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Episodes
Monday Jul 04, 2022
Monday Jul 04, 2022
Talk given at Parklands (Manchester, UK) on 23rd February 1975.
We begin by considering the three-part man. Truth goes into the head, Beauty in the chest, and Goodness in the belly. Truth is perfection, as in a perfect circle, or a perfect straight line. A circle includes and excludes. It includes a finite amount of space and excludes an infinite amount. It is a synonym for rota, form, shape, sphere, eidos (idea), and for True. When we think we encapsulate forms, shapes of experiences, in ideas. If all of our ideas correspond with the external forms we see in the world then they are true ideas. This is how a sane person can operate in the world.
The entire universe is arranged by rotation: electrons orbit their nucleus, planets orbit the sun, which orbits a central point in the galaxy. Simultaneously, every body is spinning on its own axis. “This turning around a centre is everywhere the same, so the one, universal law is rotation.” Whenever a circle is drawn, the ratio of the radius to the circumference is the same. “So one law rules all form.” This is the basis of classical philosophy.
A transcript is available at www.eugene-halliday.net.
Sunday Jun 19, 2022
Sunday Jun 19, 2022
Talk given at Parklands (Manchester, UK) in 1974.
Eugene compares Eastern and Western approaches to 'enlightenment'. The terms ‘East’ and ‘West’ do not refer to geography but to the human body. The East is the consciousness in the centre of our body, the West is the body itself, the physical world. The sun, the light of consciousness, rises in the East and shines to the West, the physical body.
Since the Renaissance, we in the West have taken the empirical approach to understanding ourselves. In the East, the mystical, introvert discovery of the centre of consciousness has been the tradition. Consciousness depends on a containing periphery, an integument, a skin, which allows discrimination between outside and inside. The periphery is the demarcation line between consciousness inside and outside. It is the resistances of the boundaries within the body that gives rise to consciousness. Without this body of resistances we would not be conscious. The universal energy that flows through all bodies becomes conscious as it flows through resistances.A transcript is available at www.eugene-halliday.net.
Monday Jun 06, 2022
Monday Jun 06, 2022
Talk given at Parklands (Manchester, UK) on 28th February 1982. Eugene introduces the analogy of the projectionist in the cinema. When we hear the word ‘God’ we should forget all we have been taught and just think “Generative, Intelligent Power.” The Universe we know is entirely energy, power at work, and this power is sentient.A transcript is available at www.eugene-halliday.net.
Who was Eugene Halliday?
Eugene Halliday (1911–1987) was a British artist, writer and teacher. For a large part of his life he lived and taught in Manchester, running groups and giving guidance and personal tuition to a large number of interested people. Possessing a profound understanding of philosophy, religion and the science of his day, he published 15 books and gave over 250 recorded talks.
Much of his work centred on his interpretation of the esoteric ideas behind religion. Halliday gave the term “absolute sentient power” to what we would call God and said that sentience and thus consciousness was an inherent quality of this power and by extension of all beings. Beings are modalities of this power, which we feel as a field of energy.
He believed that the goal and purpose of life is to grow towards an awareness of our true nature, which is not different from this field and the absolute sentient power itself. This consciousness he called reflexive self-consciousness. The force which calls and drives beings to work is Love – which he defined as “a will to work for the development of the potentialities of all beings.” He valued individuality and encouraged others to discover their own valid way to reveal reflexivity to themselves.
The purpose of this podcast is to share Halliday’s teachings.
Note - Additional talks and transcripts are available at www.eugene-halliday.net