The so-called “supernatural” is often associated with the spiritual. Indeed, what else could it be? We make a distinction, though, between what we believe is “good” and what we see as scary. Supernatural is usually the latter.

Although the distinction falls down on many fronts, depending on how we define supernatural, Syntagma Media does have a blog dedicated to “things that go bump in the night”.

So zip over to read a review of Graham Hancock’s new book, Supernatural.

How do you distinguish between what’s “spiritual” and what’s “supernatural”?

SPIRITUAL NIRVANA is closing down for 7 days and will be back on Wednesday 28th. Urgent enquiries should be addressed to the email given in the sidebar.

All Syntagma Media blogs will be post-free until the same date. Some maintenance and enhancements will be carried out during this period, and our 9th blog, Vista Office, will be launched on the 28th.

In the meantime, have a very merry Christmas, Winter Solstice (Thursday), or whichever festival you celebrate at this time of year.

John Evans
Syntagma Media
Blog Network.

Richard Branson’s Virgin has paid a “six-figure sum” to Deepak Chopra to rewrite the sexually-explicit Kama Sutra, reports New Kerala Online.

Celebrity circuits in London were delighted to read last week that Virgin had paid him a six-figure sum for his interpretation of the Kama Sutra. The deal is described as “bringing together two of India’s most well-known and established brands”. Chopra is said to be keen to put spirituality back into sex and the uplifting title suggested for the book is: Deepak Chopra’s Kama Sutra: Timeless Erotica for the Virgin Mind.

According to the source, Chopra told Celia Walden of The Telegraph: “Originally the text served purely as erotic literature for Kings and Queens. Yet there is a great connection between sexuality and spirituality. I want to explore that and take the carnal experience to new heights of spiritual ecstasy.”

Celia Walden reportedly commented, “This sounds like an interesting position to take.”

Is it wise for a writer like Chopra to be involved in such a project?

Continuing the discussion of Jung and Suzuki begun in Part 3, here we concentrate more on D.T. Suzuki (1870-1966), the man credited with bringing Zen to the West.

For a Buddhist point of view we are fortunate to have Suzuki’s description of his own Enlightenment. After a period of intense concentration and Samadhi, Suzuki attains Satori: “…this Samadhi alone is not enough. You must come out of that state, be awakened from it, and that awakening is Prajna. That moment of coming out of Samadhi, and seeing it for what it is, that is Satori. When I came out of that state of Samadhi I said, ‘I see. This is it.’”

The next day, after the enlightenment was approved by his master, he walked home from the monastery and saw the trees in the moonlight. “They looked transparent, and I was transparent too.” From that moment he was able to answer the apparently nonsensical questions of his master out of a profound insight.

He later wrote that at that point he was not fully conscious of his experience. There was still an element of dream clinging to his consciousness. While working in America a greater depth of realization dawned when contemplating the Zen phrase “the elbow does not bend outwards.” He suddenly saw that the restriction itself was the true freedom.

Later still, and back in Japan working on the records of Bankei, he felt a huge mass of stones “that I had piled up through many years fall away in a moment. I found myself in the unconditionally restful state of mind of … as-it-is-ness (suchness).”

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