Excerpt from:
SECULAR AND SACRED PHILOSOPHIES
an essay by Da Free John
March 31, 1981
Full talk below
ADI DA SAMRAJ: I have been through the tour of our conventional possibilities. I explored all of that in the “sins” of my youth and in the company of “sinners” who gathered with me in the years of my original Teaching Work. But we together came to a new and radical understanding that broke the cycle of our ordinary destiny. Therefore, we offer our consideration and our experience and all our future demonstration as an argument and an appeal that can transform the human plot. We have not solved the mystery of the universe, as if the aeons of rise and fall were evidence of a culpable murder by Nature. Rather, we have transcended the view of self as victim and of the world as a mortal machine.
My own manner of life-long consideration and practice has not been that of the traditional saint, believing from the beginning and committed to good behavior free of doubt. My practice was Crazy with doubt, such that every moment was a rigorous test. Thus, only over time and on the basis of Realization Itself was I started to be sublimed in the body-mind by the Radiance of God. Likewise, my manner of Teaching was not to demand the artifices of behavioral sainthood from those who considered with me, but to submit myself to those individuals as they were, so that all the secrets and conventions of their lives were visible even in me. In such a manner, those who came to me were permitted the freedom to consider and transcend and go beyond their own “sins” and illusions. Thus, over time, this Teaching arose, in direct confrontation and consideration of our ordinariness. And,
likewise over time, those who considered in this manner came to understand themselves and to act on that understanding.
Thus, in my Teaching Work, which followed on the profound Revelations and Realizations of my personal ordeal of practice, I again surrendered myself to the ordeal of testing this Realization an elaborating its Way. Only after all of that was done did I move to a more solitary and simple phase of life, to exercise the Way as a Radiant Occupation for its own sake, without regard for my further usefulness as a worldly person.
Full talk:
SECULAR AND SACRED PHILOSOPHIES
an essay by Da Free John
March 31, 1981
Beezone Summary
This talk explores the distinction between secular and sacred philosophies, highlighting their contrasting orientations toward the body-mind-self and ultimate reality. Secular philosophies focus on addressing the limitations and threats inherent to the mortal, psycho-physical organism, aiming for order, satisfaction, and reduced vulnerability. In contrast, sacred philosophies transcend the conventional view of the independent self, recognizing existence as inherently unlimited and eternal.
The sacred Way described in this teaching advocates the self-transcendence of the body-mind through the Realization of the Transcendental Self—an identity that is not confined by the ego but rooted in Unqualified Existence, Infinite Radiance, and Love-Bliss. This Way acknowledges the body-mind as a dependent process within a universal field of cause-and-effect, ultimately leading to Enlightenment, Perfect Equanimity, and Infinite Happiness.
The talk further emphasizes the tension between secular and sacred orientations, noting that secular perspectives often resist or distort sacred teachings to align with conventional ideals. It argues for the necessity of true spiritual culture, sacred learning, and devotional inherence in Radiant Transcendental Being. Without these, human life remains bound by egoic tendencies, perpetuating a cycle of self-contraction and mortal bondage.
Finally, the talk underscores the importance of spiritual community and the guidance of Adepts in realizing the sacred process of self-transcendence. In the absence of such higher culture and wisdom, humanity risks remaining trapped in secular and egoic limitations. The Way presented here offers an alternative, but its realization depends on individuals embracing and practicing this sacred orientation.
SECTION I
The body-mind-self is inherently a limited, mortal, and threatened organism.
Secular philosophies (including conventional exoteric religion) and their programs generally seek
to bring order, satisfaction, and a reduction of threats (and threatened consciousness) to the bodymind-self.
Sacred philosophies (including exoteric religion in its original or non-conventional intention) and
their programs are fundamentally oriented toward transcendence of the body-mind-self.
Secular philosophies and programs are based on the convention of the independent self as a
limited and mortal psycho-physical organism.
Sacred philosophies and programs are based on an understanding of the psycho-physical self,
such that the actual Condition of existence is presumed to be unlimited and immortal (or eternal).
