3. Purpose: 1983 0715
Action, thus, is set towards contemplation and an object of contemplation, so that even those whose life is in doing have seeing as their object; what they have not been able to achieve by the direct path, they hope to come at by the circuit. Plotinus Enneads 3.8.6
Comments from Astronoesis -- Anthony Damiani [Read on 7/15/83]
The purpose of life, according to Plotinus, is the acquisition of true knowledge ...
The astrological chart can and does reveal the specific ideas being manifested by that life and assimilated by the individual mind towards that goal. This is the fundamental spiritual nature of astrology. There are many levels of meaning from the ideas hidden in the symbolism of the degrees, which we have referred to as the basic presuppositions and attitudes that are the person. These basic ideas orientate a person towards certain goals in his life and this activity furthers the contemplation carried on by the mind. This contemplation or "in-seeing" is the silent assimilation of those reasons which the second soul is garnering from the experiences in the sensible, because it could not achieve it directly in the Intellectual realm.
Plotinus goes on to say that the purpose of the journey through the cosmic circuit is to acquire some good. What possible good could this be? It is the acquisition of those ideas by the mind--the second soul--to complete the vision resident in the logos. So it is rather a straightforward affair to discern that the purpose of all this activity is to ultimately possess the object of contemplation, the ideas or reason principles that are being manifested by life. This understanding will eventuate in the fulfillment, the peaceful smile of a Buddha.
But now we must consider the more immediate consequences involved in acquiring this knowledge. The knowledge must be applied to the facts of experience and to the yet unresolved picture of the world. The mind must make its own that which it knows. Knowledge must be lived or it becomes a source of infection and these ideas must therefore be applied in their place in the lower world, that is, by being translated into ethics, morality and the virtues, otherwise it is not yet knowledge actualized.
The briefness of this explanation should not delude us into conceiving that this is a process that can be accomplished within the mortality of the ego. It is a process spread over an indeterminable amount of time and involves the assumption of many bodies to secure the necessary observations. To grasp the meaning of this process, assume the existence of a secondary soul that has set out to fulfill its vision. Through its own activity it descends into the lower world and procures the body necessary in order to understand certain reason principles which sensible experience can provide.
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