Did aRchontic, Canaanite, demon-possessed,
androgynous light beings from the dark purple realm insinuate themselves within
us?
“Purple haze is
'a slightly enchanted liberatory intuition that, paradoxically, also imparts a
perplexing sense of being confined, confused or subject to the inherently
‘dissociative’ fog of a demanding, pseudo-sovereign 'other' ”.
The color purple is
traditionally associated with the royal sovereign or king; consider Gibbon, who
reports:
The rescripts of
the emperor, his grants and decrees,
his edicts and pragmatic
sanctions, were subscribed in purple ink, and transmitted to the provinces
as general or special laws, which the magistrates were bound to execute, and
the people to obey.” [and in his footnote on “purple ink”: “A compound of
vermilion and cinnabar, which marks the Imperial diplomas from Leo I. (A.D.
470) to the fall of the Greek empire.]
- The Decline and
Fall of the Roman
Empire, 1946, Vol. 2, at p.1439
Thesis: Integral
consciousness cannot integrate consciousness structures unless each of the efficient forms of those structures are first “reconstituted”
so as to function optimally as non-malignant, proportional parts of the whole.
Inquiry: If the rule
of law is a product of the
mental structure, then what becomes of it within the new milieu of integral consciousness whose constituent
stages are themselves poorly integrated?
NOTE: This
blog post is an embellishment on my doctoral dissertation:
The Odyssey of the Western Legal Tradition — Integral Jurisprudence:
Toward the Self-Transcendence of Deficient-Mental Legal Culture. (2006),
321 pages (Order No. 3238290, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses). Abstract and
table of contents are freely accessible at:
https://search.proquest.com/docview/304955482
A. Reconstituting Structures of Consciousness
The “originary custom” of nomadic, primal peoples (as
aptly demonstrated by their accomplished shamans) is, or should be, one essential
element of an integral model — one that helps to heal the pre-mental,
“dissociative self” of modern, would-be integralists.
What
is suggested is a process of retrieval of the efficient forms of the archaic, magic and mythical structures. Arguably, this retrieval can precipitate a reconciliation
toward a more “associated self” through a holistic reconstitution of the
efficient aspects of pre-mental structures of consciousness. The modern,
integralist adept might otherwise be exclusively or primarily concerned
with overcoming the deficient mental structure, e.g., by
struggling to reform a controlling ego, perhaps being at a loss as to how to do
likewise with prior structures. Yet it is the initial process or precursor
practice of retrieving the efficient aspects of pre-mental structures that
lends a curative impetus toward the healing of the mental structure and thus
might be a more ideal starting place for the integralist adept.
While
not discounting the fact that various contemplative practices, e.g., prayer and
meditation, may indeed lead an adept to a newly associated sense of a
(pre-mental) self, shamanic processes in particular may
be efficacious. By whatever process or practice, retrieval and holistic
reconstitution of prior structures in an “associated self” prepares one for their
integration with the mental structure through integral consciousness.
Pertinent
to the discussion of “wholeness,” however, is a consideration of non-sedentary,
less hierarchical primal peoples whose mythical consciousness maintains that bondedness or Abram’s “perceptual reciprocity” with the “multiple non-human sensibilities that
animate the local landscape” ((Abram, D. (1996). The spell of the sensuous: Perception and language in a more-than-human world. New York: Vintage Books, pp. 56, 9, respectively.)
Notwithstanding acceptance of Jean Gebser’s theory on the effect of the intensification of
consciousness of prior structures, I theorize that for such peoples the
efficient pre-mental structures are always already presentiated; these
pre-mental structures are less attenuated than they are in moderns because
these structures have been experienced over much more enduring spans of time,
continuing up until the present, and non-atrophied by effects on their
dimensionality from a countermovement that would otherwise be caused by an
intensified mythical or a narrowing mental structure of consciousness.
Thus,
on the issue of the degree to which wholeness is generally extant, I would
qualify Gebser’s analysis. This I would do by making the diminution of the qualitative
character of the individual structures dependent not only upon the number of
mutations of consciousness in a society's individuals, but also upon
whether we are referring to the more sedentary and hierarchical “moderns,” or
to non-sedentary, hierarchically muted, primal peoples whose consciousness may be unquestionably more limited — yet is, in my opinion, “more whole”
than is the case with typically dissociated moderns.
