Mystical Union: And the Metaphysical Philosophy of Yoga

By Stephen J. Bost

Wisdom was in abundance in the ancient societies of Greece and India, but today it seems to be in short supply. Why is that? Where did wisdom go? This book was written to help us rediscover that lost wisdom and to incorporate the concepts of the sages and the mystics into our lives.

The next parts are some of the new manuscripts I have included which talk about some of the differences between eastern and western religious thought and the ideas of the Islamic mystics, in which their thoughts and ideas could help us all solve our problems with radical Islamic ideology.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 2, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524564117

Stephen J. Bost

The author graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in 1975 and has given numerous talks in front of large audiences on the profound subject of Eastern mysticism. He is a published author. The author is married with three children living in Southern California. He lived in India for some time, studying yoga and philosophy. He is also teacher of meditation and yoga.

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Copyright © 2016 by Stephen J. Bost.

Library of Congress Control Number:         2016919656

ISBN:         Hardcover         978-1-5245-6409-4

         Softcover         978-1-5245-6410-0

         eBook         978-1-5245-6411-7

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Eastern philosophy says that universal consciousness and individual consciousness are one and the same separated only by perception. In yoga we try to remove this perceived difference so that these two forms of consciousness become one. When this merging of consciousness happens, it is called a "mystical union." This little book is also dedicated to those seekers who might be interested in learning more about the profound and subtle teachings of the mystical and metaphysical philosophy of yoga.

Rev. date: 12/01/2016

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1: A Brief History

Chapter 2: An Ancient Link

Chapter 3: A Different Perspective

Chapter 4: The Individual’s Predicament

Chapter 5: Eastern and Western Thought

Chapter 6: From Oklahoma to India/Nepal, a journey of discovery

Chapter 7: Contemplations, Profound Quotes, Thoughts, and Ideas

Chapter 8: Mystical Unions

Chapter 9: Some Stories

The Enchanted Cave

A Final Thought

Comparing Eastern and Western Religious Thought

Chapter 1: Comparing Eastern and Western Thought

Chapter 2: Eastern Mysticism

Chapter 3: Stories of some Mystics

Chapter 4: Stories from India/Nepal

Chapter 5: Mystical Quotes and Comments

Epilogue

References

Mystics and the Persian House of Wisdom

Chapter 1: Mongol invasions

Chapter 2: House of Wisdom

Chapter 3: The Crusades

Chapter 4: Nestorian Christianity

Chapter 5: The Mystics

A Final Note

References

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I

dedicate this book to my great teacher and Guru who not only gave me understanding and knowledge but also a direct experience of my ‘true nature’, my own inner Self… the Self of all.

Peace

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Note: This book has been updated with two new manuscripts which I have added at the end. I consider myself a storyteller and some of these stories that you will find here are both inspiring and profound. I’ve tried to offer us all something to think about. I hope you enjoy.

INTRODUCTION

About forty-five years ago I started practicing Hatha yoga; this particular form of yoga was designed to awaken one’s sleeping dormant spiritual energy. This then piqued my interest in seeing if there was more to yoga than just exercise. Thus began my journey which has led me to study the mystery of yoga, including India and Nepal. This book presents some of what I have learned.

I originally wrote this book sixteen years ago and a lot has happened since including our war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the emergence of radical Islam. Recently I’ve written a couple of small books comparing Eastern and Western religions and one book where I discuss a way in which we can battle this radical Islamic ideology using thoughts and ideas from Islam itself.

We will go back in time and find some of the root philosophies for not only Western civilization but also the ancient ideas and concepts that can help us all to discover some insights about ourselves and each other.

There are five great religions in the world: Islam, founded by Mohammed about 1,400 years ago; Christianity founded by the followers of Jesus Christ 2,000 years ago; Buddhism, founded by the Buddha 2,500 years ago; Judaism developed over 3,000 years ago; and Hinduism, developed at least 3,000 years ago and probably thousands of years earlier than that. There is, however, a belief system that is linked with Hinduism but is more of a mystical philosophy that was developed much earlier than the above religions and which the author contends has been with us since the dawn of human existence. This is the metaphysical philosophy of yoga. One purpose in writing this book is to present to Western readers a unique, and perhaps different, view of this profound belief system. The author believes that any individual looking at developing a personal philosophy of life should include a deep and thoughtful look at the mysterious and profound philosophy that is yoga.