The Way that I Teach is a sacred philosophy and program of self-transcending Realization of the
Unlimited and Immortal (or Eternal) Condition of existence. It is founded on intuitive observation and
understanding of the body-mind-self. That understanding is ultimately expressed in the Realization that
the conscious being (or the witness of all states of body and mind) is not an independent conscious self
but the Transcendental Self-Identity or Unqualified and Eternal Existence and Consciousness.
Coincident with this Realization is the Realization and active presumption that the body-mind is not an
independent entity but a dependent process that arises through cause-and-effect processes in a single
and infinite Field of Radiance, or Love-Bliss.
These presumptions are fundamental Realizations in the sacred Way of Life. Their import is
expressed through an active orientation toward transcendence of (or feeling beyond) the self-limiting
force of the conventional, threatened, and contracting states of the body-mind. Thus, ultimately, What is
Realized is the Condition of unqualified Identification with Transcendental Being (or no independent
self) and Infinite Radiance, Love-Bliss, or no body-mind.
Such Realization is Enlightenment, Perfect Equanimity (or “Samadhi”), Transcendental Freedom,
and Infinite Happiness. Even if the conventions of the body-mind remain, in Enlightenment they have no
power to define existence as a self. Thus, sacred philosophy and practice ultimately transcend the
body-mind-self, or existence as a separate, limited, mortal, and threatened organism.
Secular philosophies as well as conventionally oriented people and their programs tend to resist
sacred philosophies and to impugn the programs, practices, and results of the sacred ordeal-except
insofar as sacred ideals can be made to conform to secular and conventional views. Even in the
present day, the clash between these two orientations continues.
SECTION II
The body-mind and the total world inhere in the Universal Connecting Principle, Which is Infinite
and Unqualified Bliss-Radiance, or the Light Which is Love.
The conscious being inheres in Transcendental Being, Eternal and Free Consciousness of BlissFullness, the Identity of Radiance.
The Truth and the Secrets of devotional inherence in Radiant Transcendental Being must be
learned and Realized through right approach to cultural and spiritual Agents of the sacred ordeal of Life.
What is to be learned is the conscious process of self-transcendence, or ecstatic inherence in the
Transcendental Identity, in which the body-mind is natively surrendered and ultimately recognized in the
Radiant Reality.
If this sacrificial process is not learned, then attention becomes a binding automaticity, locked into
the conventions of independent selfhood and the narcissistic philosophies of mortal bondage. Either
moment to moment existence is consciously Awakened as the Supreme Identity and intentionally
surrendered into the Universally Radiant Field, or else it is unconsciously defined by the self-contracting
mechanism of independent egoity and automatically fascinated and disturbed by all of the possibilities
of experience and knowledge.
Sacred learning takes place in the intimate and free culture of spiritual community. If there is no
true, free esoteric and Transcendental Teaching and no spiritual Agencies coming from Adepts of the
sacred ordeal, then human beings are limited to egoic education, secular ideals, and conventional
ends. At the present time, there is clear evidence that mankind is generally functioning in a disposition
bereft of high spiritual culture and Wisdom. I am one among those who have tried to provide the
alternative to the usual destiny implied in the absence of Wisdom and the Way of Life. Now that my
struggle to Teach ordinary people is done, it is up to those who confront this Teaching (and the
community of Agency I have established) to choose what they will do.
SECTION III
This is the summation of sacred philosophy, the Realization of those who have fulfilled the sacred
ordeal of Life: Consciousness is the Condition or Medium or Matrix of the total universe and every
fraction of it.
Secular philosophy is a consideration of knowledge and experience based on the conventions of
ego (or consciousness as a separate and dependent phenomenon) and form (or appearances, as they
seem). Sacred philosophy is a consideration of knowledge and experience based on intuitive insight
that transcends the conventions of ego and form. The ultimate Realization is not the product of
“primitive” or wishful thinking, but it is the native intuition that is naturally evident when the Power of
Consciousness penetrates the truly primitive conditional force of the conventional presumptions and
reflexes of the body-mind.
Conventional presumptions pervade both the popular and the professional domains of secular
knowing and experiencing. Likewise, they pervade the exoteric and esoteric domains of traditional
religion and spirituality. But I do not propose that we resort to the presumptions of conventional or
popular or traditional secular and sacred philosophies. Neither do I propose the assumption of nonconventional sacred philosophy because its Truth is guaranteed by any authority we must necessarily
believe. What I propose is that every individual seriously consider the arguments I have generated in
my works, and that the teaching and demonstration of historical Adepts in all sacred traditions be
seriously taken into account.
