Left and Right as Metaphysical Principles
Jan. 4th, 2019 10:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
causticusLet's forget the political categorizes for one moment. They're always shifting with the times anyway; what's "left" in one decade shifts to the center or even goes "right" many decades later. Though Left/Right political distinctions we know of today was somewhat a result of the French Revolution, there are indeed underlying metaphysical principles of Left and Right. The manifested cosmos is a constellation of various polarities and Left/Right just happens to be one of those polarities.
So, a rough outline:
Left: Dynamism, change, transmutation, flux, chaos, unpredictability, individuality, differentiation, exceptions.
Right: Order, stability, continuity, predictability, cohesion, conformity, rules.
When it comes to religious practices and beliefs, we can clearly see how this principles measure up in various systems. The most well-known explanation of this phenomenon is the Left hand vs. Right hand path distinctions we find in a lot of esoteric and occult literature.
Left-hand path: Self-actualization/realization, religion/spirituality as a means of individual enlightenment, individual > collective focus, individualized spiritual paths, syncretism, pluralism of beliefs and practices, decentralized or disorganized networks of practitioners as opposed to centralized priesthoods.
Right-hand path: group/collective religious activities, submission of individual ego to a common ideal or object of worship, religion/spirituality as a means of maintaining group order and stability, moralism, uniformity of beliefs and practices and consolidation into single canon or set of doctrines propagated and enforced by an organized priesthood.
Of course many mature spiritual practitioners will rightly state that these two paths are not mutually exclusive and that elements of both should be harmonized as a part of a complete spiritual system. The most advanced will simply tell you right away that, "there is no such thing as the left and right hand paths." This rigid bifurcation is really a distinctly Western problem. The many variants of Western esoteric and occult practices which emerged during the European Renaissance were forced to take a rather defensive (and often secretive) stance against the totalitarian attitudes and methods of mainstream institutionalized Christianity, a belief system that traditionally did not tolerate any deviance from dogma whatsoever. And thus and set of beliefs existing in Christian-dominated lands that did not agree 100% with Christian dogma was deemed by Christian authorities as being pejorative things like "Satanic" .. "Heretical" .. "Evil" .. "Demonic" .. "Devil-worship" .. ect. Ahh, the legacy of hyper-moralized cosmological dualism; but I digress.
This Left/Right polarity was never really a problem in Eastern systems like Hinduism and Buddhism, where both approaches to belief and practice easily coexisted side-by-side. For example, a practitioner of Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism) could choose Shiva or Krishna (or even Shakti) as their prime object God worship. Shiva generally represents the individual enlightenment path (Left), and Krishna (as an avataric proxy for Vishnu) as the self-sacrificing group-oriented worship path (Right). And thus we have the various Shaivaite and Vaishnava schools. Notice how the adherents of these schools don't violently attack or denounce one another; these approaches cooexist together as a harmonious whole. The West has quite a bit to learn from pluralistic religious traditions.
I would certainly agree that these Left/Right principles should be complimentary and never exist in conflict or opposition to one another.
So, a rough outline:
Left: Dynamism, change, transmutation, flux, chaos, unpredictability, individuality, differentiation, exceptions.
Right: Order, stability, continuity, predictability, cohesion, conformity, rules.
When it comes to religious practices and beliefs, we can clearly see how this principles measure up in various systems. The most well-known explanation of this phenomenon is the Left hand vs. Right hand path distinctions we find in a lot of esoteric and occult literature.
Left-hand path: Self-actualization/realization, religion/spirituality as a means of individual enlightenment, individual > collective focus, individualized spiritual paths, syncretism, pluralism of beliefs and practices, decentralized or disorganized networks of practitioners as opposed to centralized priesthoods.
Right-hand path: group/collective religious activities, submission of individual ego to a common ideal or object of worship, religion/spirituality as a means of maintaining group order and stability, moralism, uniformity of beliefs and practices and consolidation into single canon or set of doctrines propagated and enforced by an organized priesthood.
Of course many mature spiritual practitioners will rightly state that these two paths are not mutually exclusive and that elements of both should be harmonized as a part of a complete spiritual system. The most advanced will simply tell you right away that, "there is no such thing as the left and right hand paths." This rigid bifurcation is really a distinctly Western problem. The many variants of Western esoteric and occult practices which emerged during the European Renaissance were forced to take a rather defensive (and often secretive) stance against the totalitarian attitudes and methods of mainstream institutionalized Christianity, a belief system that traditionally did not tolerate any deviance from dogma whatsoever. And thus and set of beliefs existing in Christian-dominated lands that did not agree 100% with Christian dogma was deemed by Christian authorities as being pejorative things like "Satanic" .. "Heretical" .. "Evil" .. "Demonic" .. "Devil-worship" .. ect. Ahh, the legacy of hyper-moralized cosmological dualism; but I digress.
This Left/Right polarity was never really a problem in Eastern systems like Hinduism and Buddhism, where both approaches to belief and practice easily coexisted side-by-side. For example, a practitioner of Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism) could choose Shiva or Krishna (or even Shakti) as their prime object God worship. Shiva generally represents the individual enlightenment path (Left), and Krishna (as an avataric proxy for Vishnu) as the self-sacrificing group-oriented worship path (Right). And thus we have the various Shaivaite and Vaishnava schools. Notice how the adherents of these schools don't violently attack or denounce one another; these approaches cooexist together as a harmonious whole. The West has quite a bit to learn from pluralistic religious traditions.
I would certainly agree that these Left/Right principles should be complimentary and never exist in conflict or opposition to one another.
