Subject:  An Important Message from the Kogi Elders !!! |
Author:
MG
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Date Posted: 02/26/07 4:14
Author Host/IP: 222-153-76-177.jetstream.xtra.co.nz/222.153.76.177
In reply to:
Raymond Rugland
's message, "An Important Message from the Kogi Elders" on 06/18/06 8:48
>An Important Message from the Kogi Elders
>
>By Raymond Rugland
>
>Our love of truth is evinced by our ability to
>discover and appropriate what is good wherever we come
>upon it. -- J. W. von Goethe
>The Elder Brothers by Alan Ereira (Alfred A. Knopf,
>New York, 1992; 243 pages, ISBN 0-679-40618-2, cloth
>$23.00), tucked among the new books on display, caught
>my eye. Its subtitle, "A lost South American people
>and their message about the fate of the earth,"
>clinched the matter. The dustjacket portrayed Indians
>of unknown genre, dressed in neat cotton garments and
>wearing conical hats, against a backdrop of
>mist-shrouded mountain slopes. Alan Ereira, historian
>and film director/producer, was chosen by the Kogi
>Indians of Colombia to bring their message to the
>world. This he was able to do with his TV film From
>the Heart of the World (British Broadcasting
>Corporation, London) and with his book The Elder
>Brothers.
>
>Many of us were moved in the '30s by James Hilton's
>Lost Horizon with its Shangri-La, a city deep in the
>Himalayas ruled by a wise lama, where peace and
>harmony prevailed. The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is
>no fiction. Its two peaks, nearly 19,000 feet high,
>seem to rise out of the sea in Colombia, and are home
>to the Kogi. They have lived in harmony with the Great
>Mother with great fidelity for Millennia, following an
>ancient wisdom which affirms all things are rooted in
>divinity. All things, they believe, exist in the mind
>of the Creator before they finally become manifest.
>Spirit permeates every thing.
>
>That binding thread of spirit, called aluna, is
>central to the Kogi philosophy. An enlightened
>teacher, Mama Valencia, explains:
>
>Everything we do is an event not only in the physical
>world but also in the spirit world. We live in a world
>shaped in spirit. Every tree, every stone, every
>river, has a spirit form, invisible to the Younger
>Brother. This is the world of aluna, the world of
>thought and spirit. Aluna embraces intelligence, soul
>and fertility: it is the stuff of life, the essence of
>reality. The material world is underpinned, shaped,
>given life and generative power in aluna, and the
>Mama's work is carried out in aluna. -- p. 63
>Because Kogi elders or Mamas are seers, graduates of a
>mystery school, they have the natural ability to
>penetrate higher planes of existence and hidden
>causes. They understand the vital truth of the maxim
>"as above, so below." When the Younger Brother in his
>vanity, urged by his greed and ambition, thinks that
>he is "running things," that is when the planet and
>our existence on it become endangered. The expression
>of the law of the Great Mother is interfered with.
>
>The Kogi way of life -- being content with the ways of
>old -- is a deliberate choice on their part, rooted in
>a profound sense of duty for carrying out the will of
>the Great Mother and insuring the well-being of this
>living planet. Other peoples of the New World were not
>so much conquered by the invader as they were seduced
>into believing that they were inferior to the race
>that identified "progress" with self-fulfillment in a
>limited sense. Many became Christians, assured that
>they would be considered more civilized. The Kogi have
>adopted the Spanish word civilizados ("civilized"),
>but when applied to the Younger Brother it expresses a
>contempt for the Western understanding of that word.
>The word civilization is an invention of the
>seventeenth century, but was, in fact, excluded by Dr.
>Samuel Johnson from his Dictionary on the basis that
>it merely duplicated "civility." Since then
>civilization has been used to refer to almost anything
>that distinguishes man from the animal. Almost every
>culture regards its way of life as the supreme
>achievement of the ages.
