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Journey in Being is a quest
for discovery, revelation,
And realization of the greatest destiny of Being
And the place of human being in this process.
The vehicles of discovery are individual and group—
Beings and civilization.
…
The ideas and ways of the
process are significantly new.
The new builds on and subsumes what is valid in the
old—
The narrative will have familiar elements. However,
readers
May find the new elements unfamiliar.
Some words have a number of
common meanings.
It is then essential to know which meaning is used
here.
I have attempted care in showing which meanings I use.
Understanding of the
narrative will be enhanced
By appreciating that many familiar terms have new
meaning
And that the ideas form a connected system with
meaning
That is greater than the collection of individual
meanings.
The narrative endeavors to
show what is essential
In simple form but not to suppress essential
challenge.
…
Understanding ‘greatest being’ requires depiction of
The Universe and our relations to it—
A metaphysics, cosmology, or world view.
We will find the Universe to have no beginning or
end.
A text, however, has some—perhaps arbitrary—beginning.
It is effective to begin this account with experience
Which is the place of our relation to the Universe.
…
Experience—awareness—is the core,
Place of knowledge of things and theater of our being;
Its forms are pure, receptive, and active. These
combine
As ideas—pure and creative—and action.
Experience is the rock of knowledge of things—
Knowledge that something exists (‘is there’),
For even if all is illusion, there is illusion
Which is experience.
…
The word ‘exists’ means what is there.
Here, ‘exists’ is used in the sense of ‘existed’,
‘exists’,
And / or ‘will exist’ and even more generally
According as time is but one coordinate of
distinction.
The considerations on experience show the fact of
existence.
(That experience is a robust foundation for
existence is
Shown in narratives linked at the head of this edition.)
Being is that which exists.
The power of ‘Being’, the concept, is its neutrality
to real
And hypothetical ‘kinds’—e.g., space, time, matter,
mind,
Spirit, soul, or word-as-world.
Mention of these special kinds is not essential
To the development. Whatever is real—named
And unnamed—is already and always in Being.
The Universe is All Being.
There is one and only one Universe.
Whatever has Being is in the Universe.
The hypothetical being that is not in the Universe
Does not exist—it is nothing but a hypothesis.
‘Being’ discriminates only existence from
non-existence.
It does not distinguish kinds of Being.
Whatever is real exists in the one Universe.
There is no other Universe of partially real kinds.
The Universe contains all creation
But is not created.
Any creator is part of the Universe—
The Universe has and can have no external creator.
(It will be seen that the Universe has neither
beginning nor end.
The Universe is.)
Knowledge of the natural world is
Coded in ‘laws’ and natural histories.
Natural history may be coded as law,
Legend, myth, or ancient cosmology.
The laws of natural science are
Familiar examples of laws.
A law is a reading of a pattern;
The pattern itself is the immanent Law.
All Laws have Being.
The Universe contains all Laws.
The Void is the absence of Being.
As complement to the Universe,
The Void exists and contains no Law.
All states emerge from the Void,
For the contrary would be a Law of the Void.
It is thus shown that the Void—and so
Being and the Universe—have no limits.
The Universe has no limits.
This demonstrated assertion
Is named the ‘fundamental principle of metaphysics’.
The worldview that results is called
The universal metaphysics
Or, simply, the metaphysics.
It is crucial to the development that the meaning of
The fundamental principle should be understood.
The principle implies what follows and it is
especially
The implications that bring out its meaning.
Realism—i.e., Logic—is the only constraint for
concepts
To have objects in the Universe.
Agreement with fact is part of this concept of
Realism.
Natural science and experience have domains of
validity
But the Universe is greater without limit than those
domains.
The Universe is limitlessly greater than our cosmos.
The Universe has neither beginning nor end.
The Universe is.
The Universe has (must have) manifestation and
Identity
In acute, diffuse and absent (non-manifest) phases.
That something must come from nothing is a trivial
corollary.
The extension, duration, variety, summit, and
dissolution
Of manifest phases of Being in the Universe
Are without limit.
The Universe confers these powers on individuals—
For the contrary would entail a limit on the Universe.
Individuals realize the Universe—i.e., All Being:
Its extension, duration, variety, summits, Identity.
Though individual identity may seem a concrete unity
‘Individual’ and ‘group’ are relative terms.
(Every atom is a cosmos, every cosmos an atom.)
However, the individual-group distinction is not
relative.
Power is conceived as degree of limitlessness.
The Universe is ultimate power;
The individual realizes this power.
Apparent limits are part of the constitution
Of the forms of Being—
Though temporary, limits are—part of—the form of
beings.
Limits are normally the result of origins.
Such, too, is the nature of human limits.
The givenness of realization does not remove
The value and challenge of endeavor
Or the fact of pain
But gives meaning to pain and challenge.
While in limited form realization is endless
process—
And ever freshness in variety—A Journey in Being.
In unlimited form realization is Aeternitas—
Eternity in a moment—
To which life and death—and pain and joy—are gateways.
The oneness, connection, and continuity
Of these forms lie in Identity—
In experience, idea and action.
That realization for limited form is endless
Requires that the empirical and symbolic sciences
For such forms remain ever in process and
Be complemented by immersion for their full
expression.
Our civilization is the web of human culture
Across time and continents.
Greater Civilization is the matrix of civilizations
Across the Universe.
Individuals foster Civilization;
Civilization nurtures the individual.
Civilization is the hearth of realization;
The individual is the manifestation of realization.
(While in limited form realization is endless
process—
And ever freshness in variety—A Journey in Being.)
While individual and Civilization are vehicles,
Ideas and action are modes of transformation and
realization.
Civilization provides ways of ideation and action—
Disciplines of thought, discovery, and transformation.
The standard forms of the disciplines—
Secular and trans-secular—
Are marked by incompleteness and error
But their core constitutes ground on which to build.
Our apparent limits are Laws or
Expressions of Law
Which also constitute initial ground on which to
Transcend limits on the way to universal realization.
The apparently stable initial ground
Is transient and incomplete,
But knowing and living its transient incompleteness
Is on the way to the ultimate.
Ultimate realization for all beings is given
By the metaphysics. However, efficiency and enjoyment
Are diminished immensely in quality and frequency
In absence of commitment and engagement.
Sacred scriptures talk of divine magnificence.
The Bhagavad-Gita compares the splendor of Being
To the brilliance of a thousand suns. Yet the means of
Realization of the Gita are squarely in the present.
The thoughts that now follow make explicit a
Basis for a program for realization.
A program is developed and outlined in the Précis
Edition
And detailed in the Complete Edition.
The places of realization are
Nature—the ground of civilization—
And society, which link the present
To the ultimate.
The way of realization lies
In break down and experiential rebuilding of ideas and
Being,
Which includes thought, experiment,
And correction.
(The break down and rebuilding is appropriately
described as
Analysis and synthesis of ideas and Being.)
Realization derives inspiration from the disciplines
And the powers of Being and thought
Revealed above. It derives effectuality
From their interaction.
Realization begins with ideas. Transformation
requires action.
(While in limited form realization is endless
process—
And ever freshness in variety—A Journey in Being.)
The disciplines suggest catalysts to change—of mind,
e.g.
Meditation and of body, e.g. exposure to extremes.
In incremental change in being and disciplines (ways)
Is secured in experience and reflection.
Dimensions or phases of realization are
Transformation of Being—Ideas and Action and
Transformation of Civilization—inhabiting the Universe
via
Intrinsic transformation (of Being) and instrument or
technology.
…
Ideas may be experienced as possessed of
Independent flow and necessity—as if revealed.
The ideas above are written with emphasis on
Experience of original flow.
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