 152. Self, Not The Ego |
Plato's "meno" begins with a question.
Can you tell me, Socrates,
is virtue (true "SELF," prior to ego) to be taught?
Socrates answers. Virtue is
not taught but "recollected" (recognized as "SELF").
Recollection is a gathering of one's SELF together, a retreat "into" one's soul. The doctrine of "recollection" (to know-they-self to be eternal spirit) suggests that each individual should inquire within himself. He is his own center and has possession of the truth in himself.
What is needed is that he should have the will and the perseverance to follow it through. The function of a teacher is not to teach (memorize only), but to help to put the learner in possession of "himself." The student has the true answer in him, if only he can be delivered and directed to it.
Every man is in possession of the truth (which is SELF, reality of BE-ING) and is dispossessed of it by his entanglement in the objective world.
By identifying ourselves with the objective world, we are ejected, alienated from our true nature and condition. Lost in the outer world, we desert the deeps. In transcending the object physical and mental, we find ourselves in the realm of freedom (heaven, Satori, Nirvana, Tao, Christ, at-onement, etc.).
To KNOW THY SELF is not an intellectual activity, to KNOW THY SELF means to EXPERIENCE thy SELF as ETERNAL SPIRIT.
