A Q. and A. on the Cause of Historical Decline

Q. I have been wanting to ask you a question about the long history of philosophy. Mainly my question is about the loss of the transcendental dimension in modernity, and more specifically, the loss of the transcendental in philosophy. This question is taken up by some traditionalists, but I am not satisfied with their approach; I think they ask good questions but I don't find their responses well thought out. Heidegger is famous for his view that early philosophy was the discovery of fundamental being and that the history of philosophy is a long, slow clouding of this discovery, culminating in nihilism of the 20th century. I am not a fan of Heidegger; I believe he is hugely overrated. I only bring up his view because it has some traction today among those who take issue with modernity. My own tendency is to view the loss of the transcendental in modernity as part of a natural process, a cyclic process. We are in the winter season of a cultural cycle where it is very difficult to do anything outside of material concerns. You have mentioned that modernity is actually the darkest period of recorded human history, and I think that's true; but I'm wondering if you have any thoughts about how that has come about? Do you see it as a result of specifically human activity? or perhaps more along a natural cycle of awareness and understanding, like the seasonal nature I suggested. I tend to think that human beings like to think that they are in charge of long-term cultural trends, but I doubt that this is true.

 A. It is often necessary to speak in historical terms and to have knowledge of history in dealing with getting along in our present sense world and relative reality in this birth until we can get free, and I certainly do think that this is the darkest time in at least the last 25 or 30 centuries, as you mention, but ultimately I don't think history, like everything in becoming, has any true reality. All at this lowest level of individuated sensate existence in space-time is simply the experience of fallen souls according to their karma as mediated through the Soul of the All. If you think about it, all that we call history is just inference based on sense data--written/verbal and material records, etc.--that has no ultimate reality and is just sense fields manifesting according to our karma and that of others in this our present particular relative reality system. True, real, and certain knowledge is only of Nous, the real beings, and the One/Good, and how to approach them ascetically and contemplatively through their relation to this world and our condition. Ultimately, the cause of the dark condition of modernity and the loss of the transcendental in culture and thought is just the heavy deluded poor karma of most of the souls inhabiting it. This is the real reason, however useful it may be at times to consider the 'historical' manner in which these times seem to have come about, such as you have researched so thoroughly and insightfully and we have discussed. Right now, so to speak, souls with different karma may be experiencing different relative reality systems where there is a more traditional appreciation and understanding of the transcendent and renunciation. In terms of the askesis, I think there is value in just viewing the cause in terms of individual karma this way--cf., the method of referring all causation to participation in the Forms and lack thereof in the last logos in the Phaedo. I don't really find it meaningful to think either in terms of a linear or human caused historical process or the cyclic view of the different Yugas or the like or any other overall or overarching scheme of history. I think it is more meaningful just to think of relative circumstances and realities in terms of the individual soul's movement towards or away from the Good over countless births and lifetimes. This leaves us in the peculiar position of having such good karma to be wholly concerned with the Transcendent and the askesis, but with such strange karma as to be doing it in this most dark and unsupportive and deluded environment, surrounded mostly just by souls with very poor deluded karma! No doubt, though, there is a reason for it in terms of our own karma, and is presumably in the long term for the best, or at least necessary.

A Note on the Crito

I had only read the Crito once long ago and had, except for one particular passage, not paid much further attention to it since I couldn't understand what relation it had to spiritual practice and metaphysics, am not interested in social/political/societal concerns and can't believe that the divine Plato really was also, have no interest in a 'historical' Socrates disqualified as being of interest as being a grhastha and etc. However, I was encouraged to put it in the queue for reading in Greek. I finished reading it in Greek and now have a whole different take on it. Suffering as I do from hypertrophy of the allegorical faculty and seeing everything in terms of contemplative asceticism and renunciation, I now see it as having a clear renunciant undermeaning and not being actually at all about the literal surface meaning and actually being a very good ascetic text.

Very briefly, Socrates, as usual, represents the higher divine part of the soul in touch with the higher hypostases. Crito represents the lower deluded soul or self enmeshed in the body and the sense world and attentive to the opinions and inclinations and desires of the world, the many and society. The prison, as usual, is the prison of the body and life in this world. The polis/city is this All, this world, the lowest level of existence comprehended by the World Soul, and its Laws are the law of karma and necessity and justice. Deluded souls and the many and the world (Crito) want to evade the law of karma and extend existence in this world and gain worldly benefit by acting unrighteously and against the law of karma and in a worldly unascetic unspiritual way (to try to escape from Athens by illegal means), and think that this is to their benefit, and try to persuade the soul as a whole, even the soul properly governed by the higher true part of the soul (Socrates), to do so. The true higher soul (Socrates) responds at length, using also a personification of the laws of karma (the Laws of the polis), that it is not and never is proper and to the true benefit of the soul to pursue worldly gain or what the world considers gain or desirable by going against the law of karma and righteousness and that such never works. Thus, it is not a political, but actually a very ascetic text clearly indicating the necessity of following the Way and being in accord with the Law of Karma and necessity and righteousness regardless or in spite of apparent short term worldly gain and the ways and desires of the world.

