We're in the news... again!

History ... :huh:

It is no more the past that presses us forward than it is the wake that drives forward the ship. We no more need to "update" a chronicle than we need to decorate shadows ...

"The right to search for the truth implies also a duty; one must not conceal any part of what one has recognized to be the truth" - Albert Einstein.

What we learn from the past certainly shapes how we act now or in the future, no?

If we leave the open holes in a chronicle because we don't want to update a "masterpiece", then you get what we have today with a host of religions venerating an outdated holy book.

At least put a footnote in...

Opie's history is something he's not distributed for some time. It's not currently being published and he's not promoting it. From a message exchange we had over a year ago I don't believe he minds me sharing it here for our study but it's not intended to be an up to date work.

He mentions us in his latest published book, which I'm in the midst of reading, giving us as an example of a Jedi church holding regular services.

Learn_To_Know wrote: What we learn from the past certainly shapes how we act now or in the future, no?

If we leave the open holes in a chronicle because we don't want to update a "masterpiece", then you get what we have today with a host of religions venerating an outdated holy book.

At least put a footnote in...

My point was just that : what can we learn from the past ? We cannot learn anything from the past, so no, that would best not shape how we act in the future ... We would be more wise to focus on the present - as many of our basic studies suggest. The Jedi faith, as being a religion of no religion, would remain more effective as a spiritual environment should we omit that which we find in other traditions : notably tradition - chronic attention to protocol.

In very many ways, we are getting things pretty right. It does feel as though genuinely practising Jedi are more concerned with letting go of all of that and focusing on the present with a few plans and some organisation to the extent that we can creatively interact with one another - that's fine. But Histories and certainly Holy Books ? Really ???

Apparently we aren't very good at learning from the past, are we ? Other religions, spiritual paths (methods) and such have done these things - and as a result we find that famous traditional double-bind that makes people seek us out anyway - YOU MUST BE FREE ! and then we go and write up a history that defines us whether we want it to or not, it establishes icons (most of whom are still alive) and still cling to ritual, tradition and dogma that we bring in from whatever we wanted to believe or reject before - and thus find ourselves in the same perpetual state of frustration under which we were living before. Hasn't anyone noticed that out of the 15 000 + registered with only with us (just to not try and take into account those registered only or also with other websites) give it a go (sort of) and then just not come back ? This is similar to those who embark upon any spiritual voyage of self-discovery and finds out that they are only trying to reject that to which they were clinging - or was clinging to them - by finding something else to cling to ... "Molasses in one hand, feathers in the other", or "a mosquito trying to bite an iron bull", according to Watts.

The term alone, "Jedi", has become a powerful symbol. On one hand, we want to say that we are not rôle-players, that our faith has little-to-nothing to do with the fictional Jedi of the Star Wars universe. But this isn't strictly true - is it ? "Jedi" as it were, whether we were to call it Jediism, Jediology, Jediicy, or any other suffix one may employ, it is "Jedi" that carries the symbolism. It conjures up images of Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda, Mace Windu, Annakin Skywalker or Luke and how people who have grown up or now grown older with these images identify with them. Now, every time there is an article in the press, or someone makes a radio or televised interview (regardless of the tongue-in-cheek cheekiness of some of them), we get an influx of subscriptions. I may be naïf, but this suggests that in this screwed up world we are that tends to dis-empower a great many of us, people are looking for something - something "new", "different" but at the same time "familiar". And what more "familiar" and personally "empowering" image is as accessible in modern popular culture than that of potentially becoming "a Jedi Knight" ? There may be some others - but ours sells pretty well ... Wouldn't you say ?

It feels as though we would best be getting on with our studies -- CONTINUOUS STUDIES -- taking to heart what Campbell, Watts, Krishnamurti and others have shown us about being Jedi in the beginning of the 21^st century - getting on with self-knowledge, rendering inoffensive (or at least more transparent) the images and other artifices we [still] see as just "evident" (are they really ?) - get on with making "Jedi" far less of a "path" or "method" (any 'path' or 'method' makes us just like any other tradition on the menu) - and stop erecting icons by writing "histories". Our Journals are our "histories", and I'd say the only ones we really need ...

Please - let's not be so highly trained and experienced Jedi that we get too far away from our Basic Studies. "Histories" are a bucket of "I", the Jedi "ego", on a collective or individual level - probably both - spreading out like blight on a field. It is decorating our shadow, as aforementioned. If we do this an then move at all, the decorations no longer fit ...

My suggestion thus stands as made (albeit I know quite certainly that it shall not be heeded). Not only would we more wisely NOT 'update' our "History", we would best stop writing them and scrap the ones we have ... They are largely irrelevant.

Alexandre Orion wrote:
My point was just that : what can we learn from the past ? We cannot learn anything from the past, so no, that would best not shape how we act in the future ... We would be more wise to focus on the present - as many of our basic studies suggest. The Jedi faith, as being a religion of no religion, would remain more effective as a spiritual environment should we omit that which we find in other traditions : notably tradition - chronic attention to protocol.

