Philip Dick - The Shifting Realities of PK Dick

Nonetheless, I think Spinoza is correct in his concept of God as immanent, that the universe is alive, that God possesses the attribute of physical extension, that mind, matter, and energy are three attributes or modes of His Being... there is no problem for me because I am a Trinitarian. It is only more precise to say that I found myself within, as a part of, the mystical body of Christ, rather than of God. Also, we know from Scripture that there is such a mystical body ( Collosians, supra ). No radical theology would be required, only this knowledge. No wonder it seems senseless to me when someone says, "Christ was a man, like ourselves." Also, no wonder I am attracted to Pere Teilhard de Chardin's concept of the "plasmatic" Christ (Corpus Christi).

Too, this may be why my final phosphene set-ground experience was the Golden Rectangle or pylon-entrance doorway. "I am the way." It would appear that the ICC is correct, that the written text of the New Testament is incomplete. You are baptized. The Spirit comes to you. What then? Then you experience yourself as part of the mystical Corpus Christi, which Paul speaks of in Collosians . Reunited with Christ, with His growing resurrected light-body. Taken into it (which is not the same as the Kingdom of God arriving on Earth, the Parousia). This was the "secret of secrets," and was forgotten after the Romans killed them and destroyed the oral tradition. One could commune with Christ again (or Hagia Sophia, vide Spinoza). One important difference that suggests itself to me between being part of the body of God (as in Spinoza) and part of the "mystical Corpus Christi" is that the first would be pure mystical perception, and that everything truly, if perceived right, belongs to it; this is an elevation of perception only, however important. But the latter is, so to speak, "by invitation only," belonging only to "the congregation." It is more than perception, it is an entering in which not all (I presume) share in. Perhaps that's why that -- the latter -- would seem more valuable; it would mean not just that I saw with the "Wisdom of God" but that I was taken by His yoke, so to speak, to join His (Christ's) mystical body, which is more; the first just states actually what is, one is not welcomed, everything is. One has not been judged or sought out. But I saw the "hotel register" where my name was written and so forth. I was judged; I felt that. And I now think brought into the Corpus Christi. Also, to perceive an immanent God, that the material universe is the soma [Greek: body] of God, and there is Mind behind it as well -- this doesn't supply any basis for believing in an afterlife, for anything next or beyond in that direction; whereas the mystic Corpus Christi does. It is a demonstration of the reality of the resurrection, which the former isn't; the former is great, though, inasmuch as it demonstrates the reality of God and theological purpose; it must not be put down. The latter gives more personally .

This would be why I felt I was receiving from a hidden (occult) brotherhood, represented by armed knights... the knights of the grail, so to speak. And the content of my experience: I was shown specifically the Christian brotherhood toppling Rome, now . The siege of us prisoners being lifted by the body of armored knights on horseback at the outer walls. The "mystical body of Christ" of which we are parts and he is the head -- this would be a sort of midway concept of the source, standing between pure mystical perception of immanent God (a la Spinoza) and a strictly human wisdom (gnostic, AMORC, Roman Catholic, etc.) brotherhood. The head is divine ( theos ), the members are of the human congregation. Its presence is actually here (now), in and on our world, in our society, making changes (the rock torn not by human hands and hurled at the statue, as in Daniel). (And I did hear, hypnogogically, "I am part of the King.")

Palmer -- crossed palm trees. Palm trees are a Christian symbol of the Holy Land; what I saw in 2-75, then, is a vision of the Holy Land. I did not go (journey) to it; it came to me. I was already seeing a palm tree (like the Afrika Korps palm tree emblem) in the FISH sign, months before. The palmer sign, perhaps. In hoc signo , etc. [ In hoc signo vinces : In this sign we conquer.] Again, we have here symbols specifically of Christianity, rather than of God per se (as distinguished from). Also, a building in the Holy Land, with Romanesque arches. Memory of the Sacred Other, from its "former life"? A building where the White Brotherhood (etc.) met? The significance of my seeing this might be: My search is over. I had reached my destination, the end of my journey. (And, very soon after, the voice of St. Sophia dimmed away entirely from my mind. The one full year, from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, had evidently ended.) It all must be regarded as a searching for and a finding of (vide the quest represented in my various novels).

c. 1976

I Am a Living Animal, Tied to a Dying Soul.

-- PKD

1. The Greeks considered reality veiled (by dokos [Greek: deception], e.g. Parmenides).

2. The Hindus consider reality veiled (by Maya, which we generate ourselves, but which also Kali spins) (cf. Heinrich Zimmer [noted Indologist]).

3. Calvin considered us blinded, that once we could see what is really there, but were punished (this dovetails a little with Empedocles and with Castaneda, with shamanism in general, and hence with the mystery religions, e.g., Dionysos).

4. Augustine considered the City of God mingled with the City of Earth so as to make them indistinguishable to us now; but at the Parousia, they will be separated (to our senses).

5. Zoroaster believed as 4. Good (Ahriman and Ahura-Mazda, the light and dark blended; but at the Final Day, the two portions would be visibly separate).

All are dealing with the problem of phenomenology of accident versus essence: Kant's Ding-an-sich [thing in itself]. "This crumbling pageant."

6. I once saw appearance, then briefly (five days) assimilated the objects of perception (noetically) and then returned to ordinary perception of appearance, the "reflection" of reality (Plato, Paul, etc.). My experience proves that all views that we see only "a reflection from the bottom of a polished metal pan" are correct, FOR WHATEVER REASON, the latter being in doubt only. I did not see; then I saw; then I did not see again (exactly as Paul says). Why the first? Why the second? Why the return of the first? Teilhard's view of an evolutionary step forward? Or anamnesis, restoration of lost faculties (Calvin)? Or coiled, cyclic time? Moebius strip time?

Is change (Dionysos, metamorphosis) real? Heraclitus/Christ Teilhard

Or: Is unchange (Apollo, the healers) real? Parmenides, Jahweh

Is the search itself the goal (as is said)?

My Gollancz speech ["Man, Android, and Machine" (1976), included in this volume] is insane but true. And I knew more then, noetically; what I've read since bears it out. The madman speaks the moral of the piece.

If we deceive ourselves, why? If someone/something else deceives us, then why and also who ? Wacht auf! [Wake up!] Brahmin (it, not he). It dreams, and now wakes, or it was awake, and now falls asleep; I think it is waking. The universe-organism of the Greek philosophers: It wakes and sees. Cells, forming a Great Brain. Bees in a hive. Rising now to consciousness. Of what? Itself? There are no answers, only mysteries (not questions but mysteries: secrets. Sacred secrets, not disclosed to us. But not by whom? Well, when I woke, those five days, change was real: a process. Cosmogenesis (Teilhard). Toward. Omega.

Outline in Abstract Form of a New Model

of Reality Updating Historic Models,