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George Ohsawa's Order Of The Universe
The order of appearance of things is a random one dictated by another order, the Order of the Universe. The following are what George Ohsawa laid down as fundamentals based on his understanding of this Order of the Universe. He spent much time devoted to this understanding, eventually succumbing to the efforts of his experimentation. When reading what he has written we need to put it into perspective through the changes he was always talking about. It is at times abstract and difficult to understand and this is the way it is. As your condition improves, so does your ability to understand. Become familiar with what he says and don't stop coming back to it for you will see something different each and every time. Patience is a great teacher. The forums on this site are for questions. Please ask them. Someone will be able to answer sooner or later or at least direct you to the information you need. Macrobiotics is not about the easy answer. Doing the work is what strengthens us all. Take a deep breath and relax. Enjoy and participate. Discussion is what it's all about. We are all in the process of making changes from the ground up. Thank you Bill Neall.
Ohsawa: Seven Levels of Judgment : The levels of judgment as explained in Chapter 4 of Essential Ohsawa (GOMF) are as follows: "Our happiness depends upon our judgment. Judgment develops upward toward perfection...from one to seven. At the time of birth and for some time thereafter, we are unable to form any judgment. Then the physical judgment, the lowest one, awakens. After some days, the sensorial judgment begins to function and to perceive cold and warmth, two poles of our relative world. It develops from day to day, and gradually can distinguish all the degrees between two extremes: colors, shapes, temperatures, agreeable or disagreeable tastes, sympathy or hostility. This latter stage of development occurs within a few weeks. After some months, we reach the affective emotional, sentimental judgment. We discern what attracts us effectively and what frightens us or may harm us, etc. In the fourth stage, judgment develops in us the true concept of the two antagonistic categories: good and evil, beautiful and ugly, useful and useless, healthy food and poison, just and unjust. This intellectual stage also includes all natural or scientific categories. On reaching the fifth stage, judgment turns social and perceives a wider horizon: economy and morality. In the sixth stage, ideology develops (dualism, materialism, spiritualism, life's affirmation or negation, etc.). It is in the seventh stage, the very last one, that our judging ability reaches the constitution of the universe and life, where we are able to embrace all opposites in order to establish the grand universal unification. Such is, in my opinion, a general sketch of the natural development of our judgment. It is innate and can be likened to memory, the basis of our faculty for adaptation, and its expansion is but our self-realization (or the realization of life itself). This realization can be destroyed, deformed, and repressed under the influence of the biological, physiological, and social surroundings during childhood. It is then the beginnings of our misfortune and the reason why some souls are detained and remain behind. Their judging remains childish and undeveloped. This is the case with all those who look toward symptomatic medicine and all those who love wealth, strength, and authority - such as famous politicians, industrialists, soldiers, physicians, etc. Of course, they are not entirely responsible for this state of mind; their surroundings are greatly responsible, for the impede and stop the natural and total development of judgment... The first four stages of this evolution are egocentric. A great many people who consider themselves pacifists are, in fact, sentimental and simplistic, for their judging belongs only to the third stage of judgment. Most pacifists are those who do not like war; they are afraid of war, and this is the reason for their pacifism. They are not aware of war's origin, and without being aware of its origin, one cannot solve a problem. One need not be afraid of war, but one must perceive one's own egoism, one's sentimentality and lack of fortitude, which can be one cause of war. This is true for all of us, large and small, philanthropic and religious, if we do not live according to the vivere parvo principle: eat and drink only what is necessary. In any case, one cannot possess supreme judging ability (the seventh stage of judgment) from the very beginning. One must first develop the lowest judgment. Therefore, one must endure heat, cold, hunger, and the greatest difficulties, not only in childhood, but all during one's entire life (vivere parvo). And as one grows older, life seems more agitated and full of difficulties and sadness. One must love and be betrayed. Without having lived such a life, one cannot and must not unfold one's conceptual faculty of judgment. Later, the judging ability expands, through social and ideological life, to the supreme ability. And the supreme judging ability must be strengthened, developed, and increased infinitely by training the lower categories of judgment at the same time as the higher ones, since "the greater and wider the back, the greater and wider the front." The seven stages of judgment are not alien to and independent of each other, but just different degrees of the same judging ability. They are the roots, trunk, boughs, foliage, flowers, and fruit of this "judgment tree." In order for boughs to develop and for flowers and fruit to be produced in large quantities under a fine sky, there must be thick and thin roots reaching deep into rich black soil." (Thank you, George.) Ohsawa's Seven Principles: From Essential Ohsawa, GOMF, pp 123-126.
