3 2 S p i r i t ua l i t y S t u d i e s 8 - 2 Fa l l 2 0 2 2 Notes [1] This, however, does not exclude the possibility of attaining new knowledge (Crowell 2013). [2] By mystic we mean an individual that has experiential knowledge of God (Vauchez 2012, 259–260). [3] Concerning his “lineage”, Hawkins (2007) argues that his ideas belong to none – his devotion is to truth and God. However, for convenience he suggests his body of work to be called Devotional non-duality. [4] For a more detailed account of hermeneutics and relativism see Wachterhauser 2002. [5] This is, according to our knowledge on the matter, one of the core ideas behind Hawkins’s work. [6] The Map of Consciousness is the instrument in which Hawkins specifies the different Levels of Consciousness. This map is available in all his published books. [7] As Grace (2020, 24), an intellectual and spiritual disciple of Hawkins, explains “[e]ach energy field represents a view of life that makes sense to those at that level of consciousness. Endless arguments go on between people at different levels (even in the same family or workplace) because the world they are seeing is literally a different world. If one is wearing red-colored glasses, everything will appear red, no matter how strong the case is presented by those wearing green-colored glasses. Is the world green or red? The world you see depends on the lens you are looking through. A person stuck in Grief, for example, sees nothing but the past; they talk about ‘what used to be’. A lot of frustration is eased when one realizes that people aren’t ‘bad’; they are simply seeing life the way they see it because of the lens they have. That lens is their level of consciousness.” We see that the argument is, again, the same: we project meaning onto what we perceive through our senses and then attribute reality to what we have projected by believing that it comes from out there. [8] It must be considered that authors like Heidegger and Gadamer do inquire deeply and thoroughly about the matter of truth. We believe, however, that their approach lacks the clarity and simplicity that Hawkins provides to the subject. [9] This is another core idea behind Hawkins’s thought. The fact that one of his greatest books is called Truth vs Falsehood (2013b) seems to indicate that this is so. [10] In his Map of Consciousness, Hawkins designates logarithmic numbers for each level of consciousness. Those, who are below 200 (shame to pride), do not participate in truth. There is a progressive and ascending adaptation of the mind to the entity between calibration levels 200 (courage) and 1000 (Enlightenment). [11] In Heidegger’s words (2008, 213), “[t]his everyday way in which things have been interpreted is one into which Dasein has grown in the first instance, with never a possibility of extrication. In it, out of it, and against it, all genuine understanding, interpreting, and communicating, all re-discovering and appropriating anew, are performed. In no case is a Dasein, untouched and unseduced by this way in which things have been interpreted, set before the open country of a ‘world-in-itself ’ so that it just beholds what it encounters.” Differently put, the interpretative and projective character of human understanding is an ontologically determined aspect of our being. Hawkins, on the other hand, argues that there is a way out of this existential conundrum through the responsible appropriation of the projections that we throw into the world. [12] Aristotle coins the term praxis to refer to the human action based on intellection (Vigo 2007, 110). [13] Hawkins begins and ends each his work (and almost all his lectures) with this exclamation. As an act of devotion to his teachings and respect for the teacher, we have made the decision to follow his example.
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