>
>Though much of the Kogi philosophy is unfamiliar, that
>should not deter us from opening "new doors" and
>widening our horizons. The end-product is the strong
>conviction of brotherhood and respect for the earth.
>But how will the sophisticated "man of the world"
>react to it? Possibly millions of TV viewers saw From
>the Heart of the World; far fewer will read the book.
>The film permits a glimpse into the pure hearts and
>minds of this people, but to share in Alan Ereira's
>adventure fully one should read the book. Every
>paragraph is worthy of note and calls for response. In
>this writer's opinion, Ereira's commitment to the
>Kogi, their elders or Mamas, is well taken. The
>message they bring indicates -- as the evidence is
>totaled from many sources -- that there is a sunrise
>of spiritual awareness in the world, and in response
>to that awareness the "gods come out of hiding" and
>allow their voices to be heard once again.
>
>Was there ever a time when humankind was not
>encouraged to come up higher -- to truly evolve forth
>its inner capabilities to bring it to a higher moral,
>mental, and spiritual level than it has ever known?
>The proof is obvious: it resides in the existence of
>great souls who, history records, shone like beacons
>and, because they were once ordinary humans like
>ourselves, could identify with the masses and inspire
>them. How many more left no record of themselves? The
>Kogi have told us repeatedly the Highest dwells within
>us. They modestly consider themselves "a simple
>people" while striving to work ever more perfectly in
>harmony with the Great Mother. Few outsiders would
>have the grasp or the stamina to take instruction from
>the Mamas.
>
>Does not the Kogi Genesis sound familiar?
>
>In the beginning, there was blackness.
>Only the sea.
>In the beginning there was no sun, no moon, no people.
>In the beginning there were no animals, no plants.
>Only the sea.
>The sea was the Mother.
>The Mother was not people, she was not anything.
>Nothing at all.
>She was when she was, darkly.
>She was memory and potential.
>She was aluna. -- p. 115
>Mama is the name the Kogi give to the Great Mother, to
>the sun, or to a wise or enlightened teacher (male or
>female). In the Inca pantheon Mama Ocllo corresponds
>to the Egyptian Isis (A Land of Mystery," by H. P.
>Blavatsky, The Theosophist, March, 1880, p. 160). Even
>if we call this Mother "Space," no matter how
>universal, it is not an emptiness but an existence, a
>manifestation, of something. The wisest of the wise
>gave it no name. The Hindu calls it Parabrahman,
>"beyond Brahman" or limitless. Unnamed, this power is
>nonetheless real and no thing exists but what is
>derived, supported, and sustained by it.
>
>While most native Americans left no written records,
>there is no doubt they identified with nature and the
>Great Spirit. The first invaders from Europe took
>slaves, gold, silver, and jewels. Full of missionary
>zeal, priests used every means to make converts. They
>had no sympathy for native cultures and did their best
>to eradicate them. The little we know about many early
>American cultures is derived from Spanish accounts.
>Alexander Humboldt, a man of universal interests, came
>to Colombia in the early nineteenth century. He
>visited the famed sacred lake of El Dorado ("The
>Golden Man") that had proved such a magnet to the
>Spaniards. He brought back to Europe descriptions and
>drawings of Inca and Maya temples.
>
>In 1915 Hiram Bingham, an American, made the first
>excavations at Machu Picchu, the sacred Incan city. On
>his team was O. F. Cook, botanist, a man of open mind.
>Because of our proclivity to regard ancients as
>uncivilized, their structures are usually labeled
>sacrificial altars, fortresses, or temples dedicated
>to gods and goddesses -- all an expression of
>barbarism. Cook changed all that. He showed that the
>prehistoric walls and terraces were built to convert
>rocky hillsides and canyons to tillable land. Behind
>them, in every case, Mr. Cook found that selected
>soils had been brought in from afar and then placed in
>layers to achieve the ideal mix for agriculture. This
>unknown people was dedicated to the art of farming
>and, hence, to the well-being of the community. What
>was done there on a grand scale has never been equaled
>in any other place and must have taken millennia.
