> My original reply seems to have disappeared somewhere
> Greg wrote, in reply to me..
> > >the second of these (if an inhabitant of a short world practices
> >>extreme mysticism, can they contact the transcendant? Is there
then
> >>a link?).
> >The answer is no, they could not. No link exists. That is part of
the
> >definiton of a short world. It has no link with the Absolute
> (the final
> >word being used to describe the Transcendent and Mystical realms.)
>
> To me, contacting the Absolute is a state of being. So it
> seems to make no intuitive sense that your physical location should
> affect your metaphysical state of being.
> However, that's too literal an interpretation. Looking at the
> 'worlds' as metaphorical for states of consciousness/being,
> travelling between worlds affects your state of being.
I rpefer to talk about states of conciousness personaly, but yes, I think this is definitely on the right track. The inner world of Glorantha is the objective world, which the otherworlds are subjective experiences projected through the heroquester's altered state of conciousness.
> I'm going to take a leap and posit that the major Otherworlds
> correspond to different modes of full consciousness, while the
Short
> worlds correspond to states of less than full consciousness. ....
I think they are 'fantasy worlds', based on 'what if' assumptions about the higher worlds. A mystic who is guilty of hubris will become trapped in a maze of shallow short worlds, never finding the path to transcendence. They are worlds created in our own image, hence Arkat's injunction to heroquest with humility. To do otherwise is to risk deciding your own truth, and becoming lost in your own otherworld that will be merely a shallow reflection of your worldly desires and passions.
If all you care about are worldly desires and passions though, this can be good!
Short Worlds have to be based on 'a' truth. There has to be something real about them, but it has limitations.
>
....The
> Underworld, which has no direct contact with the Transcendant
either,
> corresponds to death.
I'll say yes, because you are undoubtedly correct, but I realy don't understand properly what that means.
> To answer my own question more fully, then, you cannot
> contact the absolute from a state of incomplete consciousness, you
> have to awaken to full consciousness first. ...
Which is actualy quite hard, especialy if you are traped in a world out of somebody esle's head. However if you could realise your full transcended conciousness (hard enough in the real world), the short world would collapse around you like tissue paper (IMHO).
> ....So you in
order to
> practice a mystic path that had the result of contacting the
> Absolute, it would be necessary to leave the Short World first, to
> awaken. The affect of mystic practice in a short world is first to
> make the practitioner leave the short world. Dreamers wake, etc.
I'm not realy sure about native short world denizens. They may be a bit like Star Trek holodeck people.
> Pushing this range of thought, I'd guess that in a Jungian
> sense, the major Otherworlds all contain elements of all the
> different human faculties (thinking, feeling, intuition, the
senses,
> etc), but with different modes dominant. The short worlds do not
> contain the full range.
> Comments?
My knowledge of Jung is a bit thin. Transcendence would be equivalent
to an experience of the Self, while neither identifying the Self with
the
Ego, nor subsuming the Ego entirely within the Self. (Scylla and
Charybdis according to Campbel, I believe).
I'm not sure how to describe short worlds in jungian terms. Perhaps as Imago shadows animated by neurotic complexes? Er, probably not.
Simon Hibbs
End of The Glorantha Digest V8 #455
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