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Don Salmon's avatar

It's wonderful that you're opening up folks to these subliminal possibilities.

Several thoughts.

I think it's not that fairies choose whether to be seen or not - it's the humans go through periods where they are so focused on the superficialities of the surface waking consciousness that they lose contact not only with fairies, but the entire subliminal realm.

(NOTE: "Subliminal" - literally, beyond or behind the threshold - is a term Frederick Myers coined in the late 1800s to describe the vast realms of consciousness, whole universe, which exist underneath, behind, within the physical universe, far transcending it (yet themselves supported by the Logos - in Indian philosophy this is known as the gross or waking state of the physical universe, the subtle or dream state of the subliminal universe where fairies and all kinds of subtle beings live; and the causal or Logos of the sleep state. With the Godhead, of course, beyond all that)

As for science, we really don't have "science" yet - we have technos (perhaps it's "techne" _ i think that was Heidegger's term for it though I may be misspelling it). These small things that Hunter referred to as not being known before were, according to Owen Barfield and Jean Gebser, not even existent yet. Gebser points out that "matter" as we conceive of it in the modern age only came into existence around the 13th to 15th centuries.

The ancients - who we look down on with pity or scorn - knew of infinitely vast universes as well as aspects of the so-called physical universe of which most moderns haven't the faintest idea.

Of all the most well known scriptures I find the the Bhagavad Gita the most helpful in regard to specifics. "Waking up" (recognizing our True Nature, finding the Christ within and shifting our center of gravity so that "Not I but Christ lives in me," is the first thing Krishna teaches Arjuna around verse 13 of Chapter 2 (out of 18 chapters)

Seeing the Divine in all arrives at the end of chapter 6 - this being what many modern Christian contemplatives (even Merton) as well as most popular eastern "non duality" teachers - Zen, Tibetan Buddhist, Vedantic, Tantric - teach as the highest realization.

Starting in Chapter 7, and reaching stunning heights in chapters 10 and 11, Krishna teaches Arjuna how to look at each object, each person, each living being in the universe, and begin to recognize how this apparent solid object is the appearance, by means of the Logos, the causal, and subtle universes, of the Infinite Divine.

This is the beginning of a real science, one far transcending anything almost any scientist or theologian or philosopher of today even has the faintest idea.

To get back to the topic, fairies and countless other subtle beings are the devas, the gods of which all things are full. These Gods are the secret of a True spiritual science, though only when seen in the Light of the Divine God in which we live and move and have our being. As the evolution of consciousness proceeds, over the next several centuries (as we measure time now, though that will radically change as well) this new science will replace the old, and even the categories of science, art, theology, philosophy, politics, economics, etc will be replaced as well.

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Pierce Alexander Marks's avatar

I am very sympathetic to the views you express here. My own book is a brief introduction to the inherent goodness and lovability of all creation, from the top of the chain to the bottom. My problem, however, is that many authors who share my views argue we should believe in fairies, etc. by appealing to past beliefs and traditions. I would like to have actual evidence for what I believe. I don't think an appeal to earlier cosmic views is evidence itself for animism. A restoration of mystery and enchantment may not be a return to see the natural world as full of governing spirits, but to realize that the world is more directly governed by God than we supposed. It may be God Himself who holds all things together, who endows prime matter with its powers, who directs all things toward their ends. And He may do so very directly, not with intervening agencies and spirits. Indeed, that is the view I currently lean towards--a view that eliminates the distance between the divine and human, the immaterial and material.

I always finish readings these kinds of articles with an intense feeling of dejection, because they amount to: "look at the worldview we once had! Let's get reenchanted again! Let's believe in fairies!" But I am never given a reason to think that the material realm is governed by these spirits. (Of course, I do think that there are good reasons to think that material realm is guided by SPIRIT, but that is quite different.)

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