>
>The Kogi, today's custodians of the Tairona
>civilization, have managed to cling to their mountain
>refuge against great odds. In four hundred years they
>have had to contend with slavers, land-grabbers and
>plunderers, fanatic missionaries and, in our own time,
>hostile drug traffickers, warring politicians, and
>murderers. Realizing that this reclusive people had
>"stuck their neck out" by allowing themselves to be
>publicized, Ereira set up a trust fund to help them
>regain their rights and reclaim some of the coastal
>land which formerly was theirs. The Kogi learned from
>bitter experience they had nothing to gain from
>hospitality. Their first words to a stranger are:
>"When are you leaving?" Alan Ereira proved to be a
>rare "gringo" who treated the Kogi with respect, put
>his skills as a publicist at their disposal, and
>consented to take instruction from the Mamas for a
>period of one year.
>
>Why did the tribe finally decide that now is the time
>for their message, and why is it important in their
>efforts to save the planet? They point out that the
>world was made by Serankua, the Son of the Mother,
>before we humans were. A long time ago all humanity
>held a common belief: there were no Younger Brothers.
>All recognized an indebtedness to the Creator for
>their worldly blessings. Understandably, payment has
>to be made for everything -- game taken for food, air
>that we breathe, and all that we require in order to
>live.
>
>When the Younger Brother was given knowledge of
>mechanical things, it became apparent that its
>application would prove destructive to Mother Earth.
>There was no place for him in the sacred land.
>Serankua, recognizing the danger, declared: "Let us
>send them away to the other side and, so that they
>respect us and so that they do not pass, I make a
>division -- the sea" (p. 74).
>
>The Kogi message, delivered by the Mamas in the
>Chibcha language in the nuhue (ceremonial house), was
>translated into Spanish, and finally into English. The
>English conveys some of its primitive majesty.
>
>After centuries and centuries of years
>the Younger Brother passed from the other country,
>says the Mama.
>Senor Christopher Columbus* came to this land
>and immediately saw the riches
>and killed, shot, many natives (*The symbolic name for
>all invaders).
>He took the gold which had been here.
>Sacred gold, gold of masks,
>all kinds of gold.
>They took so much.
>So much.
>So much. -- p. 59
>Younger Brother thinks
>"Yes! Here I am! I know much about the universe!"
>But this knowing is learning to destroy the world,
>to destroy everything,
>all humanity. -- p. 197
>Because Younger Brother is among us,
>Younger Brother is violating
>the basic foundation of the world's law.
>A total violation.
>Robbing.
>Ransacking.
>Building highways,
>Extracting petroleum,
>minerals. -- p. 196
>If all the Kogi die, do you, Younger Brother,
>think that you will also go on living?
>Many stories have been heard that the sun will go out,
>the world will come to an end.
>But if we all act well and think well it will not end.
>That is why we are still looking after
>the sun and the moon and the land. -- pp. 166-7
>The civilization we boast of does not embody what
>spiritual man is capable of. G. de Purucker in his
>Studies in Occult Philosophy states the kernel of the
>problem -- so difficult for our dominant culture,
>which permeates the whole world, to grasp: "That which
>sins in man is his intelligence. Sin lies in choice,
>in action" (p. 72). Now it becomes apparent what H. P.
>Blavatsky meant in The Secret Doctrine when she gives
>the reason for a "select number of fragments" of the
>ancient wisdom making an appearance again, after
>millennia of silence: "The world of to-day. . . is
>rapidly progressing on the reverse, material plane of
>spirituality" (1:xxii). Modern man has been largely
>persuaded that he is not born of spirit. Whether he is
>aware of his divine origin or not, he exercises, as a
>matter of course, a sacred gift: his freedom to make
>choices, guided by his intelligence. When we use this
>gift solely for our own ends -- more plainly,
>selfishly -- we do it in the face of nature's examples
>all around us of selflessness. This, in my opinion, is
>what is meant by proceeding on the "reverse, material
>plane of spirituality."
