Editorial notes: This is one of Shai’s longest essays, written in seven instalments, six within a period of just ten days in 2016 (from 13th October to 23rd October 2016) and the seventh, a year later, on August 31 2017. Reflecting on Shai’s complete collection of writings, this can be seen, perhaps, as the zenith and culmination of his intellectual journey. As he was writing this essay he was...
It is oft-repeated that Buddhism is not a religion, but rather a pragmatic psychology – it is quite here that the controversy within Scientology found its ground-swell, ensuring that the archaeological finds be immune to apathetic amnesia. Professor Chowdhury and three graduate students were completing work at a monastic complex in northern India when a hermetically sealed cave was...
Editorial notes: These reflections are about the quest to find underlying enduring meaning in the transitory experiences and events that make up our lives and constitute our world. It suggests that there is no such underlying enduring meaning, at least none accessible to us. But there can be crucial turning points in which we are surprised by experiences that transcend what we thought were the...
Editorial notes: This is a meditation on the Shema, and the nature of love. It is pointed out that, as Midrashic commentators say, the reference in the Shema to loving God with all one’s hearts (plural) signifies both with the good and the bad impulse, etc., bringing the evil urge into conformity with the good urge and directed to God. Within the fleshly and worldly is the spiritual and heavenly...
[Editor: This is more “charity case” less “business proposal”] Begin by introducing the experiential state of sati as resulting from instructions The concept of bare attention The concept of purity of experience Pause to introduce bhakti yoga as experiential and resulting from instructions Situating bhakti by comparison within mindfulness of deportment theory Pause to introduce form vs concept...
[Editor: Poor and looks barren] This is probably antithetical to the goal Not happy with this. Plan: Opening room for hope [Optional section, dry but makes methodology justified – how to test belief systems [Optional section: cleaning the board; religion vs Judaism, and implications for approaching a test here. Marking targets for pilot investigation in principle Specific example route...
This is not an attempt at discovery or elucidation; this is an effort and representation of exegesis qua methodology, written from the perspective of one who does not know, and perhaps who will fail to know too. It is written as a dialogue between the lone traveller and the written text. “I” is the traveller, and “T” is the text. T: A woman becomes impregnated… I: Why do you tell me this now? T:...
{Part 1 – 15/02/2017} This is a pilot-trial to discuss avatar vectors, letter exemplification (and otiyot based synthetic apriori etymology), and an ethos [a doubt-plagued strategy] “Vayishma Yitro kohen midyan…” Vayishma contains the letters “shema” of shema yisrael‘. Letters inform their words, and words inform each other. Shema plus yud is like Shiloh...
{Part 1 – 26/10/2016} There are 22 Hebrew letters, plus 5 final variants. They are given numerical values. I don’t know if this is commonly thought by those who are better studied. This isn’t a proof, it’s a thought trail, followed by some demonstrations. Why are there only 4 letters in the 100’s order? There are 10 sefirot, but how would they fit? First thought: The...
{Part 1 – 22/10/2016} A preamble on Eastern philosophy, religion, idol worship (nb. not referencing F. Bacon[I], but weakly alluding), and phenomenological incongruencies. Any reference to Indian (whether defining geographically, as did the Muslims, vis the river, or by cultural genealogies, via translocated Arayan, [aka] Brahman lineage, or Tantric resurgence [nb. meridian axis or at least...