Apologies if I'm missing something blatantly obvious; it's been known to happen...

I'm straining to understand what you mean. We learn much from the past. We learn from our own history as well as others in order to live a better now. If our studies suggest to focus on the Now, how did they come up with that reasoning? Would it not be by having studied the past and realizing there is a better way? Is that not learning from the past?

Alexandre Orion wrote: In very many ways, we are getting things pretty right. It does feel as though genuinely practising Jedi are more concerned with letting go of all of that and focusing on the present with a few plans and some organisation to the extent that we can creatively interact with one another - that's fine. But Histories and certainly Holy Books ? Really ???

What is a disingenuous practicing Jedi? You mentioned a genuinely practicing Jedi; I'm curious what the adverse of that would be to you.

Alexandre Orion wrote: Apparently we aren't very good at learning from the past, are we ? Other religions, spiritual paths (methods) and such have done these things - and as a result we find that famous traditional double-bind that makes people seek us out anyway - YOU MUST BE FREE ! and then we go and write up a history that defines us whether we want it to or not, it establishes icons (most of whom are still alive) and still cling to ritual, tradition and dogma that we bring in from whatever we wanted to believe or reject before - and thus find ourselves in the same perpetual state of frustration under which we were living before. Hasn't anyone noticed that out of the 15 000 + registered with only with us (just to not try and take into account those registered only or also with other websites) give it a go (sort of) and then just not come back ? This is similar to those who embark upon any spiritual voyage of self-discovery and finds out that they are only trying to reject that to which they were clinging - or was clinging to them - by finding something else to cling to ... "Molasses in one hand, feathers in the other", or "a mosquito trying to bite an iron bull", according to Watts.

That is a very good point and I know what you're talking about. The Initiate journals are littered with examples...

But a history book is not a catechism. At least, I don't think it should be. I haven't read Opie's (or anyone else's Jedi history) so if it seeks to define and bind us to rituals or traditions, etc, then it's less of a history book and more of a catechism.

And I think there are a plethora of people that have learned from the past on this very board. It's why they/we are here because they recognize a better way to live in the Now having learned a faulty way through history/experience that they don't desire to repeat.

Alexandre Orion wrote: The term alone, "Jedi", has become a powerful symbol. On one hand, we want to say that we are not rôle-players, that our faith has little-to-nothing to do with the fictional Jedi of the Star Wars universe. But this isn't strictly true - is it ? "Jedi" as it were, whether we were to call it Jediism, Jediology, Jediicy, or any other suffix one may employ, it is "Jedi" that carries the symbolism. It conjures up images of Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda, Mace Windu, Annakin Skywalker or Luke and how people who have grown up or now grown older with these images identify with them. Now, every time there is an article in the press, or someone makes a radio or televised interview (regardless of the tongue-in-cheek cheekiness of some of them), we get an influx of subscriptions. I may be naïf, but this suggests that in this screwed up world we are that tends to dis-empower a great many of us, people are looking for something - something "new", "different" but at the same time "familiar". And what more "familiar" and personally "empowering" image is as accessible in modern popular culture than that of potentially becoming "a Jedi Knight" ? There may be some others - but ours sells pretty well ... Wouldn't you say ?

Absolutely.

But I've lost your train of thought about how we can't learn from history. (Again, that's probably more on me, than you, but feel free to elaborate.)

Alexandre Orion wrote: It feels as though we would best be getting on with our studies -- CONTINUOUS STUDIES -- taking to heart what Campbell, Watts, Krishnamurti and others have shown us about being Jedi in the beginning of the 21^st century - getting on with self-knowledge, rendering inoffensive (or at least more transparent) the images and other artifices we [still] see as just "evident" (are they really ?) - get on with making "Jedi" far less of a "path" or "method" (any 'path' or 'method' makes us just like any other tradition on the menu) - and stop erecting icons by writing "histories". Our Journals are our "histories", and I'd say the only ones we really need ...

Our continuous studies are ABOUT history and living, no? Campbell, Watts, etc. We are reading books by men/women of the past; we are learning how better to live in the present based on the wisdom that has come to us from the past. Even what you are telling me now, I can bookmark this page and reference it in 5 years and something might click. I might think, "Ahh, now I know what Master Alexandre was talking about. That makes sense. I'm going to do things this way now." And why? Because I've taken a lesson from history, a lesson from the past; I learned something from the past to apply to me now.

Alexandre Orion wrote: Please - let's not be so highly trained and experienced Jedi that we get too far away from our Basic Studies. "Histories" are a bucket of "I", the Jedi "ego", on a collective or individual level - probably both - spreading out like blight on a field. It is decorating our shadow, as aforementioned. If we do this an then move at all, the decorations no longer fit ...

My suggestion thus stands as made (albeit I know quite certainly that it shall not be heeded). Not only would we more wisely NOT 'update' our "History", we would best stop writing them and scrap the ones we have ... They are largely irrelevant.

