Ethics for the new millenium

It is impossible to say something meaningful without it referring in this or that way to everything. With this claim, we again touch upon the notion which is not only the topic of this book but also is the vision of poets and the wise men of yore. From the Vedas of India, Trismegistus, Gnostic Apocrypha, up to the all of mystical literature and poetry, that concept is oneness. (Apocrypha originally meant sacred, supreme scripture, science, revelation, and only later did it acquire the meaning of false according to the Church. Anyway, in Greek and Coptic, apocrypha meant sacred, and in the language of today it undoubtedly means unorthodox.)

We cannot talk about anything without referring to everything. Human rights and the rights of every raindrop, every blade of grass, every grain of sand, every stone and star, the rights of each are inseparable from the those of the many.
What can be said about human rights in society at large in the framework of national and state communities, in the European community, in the community of the United Nations, or in the family when man himself, an individual, officially not under any pressure and quite free, provided with all sorts of material support, deprives himself of his own rights by his own ignorance and his own attitude toward himself? What kind of ignorance is this and what kind of attitude? It is man’s own ideas about himself and the world, his lack of respect for himself and the world, and his disrespect of his true Self, a being above and beyond the material body and far more wonderful that deprive man of his rights. Man’s identification with his own body, his indulgence in fulfilling desires of that body, his reducing himself to that body and its life span, how can such a man with such a demeaning attitude toward himself and his fellow-beings and nature ever help himself and his fellow beings in a lasting and essential way? Considering himself a body, vulnerable and impermanent, he will indulge in immorality and other kinds of transgressions in order to please his body-self. It is man himself who deprives himself of his rights. Therefore, the fundamental transformational process consists exactly in becoming aware of who we are, why we are and what iron law of moral retribution extends from our deeds to the consequences which befall us. Understanding only this last bit, the law of karma, or as common people say, the consequences of the deeds done, is enough to stop everyone in their tracks and make them think twice before doing an intended deed since it will track them down and collect its dues.

Just laws can be written but cunning and brute force will always find their way around them. The market is full of ever newer inventions which protect cars from being stolen. Why are there always better and newer ones? Because the old ones have been outsmarted. There is always the willingness and ability to unlock somebody else’s most complex locks. That race cannot be won. The only solution is for the other side, the one which steals, to come to its senses and remember that the law of “eye for an eye” is a very realistic and mechanic one, though for a while it may not look so since our memory does not reach further than our childhood and our vision cannot penetrate the future. If it did, everyone would be honest because of fear and the instinct for self-preservation, which are but selfish reasons. But having in mind that it is faith that is required here, primarily the faith that nothing happens by accident but according to a law and that everything that happens to us is conditioned by our thoughts, words and deeds, then a change of attitudes is slow and barely perceptible since here faith is honestly considered a consolation and a childish thing. And it does not matter that so many consider themselves to be Christian because they still un-Christianly believe that it does not pay to give up stealing because of some supposed law of cosmic justice.
But if you know, as today’s astrophysicists do and poets have always known, that you cannot light a candle without brightening all of the Milky Way, you also cannot put it out without reducing the galaxy’s shine. If you know this, then you know a great law of interconnectedness not only of people but also of everything in creation. You know that you suffer damage if someone anywhere is tortured, imprisoned, or killed since the energy connections of the mental and physical organism called humankind are invisible but their flow is powerful.

That is what I have to say about human rights. First, we are all connected and interrelated, responsible for ourselves as much as for others and vice versa, and everyone should light their own candle for their own micro-Milky Way, the inner one as well as the outer one, inside of which we circle. The most fundamental among human rights and our most important duty is to know who we are and why we are. Then such brutal violations would not occur.