The Lost Music of the Spirit

The Lost Music of the Spirit

Every living human individual is endowed with what the ancients called the “spirit,” or quite literally, “to breathe.” Everyone has a spirit insofar as they move, bleed, feel, think and continuously and automatically, draw breath. They are alive.

This seemingly intangible force is a harmony like a melody from a piano. An organism creates a sort of music when it interacts with the outside forces, as would the vibrations of a guitar string upon air around it, or the effect of percussion on the atmosphere. With it the blood flows through the veins, the air moves through the lungs, certain notes are hit, and the piano keeps playing. This harmony and relationship between the individual and the outside world, the air, the temperature, the light, the sensations, vibrations, the feeding and drinking, the interactions, and being in the surroundings among all else that does the same thing—this great song—is life.

Of course life as the spirit, and the spirit as a song, is an overly simple way of explaining it—not an original way of explaining it—and the truth is much more complex; but I think it’s fair to admit that when the instrument of the body, the individual, the organism, becomes untuned or broken, the resulting song, and thus the spirit, suffers.

Luckily for us, spirituality has evolved alongside the culture of humanity. In modern times—perhaps because our lifespans have almost doubled since when we first described it—no longer do we concern ourselves with the original meaning of the spirit, and the relationship between the individual organism and his surroundings, paradoxically, has become maybe too boring, or at the very least, of less value. We can thank Plato for this..

Plato saw a new song, a new instrument to play with, and conceived of his realm of ideas; a place outside his cave, away from the rabble of the senses, the body and the suffering of the material world from which he wished to escape. Escape further he did, but deeper into his mind, deeper into his ideas where he imagined things were brighter, eternal, and separate from the world, separate from the cave where everything decayed—somehow outwards, yet back into, his own thoughts.

All the time, and luckily for Plato, his instrument, his body, himself, kept on playing its song, while the abstraction of Plato (Socrates?) danced free in his eternal world, his playground. Here was where Plato was happy.

It's not clear whether Plato actually endorsed this view, but his students sure did. His teachings spread and were adopted by and helped justify the dogmas of religions and future philosophers for 2500 years.

Platonism had a profound effect on Western thought, and many Platonic notions were adopted by the Christian church which understood Platonic forms as God's thoughts, whilst Neoplatonism became a major influence on Christian mysticism, in the West through St Augustine, Doctor of the Catholic Church whose Christian writings were heavily influenced by Plotinus' Enneads,[2] and in turn were foundations for the whole of Western Christian thought.[3]

wikipage

His teachings are a great foundation from which many schools of thought have grown. This inundation has evolved the original idea of the spirit, the breath of life, into a figment, a memory, something that cannot be found, and something separate from everything else—an idea. Ideas are the part of us that live on after we die.

What was once important—the body, the flesh, the world, the very relationship between an organism and everything around him, it’s song—is now old news, original sin, and even despised among those who seek to escape it. Forever they yearn and yearn for the eternal world, forgetting about, and even disparaging themselves, in favour of an imaginary world they can only hope to escape to.

They call their yearning Spirituality, and their eternal idea—a mere abstraction of themselves—The Spirit. But all the while, and luckily for them, their instrument, their body, themselves, keeps playing its song, like the piano of which they’ve tuned out long ago.

In summary for the lazy:

What we call spirit today, is the surplus of life, life being that which we used to call the spirit, which is the result of a higher life expectancy and thousands of years platonic thought. In the process we have forgotten the body, the world and the worldly in favour of this surplus.

Great reads for you bookies:

• The Republic Plato
  
• Phaedrus Plato
  
• The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, Vol. 1: The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition Jaroslav Pelikan
  
• A History of Western Philosophy Bertrand Russell
  

reply to post by TheSubversiveOne


Spirituality hasn't evolved. It's like the cockroach - it's very nature has allowed it to survive the most grueling of cultural shifts. But in the end, it's an idea that has been stuck in a box. We still think about it the same way, we still practice it the same way, and we still discuss it the same way. Spirituality has not evolved since Judaism and Islam and all those others. We don't like things that change with or without our permission. We like to keep it in a box and exploit it.

Spirituality used to be a roaring lion. Now it's a bird in a cage.

reply to post by TheSubversiveOne


Do you think modern mans defintion of the spirit is more superioir to that of ancient man or just different?

reply to post by TheSubversiveOne


Good Stuff, Just to let you know, I hold tight to The Spirit.
I am overwhelmed with people who are depending on me to solve their problems
for the near foreseeable future. If I am successful at that, I will then endeavor upon sharing
some Original Music with ATS,,,Overload the Moog Filters and all.

Best, Wildmanimal

reply to post by AthlonSavage


I would say, as an explanation, it used to be much more simple, more attached to what is real and fundamental. Now it is lost in abstractions and given qualities which make no sense.

Thanks for reading, all of you.

reply to post by TheSubversiveOne


I love using instruments for spiritual expansion and to resonate with different chakras. It can be so healing. I bought a double-side D#13 tankdrum to resonate with the sacral chakra at Tankdrum.com a few months ago and everyone loves it even though I am not the best player. I researched these instruments extensively upon purchasing, and I ended up getting a tankdrum and I am so glad I did! Anyway, here is a link to a drum like mine (not me in the video) in case you would like to hear a tankdrum in action.