Saint Satan, my first response in reading Peck's ideas was also about Ken Wilber. His work has been a huge influence on me as I left the Witnesses.
Wilber's spiral of consciousness is a bit more complex than Peck's, and also takes into consideration the fact that a person can be on one level of consciousness in some aspects of his life and on a lower or higher level in other areas. I appreciate that Wilber takes into consideration that life and the human personality is far more complex than Peck's "four-stages" model allows for.
For Gravedancer and others who question Peck's basic concept, Wilber, in his books, offers the results of several scientific studies of how individuals progress through various stages of spirituality or, more accurately, consciousness. He is much more difficult to read than Peck is, but I strongly recommend Wilber's "A Theory of Everything," and the more readable "One Taste," which is a year of Wilber's journals in which he explores all of these ideas.
That having been said, I disagree with several statements in Peck's characterization of Stage IV, and I think Wilber would as well.
I accept Peck's thoughts that the higher stages of human development would be marked by: "...Out of love and commitment to the whole, using their ability to transcend their backgrounds, culture and limitations with all others, reaching toward the notion of world community and the possibility of either transcending culture or -- depending on which way you want to use the words -- belonging to a planetary culture... not looking for clear cut, proto type answers, but desiring to enter into the mystery of uncertainty, living in the unknown... never separating himself from others with doctrine..."
But I disagree that the higher levels of consciousness have anything to do with: "..They are religious...The Christian mystic, as with all other mystics, through contemplation, meditation, reflection and prayer, see the Christ, God's indwelling Spirit, in all people, including all the Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Jews and so forth, recognizing the connectedness of all humanity with God..."
This religious language indicates that those at this level of existence have some sort of belief in a spirit world and in God or Christ, when that may not be so at all. Wilber uses contemplation and meditation as tools in moving to higher levels of consciousness, but approaches this like a good scientest approaches an experiment. If you do ABC and D, the result will be X. Wilber shows that for thousands of years, individuals who engage in a regular meditative or contemplative practice (ABC), always have produced the same results (X). Those results are in the first part of what I took from Peck's quote - a sense of unity, love and commitment toward all living things without concern for culture or background or doctrine.
Now SOME have interpreted this sense of unity to a oneness with God or Christ or Buddah. Personally, I think this is simply a reflection of their religious background in Phase II. They may be religious, but never with a sense of dogmatism and a need to change others, because they've moved on from that lower stage.
But others have not seen this sense of universal unity in religious terms, and this is where I differ from Peck. I would say that the 74-year-old atheist hippie that Farkel wrote about is likely at one of the highest levels in the development of human consciousness and what I would call genuine spirituality.
I see spirituality now in terms of our relationship with other humans, with the earth, and ultimately, the universe itself. When I was a Witness, I thought of spirituality only in terms of my relationship with God and what I was DOING - was I praying, studying, preaching? But I now see that that had a lot to do with being religious, and nothing to do with being spiritual.
Englishman asked if atheists are at a deeper level of spirituality than are JWs, and the answer is "Of Course!!" This was one of the great truths that I came to see as I left the Witnesses. Witness' 'spirituality' is actually very, very shallow. It seems to cover a wide area - Witnesses attend meetings, they preach, they study the Bible and build KHalls and assembly halls. It seems to cover such a huge area, every part of their lives even - but in reality it's paper thin.
For example, Witness thought is that I love humankind and show that love by preaching to convert and save others. But the shallowness is shown by the actual Witness view of humanity in general - non-Witnesses are wicked, alienated from Jehovah, bad associations, and will be destroyed unless they start believing as Witnesses believe.
I've written here and at the old H2O several times about the fact that some people leave the Witnesses because they are seeking a new "translation" of the same basic stories, and others leave because they are experiencing a genuine "transformation" to a new level of consciousness. This variation in thinking is evident in the age-old Witness panic question: "Where will I go to if I leave the Witnesses?!" Some people need a religion to tell them how to think and feel. They need to know that there is a big daddy in the sky looking over them who will make everything OK. So these folks, when they leave the WTS, scurry off to some other religion and the security that religious belief provides them in an uncertain world. They haven't transformed, they are merely seeking a new translation of the old religious ideas, and maybe one closer to their liking.
Others who leave never want to belong to another controlling organization again. They are willing to face the uncertainty, and to do it on their own. They are in the process of a genuine transformation to a higher level of spirituality and consciousness. They no longer need the guiding hand of religion, just as a child grows up and moves out from under the control of his parents.
You can easily see the difference between those who have merely moved to a new translation of the old myths, and those who have grown up spiritually, on a site like this one. The people who left the Witnesses seeking a new translation will come on here and argue about whether this particular Bible verse means that God is a trinity, or if that verse proves the soul is mortal, or if this other one proves it's immortal, or what the meaning of this or that Bible prophecy is.
A person who has moved on to the next level of spiritual development just sees all of that as silliness - like an adult listening to children on a playground arguing about the tooth fairy.
One last point. Another reason I disagree with Peck's stages is that I found myself going through what he labels as Stage IV and then moving on to something much closer to what he calls Stage III, and I agree that they are at least somewhat reversed. I know a ton of people who are into a sort of quasi-spirituality, seeing themselves as mystics, or something akin to mystics. But if that level of consciousness does not take into account the proofs and evidence so abundant in the world of science and logic, it's nothing more than a more sophisticated form of the fundamentalism found in Peck's Stage II.
For example, I might enjoy a Solstice celebration because of its recognition of our connection with the earth and the seasons. But if I REALLY believe that that celebration is what is going to cause the days to lengthen as the sun returns to the Northern Hemisphere where I live, well, I'm just another poor, ignorant asshole. Anyone familiar with some of the aspects of the New Age, New Paganism movements will understand what I mean by that comment.
Anyway, enough of that. But I highly recommend anyone who is interested in the thoughts Eman started this thread with, to check out the writings of Ken Wilber. Be prepared for a rather fascinating intellectual adventure. You may never see the world in the same way again.
S4
