Things we could learn:

"In the East you do not need to write books to convince people. If your personal life style is congruent with your mission you will convince people."
-- Abduljabbar al Kubaysi, influential political leader of the Iraqi resistance and secretary-general of the Iraqi Patriotic Alliance (IPA) -- from July, 2007 interview by Willi Langthaler

Ugly American

Don't want to be the ugly American?
Want to get beyond the tourist lines?
Eager to make real friends, learn languages?
Ready to dance and party with the whole world?
Read "Spiritual Traveler: Journeys Beyond Fear"

Who Stole Our Ancient Wisdom?

And how do we get it back?
Notes for a workshop and a book.
The Next Step for the human species...
We are standing in a group together and we initiate a musical note with our voices... an Ommm... a toning...
We let the note create a unified sound field.
Peek at your neighbor.
You are both allowing yourself to be seen with this peek and you are also learning something about your neighbor.
Continue this toning and walk around the room. Mingle and look into each others' eyes.
Forget about who you are and focus on gaining impressions from others.
Continue meandering through the room until you truly trust that everyone in the room is a compassionate person.
In this feeling of trust, were it to become permanent, would you be more willing to surrender to this group and live your life knowing that good thins will happen to you? Wouldn't this be a relief and a pleasure?
What great world religions are known for promoting surrender to the will of God?
Why would anyone surrender to the will of God?
a) they are stupid
b) they believe that they are surrounded by compassionate beings
Was there ever a civilization on planet earth wherein such a trust was possible or common?
Where would it have existed?
It stretched from southern Spain all the way to India.
When?
From 800 a.d. until 1492 a.d.
What kinds of government were there?
Mixed.
What religions were there?
Mixed.
What languages were spoken?
Many.
What could have become of this empire?
Barbarians from the North effectively destroyed it.
What characteristics do barbarians from the cold northern regions have?
a) advanced survival and military technologies
b) a mono-lingual culture
c) a need to militarily control others who speak languages they don't understand
What do barbarians like to call this imposition of technological and military control?
a) bringing civilization
b) bringing a mono-lingual and micro-managerial one-size-must-fit-all "democracy"
Who are they historically?
Mongol, Turk, Slavic, Germanic, to name some major tribes...
Others include Celtic, Latin...
What other characteristics do they share?
a) no knowledge of the history of the civilizations they conquer
b) no writing system for their own language, so they eventually adopt an alphabet from the civilization they conquer
Turks adopted Arabic alphabet after murdering everyone in Baghdad in mid-thirteenth century a.d. (only about 700 years ago)
Germans, Anglo-Saxons, English adopted Roman alphabet about 700 a.d. (only about 1300 years ago)
What are the oldest documents in Germanic languages like English and Gothic and what were they about?
How do these writings compare with contemporary writings from the extensive Spain-India civilization?
a) Persian
b) Vedic
c) Buddhist
d) Hebrew
e) Confucius
f) Taoist
g) Greek
h) Essene
i) Egyptian
j) Coptic
k) Aramaic
l) Babylonian
m) Akkadian
n) Christian
How do tribes from the North approach Southern civilization and lose their barbaric tendencies?
a) Mongols ceased to speak their own language in India and acquired Sanskrit and Arabic which gave them access to Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam
b) Latin-speaking Romance tribes learned Greek which gave them a slight access to Aramaic wisdom
c) Japanese acquired knowledge of Buddhism by learning Sanskrit
d) Germanic tribes acquired a distant sense of Aramaic (original Christian) culture through learning of Latin Romance languages which had glimpsed this culture through learning Greek
Notes on religious lineages:
Semitic (Arab) Islam: at home with Qoran in Arabic
Turkish Islam: everything must be translated from Semitic to Turkish
Persian (Iranian) Islam: everything must be translated from Semitic to Indo-European
Pakistani and Hindu Islam: everything must be translated from Semitic to Indo-European
Indonesian Islam: everything must be translated from Semitic to Malaysian
Orthodox Greek Christianity: at home in early Greek and Byzantine texts -- original Aramaic culture which contained wisdom attributed to Jesus is virtually inaccessable (even early Syriac and Coptic Christian texts were translated back into Semitic from Greek
Slavic Greek Christianity: everything must be translated from Greek -- original Aramaic culture which contained wisdom attributed to Jesus is virtually inaccessable
Roman Catholic Christianity: everything must be translated from Greek -- original Aramaic culture which contained wisdom attributed to Jesus is virtually inaccessable
Protestant Christianity: everything must be translated from Latin or Greek -- original Aramaic culture which contained wisdom attributed to Jesus is virtually inaccessable
Hinduism: at home in Sanskrit
Buddhism in India: at home in Sanskrit but largely destroyed by Mongols
Buddhism in Tibet, China, Japan, Southeast Asia, Indonesia: everything must be translated from Sanskrit
Judaism: Hebrew ceased to be a spoken language after 300 b.c.
The great world religions all contain ancient seeds of egalitarian wisdom.
But they are frequently loaded to favor the tribe of their origin.
Looking at the histories of their translations from one tribal language family to another, would it seem to make much sense to base your life decisions on currently available translations into the English language?
Historical research based on Semitic Jewish documents preserved from the records of Jewish traders who traversed the Spain to India civilization of a thousand years ago make it quite clear that there existed the greatest tolerance for diversity, enthusiasm for scientific inquiry and tradition of peace and mutual trust across multiple linguistic and religious groups which the world has ever known.
What carries a culture?
The languages spoken.
Inhabitants of that pan-Mediterranean, Arabian, South Asian civilization were generally multi-lingual with diverse languages from tribal regions as diverse as Afro-Asiatic, Ural-Altaic as well as Indo-European commonly known and spoken by the same individual.
Since our thoughts are composed of words and our emotions are driven by these thoughts, can we imagine the vastness of an individual consciousness fluent in multiple languages?
How much wisdom from those times and places of tolerance would you expect to find contained in the English language?
What does it mean to realize that there is not even a name in the English language for the greatest, most peaceful and most tolerant civilization the world has ever known?
What are the most primal forms of communication?
a) telepathy
b) body language
Are humans more advanced than other animals because we have evolved language?
a) yes -- great for technology and past and future awareness
b) no -- words are only symbols and tend to lump things together so that the subtle details get lost
c) only if this new communicative tool can be used when needed and then set aside when not needed so it doesn't control us
Who would want to be controlled by a bunch of symbols?
Are they reality?
How do we set words (thoughts) aside when we don't need them?
Dissolve into awareness of something else:
a) pleasure (sex)
b) motion (dance, rollercoaster rides)
c) sound (music)
d) taste (food)
e) smell (essential oils, perfumes)
f) act of surrender to love, trust and the will of God (Goddess, Fate, the Universe, Whatever-You-Want-to-Call-It)

Only One Meal Left...

Suppose we humans discover that there is only one meal left on planet earth. We decide that, since we are all about to starve to death anyway, we might as well give this last meal to someone we love.
What happens?
a) The last human survivor is the most well-beloved...
b) The last human survivor is the one who cheated...
Did it matter which happened?

Amazing Discovery

The words in our minds are what divide us!

Welcome to Spiritual Traveler

Recent travels in the Arab world have made it clear to me that we Westerners have much to learn from the Arab inhabitants of the Middle East. This blog has been created to open discussion and sharing about your travels. Frequently it is while off the beaten paths that we realize how many valuable spiritual lessons we can learn from folks who speak other languages. Please feel free to share your adventures!
Thanks!