews were awakening, our enemies were still actively attacking our people. Among these modern day Haman's, for the Rabbi, the Soviet government was among the worst. He used his rabbinic authority to speak out about the plight of Russian Jews as no one else of his generation. It was fine to march for the rights of Blacks and others, but who was standing for the Jews? Rabbi Meir Kahane stepped up and created a group known as the JDL, the Jewish Defense League.
Rabbi Kahane's words ring truer with each passing day. Today many Jews are speaking out about so many causes, but getting them to publicly confront the rising tide of public anti-Semitism is almost impossible! When there are pro-Israel rallies most of the participants will be Christian Zionists! It was true in the 1960 and 70's and it is even truer today, with some exceptions B"H. May the rabbi's wisdom and his martyrdom inspire us all to action and to ever greater Torah observance.
On the evening of November 5, 1990, the great Israeli Rabbi and politician Meir Kahane held a speech in the second-floor lecture hall of the Marriott hotel in Manhattan, located at 525 Lexington Avenue, to an audience of mostly Orthodox Jews. After his speech a crowd gathered around the Rebbe asking him questions as is normal. Shortly after 9:00 PM an armed Muslim assassin disguised as an Orthodox Jew approached Rabbi Kahane and shot him with a .357 caliber pistol. The Rabbi was hit in the neck and died of his wounds shortly thereafter.
After the assassination, the assassin fled from the hotel and reached Lexington Avenue where, in front of a local post office, he attempted to take over a taxi at gunpoint. Carlos Acosta, an on duty police officer, saw this and drew his pistol, ordering the assassin to 'freeze'. Instead, the Muslim assassin turned toward the officer and shot him in the chest. The officer shot the suspect, hitting him in the chin. Afterwards the suspect was arrested. The Rabbi's killer was an Egyptian-born American Muslim citizen, named El Sayyid Nosair, then living in Jersey City.
The Rabbi was very prolific. His open letter "Dear World" perhaps best expressed his heart and the heart of our people:
DEAR WORLD, by Rabbi Meir Kahane (Z"L) -- (November, 1988)
The history of the JDL, founded by Rabbi Kahane in 1968, consists of partial truths, politically motivated lies, and a not a small about of Anti-Semtism. There is no question that their zeal for the defense of Jews and Jewish nationalism at times led some members too far. Bad things were done in the group's name. Like other political groups of the period, the JDL does not have completely clean hands. After the assacination of Rabbi Kahane some members decided that fighting back was their only option. Depite that, the JDL was, and its covert members largely remain, an organizaton of good Jews dedicated to combatting Jew Hatred. With the rise of Islamic State, the likelihood of a nuclear Iran soon, the cancer of BDS and other Jew-hating groups, many are praying for the return of the JDL under new and capible management.Dear World,
It appears that you are hard to please. I understand that you are upset over us, here in Israel. Indeed, it appears that you are quite upset, even angry and outraged! Indeed, every few years you seem to become upset over us. Today, it is the brutal repression of the Palestinians; yesterday, it was Lebanon; before that it was the bombing of the nuclear reactor in Baghdad and the Yom Kippur War campaign.
It appears that Jews who triumph and who, therefore, live, upset you most extraordinarily. Of course, dear world, long before there was an Israel, we, the Jewish people - upset you.
We upset a German people who elected a Hitler and we upset an Austrian people who cheered his entry into Vienna and we upset a whole slew of Slavic nations - Poles, Slovaks, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Russians, Hungarians, Romanians. And we go back a long, long way in the history of world upset.
We upset the Cossacks of Chmielnicki who massacred tens of thousands of us in 1648-49; we upset the Crusaders who, on their way to liberate the Holy Land, were so upset at Jews that they slaughtered untold numbers of us. We upset, for centuries, a Roman Catholic Church that did its best to define our relationship through Inquisitions. And we upset the arch-enemy of the Church, Martin Luther, who, in his call to burn the synagogues and the Jews within them, showed an admirable Christian ecumenical spirit.
It is because we became so upset over upsetting you, dear world, that we decided to leave you - in a manner of speaking - and establish a Jewish State. The reasoning was that living in close contact with you, as resident-strangers in the various countries that comprise you, we upset you, irritate you, disturb you.