One can see countless examples of this in the world around us and how the many behave all the time. Over the years, I have often had worldlings try to tell me that I should act contrary to spiritual and ascetic principles and righteousness for some immediate short term worldly gain and have had to respond either to them or at least internally think of responding as 'Socrates', the higher soul with true considerations, does to 'Crito', the views of the many and the lower samsaric self. No doubt any other renunciants left in this world have also often been in this position. It is nice to have further the ascetic text of the Crito behind us also.

Relative Realities, Spiritual Systems, Genuine Spiritual Practice and Renunciation

Relative Realities, Spiritual Systems, Genuine Spiritual Practice and Renunciation

by Eric S. Fallick


Platonism is very subtle because it requires transcending the sense-realm, and, finally, only Platonism is of ultimate soteriological value among the different systems. All the other systems, especially those involved with institutionalized religions for the many, really take place just within particular relative phenomenal realities, even when they think they are going beyond them, and are very much wrapped up and involved with particular relative consensus realities and confound actual spiritual contemplative ascetic practice aimed at the transcendent and phenomenal sensory experiences and occurrences. (That is not to say that they aren't of value to particular souls at a particular stage of their practice in a given birth, nor that we can't learn from them, but ultimately to get free one has to access the higher hypostases through Platonic contemplative asceticism.) Plotinus has expressed this well at the beginning of Ennead V.9. Renunciation and asceticism is an absolutely necessary corollary of this understanding. A somewhat hokey analogy is that when we look at a website all that is really being sent is the HTML code that the browser converts into the web page we see. All the different systems are really just moving within their given webpages, even when they think they are getting out of it, and so are concerned with the details and things going on within their webpage. Platonists, however, are concerned with how webpages in general are generated and how to get out of webpages of any sort altogether! (For example, the Mahayana/Bodhisattva ideal is all dependent on and wrapped up in a particular version of relative reality that is no more than just another phenomenal sensory experience set that is no more valid than any. Tibetan Buddhism is especially egregious in this regard. Similarly, and even more so, especially given their notion, of the essence of their systems, of a single linear geocentric historical progression, the Abrahamic systems are totally caught up in and involved with and dependent on one particular phenomenal sensory relative reality as being of spiritual significance. Such observations could me multiplied practically indefinitely. As just one of countless examples, some Catholics go on pilgrimage to pray at the relics of saints--just running around all the time chasing after phenomena instead of pursuing noumena through contemplative ascetic practice, which would be real actual spiritual practice! If one tries to explain a little that such phenomenal 'miraculous' experiences occur in all different religious traditions and have no bearing whatsoever on the metaphysical validity of their theological and soteriological systems and are just more phenomenal sensory karmic experiences--things to be ignored and transcended in pursuing the Absolute to really get free--of course, they don’t understand at all what one is talking about. The same quite and altogether applies to Iamblichus and Proclus and other post-Iamblichus so-called ‘Platonists’ or ‘Neoplatonists’ with their theurgy and etc. Most sadly, they have simply jettisoned the true transcendent Platonism of Plato and Plotinus and replaced it with what is really just another worldly, phenomenal, particular relative reality dependent ‘religious’ system.)

All sensory or 'physical' worlds are just shadow relative realities according to the karma of souls, of which there can be very many--the present world of modernity and science and scientism and naturalism, especially, just being one of many possibilities and not one of particular validity, except that it believes itself to be so--actually, it is one of the worst and least valid of many possibilities since it is most unconducive to and makes most inaccessible true spiritual knowledge and practice and renunciation and thus makes most remote the possibility of making progress towards getting out of relative realities and their misery altogether. The true underlying realities are transcendent and spiritual and suprasensory and are the objects of real knowledge--sensory knowledge being relatively unreal and unimportant and variable.

