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Blaketashi Links |
"...let him not say that he knows better than his master, for he only holds a candle in the sunshine."
There are many voices interwoven within the cyber-babble which are recognizably Blaketashi voices, although not self-characterized as such. The following links provide an interesting counterpoint to traditional Blaketashi ideas, and are recommended to the student who wishes to increase their understanding of the larger subject matter.
It has long been argued that mysticism, of itself, is not an adequate basis upon which to construct an ethical life. While the experience of base Reality is altered during the mystical experience (an alteration which may be temporary or permanent) in most cases the experience is silent about societal or interpersonal matters. Zen and the Art of Divebombing explores this issue, amongst others, in a perceptive and well-written article, which may be found at: http://www.friesian.com/divebomb.htm
The awakening of the heart (qalb) is an important accomplishment of not only the Muslim, but also the esoteric Christian. And, in truth, it is an accomplishment of the human person, of whatever creed. The Sufi Healing Order works to open the heart as a preliminary to healing oneself and others http://sufihealingorder.org/
There has been a significant Blaketashi involvement within the Noetic Sciences organization, since its founding decades ago by astronaut and mystic, Edgar Mitchell. Noetic Sciences produces the magazine IONS six times a year, and it is a worthy publication by a worthy organization. Its website may be accessed at http://www.noetic.org
International Association of Sufism, the IAS, is a broad minded Sufic organization which promotes dialog between various exponents of Sufism resident in the West. The effort to bring a series of ostensibly universally diverse expressions into a coherent dialog is, of course, a needed one. Recently, it has created an online journal, which may be accessed at http://www.sufismjournal.org
Erik Davis is a San Francisco-based writer, culture critic, and independent scholar who recently published TechGnosis: Myth, Magic, and Mysticism in the Age of Information (Harmony Books, 1998.) A part of this work can be viewed at: http://www.techgnosis.com/
Alan Carter has a clear view as to the modes of thought which separate the Sufi from the average person, or the great software engineer from the average hack. A series of excellent essays can be found at: http://www.datamodel.co.uk/Reciprocality/www.reciprocality.org/Reciprocality/index.html
"This project began as a bit of practical industrial psychology, and ended up unfolding into an understanding of how most people in most human societies have a consistently distorted view of everything. Not everyone is caught in the confusion, and as the picture emerged, an alternative model of relationships between observable phenomena that seems to be experienced by creative programmers in software engineering, star diagnosticians in medicine, great physicists and mathematicians, so-called ADHD children..."
And finally, there is Dr. Godlas' excellent and scholarly site on Sufism, at: http://www.uga.edu/islam/Sufism.html