Secular philosophy and all the popular excursions of experiencing and knowing represent a
conventional application of attention to phenomenal conditions. Such enterprises presume and use the
local or egoic consciousness to develop states of phenomenal knowledge and experience. But such
enterprises and their results are always like the presumptions on which they are based. They neither
exceed nor transcend those presumptions. Thus, for example, scientific experimentation uses
Consciousness as a bare instrument of attention and of ratiocination based on phenomenal evidence.
Its results are theoretical models and sophisticated technologies that describe and serve a world of
beings that are nonetheless separate, mortal, and threatened. Sacred philosophy is, when free of its
historical conventions, a rigorous intuitive and intelligent discipline that examines and transcends the
conventional presumptions of ordinary, or popular, and professional secular knowing and experiencing.
Therefore, the sacred enterprise intuitively transcends the convention of egoic attention and its ordinary
conception of the status of phenomena.
Free sacred philosophy is not inherently opposed to the conventions of daily life or of secular
philosophy, science, and technology. On the contrary, it values the evolutionary growth of Man and the
elaboration of higher human culture and society. But it also insists that there is a higher or
Transcendental dimension to existence, and if that dimension is not understood and engaged, then we
cannot rightly understand or positively use the conventions and results of our apparent existence,
knowledge, and experience. If we are limited to the secular model of existence, knowledge, and
experience, then we are merely projected into the mortal domain of limits and possibilities bereft of
Ultimate Paradox, Mystery, and Truth.
Secular philosophy, whether popular or professional, invites us toward enthusiastic participation
in a mortal lifetime displayed within a scheme of dreadfully indifferent powers and laws and forms. The
universe of science is a mighty pool of senseless rocks, winding like clockwork, shedding a soup of
poor beings cited with the demand for yes and yes, until, in some terminal collision, they are made
soundless in the molecular roar. Yet, if human beings or their politics act in a manner like the universe
they suppose, there are cries against barbarism, totalitarianism, and unlove. How can we justify and
demand superior behavior on the part of mankind if we conceive of mankind merely in terms of the
mortal ego and the secular cosmos? If mankind does not achieve a higher sacred and Transcendental
view of self and world and Reality, then there is no alternative to the mad gleefulness of conventional
religion and the sorry revolt of angry secular mortals.
I have been through the tour of our conventional possibilities. I explored all of that in the “sins” of
my youth and in the company of “sinners” who gathered with me in the years of my original Teaching
Work. But we together came to a new and radical understanding that broke the cycle of our ordinary
destiny. Therefore, we offer our consideration and our experience and all our future demonstration as
an argument and an appeal that can transform the human plot. We have not solved the mystery of the
universe, as if the aeons of rise and fall were evidence of a culpable murder by Nature. Rather, we
have transcended the view of self as victim and of the world as a mortal machine.
To most human beings, the life-force seems to move selves in a round of limited possibilities until
death. But I have observed that the Condition of the life-force is an infinitely Radiant Energy that does
not move. It is attention that moves, or seems to move, via the paradoxical laws of cause and effect,
combining the presumed self of the body-mind with the universal scheme of space-time possibilities.
Rather than merely submit the body-mind-self (or attention) to the presumed possible motions of the
life-force, we must constantly recognize or yield and identify attention in the Ultimate Condition of
Infinite Fullness or Motionless Radiance Itself.
If attention is not understood, then the conventional interpretation of self and world cannot be
understood. If attention (or local egoic consciousness) is merely exercised, then we are played upon by
possibility and never participate in the true Condition of existence. Both science and ordinary living are
founded on the conventional exercise of attention, and so experience remains localized at the self, and
knowledge never exceeds the domain of limitations. We must understand and transcend the
mechanism of attention and all the problematic conventions of self and world.
If attention is merely exercised from its self base, then Consciousness, prior to the act of
attention, is not Identified or explored in Itself. (Even mind is not explored in itself, but is made to be
composed of analytical and sensory conceptions determined by the identification of consciousness or
attention with the locus that is the body.) And if Consciousness is not Identified, then the Condition of
the world and the body-mind is not recognized.