The real unchanging actual Realities are the higher Realities or hypostases of the One or the Good and then of Nous or the Divine Mind-Thought--the realm of the Divine Mind and the Platonic Forms. From the Divine Mind-Thought then further emanates or devolves or darkens the last and lowest and least real level or hypostasis of Soul and the "world" or "worlds" that Soul perceives and creates through projecting the Forms and Itself in the realm of individuated changing sensate existence in space-time. This includes both the Soul of the All or "World Soul" and all the individual souls, such as ourselves. There is only experience. There are no other separately existing objects or worlds or things apart from the experience of Soul or souls. This level of experience where there are different souls and their variety of experiences that change and present the image of worlds and changing worlds is, again, the lowest and least real level and the only one in which there is change and the possibility of a variety of different experiences and, therefore, "worlds". There are as many different sets of experiences or possibilities of experiences or "worlds" as the possible combinations of projection of souls and their projection of combinations of projections from/of the Forms as are possible--effectively, an infinite variety. All these are determined by what we call 'karma'--which is the experience of the individual souls and the World Soul modifying each other's experiential fields through their volitional workings. The relative realities are just all the different sets of experiences and experiential fields determined by karma of the different souls and the World Soul. These are all that there is at the level of soul--there is no other sort of objective world out there. These sets of experiences and experiential fields can take all sorts of forms according to karma. The underlying Reality is only the higher hypostases and the unchanging Law or Way in which these are projected down into the level of Soul. Thus, all phenomenal things, all the things in the supposed phenomenal sense world--so-called physical laws, gods or no gods, miracles or no miracles, etc., etc.--are just parts of different experience sets according to the karma of different souls as mediated through the World Soul. This is what is meant by relative realities and such applications of the idea as that some souls may experience or have experienced a relative world, for example, where 'miraculous' or 'supernatural' things are more likely to occur, but we don't, or we experience at the moment a world where things appear to operate according to the so-called laws of modern science, but others didn't, and etc., etc. These hypostases and these workings are all that there is. One shouldn’t be mislead by all the foolish people and society around one into thinking that there is some sort of objective material world out there and that its workings are real and that different appearances within it, including those that seem to violate its usual workings, are of significance or spiritual importance. One must just strive to transcend all these relative realities and worlds and existence as an individual soul to return to Nous and the One and to create karma only tending to aid in this direction.

It can readily be seen that this nature of Reality means that actual transcendent-oriented contemplative asceticism and renunciation is the very essence of, is, in fact, identical with, genuine spiritual practice of actual ultimate soteric value. The actual ultimately valid spiritual teaching is this of the higher realities and the generation and ultimately minimally valid nature of the many lower relative realities and possible worlds and experiences and how to understand this and to escape from and transcend the cycle of rebirth in these lower relative shadow realities that are miserable as a result of their minimal degree of being and to return to the real higher realities that are freedom as a result of their really being or being beyond being. To do this one must truly renounce all the relative lower realities and life in them and all that is entailed or contained in them and focus, as much as possible, solely on contemplation of the higher hypostases. One must shift one’s entire being from the lower relative realities of individuated sensate existence in space-time and repeated rebirth to the unchanging higher hypostases of Nous and the One. This means having as little to do with the sense world of the lower relative realities as possible while one is still in them (though, alas, maintaining the psycho-physical organism until one is free from it will constantly do more than plenty of pulling one’s attention back to the sense realm!). This, of course, means as much renunciation of the world and all worldly pursuits, desires, activities and possessions as possible and single-minded devotion to ascetic contemplation (and ancillary study, etc.). The very turning of the soul from the shadow worlds of relative realities and relative non-being back to the higher hypostases of true being and beyond being appears in these very shadow worlds of relative realities as the very fact of true transcendent-oriented otherworldly world-denying renunciation and ascetic contemplation.

Ⓒ 2018 Eric S. Fallick platonicascetic (at) (Gee) mail (dot) com

Q. and A. on Karma

Q. and A. on Karma



Greetings Eric. In past emails we touched upon the subject of karma several times. For instance, why we view phenomena the way we do, while others do not. I want to clear any erroneous notions I might have, regarding how karma works within the Platonic system. I once heard the late Advaita Vedanta teacher Ramesh Balsekar say, "there is no individual doer of any deed, everything is just a happening. The Will of God or Cosmic law." You also know, the Jains and Buddhist understand karma completely different from him, and each other. Is everything predetermined by karma? What is the difference between fate and karma? Is the human will completely in bondage to karma? I do not wish to sound Augustinian, I just desire clarity. What is the proper hierarchy between intellect and will? Which Ennead and Platonic dialogue should I read, which would point to the correct understanding, concerning freedom of the will or the lack thereof? Thank you in advance for your reply


