can someone help me out?

[redcannon]

I heard somewhere that there is a school of philosophy that teaches that we are all one entity viewing itself subjectively. Can someone please tell me what this is or who said it so i can look into it deeper? it caught my interest

was it Hegel? It sounds Hegelian

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

There are in fact many 'philosophies' that adopt views vaguely like this, although Hegel's is not one.

In his system there is no 'entity' to view itself, since the whole thing is a process.

Plotinus's system was vaguely like this, but did not stress 'viewing', but 'emanating' (yes, I know, a perfectly meaningless term!).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plotinus

Various NeoPlatonic philosophers went down this route as well (the most recent leading figure being Hegel himself, but given the above qualifications):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoplatonism

Certainly, mystics of all kinds said similar sounding things (but these were all either Hermetic or NeoPlatonic 'thinkers' themselves):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeticism

http://www.gnostic.org/kybalionhtm/kybalion.htm

http://www.kybalion.org/

Meister Eckhart and Jacob Boehme come closest to what you ask, though (both highly influential on Hegel):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meister_Eckhart

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jakob_B%C3%B6hme

But they would not have used 'viewing'; 'viewing' suggests a causal interaction with the world, which the above would have eschewed.

They were all Platonists, so they would have gone in for some form of intellection, or perhaps 'recalling' (since they held we bring to mind all that 'god' knows in 'his' knowledge of us, blah, blah...).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anamnesis

Now Hegel was into that, and big time, too!

You find this today in dialectics as 'Totality' and 'interconnectedness', but that, as they say, is a different story....

Unless you give me more details that is the best I can do (at least, with respect to Western Philosophy).

[JimFar]

Rosa,

As long as we are listing various sources of Hermetic thought, in addition to the Christian and pagan sources that you have mentioned there are Jewish varieties of Hermeticism too, which promulgated various forms of panentheism including the Kabbala (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabbalah) and Hasadic philosophy, especially that of the Chabad (http://www.myjewishlearning.com/ideas_belief/Kabbalah_and_Mysticism/Overview_Kabbalah_And_Hasidism/Hasidic_Mysticism/Hasidic_Ideas/Habad.htm) sect.

Both the young Marx and the young (as well as the old) Engels were admirers of the Hermeticist, Jakob Böhme, and they would occasionally throw a quote or two from Böhme in their writings. as they did in The Holy Family where they wrote, "Among the qualities inherent in matter, motion is the first and foremost, not only in the form of mechanical and mathematical motion, but chiefly in the form of an impulse, a vital spirit, a tension — or a ‘Qual’, to use a term of Jakob Böhme’s — of matter. The primary forms of matter are the living, individualising forces of being inherent in it and producing the distinctions between the species." And many years later Engels would quote that entire passage from The Holy Family when writing an introduction to the English edition of his book, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Jim, thanks for that.

I am aware of this material (and not just because I had had a Jewish father); you will be relieved to know that I will be covering it fully in Essay Fourteen. See below.

You probably also know how popular such ideas were in Russia before and after the revoluton. I have not been able to prove a link with Lenin yet (via his Jewish origins) but I am working on it.

You must also know that Engels was brought up in the pietist faith -- that branch of Lutherism most heavily influenced by Boehme.

As was Hegel.

I have copied this to my site:- The Introduction to: Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/glenn_magee.htm

This is what I plan to show in Essay Fourteen:


Summary Of Essay Fourteen -- Dialectical Mysticism

In this Essay (when it is published sometime in 2007/8), the Hegelian/DM-view of reality will be traced back to its real roots; these are not to be found in the ordinary lives of working people, nor yet in the everyday experience of the revolutionary party. This lineage stretches back in the mists of time to mystical Hermetic thought, to doctrines that expressed ancient ruling-class theories about nature, and their own 'rightful' divinely ordained place in it.

Although others have made somewhat similar points, these connections are pushed much further in this Essay, and are based on an entirely new approach, coupled with far more evidence.

