The Dark Garden

The Dark PaRDeS

The Dark PaRDeS

I fell in love with the Garden of religious & spiritual delight.  But there are really 2 gardens. One is one of discovery & spirituality. The other is the dark Garden. The peril of the one is that it can be so inspiring & illuminating it can burn ones spiritual retina if one gazes too long. The other garden, the dark garden is one illuminated by the moon. The moon of delusion, desire, illusion & dark fantasies. They can be the same place by day.

Pretense

The Religious can easily be lured into the dark garden. It is a place of unreliable  authorities, where compulsion replaces deep truth. Authorities compel belief, but the initiate pretends to believe so he/she can enjoy all the dark pleasures of the dark garden. They make the mistake of seeing a symbol, something like water, and calling it water.

Authoritarianism and Fanaticism

The dark garden is a place where the truth is defined by a hierarchy of lies. Those at the top of the hierarchy know the truth but are trapped by their own lies. It is possible to become so entranced by the fantasy and abstraction that one fails to eat or tend to one's needs.

Repression.

The dark garden is marked by repression & self repression, masked by the words discipline & faith.  True faith is marked by belief founded on self evident revelation. The dark garden is a place of violent faith & hypocrisy. People can become insane.

Darkness

Oppression

Suffering

The Dark PaRDeS traps those who fail to listen to the warnings of the Story.