What better notion, then, than to leave you and thus love you - and have you love us? And so we decided to come home - to the same homeland from which we were driven out 1,900 years earlier by a Roman world that, apparently, we also upset.
Alas, dear world, it appears that you are hard to please. Having left you and your Pogroms and Inquisitions and Crusades and Holocausts, having taken our leave of the general world to live alone in our own little state - we continue to upset you.
You are upset that we repress the poor Palestinians. You are deeply angered over the fact that we do not give up the lands of 1967, which are clearly the obstacle to peace in the Middle East.
Moscow is upset and Washington is upset.
The Arabs are upset and the gentle Egyptian moderates are upset. Well, dear world, consider the reaction of a normal Jew from Israel. In 1920, 1921 and 1929, there were no territories of 1967 to impede peace between Jews and Arabs.
Indeed, there was no Jewish State to upset anybody. Nevertheless, the same oppressed and repressed Palestinians slaughtered hundreds of Jews in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Safed and Hebron. Indeed, 67 Jews were slaughtered one day in Hebron - in 1929.
Dear World, why did the Arabs - the Palestinians - massacre 67 Jews in one day in 1929? Could it have been their anger over Israeli aggression in 1967? And why were 510 Jewish men, women and children slaughtered in Arab riots in 1936-39? Was it because of Arab upset over 1967? And when you, World, proposed a U.N. Partition Plan in 1947 that would have created a Palestinian State alongside a tiny Israel and the Arabs cried and went to war and killed 6,000 Jews - was that upset stomach caused by the aggression of 1967? And, by the way, dear world, why did we not hear your cry of upset then?
The poor Palestinians who today kill Jews with explosives and firebombs and stones are part of the same people who - when they had all the territories they now demand be given them for their state - attempted to drive the Jewish State into the sea. The same twisted faces, the same hate, the same cry of "idbah-al-yahud" - "Slaughter the Jews!" that we hear and see today, were seen and heard then. The same people, the same dream - destroy Israel. What they failed to do yesterday, they dream of today - but we should not "repress" them.
Dear World, you stood by the Holocaust and you stood by in 1948 as seven states launched a war that the Arab League proudly compared to the Mongol massacres.
You stood by in 1967 as Nasser, wildly cheered by wild mobs in every Arab capital in the world, vowed to drive the Jews into the sea. And you would stand by tomorrow if Israel were facing extinction. And since we know that the Arabs-Palestinians daily dream of that extinction, we will do everything possible to remain alive in our own land. If that bothers you, dear world, well - think of how many times in the past you bothered us.
In any event, dear world, if you are bothered by us, here is one Jew in Israel who could not care less.The Five Fundamental Principles of the JDL
- LOVE OF JEWRY: One Jewish people, indivisible and united, from which flows the love for and the feeling of pain of all Jews.
- DIGNITY AND PRIDE: Pride in and knowledge of Jewish tradition, faith, culture, land, history, strength, pain and peoplehood.
- IRON: The need to both move to help Jews everywhere and to change the Jewish image through sacrifice and all necessary means including strength, force and violence [when neccessary].
- DISCIPLINE AND UNITY: The knowledge that he (or she) can and will do whatever must be done, and the unity and strength of willpower to bring this into reality.
- FAITH IN THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE: Faith in the greatness and indestructibility of the Jewish people, our religion and our Land of Israel.
The JDL was classified as "a right-wing terrorist group" by the FBI in 2001. It is considered a "hate group" by the Southern Poverty Law Center. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the JDL consists only of "thugs and hooligans." JDL's sister movements, Kach and Kahane Chai are both outlawed in Israel as terrorist organizations; they are also banned in the United States and the European Union. The French JDL group the Ligue de Défense Juive (LDJ) is legal there.
The JUBU: Jewish-Buddhists
Other Jews took a very different path.
The developing Eastern-inspired universalism crossed all religious and socioeconomic boundaries. It was part of a trend that had been slowly building since the Third Great Awakening and the Parliament of World Religions as discussed previously. Now Spiritual Universalism was again picking up steam through the efforts of people like Ram Dass and Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (founder of the Jewish Renewal movement within non-Orthodox Judaism) - not to be confused with Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liady of the Orthodox Hassidic CHABAD-Lubavitch sect. Coincidentally, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi was ordained through Chabad but later left to pursue a different path as we discuss shortly.
