Know Yoursel and the “E” of Delfphi

 KNOW YOURSELF

The “E” of Delphi and Nothing in excess

In the midst of the turbulence of the last century and the present, in the midst of this accelerated time, even faster than our ability to understand and integrate so many changes in such a short life, it is necessary once again, as in all critical times, calm down and look again for the essential keys to continue on our path.

Just as it is relatively easy to meditate in the middle of the night and in silence, while it is difficult or even impossible in the noise of the street, on the subway or while driving a car, the human capacity for introversion has become enormously reduced in recent centuries.

In previous epochs, the environment that surrounded man was limited: colors, tastes, clothing, settings and landscapes, customs and festivals, life and work were well regulated, simple and durable, without many changes over time. It was relatively easy to abstract consciousness from this familiar and controlled environment. On the contrary, the upheaval and acceleration we are experiencing today make it increasingly difficult to assimilate and adapt to new advances in technology, culture and art. As soon as we begin to master a new field of knowledge, it becomes obsolete.

In the past, for a student in search of wisdom, the process of seeking and assimilating new knowledge sometimes required long journeys and even risking one's life. Finding a text, copying it carefully and commenting on it in the closest circle was in itself a way of learning and contrasting with the opinions of others.

When we are told, for example, that Tsong Kha Pa, the founder of the Gelugpa tradition in Tibet, had up to a hundred different teachers, or that Paracelsus traveled to faraway Tartary, or that Plato managed to accumulate a small fortune to travel to Egypt in search of knowledge. Today it is almost incredible for us to imagine ourselves in such circumstances, because despite the ease of transportation of our times, we lack that kind of perseverance and dedication in the search for deep knowledge that can take a lifetime.

It is not causal, then, that the birth of many religious movements began in solitude, in the desert or in the high mountains. There the soul tends to rise, free from distractions, propelled to higher spheres, free from the fatigue of daily life. Serenely at rest, in the midst of these "deserts of the senses", the soul tends to immerse itself in the profound mystery of individual existence.

The ancient advice of the Oracle of Delphi: "Know thyself," was the necessary end to a routine and mechanical life. In our time, however, the constant hustle and bustle, the constant impact of news, advertising and the many ways in which the senses are forcibly drawn outward, make it very difficult for our minds to find a moment of peace, without being bombarded by external impacts.

In reality, the Delphic Motto was only a part of a complete program, therefore to know ourselves was not the end but the beginning of a spiritual adventure. On the frontispiece of that temple, accompanying the famous phrase γνῶθι σεαυτόν, (Know thyself) there were two other indications of the next step to follow: It was not enough to know oneself, it was also necessary to harmonize ourselves, as indicated by the second motto engraved there: "μηδὲν ἄγαν", that is, "Nothing in excess." Therefore, it was necessary to perfect habits, perfect the human being by seeking the necessary balance between the different components, physical and psychological, to finally chart the course towards the goal indicated by the third Delphic sign: the letter Epsilon.

This was a symbol of the number five and of the human superior and celestial plane, as Plutarch tells us in his treatise "On the E of Delphi", that is, the fifth celestial or spiritual quintessence, above the 4 usual components of the human being: physical body, energy-vitality, psychic-emotional plane, and mind.

It was, therefore, an entire life program, which began with a deep introspection of oneself, continued with the practical work of polishing the edges of one's personality through moral practice, and finally culminated on the level of the intelligible wisdom.

The three Delphic mottos could also be expressed as three phases: Information, Integration and Transformation, i.e. the acquisition of the necessary self-knowledge, the concretization of this knowledge by working on the harmonization of the different factors at work in the human personality, and finally the access to the higher through a process of transformation.

Nowadays information dominates, it has never been so easy to acquire it, at our fingertips we can have any of the thousands of treatises and books of wisdom from the present and the past in a few seconds. Education itself is conceived as an accumulation of data, as if the human being were a modern computer.

Nobody today demands that certain knowledge become a reality in a human being, it is enough to memorize it and then to remember it, i.e.: to know how to access the mechanical memory stored in our brain.

But the real and necessary information is not that which comes from the changing and illusory world that surrounds us, but rather that which comes from introspection within ourselves, it is the result of the profound “Know thyself” of the Delphic mandate.