These are questions of great importance and involved and hard to cover extensively in an email reply, but I will try to do so briefly. Ennead VI.8 is "On Free Will and the Will of the One" and deals with this. You might also want to read the beginning of Ennead V.1. It would take a very long time for me to go through all the Enneads and try to cite all the passages and parts related to this. There isn't a specific Platonic dialogue I can refer you to for this. In passing, let me mention that modern so-called Advaitins are generally most all actually full-blown theists of almost an Abrahamic type and I wouldn't necessarily go by what they say as actually representing the actual earlier Advaita school. Karma is not determinism, fate or pre-destination and we are not Augustinians or Calvinists. The human will is not completely in bondage to karma or else liberation would not be possible. Everything is determined by karma but not pre-determined. At every moment, we have the free will to move either towards liberation and re-union with the One or further into multiplicity and greater bondage. Some of the confusion may be due to a realist (in the modern, not the opposite medieval, sense) and physicalist/materialist perspective on things that conceives of objects and events existing apart from perceiving subjects, where in reality there is just experience and Mind as a unitary whole. Karma is only relevant at this lowest level of Soul and individuated sensate existence in space-time that is a weak projection or faint reflection or darkening of the higher hypostases of Nous and the Good. At this level, subject and object have apparently broken up, but still cannot exist apart from each other, by definition. The Soul of the All experiences this All as a whole and all time and space, which are only created by soul, simultaneously and all our individual souls are within its experiential field. Our individual experiential fields include all our individual relative worlds and experiences that we experience appearing as a temporal and spatial series of past, present and future and translation in space and all our sense-perceptions of objects and events and other souls, etc. At each moment, we experience given things and happenings as our experiential field and we act volitionally on this basis. Our volitional actions and choices and thoughts modify our experiential field and sometimes that of others we are interacting with. All the modifications of our experiential field and those of all other souls modify the experiential field of the Soul of the All. These modifications of the experiential field of the All in turn then modify our experiential field and those of all other souls. The Soul of the All experiences all this in a single moment of time, as it were, and a single place, as it were, but we experience all these modifications of our experiential fields as a temporal series.

Thus, all the modifications that we have done by volitional thought and action in what we perceive as the past modify, through the Soul of the All and its experience of both our modified experiential fields and those of all other souls, what we perceive and experience as our present and future experiential fields. This is what we call karma. There is no such thing as fate in the sense of experiences that don't occur as a result of our volitional choices, but there is providence in that all this works in accordance with righteousness and necessity and is a reflection or unfolding in space-time of the eternal relations of Nous. At each moment, we have the choice of our will being that of the higher soul--of that in contact with Nous and the Good and, ultimately, really of Nous and the Good themselves--which moves us in the direction of divinity and liberation or our will being that of the lower or animal soul bound in with the body and sense-perception and this world, which moves us further into bondage and sense-experience. Even though the conditions, circumstances, perceptions, desires, passions, emotions, defilements, involuntarily arising thoughts, etc., etc. that we experience and that constitute our experiential field at a given time are determined by karma, we always have the ability to whatever extent to then react to them or act and think, even if only a little bit, based on the higher soul and higher hypostases rather than the lower and thus create positive karma and, more specifically, karma leading to release. As I have indicated before, this striving for liberation and renunciation and acting according to the true higher self is really the One acting through us and working to re-realize and re-unify Itself through us, though It has actually never become de-unified and all this is actually only happening or apparently happening at our level which is less real and only a subtraction and darkening that doesn't affect the Light at the level of the Good, which is completely unchanged. Words and purely discursive understanding maybe begin to fail at this point in my explanation. When this happens, when one is truly renouncing and correctly striving for release, the modification of the experiential field of the Soul of the All includes that the Light is starting to reappear in and through a particular soul and its experiential field is being thus modified, and so that soul's experiential field keeps being modified in a way to allow it to keep going to liberation, but also brings forth the deluded modifications that it previously effected and have to be used up, but now in a manner that, while perhaps difficult and not pleasant, doesn't permanently or really hinder its continued progress towards the telos. Ordinary deluded worldlings, on the other hand, just experience modifications to their experiential field based on previous deluded volitions based on the lower self and just react to them again on the basis of the lower self and just then create more such modifications and just keep going in an endless cycle of shifting low level experiential fields of rebirth as humans and non-humans until and if somehow they begin to see through it and begin to act from the higher soul and the Absolute begins to remanifest through them. Why this movement towards release has started in a few souls but not in most at any given point, I don't know. As I have said, this is all kind of involved and not necessarily easily graspable at soul-level. The most important thing is to renounce the world and strive wholeheartedly for re-union with the Good, the source of all knowing and knowledge, at which point this won't be a problem.

I hope this explanation is at least somewhat intelligible and helps to answer your questions and give you greater clarity, at least to a reasonable degree. Perhaps, I should also mention that my answers are, frankly, based on my own contemplative experience and understanding, and I can't necessarily cite written authorities for my way of putting things.