>
>In our heart of hearts -- for all our declared beliefs
>and good intentions -- we know better. The Kogi Mamas
>see clearly; they are not naive. They are unmoved by
>pious declarations, alibis, excuses, and the down-deep
>conviction that nobody is looking and we can get away
>with it. If what we are doing is destructive to other
>humans, the lower kingdoms, and a living planet which
>provides home for mankind, is it too much to ask us to
>consider changing our direction -- say 180°?
>
>Gloom and doom are not what we like to convey. Neither
>can the strength of good intentions undo the harm that
>has already been done. Good intentions are not enough.
>The bottom line is that there are those who will not
>stop plundering the earth for the dollar bill until
>they are compelled to do so by a rising tide of public
>indignation. Apparently nothing is sacred to those who
>are determined to plunder the planet of its riches.
>There is no thought for the generations to follow. The
>exploitation of other human beings did not end with
>the abolition of slavery and serfdom. Our ingenuity
>never ceases. The Kogi Mamas see us for what we are:
>very Younger Brothers.
>
>The last resort of the "intellectual" is: "What are
>your proofs that the Kogi initiates have more insight
>than our Ph.D.s in the universities in preparing
>students for life?" Compare the practicality of the
>Kogi with our own: possessing few of the gadgets we
>regard as necessities they, nevertheless, have no
>homeless or starving, no gangs, no banks, no "working
>mothers"; whatever urban renewal they need, they do
>themselves. They do not feel disadvantaged because
>they have no shopping malls.
>
>A Mama was assigned to Alan Ereira to instruct him in
>basic teachings and make him welcome in the ceremonial
>lodge. At one point the pupil asked the teacher about
>creation. He was told there was no time for it: just
>to run through the chapter headings would take nine
>nights. The details would require nine times nine
>nights. "We will tell you what you need to know." From
>this we may deduce that The Elder Brothers is based on
>the same logic. The Kogi message is limited to what
>the Younger Brother can receive.
>
>Present-day scientists are beginning to investigate
>the world of sleep, in which we spend a third of our
>lives, but do they really understand about death or
>the causes of birth? The Kogi Mama knows that it is
>only in recognition of the reality of soul and spirit
>that the divine side of human nature can be
>cultivated.
>
>Over the next days, Javier (Rodriguez) was a mine of
>information about the Kogi. He told me that Mamas are
>educated from infancy in the dark, and only allowed
>into the light when their education is complete, after
>two periods of nine years. Nine is the number required
>for completeness, as a foetus spends nine lunar months
>in the womb, and there are nine worlds. There are also
>characters called moros, he said, whose education
>continues for two more periods of nine years. These I
>would never meet; they live high in the Sierra, and
>speak only with Mamas. These are the oracles who
>determine ultimate policy. These creatures are the
>ones who have seen the approach of the end of the
>world. I later discovered that moro is the word for
>any pupil studying to be a Mama. It does seem quite
>possible that some students are not released into the
>light until they are over thirty. . . . The Kogi are
>profoundly ascetic, and prepare themselves for
>important moments by fasting, meditation and sexual
>abstinence; contact with anyone who is still locked
>into the gross physical world can, they believe,
>render this preparation useless. Javier's moras would
>be in this heightened state all their lives, and it
>would therefore be impossible for me ever to set eyes
>on them, but he suggested that they would have their
>eyes on me. -- pp. 77-8
>Anyone who can discern the pure virtues of the
>bushman, the Australian aborigine, the Athapascan,
>Seminole, or the Hopi, should have no problem with the
>Kogi. They wear the seal of majesty: the recognition
>of the divinity in the heart of all. That gold
>insignia shows in their concern for their very Younger
>Brother.
>
>(Reprinted from Sunrise magazine, April/May 1993.
>Copyright © 1993 by Theosophical University Press)
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