Gebser
speaks of “a plus mutation” (Gebser, 1985, p.38). He writes:
...all
of our structures of awareness will have to be integrated into a new and more
intensive form, which would in fact unlock a new reality. To that extent we
must constantly relive and re-experience in a decisive sense the full depth of
our past. (Gebser, 1985, p.4)
In
order to achieve the requisite basis for the transformation to which we have
alluded, we wish to present as a working hypothesis the four, respectively
five, structures we have designated as the archaic, magic, mythic, mental and
integral. We must first of all remain cognizant that these structures
are not merely past, but are in fact still present in more or less latent and
acute form in each one of us. (Gebser, 1985, p.42, emphasis in
original)
If
I am interpreting Gebser correctly, I concur to the extent that structures that
are antecedent to the mental have been lumped together and are referred to in
today’s common parlance as “the unconscious.” This is to say that the
extent to which we are dissociated from the earlier (healthy or efficient)
stages of these structures is the extent to which we remain enthralled to them
as puzzling remnants of poorly understood yet powerful emotional or imagined
cues that often affect and control us in our everyday lives; and to the extent
we remain controlled by magic/mythical prompts, rather than mastering these prior structures, they
remain as our unconscious masters — those dissociated,
misunderstood and mysterious parts of us remain latent and hidden from our
“consciousness” in the murky depths only acting to confuse our
being.
The
fact is, however, that psychology tells us human beings constantly draw on
and act instinctively from this seemingly forgotten, unconscious side of
ourselves. The fully integrated individual would strive to
coordinate and bring pre-mental structures more to the foreground, resulting in
a more properly proportioned wholeness of all structures. Attaining
to this level of human development is to become more whole. And in
the context of lived experience, integrating oneself means to exist in the
wholeness of a reality of a consciousness attuned to a human noosphere; one
harmonized with the biosphere and physiosphere, i.e., of both body and nature. In
short, we retrieve/ reclaim/ recall largely atrophied aspects of our latent
potential; what once were and still are essential qualities of our “human-ness.”
The
long-term effect of causing a once associated (unalienated) psychological state
of wholeness (a strong characteristic of both magic and mythical structures of consciousness) to engage a mental
structure morphing into an emerging integral consciousness, transforms us
into real human beings. That is, by so doing we can self-transcend toward
becoming more authentically and wholly human (rather than the beaten down,
sub-species idiots that millennia of archontic control, oppression and
misdirection have rendered us).
To be clear,
the deficiently operating pre-mental structures manifest themselves in both
oppressor predators and in those whom they control; the former rely upon black (deficient) magic/mythical regimes, while the latter become stupefied in
ignorance from a weak association with these consciousness structures, thus making them
perfect candidates for mind-controlled prey.
B. The
Cultural Creatives
A
place to look for a burgeoning integral worldview is by examining those values
held by “Cultural Creatives” (as compared to “Traditionals” and “Moderns”). (Ray,
P., & Anderson, S. R. (2000). The cultural creatives: How 50
million people are changing the world. New York: Harmony Books)
According to research
conducted by Ray and Anderson, a subculture they call the “Cultural Creatives”
has been emerging, particularly over the last generation or so. Their
values are in harmony with, or at least closely approximate, those values
considered characteristic of an integral worldview. That is,
Cultural Creatives are both inner-directed and socially concerned, caring
deeply about ecology and properly stewarding the planet, about relationships,
peace, and justice, about self-actualization, spirituality, and
self-expression. They are generally disaffected with the materialism and
consumerism of modern culture.
Over
twenty years ago, Ray and Anderson estimated that there were about 50 million
Cultural Creatives in America, or about 26% of the adult population. (By 2021
that proportion has certainly risen.) The preponderance of the rest of the
population are categorized as either “Moderns” or “Traditionals.”