While historically Judaism has sought (with varying degrees of success) to avoid merging with other belief systems and to maintain strict devotion to HaShem, the God of Israel, alone; the new social drive towards universalism was becoming ever more seductive. American Jews could now be accepted as just another ethnic minority if they would embrace the Secular paradigm of the times and reject their Old World ways and beliefs. Especially offensive to the new Jews was the Chosen People idea. It had to go!
As discussed in part five of this study, since the Trefa Banquet of 1883 American Jews had largely embraced Reform Judaism and rejected the traditional forms of the Covenant. For many Reform Jews the Jewish people had not been specifically chosen by HaShem at all (if He even exists). Jews were merely a reflection of the universal quest for ethnic meaning, not the Chosen People of a literal God. As just another ethnic group Jews were now finding themselves more accepted in American society than they had ever been anywhere else. They had largely assimilated into the dominant Secular Humanist culture and were fast losing their distinctiveness as the ancient Covenant people (a Covenant most now regarded as a superstitious remnant of the past).
Just as the Baal Shem Tov had noted the lack of meaningful personal spirituality within traditional Orthodoxy (giving birth to the various Hassidic sects), so too certain American Jews were now hoping to rekindle Judaism within their assimilated non-Orthodox and Agnostic sects. Some of these Jews found their way to Israel and the kibbutz agrarian movement, while others began assimilating more alien doctrines into their Reform Jewish ideas.
These ideas came largely from the East, but in a reworked American New Age context. Others incorporated Pagan ideas such as the goddess earth mother, Gaia. Especially incorporated from the East was the Buddha Dharma. These "Jubu" (or Jewish Buddhists) typically confuse the Buddhist concept of anattā (or not-self) with the Hasidic concept of ain Soph (i.e. the Eternal One prior to self-manifestation in time). Based on this misunderstanding the JuBu finds no essential difference between the two religions even though they are completely different and contradictory if one understands the Buddhist concepts as Buddhists do.
For some, the various unorthodox interpretations of Kabbalah created an interdisciplinary space where they felt they could return to a more traditional, if heterodox, observance. Were he alive today the Vilna Gaon would surely be shaking his head: "See I warned you!"Some non-Orthodox Jewish communities have now begun moving toward more traditional observances and understandings. This in part is what is drawing the Reform and Conservative movements closer now. Since the re-birth of Israel in 1948 many Jews of all movements (including the non-affiliated groups) have been rediscovering the richness of Derech HaShem (the Way of God) in ways their parents had largely allowed to fade (due to assimilation, the War, Secular Humanism, etc). And yet in some ways the non-Orthodox are farther from traditional Judaism than ever before because so many of them have replaced HaShem with a Buddhist Force similar to George Lucas' in Star Wars. This arises from a misapplication of the term "echad" or One. Being One does not negate His Existence. HaShem is "I Am."
In quest of this new JuBu religious consciousness Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (August 28, 1924 - July 3, 2014) was part of a group of Jews who travelled to India to meet with the Dalai Lama. This historic trip is chronicled in Rodger Kamenetz' popular book The Jew in the Lotus (JL). The expression "JUBU" (Jewish-Buddhists) was first published in that work (and was considered a positive by the author). The phrase itself is a pun on the Tibetan mantra: Om mani pad me hum. This witty nickname reveals the fundamental shift that is still very much alive in American religion in general and within non-Orthodox Judaism in particular. Historically no religious Jew would have embraced such a term. It would have been considered deeply offensive, anti-Semitic, and bordering on idolatrous for a Jew to name him/herself after another god or religion.
That it is an offensive term can be demonstrated. Understanding what the mantra means and how some Jews came to embrace it, reveals a lot about the paradigm shift of this period and its continuing consequences on Judaism and its future. Traditional Judaism has survived because of it uniqueness. Will an assimilated Buddhist Judaism that denies it uniqueness continue to exist as new persecutions come? It seems doubtful. More likely these new forms will fade away with time and traditional, Orthodox, Judaism will survive.
First, this popular mantra can not accurately be translated despite the popular but inaccurate ascription: "Hail, the Jewel in the Lotus"(i.e. what is of value is sequestered within the consciousness of the Higher Self which exists amidst the mire). This is not exactly how Theravadin Buddhists understand it.