1. Whatever has a beginning has an end (the principle on inversion and the negation of the law of identity and contradiction in time). That which has a beginning is inevitably proceeding toward its opposite. Beginning and ending are always opposed to each other: birth-death; formation-decomposition; poverty-wealth; meeting-separating; having-losing, etc. In this way, all of these various functions are inverted forms of their opposite. All thinks in this relative world, at a greater or lesser pace, will eventually conform to this law. If there is anything that does not conform to this law, it belongs to the absolute, infinite world. Such a thing, however, is exceedingly rare. You must be extremely careful in order to detect the invisible and infinite thread that runs through and connects things.
2. That which has a front has a back (the principle of omote-ura, front and back in Japanese, and the negation of the law of identity and contradiction in space). Front and back are opposites and they are also complementary. There is nothing in this world that has one without the other.
3. No two things are identical (principle of difference and the negation of the law of identity). There are no two identical things in this world. Mountains, rivers, rocks, states and countries, the Earth and other planets, the sun and stars, people: all are unique.
4. The larger and greater the front, the larger and greater the back (the principle of balance and the negation of the law of the excluded middle). when one reaps great profits in some way, one inevitably receives great losses in another. Great progress is accompanied by great degeneration. One example is the striking contrast of modern civilization and nuclear warfare. The legal system and the police are always running a competitive marathon with crime. It is the same with modern medicine and disease.
5. Change (differentiation or movement), as well as stability (state of temporary equilibrium as two opposing forces exchange their energy and direction), are products of the two fundamental, universal, and dialectical forces of yin (centrifugality) and yang (centripetality) confronting each other (principle of dual origin and the negation of formal logic). The forces of yin and yang are interpreted as cold-hot; dark-light; acid-alkaline; dilation-constriction; ascent-descent; negative-positive; feminine-masculine, respectively. These are all antagonistic and at the same time complementary. Everything is in a state of constant, incessant change. All is fluctuating, volatile, and ephemeral. All is engaged in a motion. Motion, differentiation, joining together, separation, are all nothing more that the various processes of change through which all things must inevitably pass. Mountains are waves that rise and fall within empty space and then subside and vanish into nothing. Change is everything. Balance or equilibrium is the point where two different directions meet and exchange their respective energies. All changes, as well as so-called balance or equilibrium, are produced and given life by the intersecting of opposites. The resulting scene is then projected onto the screen of the absolute or infinity.
6. The two conflicting forces of yin and yang are the right and left hands of the one, absolute, eternal infinity (principles of polarization and the foundation of the universal dialectic logic). Since yin and yang are in reality complementary, all phenomena have a dialectical constitution made of these two opposing factors. All physical phenomena contain a central point that gathers all peripheral elements toward its center. Furthermore, all chemical elements are made up of two groups that continually contend with each other. For this reason, one uses the reactionary changes of opposing factors such as acid and alkaline and heat and cold alternatively for physical or chemical analysis and synthesis. Without antagonism there is also nothing complementary. Yin and yang are the two hands that create, sustain, and destroy, in order to produce anew, everything that exists in this relative world. Therefore, all things existing are inevitably relative, antagonistic, and, at the same time complementary. Where there is no conflict, there is also no harmony. Where there is no contradiction, there is also no agreement. Therefore, every thesis is progressing towards antithesis in order to synthesize and create a new thesis. I believe, at this point, it should be obvious that the above six principles, all of the relative world, completely destroy all the old laws or theories. These are, after all, of no use whatsoever in solving the disputes and quarrels of everyday and family life, much less international conflicts, which require an even larger perspective in order to be understood. Formal logic is an extremely sensory and simple-minded invention. The law of identity is demolished without a sound by the principle of inversion, as is the law of the mean by the principle of balance.