At
the turn of the 20th Century Moderns were the dominant subculture (about 48%
of the U.S. population), tracing their lineage back about 500 years to the
beginnings of rationalism and modern science. They are “the people
who accept the commercialized urban-industrial world as the obvious right way
to live.” (Ray & Anderson, 2000, p.27)
Ray
and Anderson describe the Traditionals as the first counterculture, branching
off from the Moderns around 1870. The Traditionals are now about 25%
of the U.S. population and declining [or arguably merging into a more
conservative Cultural Creative camp] — they once comprised about 50% of the
population around the time of World War II. They are largely
cultural and religious conservatives who maintain or seek a simplistic,
black-and-white certainty in their views, and who yearn for an idealized,
romanticized, and more idyllic “simpler time” (that may in fact never have
existed). It is in the ready acceptance of religious convictions
received from “divinely inspired sacred texts” that the worldview of
Traditionals can be seen as preserving a more mythical consciousness. (Note: In retrospect, these qualitative researchers may have been promoting a progressivist agenda using the term "Cultural Creatives" as a cover. Still, the work is useful as a lens of understanding from social trend perspectives, e.g., from the standpoint of one being biased against the values and beliefs of Traditionals.)
The following chart lists the values and beliefs among the three subcultures (in the year 2000):
Ray & Anderson,
p. 29 (2000)
Cultural Creatives
tend to value both intellectual pursuit and spiritual development. Hence,
this subculture may be naturally inclined and relatively well-disposed toward
the integral theories of Gebser and/or the integral yoga of Aurobindo. But
the important point with regard to Cultural Creatives, in comparison to the
other two subcultures, is that they are more prone to actively engage and apply
their values in the world. Ray & Anderson (2000) also reported
that there are more activists, volunteers, and contributors to causes than in
either of the other subcultures.
Thus,
the values practiced by Cultural Creatives, largely learned by direct
experience in the world, might be expressed, phenomenologically, in the sense
of a preference for “being” over “thought.” As such, just “being”
one of the estimated 50+ million Cultural Creatives may be the most common path
toward realizing an integral worldview. Such an “accidentally
heuristic” path, tending toward everyday praxis, would seem to suit the needs
of the ordinary person, whether or not he or she is consciously seeking an
integral worldview through the integral structure of consciousness. For
example, we might consider that the lawyers currently engaged in new law
practice models are developing integral worldviews and whose work, by whatever
name, approximates the theoretical precepts and practical values espoused by
Cultural Creatives that are also associated with integral jurisprudence.
However,
the three categories of Ray and Anderson must be seen as fluid and overlapping.
The panopticon of media subjects all human beings within eye- and ear-shot of its
messaging to being programmed into accepting and tolerating those superficial values characteristic of being a Modern. Subversive
infiltration into all institutions has subjected Traditionals and Cultural Creatives
to Marxist-style mind control. But in the past twenty years intrepid online and in-person sharing of data has given rise to alliances between Traditional believers and Cultural Creatives of faith, on the one hand, versus a secular-to-atheist (Luciferian) merging of Moderns and Cultural Creatives on the other. (The data in the above table have not predicted such mergers, instead portraying Moderns and Traditionals cleaving to one another with Cultural Creatives as the "progressive pioneers of forward-looking change"— perhaps a major shortcoming of the study and the book.)
The
“media is the message” ecological pollution that conditions and separates
people lends more weight to considering subcultural groups who tend to insulate
themselves from the “messaging,” viz., those non-sedentary, less hierarchical, insular folks who live more in originary custom than they do in the (over-legalized-and-regulated, generally deficient-mental)
modern world.
And
so the Cultural Creative designation while interesting and somewhat helpful can
also become yet another divisive tool that separates and alienates. Beware!
Still, when considering how we come to govern ourselves as societies within a
connective culture of national-to-planetary identity, natural rhythms of
consciousness evolution and social ordering are continually in play. This gives
rise to a perhaps ingenious new method of self-understanding humanity and our world through yet
another ordering lens referred to as “metapolitical.”
C. Metapolitical
Theory
An overview of
metapolitical theory[1]is here presented as an alternate yet analogous take on the integral
worldview. Metapolitical theory takes
up the thread of moving beyond the old paradigms of secularism (Modernist
worldview) and "traditional myth religion" (Traditionalist worldview)[2]. This new, general
theory provides an additional contextual template or analytical lens. It can be
used, e.g., to further discussions of how the rule of law fares under both deficient mental legal culture and
integral jurisprudence.
