Online World Provides the
Astral Agora of Our Planetary Village
Carlos Cardoso Aveline
The Agora or meeting place in a city of ancient Greece, and the planetary Agora of today
“Ethos”, says the Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, is the fundamental character and spirit of a culture, or society.
Each nation has an ethos of its own. It possesses a common karma, a collective heritage which is shared by its citizens. The esoteric movement is a cross-national community which has its own sort of identity or “character”. Theosophical associations exist in some 70 or 75 countries, while there are more than 180 member-states in the United Nations.
Theosophists are still poor in cultural and national diversity, therefore. But they already exist in a number of nations, and the ethos of many a country has been interacting with some of the most fundamental tenets of esoteric philosophy for over a century now.
The Internet is also cross-national and in recent years it has put each individual in potential contact with everyone else around the globe. In the international theosophical debate, people from many cultures add distinct flavors and viewpoints to the original teachings of theosophy. New places around the planet – some of them situated in inner and non-geographical locations – emerge as active centers for the renewal of the movement. This brings about a variety of styles in action, in leadership, and in approaches to the duty and dharma of the theosophical effort.
The theosophical effort is cross-cultural, inter-linguistic, multi-cultural. It transcends national limits, and it also respects them. It sees diversity and unity as necessary parts of life.
The search for esoteric wisdom occurs among people of different social classes, ages, and intellectual skills. As more and more of life gets transferred every year to the subtle online world that is part of the astral light, the democratic sharing of information and responsibility becomes more immediate and powerful.
The Internet is emerging as an efficient vehicle for buddhi-manasic dialogue. The online world is the great abstract Agora, the market-place of ideas and meeting-place for people. On it, nations and world-citizens of all kinds share thoughts, viewpoints, perplexities and experiential testimonies.
A global ethos is in the making, and theosophy is part of the glue that holds it together and gives it its inner substance.
Ethics relates to ethos: it is a feeling of duty towards the collectivity we belong to; and by now everyone can see that our collectivity is the whole planet. Even our solar system cannot be seen as much more than the local village.
The theosophical movement can understand that, and it must make a stronger buddhi-manasic contribution to the building of a planetary ethos. Esoteric philosophy has a silent, invisible, but effective role to play in the global awakening. To the perception of this role the theosophical movement is awakening already. However, the awakening also follows the rule and the karma of each local Ethos. Some countries are more open to change than others. None of them has to be dismantled because of the growth of a planetary awareness. Nations become more subtle in their substance, yet respect for them is of the essence.
There are individuals and perhaps few theosophical groups that think they know already too much to learn anything from life. In other places, however, life is new and must still be invented.
Learning is the main purpose of life, perhaps: learning the law of mutual help and solidarity. Things always happen according to Law, and they occur in the timing that best serves Law. There is no way to accelerate or slow down the dawning of the new day. The spirit and the people of each place and nation have much to contribute to the new global Ethos and its planetary Ethics. Their lessons are different: we need all of them.
000
An initial version of “The Ethos of Global Citizenship” was published in the December 2012 edition of “The Aquarian Theosophist”, with no indication as to the name of the author.
000
Readers are invited to see in our associated websites the text “How Theosophy Transcends Tribalism”.
000
In September 2016, after a careful analysis of the state of the esoteric movement worldwide, a group of students decided to form the Independent Lodge of Theosophists, whose priorities include the building of a better future in the different dimensions of life.
000
E-Theosophy e-group offers a regular study of the classic, intercultural theosophy taught by Helena P. Blavatsky (photo).
Those who want to join E-Theosophy e-group at YahooGroups can do that by visiting https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/E-Theosophy/info.
000