Thus, knowledge that comes to us from the outside often prevents the knowledge that comes to us from the most intimate and spiritual, and therefore hinders the moral integration of this knowledge and its logical consequence: the transformation of the human being.

THE PLATONIC CAVE IN THE 21st CENTURY - FITNESS AND SMOTHIES

The PLatonic Cave in the 21st Century

Fitness and Smothies

Almost everyone knows the ancient Platonic myth of the Cave, that place dominated by powerful and invisible masters of the cave, and where the prisoners, born there, can only see their own shadows reflected on the walls, as if they were in front of a cinema screen, and which they believe to be themselves.

The interpretive key to the whole matter is twofold: on the one hand there is the illusory world of the prisoners and on the other the self-deception of the jailers, who, believing themselves to be owners of the cave, are nothing more than actors in this drama of life. In fact, the only truth is that no matter whether you are part of the dominated prisoners or the dominant masters, you have to free yourself from the cave, you have to get out of it and return to the true sun light.

Now let's ask ourselves: is the Cave simply a philosophical myth, a more or less attractive story proposed by Plato? Or is it a daily and present reality in our lives? Because if it is real, then all those who desperately ask for freedom (in the family, social, work and political spheres) do not make sense in what they say, unless they mean that we must get out of this cave. The Cave exists in many forms, and we have to learn to distinguish its manifestations in our environment, and know how to recognize it and how it traps us in its darkness.

The hardest and most direct form of the Cave, the darkest and most painful, is that Cave made up of our bones, our flesh and our blood. Locked within its demands, enslaved by its particular tyranny, we run and fight incessantly to satisfy our body, thus becoming eternal slaves to that mass of arteries, veins and nerves.

But there is an even more sinister twist, because there is an even more subtle tyrant, one who appears in our brain after passing through our senses, and after settling in there he becomes the master, the lord of our thoughts, worries, desires and ambitions, hatred and separateness. This sinister "invader" does not rest, and to continue controlling us the invader constantly proposes new tasks to distract us so that we do not discover its perverse game. Let's look at some of the external traps of him.

"Social networks": a better name could never have been chosen, because “networks” are only used for hunting and trapping. In the nets, social fish move restlessly, from side to side, swimming incessantly in illusory waters. Another trap is called "Multitask", that is, becoming a model of an "active and efficient human being", which consists of working on a thousand external things at the same time, and at the same time forgetting about oneself as a being with a soul, which It also has its needs.

For those who dare to slightly lift a corner of the veil, the “invader” of our being has other traps prepared, for example the “False Inner Life”, the invader and controller of our inner being proposes this time a “deeper and intense life” that consists of “hugging trees”, reading some “inspirational” or “self-improvement” books, or “practicing meditation” far away in some lost place, or maybe practicing some “feng-shui” or “raja yoga” to harmonize our lives.

There are other options, for example a "healthy lifestyle" as a false proposal to comply with, focused on "fitness and fruit smoothies." Thus we see our streets flooded with runners, cyclists and carriers of natural juices, smoothies, etc. in an airtight glass, by the way, all of them in very natural plastic containers.

Another variant is the "False Preservation of Nature" which consists of having an electric car with the green "ecology" label, or avoiding the use of plastic bags, although the big brands continue to use plastic packaging for their products. After fulfilling all these “moral and social duties,” as good citizens, we consider that everything is done.

Added to all this, there is a fundamental task before us: to achieve the social status of a mature and respectable member of our society. This model varies according to cultures, but is always in relation to the social models proposed by the media and advertising. Most cases consist of having a partner and children, although lately what is really “cool” is having a same-sex partner, or renting bellies to have children, or simply buying them on the international or national market, so to fill our empty life. The problem is that this feeling of emptiness will never disappear by "buying" things, or obtaining a social status, or even by drinking a beer.

Yes, this is the Cave, our Great and Dear Cave. But even in the darkest caverns, the prison guards cannot prevent one of the prisoners from occasionally discovering their real chains, and then to work to free himself and find true freedom, and then to shout “at last I am free!”, not feeling anymore furious or in despair, but on the contrary feeling the Joy of a true free being. Ah, I forgot to tell you that this tyranic “invader”, the master of the Cave, has a real name, it is called the "Illusion of the World" and its antidote is called "Philosophy" or Love for Wisdom.