John Dunn

Ein Sof

Thursday, 9 May 2024 at 22:03

Baruch Spinoza

Ein Sof

There is no evidence that Spinoza actually formed a sect, other than his stated desire to do so. Nevertheless, the fact that his philosophy ultimately achieved the goal of Spinozist Tikkun, by forming a near-universally accepted worldview, is due in no small part to the clandestine sect that adopted Kabbalah into its quasi-religious activities, and did so with revolutionary and globalising ambition. The highest divinity of Freemasons is the Ein Sof of Kabbalah and the Substance of Spinozism.

© John Dunn.

Coleridge

Thursday, 9 May 2024 at 01:35

Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Thomas Phillips

Coleridge

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834), the Romantic poet and philosopher, long ago knew what was lost in these so-called Ethics. The ‘Sage of Highgate’ recognised the anti-humanism of Spinoza early on, lamenting that Spinoza’s ‘error consisted not so much in what he affirms, as in what he has omitted to affirm or rashly denied . . . that he saw God in the ground only and exclusively, in his Might alone and his essential Wisdom, and not likewise in his moral, intellectual, existential and personal Godhead’.32 In short, the Ethics lacked the theoretical basis for an ethics and, above all, lacked hope.

© John Dunn.

Imagine worlds

Wednesday, 8 May 2024 at 01:32

Imagine worlds

Dante poses the question - what moves the imagination when the senses offer nothing? ‘A light which takes its shape in heaven moves you’, he answers. The power to move the imagination is held innately within us. It is a faculty that is completely free from the solicitations of the outside world. It is the power within us to imagine worlds that do not even exist.

© John Dunn.

Will and creativity denied

Monday, 6 May 2024 at 23:50

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Will and creativity denied

Yes- there was always something strange in Marx’s upturning assertion about Hegel. The truth is that Marx espoused Spinozism, the denial of human will and creativity. Marx took much from Hegel, but Hegel too was a Spinozist, inheriting his concept of Absolute Spirit from Judaism and Kabbalah. For Hegel, the origin, substance, purpose and direction of the universe was the realisation of an infinite knowledge, consciousness, or mind. Like the Kabbalists, Hegel held that the world’s beginning, substance and end is to be found in an infinite, all inclusive, Absolute Being. This Absolute, which is analogous to the Kabbalist’s Ein-sof, is conceived of by Hegel as the Absolute Spirit, a notion that is itself present in many kabbalistic works.

© John Dunn.

This question needed answering

Monday, 6 May 2024 at 01:47

Baruch Spinoza

This question needed answering

In Spinozism, I came to a retrospective understanding of my own Marxist thinking - and there were two surprises. Firstly, what I had once thought of as dynamic and revolutionary in my attitude was essentially passive and static. Secondly, this state of passive acceptance has triumphed as the underlying principle of all thought in today’s world as it applies to ethical and scientific matters. In both instances, the animal soul has defeated the divine.

I was left with a question. If the power to create something new where nothing existed before is the defining factor in what it means to be human, how did mankind arrive at its present dehumanised condition? This question needed answering before I could ever hope to answer the ‘who am I?’ question.

© John Dunn.

Ilyenkov

Sunday, 5 May 2024 at 02:10

Ilyenkov

Evald Ilyenkov, the Soviet Marxist, fell under the evil curse of Spinoza. Parsifal might as well have chosen Klingsor as his guide to the Grail. Ilyenkov must have known that there is no such thing as Marxism - only Spinozism, which means without room for contingency, man has to understand necessity and subject himself to it.

© John Dunn.

The evil curse

Friday, 3 May 2024 at 02:19

Marcel Journet as Wagner's Klingsor

The evil curse

Through error and the path of false righteousness I too came. An evil curse drove me about in trackless wandering, never to find the way to healing.Numberless diversions, false battles and conflicts forced me from my path even when I thought I knew it. And what was the evil curse? Dante metaphorically rendered it as the siren, Wagner did so as Klingsor. And what emanation of the dark side of the Zarathustrian bifurcation did I face? - Spinozism and its offshoot, Marxism.

© John Dunn.