In Search of the Miraculous

Indicating what had been preserved up to our time, G. at the same time pointed out

what had been lost and forgotten. He spoke of sacred dances which accompanied the

"services" in the "temples of repetition" and which were not included in the Christian form of worship. He also spoke of various exercises, and of special postures for

different prayers, that is, for different kinds of meditation; about acquiring control

over the breathing and of the necessity of being able to tense or relax any group of

muscles, or the muscles of the whole body at will; and about many other things having

relation, so to speak, to the "technique" of religion.

On one occasion, in connection with the description of exercises in concentration

and bringing the attention from one part of the body to another, G. asked:

"When you pronounce the word 'I' aloud, have you noticed where this word sounds

in you?"

We did not at once understand what he meant. But we very soon began to notice

that when pronouncing the word 'I' some of us definitely felt as if this word sounded in the head, others felt it in the chest, and others over the head—outside the body.

I must mention here that personally I was entirely unable to evoke this sensation in

myself and that I have to rely on others.

G. listened to all these remarks and said that there was an exercise connected with

this which, according to him, had been preserved up to our time in the monasteries of

Mount Athos.

A monk kneels or stands in a certain position and, lifting his arms, which are bent

at the elbows, he says—Ego aloud and drawn out while listening at the same time

where the word "Ego" sounds.

The purpose of this exercise is to feel "I" every moment a man thinks of himself and to bring "I" from one center to another.

G. many times pointed out the necessity of studying this forgotten "technique" as well as the impossibility of attaining results of any kind on the way of religion

without it, excepting purely subjective results.

"You must understand," he said, "that every real religion, that is, one that has been created by learned people for a definite aim, consists of two parts. One part teaches

what is to be done. This part becomes common knowledge and in the course of time is distorted and departs from the original. The other part teaches how to do what the first

part teaches. This part is preserved in secret in special schools and with its help it is always possible to rectify what has been distorted in the first part or to restore what

has been forgotten.

"Without this second part there can be no knowledge of religion or in any case such

knowledge would be incomplete and very subjective.

"This secret part exists in Christianity also as well as in other religions and it

teaches how to carry out the precepts of Christ and what they really mean."

I must quote here still one more talk with G., once again in connection with

cosmoses.

"This is connected with Kant's ideas of phenomena and noumena," I said. "But after all this is the whole point.—The earth as a three-dimensional body is the

'phenomenon,' as a six-dimensional body, the 'noumenon.' "

"Perfectly true," said G., "only add here also the idea of scale. If Kant

had introduced the idea of scale into his arguments many things he wrote would be

very valuable. This was the only thing he lacked."

I thought while listening to G. that Kant would have been very surprised at this

pronouncement. But the idea of scale was very near to me. And I realized that with

this as a starting point it was possible to find very much that is new and unexpected in

things which we think we know.

About a year afterwards while developing the ideas of the cosmoses in connection

with problems of time I obtained a table of time in different cosmoses of which I will

speak later on.

On one occasion when speaking of the orderly connectedness of everything in the

universe, G. dwelt on "organic life on earth."

"To ordinary knowledge," he said, "organic life is a kind of accidental appendage violating the integrity of a mechanical system. Ordinary knowledge does not connect it

with anything and draws no conclusions from the fact of its existence. But you should

already understand that there is nothing accidental or unnecessary in nature and that

there can be nothing;

everything has a definite function; everything serves a definite purpose. Thus organic

life is an indispensable link in the chain of the worlds which cannot exist without it

just as it cannot exist without them. It has been said before that organic life transmits planetary influences of various kinds to the earth and that it serves to feed the moon

and to enable it to grow and strengthen. But the earth also is growing; not in the sense

of size but in the sense of greater consciousness, greater receptivity. The planetary

influences which were sufficient for her at one period of her existence become

insufficient, she needs the reception of finer influences. To receive finer influences a