The mantra is not intended to be a translatable sentence. Om mani pad me hum is a meditative revelatory key or affirmation of Sound-Vibration intended to invoke the blessings of Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara (aka Chenrezig), the Buddha of Great Compassion. The idea that a Torah observant Jew would desire communion with a Shamanic Buddhist deity like Avalokitesvara would have been unthinkable prior to the Fourth Great Awakening.
The growing American Humanist paradigm rejects the literal existence of God, gods and spirits. Many non-Orthodox Jews today do not believe in God as described in Rambam's Thirteen Principles of Judaism let alone the gods of other religions. It was not that the rabbis were seeking an audience with Avalokitesvara, a god they did not believe in and probably had never heard of. They viewed the mantra as a psychological focusing tool rather than as a religious formulae of evocation as accepted by the Buddhists. These men would not have worshipped the Buddha (one hopes). But where does one draw the line between worshipping a god and redefining him for ones own uses?
The predominant religious belief of the US now is that "truth" is everywhere and can be taken and reworked from any source and merged into ones own belief system. This belief is as old as the Roman Pagan Nicolaitan dogma, even older (note Nic). For traditional Jews, without relying on Torah there is no foundational authority to regulate religious hybridization. With Torah we know that the practice is condemned. How odd that when "Messianic Christians" do this with our religion many Jews become irate and yet many of these same Jews feel enlightened doing it with other religions!
Those who embrace this Nicolaitan belief system can justify anything, even bowing before literal idols. If all that matters is ones intention, and given that the idols have no actual existence of their own, what's the harm? All the more when the God of Israel has been de-personalized into a universal consciousness devoid of independent existence (compare this belief with Exodus 20:5, 34:14, Numbers 25:13 etc)? This is a very slippery slope that is leading many Jews ever farther away from Torah and from HaShem. It is because of this growing practice among some non-Orthodox Jews that many Torah observant Jews are beginning to question if these Jews are even Jews at all! And the gulf is widening.
Assimilation remains the biggest single threat facing the Jews of the Diaspora. It has led led many to trade the God of our Patriarchs for an interpersonal collective consciousness that can neither see, hear nor choose from among the nations. Few maintain real emuna (active faith) in HaShem as Sovereign God today. In an insightful piece on the state of Jews in America consider this:
"...spiritual rootlessness is no less horrendous than physical insecurity... The dangers of spiritual impoverishment were greatest exactly where external pressures were weakest or non-existent" (quoting the Zionist leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky from over 100 years)Torah study, belief, and practice has historically kept the Jewish people theologically Jewish. Many Orthodox Jews today are convinced that the lack of Torah knowledge and observance will eventually lead to the extinction of the non-Orthodox sects and possibly of Judaism outside of Israel, New York and a handful of other communities. The majority of Jews today are non-Orthodox.
...Other than Chabad and perhaps Birthright what American Jewish organizations or movement in the last 15 years can claim to have an impact on this generation of American Jewry? Which one of them will claim to impact the next generation (or two)? Precious few and it's simply terrifying....
"Mark Twain in 1899 wrote: "All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?" Answering this question and ensuring the people of Israel remain immortal remains the foremost Jewish problem in America (source)After Nam
In the years following the Vietnam "police action", after Woodstock and Altamonte, after the Symbionese Liberation Army, and the Weathermen Underground had disbanded, and Timothy Leary had become the subject of university history classes, as Jewish Renewal became normative of American Judaism... what had appeared to be the dawning of a Fourth Great Awakening (the Age of Aquarius) collapsed. The hippies and yippies cut their hair and donned suits to join the corporate workforce. The promised social revolution never materialized. After Vietnam things calmed down as most people returned to spiritual slumber and political apathy. The imaginary land of the American capitalist dream and its new paradigm covered the land like wet blanket soon putting out most of the surviving embers. Social outrage and righteous indignation was replaced by passive complacency. Watergate and the impeachment of Richard Nixon for crimes that by today's standards of governmental abuse seem petty, shattered the remaining utopian hopes. Not only had the "invincible" nation lost its first war, it had been humiliated in the eyes of the world as solid proof emerged that the justification for the war had been a White House fabrication (note T).