The
mutation from mental/rational to integral consciousness might be seen by
theorist Mark Ettlin as the evolution from 4th to 5th order being (See Kegan,
1995)[3]
[I]t
is at this [5th order] epistemological stage that we may see a
deeper differentiation and integration of three kinds of value roughly
prefigured by what our mythic/rational society has tended to call the
Beautiful, the True, and Good. I refer to these three kinds of value as X, Y,
and Z value, or as ontological, technological, and epistemological value, and
use such suggestive triads as eternity, time, and history to explore them.
The
5th order self is more discipline than identity. It
is an inquiry into value. Ettlin describes it as the dialectical and
reflexive order par
excellence, the term “metapolitical” specifically referring to his
conception of a Z-value discipline of the “citizen.” That
is, metapolitical is used to indicate the reflexivity and
philosophical quality of a 5th order political discipline in
which politics cannot be separated from epistemology, participant anthropology,
and an ongoing attempt to place ourselves in and as an
evolving, historical intelligence. Thus, Ettlin concludes that
[D]emocracy
is necessary not only because it is more fair (the politics of redistribution)
or more respectful of human freedom/dignity/identity (the politics of
recognition), but because only a radical democracy can realize itself as a
lucid and sane historical mind. This is the ‘draw’ of Z value. We live in each
others’ minds, and if some of us are insane, all of us are insane. A hegemonic
community necessarily suffers what Habermas calls “systemic speech distortion,”
a fancy term for insanity. The metapolitical is
a term that tries to indicate the intrinsic delight of a philosophical
citizenship, where “sophia” is the emergent historical intelligence of an
exuberantly reflexive, dialogic, and self-transcending polis.
According
to Ettlin, as metapolitical citizens we concern ourselves with how we make and
know ourselves as historical bodymind. In this sense,
the legal system we design and implement “contains” us, as do other historically
emergent systems (e.g., educational, economic, recreational, and even
transportation systems) that humanity has devised. All of these
systems mediate us and hence structure the ways in which we know ourselves,
each other, and the world. We “come to know” within an understanding
of three distinct fields of value realization, viz., the value
disciplines X, Y, and Z. Under each X, Y, or Z field can be grouped
what Ettlin metaphorically refers to as containers specific to
that particular value field:
|
X
|
Y
|
Z
|
|
Ontos
|
Cosmos
|
Polis
|
|
God/
Consciousness
|
The
World (Other)
|
Mind(s)
|
|
Eternity
|
(Chronic)
Time
|
History
|
|
Nondual
|
Hypothetically
Dual
|
Dialectical
|
|
Ignorance
|
Intelligibility
|
Intelligence
|
|
Aformation
|
Information
|
Eformation
|
|
Cipher
|
Cyborg
|
Citizen
|
|
Agnosis
|
Science
|
Sophia
|
|
Who?
|
What?
|
Where?
|
|
Feeling
|
Seeing
|
Hearing
|
Ettlin
warns readers, that these containers should
be taken in stride, as some may tend to be “playful, cryptic, and intended for
heuristic, speculative purposes.” At the same time, however, these
are for Ettlin in some sense “absolute” containers[4]. In
a sense, a concern with how we contain and transcend ourselves as historical
polis or Intersubject is intrinsic to the metapolitical citizen. This
means a welcoming and questioning of all three fields of value realization: X,
Y, Z; or respectively, consciousness, the world, and other minds; or eternity,
chronicity, and history; or, qualifiedly, Ontos, cosmos[5],
and polis. Ettlin argues that these three fields of value
realizations only become explicit value disciplines within
a 5th order or dialectical epistemology (or within what I would describe as integral consciousness).