Indeed, it is shown here for the first time: (1) Just how and why this ancient mystical perspective actually developed; (2) Exactly how it was linked to wider ruling-class interests and priorities; and (3) Precisely how this alien thought-form was (inadvertently) smuggled into Marxism 150 years ago.

In support of these claims, texts from ancient Mesopotamia, Persia, China, Egypt, India, Greece and Rome are quoted at length. In addition to this, the relevant (surviving) works of pre- and post-Socratic thinkers -- such as, Anaximenes, Anaximander, Empedocles, Heraclitus, Xenophanes, Zeno, and Parmenides, Plato and Aristotle -- are introduced as main exhibits for the prosecution.

Moreover, the ideas of NeoPlatonic, Stoic and Hermetic theorists (for example, Plotinus, Proclus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Pseudo-Dionysius, and the shadowy figure Hermes Trismegistus 'himself') are linked to the ideas and doctrines of medieval/early modern thinkers -- such as, John Scotus Eriugena, Albertus Magnus (St Thomas Aquinas's teacher), Meister Eckhart, Raymond Lull, Nicholas of Cusa, Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola, Marsilio Ficino, Henri Cornelius Agrippa of Nettesheim, Giordano Bruno, Robert Fludd, John Dee, Johannes Reuchlin, Paracelsus, Sebastian Franck, Valentin Weigel, Jacob Böhme, William Law, Emanuel Swedenborg, Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin, and Friedrich Christoph Oetinger.

Finally, the views of these assorted mystics are then linked to the works of authors who directly influenced Hegel (i.e., Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Fichte, Hölderlin, Goethe, Schelling and Novalis). The impact on DM of this mystical hotchpotch is set out in detail.

Of course, these are no mere speculations; Hegel admits them himself, and acknowledges his debt to many of the above mystery-mongers; here are his odes to NeoPlatonism, Gnosticism and the Kabbalah, to the Y-Ching -- and here to Boehme.

[An outline of these influences on Hegel can be found here.]

In fact, Hermeticism was highly influential on German Pietism (through Boehme and his followers) -- which was itself a version of Lutheran Protestantism beloved of German Kings. Not only was Hegel brought up in the Pietist tradition, but Engels's father was a Pietist, and he too was raised in this faith. In fact, we find Engels himself speaking positively about Pietism in an early work: Reports From Bremen. [A copy is posted here.]

Hence, Engels's later trajectory back into Hermeticism (under the guise of Dialectical Hegelianism) is not the least bit surprising.

Indeed, anyone who thinks that Materialist Dialectics lies at the cutting edge of modern thought/science should read the Kybalion, the third most important book of Hermetic Philosophy, so we are told. Even though it was first published in 1912 (and had three authors who were all Masons), it summarises the core beliefs of this mystic creed. In many places it is not easy to tell the difference between DM-theses and the Hermetic doctrines this text outlines. Doubters are encouraged to check here --, but more specifically here, here and here. [Subtract the overtly mystical language, and you have the covertly mystical jargon of DM.]

Similar boss-class bona fides can be found in Chinese, Indian, Tibetan and Japanese thought. These are also outlined in this Essay. Indeed, in many respects, Daoism is virtually identical to DM -- which fact Maoists used to 'good effect'. The same can be said for parts of Buddhism.

All this helps refute the claim (found in TAR -- for example, on p.6) that although DM shares with mysticism a belief in Totality, mystics do not try to account for change by appealing to 'internal contradictions', nor do they see the Totality as a process.

The reverse of this is in fact the case. Rarely do mystics fail to appeal to opposites (and unities of opposites, too) -- or to terms that are analogous to contradictions and contraries; indeed, they speak about "conflicts" in nature almost exactly as they are depicted in DM (often appealing to the same trite examples in support), to account for reality and change. Moreover, mystical systems in general (e.g., Hermeticism and ancient Chinese Daoism, again) picture reality as a process, powered by these mysterious 'opposites'.

[TAR = The Algebra of Revolution.]

There are, however, comrades who acknowledge this; but, they regard it in a positive light, since they clearly think that the appearance of the 'dialectic' in a 'mystical' form (in ancient religion) indicates that it is correct!