During the 1960's and into 70's the country had awakened to new spiritual realities. These new insights are usually classified under the umbrella term New Age Movement. These beliefs were brought forward from the Second Great Awakening and were reenergized through the Aquarian concepts of the hippies, psychics, and spiritual entrepreneurs who were always ready to offer true enlightenment, but for a cost. They plagiarized all religions and created a montage without root or historic underpinning. Unlike the free 'brush arbor meetings' of the Third Great Awakening, the New Age Movement became largely the religion of the privileged few who could afford to pay the new gurus and Channelers, As the seventies passed into the 1980's American religion largely became an economic racket leaving most people out in the cold. The during the nineties it became largely irrelevant.
Those experiences fundamentally altered the society. Scholars disagree as to whether this awakening was significant enough to be recognized as the Fourth Great Awakening. In my opinion today it was not because it faded too soon. Just as the full impact of the Third Great Awakening was not completely realized until afterwards however, so too we are now beginning to see how far reaching these transformations actually were. A Fourth Great Awakening may now be beginning. Time will tell. If it is, it began in a most unlikely place: The Occupy Movement as we will discuss below.
Most observers would agree that for a while there was a genuine transformation in consciousness underway among the citizens, arguably such as had not been seen for millennia (TP 33). The awakening that occurred during these years was amazing even though its potential was never realized!
The Neo-Cons and Islam
During the "Me Generation" of the 1980s and 90s through the dawn of the new millennium the nation's spiritual consciousness gave way to a short lived revival of Christian Fundamentalism in various forms. This was not unlike the Christian elements of the Third Great Awakening except that within this one the Church lacked the needed zeal to sustain and unify it. It also lacked viable answers to it Secular detractors. Calvary Chapel exemplifies this point. While it began as a dynamic beach outreach of awakening 'Jesus People', it soon transformed into another reserved socially negligible organization as it merged with normative Protestant Christianity. Not that this was a bad thing necessarily. I only note it here to show how spiritual awakenings originally enliven and challenge people in ways religious orthodoxy seldom can but then fold into new orthodoxies. As religious reform movements wind down they typically either cease to exist (like the Shakers and I Am Movement) or enter into the orthodoxy of the day (like the Quakers, Seventh Day Adventists, and Calvary Chapel).
The rising Neocon political trend reflected this. Many Americans felt that the attacks on ethics and social morality had gone too far and yet they were not ready to return to traditional religion and values. Many sensed that the nation needed a counter-weight to the leftist trends of the 1960's and politicians like Ronald Reagan, Jerry Falwell, and Pat Buchanan provided it for them. Once the new social vision was embraced politically by those on the Right side of the political spectrum, many of these people were ready to return to their pews as part of the 'Religious Right' or 'Moral Majority'. What the children of the 1960's and 70's had soundly rejected they now, as older people, repackaged and embraced as they took up the reigns of political and religious power. This too was short lived however.
The growth of Islam's popularity during the 1990's reflected both the nation's gradually returning optimism and its remaining general dissatisfaction with traditional Western religion. The Internet was becoming a public gateway to the world and many non-Western religions were quickly learning how to utilize its awesome power. Millions of Wahabi taqiyya dollars were invested in convincing Americans that "Islam Means Peace" (note I). Many of those who still felt the need for a religious center, especially former Christians, were now looking toward Mecca hoping to find the untarnished religion of Abraham.
September 11
When I originally wrote this piece in 1989 I was working on my MA degree in Religious Studies at John F. Kennedy University. The chaos of 9-11 had not yet happened and the possibility that we were witnessing the fresh blooming of a major spiritual awakening seemed likely to many us. The events of 9-11 fundamentally changed everything.
As the nation physically awakened to the events of the morning of 9.11.2001 few Americans grasped the deeper significance of the attacks nor the political shock waves that would emerge from them. Every aspect of our lives were impacted. In many ways the United States we had known was gone forever when the second plane hit.
I significantly updated this study in 2002 reflecting the change in direction caused by the attacks. I then did a slight update in 2006 and another in 2014. Now in 2015, hindsight has clarified much. 9-11 changed everything.