For
Ettlin, then, deficient mental legal culture would be just one symptom of a
much greater, all-pervasive, and confusing “onto-technological[6]maze” that is insoluble from within a 4th order
(inevitably dualist) epistemology. Accordingly, in the arena of
human endeavors Ettlin asserts that we ever err by forever mixing up the fields
of value realization, writing:
At
present we live in a mythic/rational [Traditionalist/Modernist] society that is
deeply terror-driven, power-interested, and dedicated to the perpetuation of
inequalities that can only be maintained through epistemological inequality,
that is, through the creation of an “Oriental” class capable of trust (and
paranoia), and hence obedience (and programmed transgression) but incapable of
verification, that is, of holding the Orientalists or “manufacturers of
consent” accountable. This has catastrophic consequences, not just
in an epistemological sense, but for all three value disciplines. We
live in a society in which most people have no inkling of the importance (and
delight) of “placing ourselves” in a collaborative and democratic fashion, that
is, as citizen philosophers. If we do not democratically diagnose
and design the fundamental containers that structure and mediate us, they will
be designed for us and they will be designed in both stupid and “interested”
ways. Hegemony is inevitably a degradation of our potential as
historical intelligence. Power inevitably under-realizes value.
Ettlin’s
metapolitical theory, then, might explain deficient legal culture in terms of
an epistemological inequity between the rulers and the ruled; despite the
democratic principles that inhere in the Western legal tradition’s avowed aim
of establishing a just society, the confusion among fields of value realization
has resulted in a legal culture in which “power inevitably under-realizes
value.”[7] Currently, where “fewer than 400 people ‘control’ half the money in this
world” (Wilson, P. L. (1998). Escape from
the Nineteenth Century and other essays. Brooklyn, NY: Autonomedia, p.134), what Ettlin would describe as a “degradation of
our potential as historical intelligence” manifests as a withering of social
emancipation in the face of social regulation imposed under the guise of
democratic pretensions, and the “rule of law” is manifested by an ontological
hegemony that has effectively divided the globe into zones of comfort
(the”West”)[8] zones of security (e.g., the “Pacific Rim”), and zones of depletion
(much of the Southern Hemisphere).
Perhaps
the most crucial container the citizen considers is the polis itself, in the
Z-field of value realization wherein jurisprudence also most properly resides.
How does the polis reproduce itself? How does it educate its young into 5th order
epistemes and disciplines? How do we practice politics and law together? How
do we talk to each other? From within the framework of what Ettlin
characterizes as the “adversarial humanism of our day, with its implicit war
ontology,” politics and law are adversarial, power-oriented, and implicitly
terror-driven. They have little to do with a discipline that seeks
to realize value through intersubjective exchange, through listening to others
to get a sense of horizons that one cannot see in “objective”
fashion.
Instead,
Ettlin seeks to encourage metapolitical circles that he
believes would precede the emergence of a true metapolitical society, writing:
Such
circles will be experimental in nature and will be drawn to explore and
formulate the practices and mind that constitute the metapolitical (or Z-value)
discipline itself. They will ask, “How do we create and practice a
collective historical Mind or Intersubject that leverages reflexive knowing? How
do we participate in this Mind”? In an interesting way this polis,
Mind, or Intersubject is a container and an agent, a ground and a figure. It
does not dissolve or abrogate individual minds, and yet it achieves a kind of
collective coherence and unity.[9]
Ettlin
is designing a Metapolitical Institute, which he intends to be the instrument
by which he hopes to generate resources and practices intended to draw people
into metapolitical circles and the discipline of metapolitical citizenship. For
example, there are some containers to which metapolitical citizens must attend
in their collaborative inquiries.
He
calls some of these containers “macromaterials.” All materials are
generated by human beings who discern principles in matter and proceed to
develop, diversify, and integrate matter into more complex forms and systems. Trees
are a material. A law book is a material. A legal system
is a macromaterial. All materials entail human practices and ways of
knowing. At the level of the macromaterial such practices and
epistemes are often highly complex.
Capital is a kind of economic
macromaterial. The metapolitical citizen would understand that the
polis must contain the economy and not, as would be the preference of an
ideologue of Capital, the other way round. While private property is
plausible as a material, according to Ettlin, as a macromaterial private
property must, as with all macromaterials, be democratically owned and
controlled by its metapolitical citizen owners in a more custodial sense so
that it would not despoil the environment or otherwise threaten the integrity
of the polis.