7. This great universe, the so-called world of oneness, is unchanging, limitless, constant, and omnipotent. It is infinity itself and produces, transforms, increases, destroys, and gives rebirth to all people and things both physical and spiritual (principle of polarizable monism). This oneness may be referred to as God, the all-knowing, all-powerful, and ever-present One; the ruler of the universe; that primal force that is uncreated and without beginning or end; the infinite, eternal One. Principles one through six appeal to the five senses. They are a sketch of the order of the relative world. They are the most fundamental principles underlying the entire manifest world, from the earth we live on to the great expanse of the universe. In contrast to these, the seventh principle is a sketch or the parental source of yin and yang, the ultimate cause of the universe itself. Don Beckett posted this explanation of the Seven Principles on the cybermacro Main Forum in response to a question from Donna March 9, 1999): Donna: ...Would it be possible for someone to start at the beginning and take, say, each of the theorems and principles etc. and explain them in easy to understand language, and also add examples of how they are applied in every day life? For example - "All things are differentiated apparatus of One Infinity"
1) All things being differentiations of one Infinity -- I think this describes the process of creation. Everything tangible and distinguishable arises out of the intangible and indistinguishable (undifferentiated), call it God or Infinity or whatever you like. All things arise from this Infinity, exist in it, and therefore embody at least something of the nature of Infinity. In everyday terms, maybe the creation of a human embryo gives us some hint of this process: it begins as a single, undifferentiated cell, divides and divides and divides (still undifferentiated cells), then, at various points of development, certain groups of cells differentiate to form particular organs, limbs, etc.
2) Everything changes. Simple observation: nothing in the physical world remains unchanged. Everything is born or in some way created, has a certain lifespan (including stages of growth and deterioration), then dies, withers away, vanishes, is transformed into something else. Even when a thing may appear unchanging for a period of time, changes are happening; for example, we may appear the same from one day to the next, but millions of unseen changes are going on in every cell of our bodies -- new cells being created, old ones dying, etc.
3) All antagonisms are complementary. We live in a world of duality: night and day, winter and summer, up and down, black and white, cold and hot -- and, though these pairs may seem to be opposites, one complements the other, their "opposing" natures create a balance between the two.
4) There is nothing identical. No two things are the SAME thing, in other words. Even if two things are exactly alike, the fact that they are two separates them, means that they occupy different points in space and/or time.
5) What has a front has a back. Another way of saying that everything is duality. Every time you inhale, you then have to exhale. What goes up, eventually comes down. Balance has to be maintained.
6)The bigger the front, the bigger the back. Someone who promises the most ethical Presidency ever....may end up exposed as a gangster, a pathological liar, etc. On the other hand, someone with much less flash and charisma is also likely to have much less of a "dark side." Or...say you eat some ice cream. Eat a spoonful and its effect in your body will be minimal; eat a half gallon and you'll really feel it!
7) What has a beginning has an end. Similar to #2. There is nothing we know of (in the differentiated world) that has a beginning and no end. Only God or Infinity, we believe, is endless....and also beginning less. (Thank you, Don) Twelve Theorems of the Unifying Principle (from Essential Ohsawa, pp 128-129, GOMF) These theorems define the functioning of the relative world in terms of yin and yang.
1. Yin and yang are the two "activity poles" of the infinite pure expansion and are produced infinitely and continuously from the infinite pure expansion itself.
2. Yin and yang, combined in an infinite variety of proportions, produce energy and all other visible and invisible phenomena.
3. Yin activity is centrifugal (dilating) and produces expansion, lightness, cold, etc. Yang activity is centripetal (constricting) and produces contraction, weight, heat, etc.
4. Yin attracts yang; yang attracts yin.
5. Affinity or force of attraction between things is proportional to the difference of yin and yang in them. In other words, the force of attraction between yin and yang is greater when the difference between them is greater, and smaller when the difference is smaller.
6. Yin repels yin; yang repels yang.
7. The nearer two beings or phenomena of like activity are to each other, the more they will repel each other. The farther away, the weaker the repulsion.
8. All phenomena are composed of both yin and yang activities. There is nothing completely yin or completely yang. All is relative.
9. there is nothing neutral. There is always yin or yang in excess. No phenomena is balanced. Polarization is ceaselessly working and is universal.
10. All phenomena are constantly changing their yin and yang components. Everything is restless. In other words, yin and yang are constantly changing into each other.
11. Yin produces or becomes yang and yang produces or becomes yin at the extremes of development.
12. Everything is yang at its center and yin at its periphery (surface).
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