The consciousness of the post 9-11 nation remains confused. People are generally spiritually and socially unsettled with seemingly no where to go for answers. Feeling they can trust neither the government nor the religious leaders the majority of people in the once United States have spiritually shut down. Others are embracing political or religious fanaticism and inevitably becoming angry when their beliefs are challenged or their when heroes fall, which seems to keep happening. Neither state is conducive of spiritual awakening. And yet spiritual growth is always possible and some people will always seek spiritual enlightenment despite the obstacles set before them.
Today any viable system of knowledge, whether science, religion, philosophy, or what have you must have, at its basis, a comprehension of the relative nature of human perception and of our roles as cocreators of reality (SW 33). In today's socially acceptable paradigm people no longer look outward to a God for enlightenment. Rather the modern seeker, as so many of the ancients, turns inward, generally employing modified Eastern techniques. This belief system is supported by popular New Age gurus like Deepak Chopra, much of liberal Christianity, Reform Judaism, the Religious Society of Friends (Quaker) and many others. Within these universalist conceptions there is no place to 'humble oneself before God' as Lord and Master since believing in a deity other than oneself is generally viewed as foolish. Even many of the traditional liturgies are now being reworked to de-personalize the Deity. People now often speak of a Higher Power or Consciousness, of an impersonal omnipresent Force. These formerly eastern ideas have now become an accepted and 'obvious' Western truths.
Anti-personalism entered the Western consciousness during the Third Great Awakening through people like Madame Blavatsky and the Indian gurus. It began to flourish during the 1960's and 70's as we've discussed. Supposedly open minded people now frequently become flustered or even angry by references to God in the traditional sense as though engaged in a Unitarian Jihad (this link is to a work of satire that emphasizes this).
Absolute Relativity
Categorizing history as I do here can be interesting but ultimately it is without meaning. What has been has been and what will be exists beyond our understanding and definitions. Or least, we used to think so. We were merely striving for a handle. But according to the awakening consciousness of the day the existence of past, present, future and anything once considered to be "reality" is but more illusion, more "control mechanisms" to be rejected. Nothing exists beyond what I perceive (whoever "I" might be) and even then, it is only my current illusion. Indeed the notion of solipsism is emerging. What I do I do to myself because only "I" exist and "I" am God! Shirley Mcclain was mocked for her belief in solipsism but now it is widely held and may become the dominant paradigm of the Western World.
Outside of the Muslim world this seems to be the emerging paradigm Absolute relativity. Our choices reside in what we make of our realities not in our objective realities themselves. The years that passed between 1960 and 1975 witnessed an amazing increase in spiritual knowledge and experience. This wasn't only the case with the sciences, but also with the 'dharma bums' and 'hippies' who roamed the earth in search of truth. The years immediately preceding the 1960s I see as preparatory.
The Dead Sea Scrolls
For instance, the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven main caves in and around the Wadi Qumran (near the ruins of the ancient settlement of Khirbet Qumran, on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea). The 972 texts support the essential rabbinic teachings and development of Jewish history and yet merely citing them became evidence for concepts not taught in them. While they lend no support to Christianity the scrolls do offer better light on the first century. The Dead Sea Scrolls don't significantly alter our understandings of Judaism but they do remind us of its depth and diversity. Their main impact remained intellectual.
Within Jewish diversity of the First century lived the Jewish followers of the historic Jew Y'shua (renamed Jesus). The discoveries excited the hope that yet other finds might turn up that might answer many of the difficult questions posed by the historic faith of Klal Israel. The popular works of Elaine Pagels (P) arose from this hope and added much to our quest of rediscovering the early faith of the Jewish sects and those spawned from them.
In 1957 Paul Edwards' edition of Bertrand Russell's book, Why I Am Not a Christian and Other Essays introduced a new generation of skeptics to his humanist ideas. A bit later in the 1960's and 70's books like The Flowering of Mysticism in the Fourteenth Century introduced the generation to other views of Christianity, such as those of Meister Eckhart (1260 - 1327/8), Julian of Norwich (1342 - 1416), and Saint John of the Cross (1542-1592). Gnosticism and Christian mysticism in various forms were making slight comebacks. As has historically been the case Gnosticism lacked the foundation and general appeal to become a significant presence although people were once again discussing it.
The Christianity developing during this period in some ways had more authentic roots thanks to the Dead Sea Scrolls however in most cases it remained firmly attached to the Universalism of the Vatican and its developing views remained outside the ancient Jewish mainstream of its birth and founder. Antiquity does not always equate with accuracy nor reflect prominent past views. There have always been minority views on everything. The Jewish religion of Y'shua remains undiscovered.