The philosophy of yoga is very subtle and sublime, especially to our Western-trained minds. It seems that even the brightest minds of the West have a hard time in grasping some of these unique concepts, and a good example of this were the debates that took place in 1916/17 and again in 1930/31 between two Nobel Prize winners Mr. Albert Einstein and Mr. Rabindranath Tagore. Here is part of their conversations:

Einstein: There are two different conceptions about the nature of the Universe—the world as a unity dependent on humanity, and the world as reality independent of the human factor.

Tagore: This world is a human world—the scientific view of it is also that of the scientific man. Therefore, the world apart from us does not exist; it is a relative world, depending for its reality upon our consciousness.

It is the author’s contention that Tagore had the more subtle view here. Later on in this book we will go into more depth on this and explain our thoughts as to why this is so.

The ancient philosophy of yoga is also a philosophy of life that is relevant for living in today’s difficult and complicated world because it gives us glimpses into the secrets of human nature and how human beings can overcome the problems or situations in which we find ourselves. This is accomplished by giving us a change of perspective as to how we look at society, each other, the world, the universe, and ourselves. This philosophy attempts to answer questions about the profound mysteries of life, such as Who am I? Why am I here? And how can I attain permanent happiness? It also gives us the ability to create for ourselves an effective, dynamic, and workable purpose for our lives.

The following are some meaningful and important definitions from Webster’s II New Riverside University Dictionary that will be helpful in our discussions:

Mystical—of relating to, or stemming from direct communion with God or with ultimate reality.

The word yoga is from the Sanskrit yogah: union; the uniting of the self with the universe. This word literally meant a yoking together and is descended from the Indo-European root yeug—to join, yoke. The author would like to add that yoga is really the uniting of one’s individual self with the universal self. This uniting process takes place within the hidden inner realms of our individual souls.

This work is not about religion. It is about philosophy. In some religions they strive to reach heaven and try to avoid hell. In the philosophy of yoga we try to understand, among other things, the true nature of things. A definition of philosophy is in order: Love and pursuit of wisdom by intellectual investigation and moral self-discipline.

Metaphysics investigates the nature of first principles and problems of ultimate reality, including ontology (study of the nature of being) and often cosmology.

The science of yoga is also about giving people the ability to calm their minds, something that the author feels is badly needed in this modern-day world.

CHAPTER 1

A Brief History

In 1923 Edwin Hubble, an American astronomer, discovered that the galaxies in the universe were relentlessly moving apart, and that the universe was ever expanding outward.

In 1927 a young Belgian priest named Georges Lemaitre, who was also a brilliant scientist, conjectured that if the universe was now moving apart, then this meant that at one time it would have been smaller. Imagining the expansion of the universe in reverse, he envisioned galaxies rushing toward one another coming ever closer together. Carrying this scenario to its logical conclusion, Lamaitre pictured all matter and energy joined in what he called a primordial atom, which scientists now call a singularity. Our universe began, Lemaitre suggested, when a cataclysmic explosion spewed all matter and energy into its still unfolding condition. This theory is now called the big bang theory, and the majority of our modern-day physicists, astronomers, and cosmologists now agree with it.

Modern science believes that about twelve to fifteen billion years ago, give or take a few billion years, from this singularity (an intensely concentrated dot of energy/matter that is of infinite density, which had no width, depth, height, nor any other measurable dimension of space-time) the components of the physical universe exploded out from this point, and the universe began unfolding.

As this hot matter began to cool, stars and galaxies started to form.

Then about 4.6 billion years ago, our sun, earth, planets, and solar system formed.

As our hot planet cooled, the basic ingredients for life began to work their magic. Then after a billion years had passed, life began on earth. First with one-celled organisms, then, over the eons, into more complex plants and animals such as sharks, crocodiles, reptiles, dinosaurs, mammals, and eventually human beings. The process of physical evolution took billions of years.