I think of decorating our shadows as trying to lessen the consequences of our past actions. If I make a post at this Temple and I'm ashamed of it years later, were I to ask the Council to delete it to "clear my name" as it were, that would be trying to decorate my shadows. It wouldn't solve anything.

But learning something factual that could provide value to a look back at history for those that study it then absolutely it should be updated.

Let me provide a few examples...

How many times are books revised and go through several editions? Sometimes they are updated because they've learned through experience/history that one teaching method may be more applicable than another. Or they learn about a factual event that might change the story a bit, so it's included in a later edition. These are good things to add to a book to keep it relevant.

I'm not sure how familiar you are with the Mormon religion, but they have a holy book called the Book of Abraham. The Book of Abraham has three pictures in it that are facsimiles of scenes from the Book of the Dead and the Book of Breathing in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The Mormon founder (Joseph Smith) claimed to be able to translate Egyptian hieroglyphics when the language was considered to be dead. Little did Smith know that the Rosetta Stone was discovered and being studied in Europe during the time of his translation. Several years after Smith's translation, the three pictures came to the attention of Egyptian scholars in a handful of different universities. They translated it according to scholarly methods and as one, denounced Smith's translation as gibberish. Yet Smith's explanations and the core of the Book of Abraham which he claimed to translate from Egyptian hieroglyphics expounds upon very key and fundamental doctrines of Mormonism. If you take away the Book of Abraham, then you take away a lot of the doctrine of Mormonism that makes it unique from Christianity.

Did the Mormon leaders decide to be up front with what these secular scholars had to say about their founder's translation? Of course not. What did I learn from the past as I studied this history? What changes did I make in the present based on these facts from the past?

I'll tell you now I wouldn't be a Jedi without having discovered that history.

"We would scarcely call anyone 'educated' who had no knowledge whatsoever of history" - Frederick Copleston.

So, long-post aside, I don't understand how you can say we can't learn from the past. We do it all the time...

The past flows backward from the present. There is no learning from the past, for that is generally wildly inaccurate, highly subjective and is going to suggest something different to learn to anyone. That said, I have taught history - and generally do not have anything against chronicles, once again, very generally speaking. Yet any historian worth his salt will tell you that they are not altogether reliable on all counts, and would best never ever be considered unshakable truth.

Memory is not very clear, and is influenced - even altered - according to the conditions of its retrieval. Is this 'learning' from the past ? We can perhaps have a trace of some sort, now, in the present, of what did or didn't work at some other time ... and do likewise or differently. In many cases, it really doesn't matter. There are other governing factors in what pushes societies' behaviours and practices ; the past is of much less consequence than one may believe.

cf. - The Better Angels of Our Nature : Steven Pinker

In the case of religious history, there is a real risk of not only misrepresenting the way things happened, but also of establishing a tradition and elevating icons. For as much as we may love Br John, we would not do him nor anyone else justice by making him a legend or by making statues or any other iconography. I was just naming Br John because he founded our order ; the same applied to any founder of any Jedi organisation, whatever its platform, on-line or off- ...

It feels as though any 'history of Jediism' will focus on the -ism and the actors of it. What would we really be learning from that in five years, in 50 ? Is this history going to provide anyone with any impetus on a personal journey of self-discovery or strengthen anyone's connexion to the Force ?

History is full of lies and errors - both or either are as innocent or deceitful as the intention of the interpreter. Furthermore, in a religion of no religion, a would be 'factual' history leads one to want to emulate the figures of it. And the Jedi would be better off without celebrities - in any time period.

So, as it were, this crabby old Jedi stands by the objection that any 'History of Jedi-ism' would or will be of the slightest value to us ...

Br. John wrote: Opie's history is something he's not distributed for some time. It's not currently being published and he's not promoting it. From a message exchange we had over a year ago I don't believe he minds me sharing it here for our study but it's not intended to be an up to date work.

He mentions us in his latest published book, which I'm in the midst of reading, giving us as an example of a Jedi church holding regular services.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Jedi-Religion-Spiritual-Presents/dp/0615873480/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1384038008&sr=8-4&keywords=jediism

Perhaps I'm mistaken but this is a very recent release. Perhaps he doesn't share his history but he's been published or at least his ideas are accessible. I'm confused??

Even Mrs. Thompson wrote a book review on amazon.

Edit2: Maybe the Jedi can include delete the whole post for clumsiness. I'm good at that you know, clumsiness.

Edit: My apologies Brother John, you did mention his book. My bad.

History is an interesting subject, one that I never really studied until recently - now I know what I am looking for in it. I think its ok to have as a record but I don't think it has much training value compared to other things that are available.

i think history is a very interesting subject indeed, one that we can and do learn a great deal from. even at the level of individual jedi on their own paths to reflect on how did the society around them arise, how did it become this flawed and skewed towards injustice, what has been attempted as 'fixes' in the past, what we have within our power to do.

then of course at the international level, those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it, and other such truisms.