Those Christians who were beginning to devote themselves to the "rediscovery of the Hebrew Roots" failed to consider that what Y'shua taught, even if rediscovered, had long since been rejected by Rabbinic authority. They placed great emphasis therefor on rediscovering a heretical belief system. This effort led to yet more confused ideas.
In addition to the essential support for Jewish history offered by the Sea Scrolls, archeological research in various fields was producing ever new confirmations of biblical truth. Ironically, rather than producing faith, these generally favorable reports caused ever more skepticism. The biblical texts themselves were now being called into question as never before. As religious Bible houses were replaced by secular publishing companies selling new versions of the Bible the presentation of the Bible as something holy quickly diminished. As the masses accepted non-faith based translations and study notes (such as the NIV) soon it was not only public religious dissenters like Bertrand Russell and sympathetic Humanist scholars who were attacking. Now non-scholars began studying the Bible with an eye at disproving it. New translations of the Bible, most less scholarly paraphrases like the New International Version, all but replaced the Authorized King James Version, the main English standard since 1611. The ancient Protestant cry "God said it, I believe it, that settles it" means nothings when the Christians can not agree on what He supposedly said! More and more people were leaving the Christian religion. More and more churches were closing their doors.
Islam Rising
As a result of this change in foundational religious texts Christianity began undergoing major doctrinal changes and lost most of it 'fire' and authority. Confidence in the Bible as an historically reliable sacred text is at an all-time low now, even though it remains the world's number one best seller in its myriad translations. When the footnotes in every major translation of the Christian Bible frequently point out that this or that verse should not be in the text, better manuscripts read as... it makes it difficult to argue that one is reading "the divinely preserved inerrant Word of God." Considering this it no wonder that this generation witnessed the formal Vatican announcement that Christianity is no longer the world largest religion:
"For the first time in history, we are no longer at the top: Muslims have overtaken us," Monsignor Vittorio Formenti said in an interview with the Vatican newspaper Laisser-faire Romano. Monsignor Formenti compiles the Vatican's yearbook.The slightly awakened Christians from the 1960's and 70's (always a minority), other than the Fundamentalists (including the growing yet tiny "messianic" sects) had largely returned to spiritual slumber by 1975. As Richard Nixon had enraged the already outraged nation, now Jimmy Carter's pro-Islamic lackluster maladministration (January 20-1977 - January 20 1981) tucked the lukewarm citizens into bed with the lollypop of apathy.
He said that Catholics accounted for 17.4 percent of the world population - a stable percentage - while Muslims were at 19.2 percent...
When considering all Christians and not just Catholics, Christians make up 33 percent of the world population, Monsignor Vittorio Formenti said (source) See also a Muslim responseThose who were still seeking truth began evaluating their experiences and applying what they had learned. The positives of the 1960's were recast as a period of nothing but sex, drugs and rock and roll. The result of this general national malaise and the self-denial of the former Beatniks, hippies, flower children and seekers, was more eclectic (non-specific) religious and political perspectives and less traditional, organized ones.
As we discussed earlier, during the Protestant Reformation a major concern of the Roman Church had been Christian and social unity of belief. With the rise of the various Protestant sects, the Church fragmented into competing beliefs and authorities. If Emperor Constantine's Nicene Doctrine had been fragmented by the Reformers of the 16th century, the reformers of the 20th century pulverized them into bits! Debates no longer centered on issues like proper biblical observance. Now Christians themselves were debating the need for any structured doctrine and beliefs. The Universalism touted at the World Parliament of Religions was strengthening its hold and the term "organized religion" became a pejorative.
For the past few hundred years belief had been a personal matter for Christians, especially for Anglicans and Protestants, but certain foundational authority was generally accepted: The "priesthood of all believers" does not grant one the right to question everything. In the world of 911 however there were no accepted authorities nor ethics. Now anything went, as long as it was not traditional. This absence of foundation resulted in the short-lived Christian "discipleship" attempts but it also was too little too late. For the first time in US history an entire generation had grown up without a Judeo-Christian foundation. Those who had been raised in the Church generally viewed it as either universalist to the point or irrelevance or fundamentalist to the point of cultic. Without faith the Bible was regarded at best as an antiquated book of suggestions.