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Two hundred million years ago, the supercontinent of Pangea, in which the majority of the earth’s landmasses were concentrated into one huge continent and were floating upon the molten rock core of the Earth’s crust, started to break apart and move in various directions eventually recolliding millions of years later. It was about seventy million years ago when the floating continents of Africa and India jammed back together again up against the continents of Europe and Asia. Where these continents met, with one continent riding up on top of another, the land was pushed up, becoming hills, and then eventually becoming huge mountain ranges. Along with the mountains there were also created various valleys and lush lagoons, lakes, and rivers in what must have been a magnificent tropical paradise. Over the millions of years since the collision of these landmasses, the mountain ranges of the Hindu Kush, Himalayas, Caucasus, and others have been continually rising, and, in fact, they are still rising today.

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There is one theory that in these lush valleys and lagoons which were, in a way a real garden of Eden where different groups of protohumans (our very ancient ancestors) were being introduced to each other. Thus began cohabitation and interbreeding that was to lead to the development of a new species of a more advanced and highly evolved early-human being. We also agree with the multiregional theory, which says that humans, in this case Homo erectus humans, evolved about two million years ago in different parts of the Earth from Europe to Africa, including Asia and the islands of Indonesia, and then spread out throughout the rest of world, which set the stage for further human growth and evolution.

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We see that there is one area that has been very rich indeed in the development and history of human beings. This area is in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea region that extends near the Black and Caspian Seas in southern Russia and includes the land surrounding the Sea of Galilee and the Golan Heights. Here, in nearby caves, fossils of our ancient human ancestors have been found dating back to 250,000 years ago along with the remains of both Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon humans that were living in close proximity to each other at about the same time at least 105,000 years ago. Also not far from here, to the north, in the Caucasus Mountains of the Republic of Georgia, near the town of Tbilisi, fossil remains of protohumans called Homo erectus have been found that date back to almost two million years ago. In fact, modern scientists believe that this region has been inhabited by humans since the dawn of human existence. So it is with this rich history in mind that this area will be the beginning of our story.

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North of the town of Tbilisi, in the region called Pontic-Caspian, there lived an ancient nomadic people called the Indo-Europeans. It is their story, and, primarily, their philosophy of life that will be the focus of our book. We will begin with the last major Ice Age ten thousand years ago, which began to melt as this part of the earth warmed up. As these huge sheets of ice, in some cases one to two miles thick, melted, they created lush rivers and lakes that spawned rich and vast fields of wild grain. These fields of grain drew many different large herds of grazing animals, along with the huge beasts that preyed upon them. Here huge animals, such as cave bears, saber-toothed cats, wooly mammoths, wooly rhinoceros, horses, etc., existed, and competed for food during the same time and place as our ancient ancestors. What a difficult time it must have been because not only did they have to deal with these large ferocious beasts but they also had to endure the harsh cold weather and the changing climate. What a different world they lived in compared to our world of today. Somehow our ancient ancestors survived and, eventually, they even came to dominate this hostile environment.

As the rich grazing areas attracted large herds of animals, some of the southern nomadic tribes started to cultivate these wild grains, and this is where the first known farming began. They also began to domesticate some of these grazing animals. Most of this farming activity took place in what is called Mesopotamia near the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Soon towns and villages sprang up that would eventually develop into the first cities and permanent communities. Then about 5,500 years ago in the Mesopotamian town of Ur, it is said civilization first began along with many new inventions such as the development of writing, the use of the plow, the use of the wheel, the cart, etc. During this same period, there was a contemporary culture developing about one thousand miles to the east. It was the Harappan civilization, and it was situated along the banks of the Indus River that borders India and Pakistan. It flourished for about two thousand years then mysteriously died out, perhaps due to flooding. It had developed some very sophisticated cities, artwork, writing, etc., and was as advanced as those of Mesopotamia, with whom they traded.

For a long time this entire area prospered and was witness to the flowering of humankind. This was somewhat disturbed about five thousand years ago by a small group of nomadic warriors from Arabia to the south who invaded this rich and fertile land. These invasions were in turn followed by other tribes from the south, but these were to cause only a slight ripple within this vast region. The big changes were to come a few hundred years later.

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About 4,500 years ago, there came another wave of invasions, but this time they came from the northern regions or from southern Russia in the area called Pontic-Caspian. For some unknown reason, possibly a severe drought, these northern nomadic tribes began