Consciousness is not merely dependently present in the body-mind and the world as attention
(or the perspective of a point of view in space and time). Consciousness is the very Matrix or Medium or
Condition of the body-mind and the world and every fraction or point of view in the world. The world and
the body-mind must be recognized in the infinite Radiance that is Consciousness. And the self (or
apparently independent consciousness identified with any moment of attention or point of view) must be
Identified with the Transcendental Nature that is Consciousness, or the Self-Identity of the Universal
Radiance that pervades and supports the world.
The Way in which this Realization is spontaneously, natively, and naturally evident is described
in its essential outline in the literature I produced during the years of my Teaching consideration. I offer
my own testimony to its Truth and Fullness, as do many individuals who considered and practiced this
Way in my company. It remains simply to be considered and practiced to prove itself in the case of all
others.
My own manner of life-long consideration and practice has not been that of the traditional saint,
believing from the beginning and committed to good behavior free of doubt. My practice was Crazy with
doubt, such that every moment was a rigorous test. Thus, only over time and on the basis of
Realization Itself was I started to be sublimed in the body-mind by the Radiance of God. Likewise, my
manner of Teaching was not to demand the artifices of behavioral sainthood from those who
considered with me, but to submit myself to those individuals as they were, so that all the secrets and
conventions of their lives were visible even in me. In such a manner, those who came to me were
permitted the freedom to consider and transcend and go beyond their own “sins” and illusions. Thus,
over time, this Teaching arose, in direct confrontation and consideration of our ordinariness. And,
likewise over time, those who considered in this manner came to understand themselves and to act on
that understanding.
Thus, in my Teaching Work, which followed on the profound Revelations and Realizations of my
personal ordeal of practice, I again surrendered myself to the ordeal of testing this Realization and
elaborating its Way. Only after all of that was done did I move to a more solitary and simple phase of
life, to exercise the Way as a Radiant Occupation for its own sake, without regard for my further
usefulness as a worldly person.
This is my Testimony: Consciousness is the Transcendental Condition or Medium or Matrix of
the total self and the total world. And Consciousness is Full. It is not merely within us or defined as ego
and point of view. It is Transcendental or Unqualified Being. It is also Universally Radiant, such that all
selves, all states of mind or knowledge, and the total phenomenal world arise as apparent modifications
of that Self-Radiance. We can simply give ourselves up as mortal attention to the flow of possibilities (or
cause-and-effect processes). Or we can understand the body-mind-self as a contraction of the
Universal Field of Transcendental or eternally Free Radiance. And the Way of that understanding is not
merely the method of inverting back upon the body-mind-self, retreating into inwardness. Rather, the
Way is to understand, feel beyond, and transcend the self-contraction of body-mind (appearing as
states of knowledge and experience) moment to moment. We cannot successfully turn back upon
Consciousness, since it is neither localized within nor object to Itself. Rather, we must understand the
self-contracting localization of Consciousness that appears as an inference or result of the fearcontraction of the body-mind. Thus, we must transcend both egoic extroversion and egoic introversion by transcending ego itself, which is not an “entity” but the self-defining activity of the contraction of body-mind in the conventional states of knowledge and experience. The body-mind and its relations are naturally recognized in the Universal Life-Radiance when the self-contraction is transcended. Likewise, in the same equanimity of freedom from the self-contraction and its implications, the Condition of consciousness is tacitly and natively Realized.
In every moment of recognition of self in the Transcendental Identity of Consciousness and of
the body-mind and world in Universal Radiance, the local or egoic point of view of attention is
transcended. Thus, the Way demonstrates Its Truth in the Radiant Transformation of the body-mind
and the world. Realization or Enlightenment is a great “Siddhi” or Divine Power that universalizes the
being as Love, the mind as a consciousness that pervades all space-time, the body as a Fullness that
Blesses all beings and places, and the world as a transparent Delight or God-Presence.
The Ultimate Revelation or Realization is not merely within us, nor merely outside ourselves. It is
both Universal (or All-Pervading) and Transcendental (beyond the conventions of self and world). I will
Work eternally to Bless all beings and all domains with this Realized Revelation. Let all others consider
this and practice the Way and be magnified into the Siddhi or Work of God.