Bøger af Raghavan Iyer

The purpose of this book is to bring together in a convenient and coherent form some of the many HERMES articles written by Prof. Raghavan Iyer on the subjects of meditation and self-study. In truth, meditation and self-study represent two sides of one human activity. The one is the centrifugal movement of consciousness expanding to Universals beyond the limits of Self; the other is the centripetal movement focusing with laser-like precision upon the particulars within the limits of Self. They represent roughly the principles of Buddhi and Manas acting within the incarnated Manasic principle; for the spiritual aspirant they should - in time - become as natural as breathing in and breathing out. These two aspects of the inbreathing and outbreathing within the neophyte's consciousness are dealt with in the three treatises of The Voice of the Silence and Prof. Iyer's seminal article, Meditation and Self-Study: "We might begin to wonder whether perhaps there is a golden chord that connects the golden sphere of a man of meditation and the complex intermediary realms in which he must, by pain and anguish and awakening, by knitting together minute golden moments rescued from a great deal of froth and self-deception, come to know himself. If there were not a fundamental connection between meditation and self-study, something of the uniquely precious wisdom in this great text would be lost to us. When we begin to realize this in our lives, we come to appreciate that, while we may not be in a position to make judgments about teachers and schools in a vast and largely unrecorded history or in our own time, nonetheless we do know that there is something profoundly important in stressing both meditation and self-study, in bringing the two together. We must reconcile what looked like a pair of opposites and get beyond despair to something else which allows an existential and dynamic balance between meditation and self-study.

The purpose of this book is to bring together in a convenient and coherent form the many HERMES articles written by Prof. Iyer that dealt with this subject. In truth, meditation and self-study represent two sides of one human activity, something analogous to the operation of the systolic and diastolic movements of the human heart. The one is the centrifugal movement of consciousness expanding to Universals beyond the limits of Self; the other is the centripetal movement focusing with laser-like precision upon the particulars within the limits of Self. They represent roughly the sub-principles of Buddhi and Manas acting within the incarnated Manasic principle; for the spiritual aspirant they should - in time - become as natural as breathing in and breathing out. These two aspects of the inbreathing and outbreathing within the neophyte's consciousness are dealt with in the three treatises of The Voice of the Silence, as well as in Prof. Iyer's seminal article, Meditation and Self-Study.

The title of this book, Wisdom in Action, indicates the slightly different emphasis in this second volume of Raghavan Iyer's HERMES essays than the fi rst volume, The Dawning of Wisdom. In truth, these jeweled essays in Buddhi Yoga could be gathered together into any number of confi gurations simply because the writings themselves are so multifaceted and universal in scope. As they embody Universal Good, so too they lend themselves to the purposes of the highest good under whatever name or form. The constant, underlying theme of all these essays is the crucial need for unconditional devotion to Universal Good as a prerequisite for traveling on the spiritual Path. There is simply nothing else that can serve as a substitute for the highest of noble motives for living the spiritual life. But these writings also bear upon the crucial and thorny problem of translating theoria into praxis, and they shed a pristine light upon the obstacles and diffi culties encountered by every aspirant who self-consciously chooses to tread the Path of Renunciation.

The spiritually penetrating essays in this volume were written for the expressed purpose of shedding the pristine light of universal Theosophy on the path of spiritual self-regeneration in the service of humanity.The Theosophical philosophy is predicated on the ageless truth that divine wisdom exists, and that wise beings exist who dynamically embody it in world history; that sages and seers still grace the globe and continually oversee the spiritual, mental and physical evolution of man and nature. The secret Society of Sages that guides human progress periodically sends forth one of their own to sound afresh the Divine Philosophy and exemplify the spiritual life in all its richness and mystery. Such an enlightened spiritual teacher articulates eternal but forgotten truths in ingenious ways, adopting modes that inspire the mind, release soul perception, and cut through the miasma of an age.The wide-ranging articles in this volume span the spectrum of human thought from the metaphysical to the mystical, the ethical to the psychological, the spiritual to the material. They reveal the fundamental basis of religion, philosophy and science. The assimilation of these essays turns us back upon ourselves and releases that laser-like insight that allows us to increasingly discern the true, the good, and the beautiful in all religious teachings, philosophical musings, and scientific discoveries. When carefully meditated upon and skillfully applied to the realm of self-chosen duties, they purify the mind, cleanse the heart, and uplift the human condition.

In this book, first published by OUP USA in 1973, Professor Iyer elucidates the central concepts in the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi, bringing out the subtlety, potency, and universal importance of his concepts of truth and non-violence, freedom and obligation, and his view of the relation between means and ends in politics.