Tuesday, April 21, 2020
Fred :LaMotte––The Sensuality of God
THE SENSUALITY OF GOD
Written by Fred LaMotte
(In honor of Orthodox Easter, April 19: Blessings!)
Spirituality is not the renunciation of the senses, but their refinement to the subtlest of all sensations: God. God is the most sensuous of delights.
Meditation refines sensation through silence. Our spiritual practice cultivates finer perception until taste and smell may sense the flavor and fragrance of pure Being; sight may gaze at the light shining from Divine Darkness; touch may feel the inner caress of this Breath, and the hug of earth's great breathing upon the skin; hearing may listen to the hum of Silence, which contains the music of the galaxies.
The sixth sense organ is the mind. Meditation refines the mind just as it refines the other organs of perception. When the restless mind settles into stillness, thought is transcended, no image limits awareness, the bliss of emptiness becomes full, and the mind relishes Infinity.
The seventh and deepest sense organ is the soul. The soul, "I Am," does not oppose matter, it is just at the opposite end of the spectrum. Matter and spirit are one continuum of divine energy, from the dense to the subtle. Soul is the fine end of the continuum, the subtlest of the senses.
When, through meditation, the soul becomes "poor in spirit," this is boundless wealth. In the heart of silence, the soul transcends its soulness, flows beyond the root of its individuality, and enters the seed, Christ. This loss is rich indeed. For when the droplet becomes the sea, the sea becomes the droplet. Now Christ is the Self of the soul.
In ancient India, this exquisite affair was represented by the love-making of Radha and Krishna in the garden of Vridavan. In the Biblical tradition, it is the union of the Bride and the Royal Bridegroom in the Song of Songs, which is why the Song of Songs has always been the favorite Biblical book of Western mystics. It is at once the most sensuous and spiritual of poems.
When we enter into this marriage, all our senses feel the transcendental kiss of God, who has created the earth and its sensory pathways just to lead us back to this place, the wild garden in the heart, where the seed is stored.
God is the cosmic sensation, the passion of a soul so voluptuously in love that she transcends all boundaries. God whispers to this soul, "You are the garden, I am the Spring." And the soul sings, as the Bride in the poem, "My beloved is mine, and I am my beloved's. Come into your garden, and feed among the lilies."
________
Written by Fred LaMotte
(In honor of Orthodox Easter, April 19: Blessings!)
Spirituality is not the renunciation of the senses, but their refinement to the subtlest of all sensations: God. God is the most sensuous of delights.
Meditation refines sensation through silence. Our spiritual practice cultivates finer perception until taste and smell may sense the flavor and fragrance of pure Being; sight may gaze at the light shining from Divine Darkness; touch may feel the inner caress of this Breath, and the hug of earth's great breathing upon the skin; hearing may listen to the hum of Silence, which contains the music of the galaxies.
The sixth sense organ is the mind. Meditation refines the mind just as it refines the other organs of perception. When the restless mind settles into stillness, thought is transcended, no image limits awareness, the bliss of emptiness becomes full, and the mind relishes Infinity.
The seventh and deepest sense organ is the soul. The soul, "I Am," does not oppose matter, it is just at the opposite end of the spectrum. Matter and spirit are one continuum of divine energy, from the dense to the subtle. Soul is the fine end of the continuum, the subtlest of the senses.
When, through meditation, the soul becomes "poor in spirit," this is boundless wealth. In the heart of silence, the soul transcends its soulness, flows beyond the root of its individuality, and enters the seed, Christ. This loss is rich indeed. For when the droplet becomes the sea, the sea becomes the droplet. Now Christ is the Self of the soul.
In ancient India, this exquisite affair was represented by the love-making of Radha and Krishna in the garden of Vridavan. In the Biblical tradition, it is the union of the Bride and the Royal Bridegroom in the Song of Songs, which is why the Song of Songs has always been the favorite Biblical book of Western mystics. It is at once the most sensuous and spiritual of poems.
When we enter into this marriage, all our senses feel the transcendental kiss of God, who has created the earth and its sensory pathways just to lead us back to this place, the wild garden in the heart, where the seed is stored.
God is the cosmic sensation, the passion of a soul so voluptuously in love that she transcends all boundaries. God whispers to this soul, "You are the garden, I am the Spring." And the soul sings, as the Bride in the poem, "My beloved is mine, and I am my beloved's. Come into your garden, and feed among the lilies."
________