Unfortunately for them this merely underlines the fact that the continuity that exists between ruling-class mysticism and DM situates both in the same tradition of anti-materialist, anti-democratic alien-class thought.

Incidentally, this also helps account for the fact that the Nazis appealed to similar ideas to justify their anti-democratic and murderous system.

It is not too clear if this means that the mystical ideas under-pinning National Socialism (i.e., Ariosophy) are viewed in the same light by such comrades. [On this, see here, and here.]

Mystical doctrines like these originated, so we are told, in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Creation stories from these civilisations see the world as an extension of the 'Divine' word, called into existence by means of language. Similar ideas also pervade Chinese and Indian myths (as they do other ancient theologies, and Theogonies). Such beliefs have cast a long shadow (in one way or another) across all forms of ruling-class thought. They reappear today in the most unexpected places, which is no surprise really for anyone who takes Marx's claim seriously that ruling ideas are always those of the class that rules.

Given this unsavoury background, the many similarities there are between Hermetic (and/or) NeoPlatonic doctrines and those found in DM are not just coincidental. The historical links outlined above show that it is indeed part of an ancient, boss-class tradition.

DM is thus exposed as a modern-day Deistic Myth.

This helps explain why Dialectical Marxism is so spectacularly unsuccessful: its core theory reproduces the thought-forms of those classes who have up till now been vastly more successful at extending and preserving their own power than our side has been been at ending it.

The adoption of such mysticism thus solves the mystery of our own impotence: if we think like them, small wonder that we end up acting like them.

Links ommitted.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%20016-7-14.htm

At the foot of that page.

[redcannon]

when i say "viewing" i mean anything close to viewing, not viewing in a concrete form. its just the best i could think of, im having a hard time remembering it all, but it seems so interesting.

something like, we're all one thing, interacting a viewing itself.

:wacko:

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red, thanks for that, but over and above the above 'thinkers', I cannot think of anyone in particular who believed this.

[redcannon]

well, i'll start combing the links, i'll let you know if i find what i was looking for.

thanks a lot for your help, Rosa

[Issaiah1332]

Originally posted by [email protected] 15, 2007 07:58 am
I heard somewhere that there is a school of philosophy that teaches that we are all one entity viewing itself subjectively. Can someone please tell me what this is or who said it so i can look into it deeper? it caught my interest

was it Hegel? It sounds Hegelian
That is very vague. Carl Jung said that we are all part of a collective unconsciousness. I doubt that is what you are looking for, but it is a kind of similar and hella interesting.

[rouchambeau]

Try looking into Spinoza. He was a pantheist, so he belived that all things are part of God. Maybe that's what you're thinking of?

[redcannon]

Originally posted by Issaiah1332+April 18, 2007 06:16 am--> (Issaiah1332 @ April 18, 2007 06:16 am)
[email protected] 15, 2007 07:58 am
I heard somewhere that there is a school of philosophy that teaches that we are all one entity viewing itself subjectively. Can someone please tell me what this is or who said it so i can look into it deeper? it caught my interest

was it Hegel? It sounds Hegelian
That is very vague. Carl Jung said that we are all part of a collective unconsciousness. I doubt that is what you are looking for, but it is a kind of similar and hella interesting. [/b]
yea, i've always been interested in collective unconcious

[Question everything]

Originally posted by redcannon+April 19, 2007 10:47 pm--> (redcannon @ April 19, 2007 10:47 pm)
Originally posted by [email protected] 18, 2007 06:16 am

[email protected] 15, 2007 07:58 am
I heard somewhere that there is a school of philosophy that teaches that we are all one entity viewing itself subjectively. Can someone please tell me what this is or who said it so i can look into it deeper? it caught my interest

was it Hegel? It sounds Hegelian
That is very vague. Carl Jung said that we are all part of a collective unconsciousness. I doubt that is what you are looking for, but it is a kind of similar and hella interesting.
yea, i've always been interested in collective unconcious [/b]
I've heard of that in a few branches of theism...