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Bibliography and Resources
NOTES
- Note 35: During this period two equally dire sceneries were offered to the world: George Orwell's 1984 and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. As the years past both books came to be seen as political prophecy rather than mere works of dystopian literature. In Brave New World Aldous Leonard Huxley (July 26, 1894 - November 22, 1963), a prominent member of England's powerful Huxley family, presented a world in which the people are manipulated like sheep by a scientific oligarchy. Huxley was an influential member of the privileged global ruling class. He knew what he was taking about. He also delved deeply into parapsychology and philosophical mysticism in part to learn how to more fully manipulate the masses. Huxley discovered the esoteric power behind spiritual manipulation through Eastern philosophy, especially that of Swami Vivekananda's Neo-Vedanta and merged it with political globalism and the universalism that came to the West through White City and the Parliament of World Religions discussed before. Then on November 22, 1963 Huxley, CS Lewis and John F. Kennedy all died (return).
- Note NIC: The Nicolaitan dogma, by various terms, is the universalist approach in which beliefs and religions are merged and re-codified for the purpose of establishing a unity that does not intrinsically exist. This process was used extensively by the Romans as the gods of conquered peoples were added to the Roman Pantheon and assigned to the Roman lineages. This process is referenced as being used to merge the Judaism of Y'shua (Jesus) with Roman Universalism at Revelation 2:9 and 3:9 (return).
- Note T: Most Americans had already given up on America being the New Zion, the City on a Hill, but the loss of its spiritual foundation now lead to the loss of what had made America unique. The previous pride that was common among Americans as being part of a just and caring nation was shattered by the American Democide (i.e. government directed and permitted killings) in Southeast Asia. The US war against the people of the region (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and other countries) was shown to be a complete fraud created by President Johnson and the military–industrial–congressional complex. It had nothing to do justice. The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (August 7, 1964) was a lie:
...It was later revealed that the federal government had drafted the Tonkin Gulf Resolution fully six months before the attacks on the U.S. vessels occurred. It was also revealed that the United States provoked the attack by assisting the South Vietnamese in mounting clandestine military attacks against the North Vietnamese. Although the two U.S. vessels attacked were actually on intelligence-gathering missions, the North Vietnamese could not distinguish them from the South Vietnamese raiding ships. Johnson had also exaggerated the gravity of the attack itself, which did not harm either of the ships -- source.As a result of this damning US government deception between 95,000 and 430,000 South Vietnamese civilians were murdered by US troop during the "police action." 50,000-65,000 North Vietnamese civilians died in the war as well. This is not counting the soldiers defending their homes nor those of the US military.
During the Fourth Great Awakening there was at least popular resistance against this senseless slaughter. As the awakening subsided and was replaced by the ME Generation there was only apathy: "Well what do you expect? Its the government!" "Its Congress!" "There's nothing we can do about it...." The spirit of e pluribus unum was dead. Ronald Reagan later tried to restore it (with his City on a Hill speech for instance) but to date America lacks that sense of unity that previously made it great. The United States is clearly not a country by and for its people. Its just another oligarchy with a rich past. (return).- Note I: Lying (Taqiyya and Kitman): Lying to non-Muslims to convert them to Islam or to otherwise use them deceptively for a "just cause" is permissible according to Islamic authorities. Much of what Americans think they know about Islam is based on taqiyya. The following is taken from a reputable Muslim website:
Qur'an (3:54) - "And they (the disbelievers) schemed, and Allah schemed (against them): and Allah is the best of schemers." The Arabic word used here for scheme (or plot) is maraca, which literally means deceit. If Allah is deceitful toward unbelievers, then there is little basis for denying that Muslims are allowed to do the same. (See also 8:30 and 10:21) -- sourceHere's an example. "Islam means peace." One must understand what this means according to Islam. The Arabic word islam only means "submission." This taqiyya conceals the true belief that IF one fully submits to the Islamic authorities and Sharia law one will thereby know "peace" through absolute submission. Conversely one who refuses to submit will know the opposite. To see what this means in practice simply observe "Islamic justice" as practiced around the world. (return)
Be the Blessing you were created to be
and
Don't let the perfect defeat the good