Ettlin’s
“fields of value realization” are compatible with, e.g., such integral values
as are espoused by Cultural Creatives in the table above. What
distinguishes his “metapolitical values,” however, are their more organized
categorizations into X, Y, or Z fields. Much like Plato’s “the
Beautiful, the True, and the Good,” or the “separation of powers” or
“separation of church and state” doctrines, preserving separate noospheric
identities for God, for science, and for politics [a characteristically mental
attribute] clarifies the process by which humanity embarks on its acts of
self-discovery; by not searching an inappropriate category to
substantiate any particular issue that does not pertain to that category,
fallacies can more easily be avoided. Much human anguish can be
traced to such fallacious undertakings. Law has found itself in
trouble when trying to inculcate a divine pre-text (X-field) to itself or an
overly rigorous scientific (Y-field) approach in its theories and formulations.
While
these excurses outside the proper domain of jurisprudence (Z-field) might be
deemed to have been historically “necessary” — as in having prompted much
debate and punctuated the evolution of the Western legal tradition with certain
insights and developments — the deleterious effects of misplacing or
misidentifying the values of jurisprudence are legion.
Examples of law premising
itself on the divine right of rulers (X-field) would include
the harsh inequities of laws enforced by “God-Kings” from Sumer, extending
through the “lawgivers” of Greece and the “Age of Tyrants” in Rome, to
persecutions in the name of God by the Church’s Inquisition and by the
monarchies of pre-revolutionary Europe.
The “science of law,” is
an expression indicative of law’s mental tendency toward systematization. Law
resulting from empirically verifiable facts, forged in the real world of
legal disputes and argumentation, can be traced to the early Greek Sophists,
through the legal hermeneutics of Papinian and categorizations of Gaius, to the
formulations of Justinian’s Code and, in more modern times, e.g., through the
German Pandecists and the analytical-positivist approaches of Austin and Kelsen.
The reaction to law’s
emphasis on overly rigorous scientific values (Y-field), that favored the letter over
the spirit or equity of law, became manifest in both the Romantic and
democratic movements of the eighteenth century, culminating in the social
question issue raised in the 19th century as a
response to industrialization, and the growing inequities in wealth and class
privilege driven by the unjust totalitarian logic of Capital that, while being
challenged, continues almost unabated today by means of a powerful global corporatocracy. This
anti-democratic alliance of business, government, and media, with seemingly
unlimited resources, has much greater access to powerful law firms and
lobbyists who are able to exert undue influence over the engines of power in
the executive, legislative, and judicial spheres of the state.
Any theory, from whatever
source, that also puts forth a discipline capable of efficiently and
effectively guiding both our minds and our hearts toward a more just and beautiful world, is a worthy one. The integral worldview allows
for meanings that are as unique as those who have sought to articulate them,
whether they use different terminology, or are embracing and practicing values
considered implicit in an integral worldview without being cognizant of
any theoretical underpinning. From this we might hypothesize
that all of us may be witness to a single phenomenon — the dawning of a new
integral structure — yet one that is characterized by multivalent, mutational
surges of consciousness.
Metapolitical theory is an
important contribution to our investigations — not only in exploring the
Western legal tradition itself, but also when considering the over-arching
significance of the varying contexts within which jurisprudence has meandered;
metapolitical theory posits an ordering of values that any thinking person
might find extremely useful when trying to navigate through the harrowing
thickets of being and reality, Spirit and Matter, body and soul, society and
self, knowledge and wisdom.
Formidably great
individuals have slogged through these noospheric marshes in the past, only to
get lost. Metapolitical theory certainly holds particular promise, not
just as a map to escape consensual reality and culture trance, but also as a
discipline capable of orienting us toward a reality gained through a fuller
mastery of our human potential. The extent to which it builds upon
(yet, as its progenitor, Mark Ettlin, asserts, “goes beyond”) Gebser in its
capacity to support an integral jurisprudence is worth pondering as the
plasticity of the rule of law has currently been contorted beyond recognition.
Hence, by whatever theoretical means, any anchoring in a fuller, more integral
understanding of the rule of law is most welcome.
________________________
[8] Ettlin, however,
does not think we can call the West a “zone of comfort.” In his
view, market globalization requires that only a small class in each country
lives in increasing comfort or opulence, while life becomes progressively more
uncomfortable and barren for everyone else. Ettlin has a terminology
for how state capitalism, caught as it is in a dualistic worldview, inevitably
exhibits its inequitable features: “Exes of Evil,” the three ‘exes’ being extraction, externalization,
and extermination.
