Consciousness, Literature and the Arts

Archive

Volume 4 Number 1, April 2003

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Illusion and creativity, where does fascination come from ?

Abstract

The interrelations of rational and emotional aspects of creativity, the role of well-developed symbolic thinking are discussed. The considered examples pertain to mathematics, medieval architecture, painting of Renaissance, and religion.

Introduction

Descartes said : « Cogito ergo sum » « I think therefore I am », but is this reality ? From the Indian philosopher Inayat Khan we can read : « Reason is the illusion of reality » (Khan, 1974). Here are some more questions : Are animals unreal because they cannot apparently think ? Are plants and all the surrounding world unreal ? Is suffering unreal ? What is reality ? What is illusion ?

We do not actually know, except that we have in common a feeling that the world we are living in gives us the illusion of being real. So from our vantage point we live in a real world, and in this so- called real world creation is permanent. We are integrated in the endless cycles of the universe metamorphosis. As a matter of fact as soon as simple or compound elements appear there is either repulsion or attraction, fight or love and as a result, there is death for many, and union and multiplication for many others. Besides we notice that out of death, through the chemical process of decomposition other bodies appear and all this forms a chain that goes on and on...

Creation in our world is permanent.

Creation and Creativity

Now, what do creation and creativity have in common and what makes them different ? For creation as well as for creativity one needs at least two elements to create something new, and the bigger the number of connected elements, the more elaborate the creation is.

But for creativity we need more. First, we have to be conscious of what we are doing, then we have to be aware that what we are elaborating did not exist before and feel that it should exist now.

Can we achieve all this out of reason, out of the studies dealing with consequences and effects ?

To my mind, this is not enough, there must also be a strong appeal that has nothing to do with logic, that has something to do with a part of our being for which there is neither shape nor form, for which, no precise definition can be given. This appeal seems to be at the same time, basic and transcendental. Basic because it is vital and creativity like creation is permanent, but also transcendental because we feel that what we are doing should be perfect. Unfortunately very often by lack of means, possibilities, energy and so on… we are far from reaching that perfection and here doubt comes. Yet there are moments when emotion arises like a tuning-in with the sound-post of the Great Universal Cosmic Soul, and then, all of a sudden, a gift, an illumination may invade us.

When this occurs, why not consider it, on the one hand, as the fruit of all our former studies and knowledge, and on the other hand, as the result of this wonderful emotion ?

A / Pascal’s triangle

To begin with, I will try to represent this through Pascal’s arithmetic triangle. But a question could arise, why a triangle ? As a matter of fact, everyone knows that parallels join in the infinite and from this virtual connection point an infinity of triangles can spring forth like the rays of the sun.

In his « Thoughts » Pascal wrote that Man is between two abysses : Infinity and Void, he also added : « All the visible world is but an imperceptible dot in Nature’s Spacious Bosom. No idea can approach it. No matter how much we inflate our concepts, we only give birth to atoms compared with the reality of things. It is a sphere whose center is everywhere, whose circumference is nowhere... Therefore let us know our limits ; we are something, we are not everything ».

Keeping this in mind, we may nevertheless, at our level, imagine that this infinity of infinite centers converge towards The Center which could be the Principle of All. Let us call this point ALPHA and choose one of the possible triangles.

Pascal with his arithmetic triangle defined a table in which every number is worth the sum of the one preceding it on the same line and of the one above it in the same column.

If we represent this under the shape of an isoceles triangle we notice that :

1/ if for every new number on each side of the triangle we draw a parallel to the other side, as the triangle gets bigger, the numbers inside get bigger and bigger too ;

2/ the biggest numbers are to be found at the converging points which are right under the summit of the triangle ;

3/ if we join two equidistant points situated on the two sides of the triangle, for example B and C, we create two new triangles B Alpha C and B Béta C,

B Béta C being the exact replica of B Alpha C.

We can then deduce that all the elements contained in the second triangle are already included in the first one, in other words, the principle of unity is infinitely repeated in its elements in General and in Particular.

In a more colloquial language we would say that all the elements of the sea are contained in a drop of water, although a drop of water is not all the sea.

Now, as I said before, the biggest numbers are to be found at the converging points which are right under Alpha, that is to say under the top of the triangle. This is most important. On the one hand, these new numbers are the sum of the two preceding numbers which themselves are the biggest ever met up to that moment, and we may say that they are the result of a long series of deductions made at least on two different sides ; but, on the other hand, as they are on direct line with point Alpha, we may also say that suddenly a direct connection has been made with this point and something which had not been seen before suddenly appears like a flash of lightning.

Let us remember Archimedes when all of a sudden, he cried « Eurêka », or this spiritual man who said talking about God : « He was there and I did not know it »

So, here we have the connection of two different sorts of knowledge : rational knowledge and let us say spiritual-emotional-knowledge.

B / Solomon’s seal

The idea of a triangle is found in the Christian religion where God is often represented as a triangle ; it is also to be found in the Jewish religion, in Solomon’s seal, but this time there are two triangles instead of one.

Those two triangles are like the two opposite triangles B Alpha C and B Béta C that we drew before, except that part of the upper triangle goes down into the lower one, and part of the lower triangle goes up into the upper one.

Here is a representation of that seal where we can very clearly see that the triangle is the image of God ; the upper triangle being the God of Light, and the lower one its reflection, the God of Illusion.

These two triangles are framed within a circle (the snake biting its own tail) symbolizing eternity.

It is really interesting to look carefully at this picture. The god of illusion seems to be the exact reflection of the god of light, and yet there are important differences :

- Both gods are crowned, but for the god of light, on top of his crown we can see a cross, there is not such a cross on top of the crown for the god of illusion.

- One has a white face and black clothes, the other has a dark face and white clothes ; that could be compared with the two sides of the same medal or with an exoteric reading and an esoteric one.

- The most striking difference comes from the look. The god of light’s look is perfectly clear and wilful, whereas the god of illusion has a lost and wild look. All this reminds me of Saint John of the Cross who, when talking about our life on earth, used to say that it was a « dark night ».

Then the question shall arise, in such a context can there be « Hope » ?

Let us now look at the picture again and this time let us examine the gods’ beards. They are very long with a main branch and two thinner branches and they precisely join on the demarcation line between the two worlds : the world of light and the world of illusion.

There, a Cross appears, symbolizing the junction between the two worlds, first a vertical junction which, once achieved, spreads out horizontally. This cross-junction may be considered as the tuning-in with the Great Universal Soul.

When, among the infinity of infinite possibilities, a junction has been made, it does not any longer belong to the person who did it, but spreads out all over and belongs to all.

You will see one by one the faces inscribed in the different circles, the two women looking at the child, and the child looking at his mother and grand-mother. You will admire the wonderful circular movements and positions of everyone and marvel at the splendid structure of the painting, at the extraodinary artistic and scientific knowledge of the painter. I could give you many other reasons to admire this work, but in fact, this is not really necessary, because without referring to all this, we are all immediately stricken by the Beauty of the work, by the pure and loving expressions of the women and child. This painting is like a musical symphony whose Beauty reaches perfection, a perfection which is suddenly part of our being. In fact the emotion that we feel at looking at this painting is but the echo of our permanent thirst for Beauty and Perfection. Da Vinci’s work and illumination has become ours as soon as we lovingly look at it.

If Da Vinci used triangles and circles to represent the Holy Family, that use was not something new. One of the most interesting and beautiful examples is to be found in the rose windows of medieval cathedrals.

Medieval cathedrals of the XIIIth century are like cosmic vessels navigating in the sky ocean. This is quite obvious if we look at Notre Dame de Paris in the City Island. Notre Dame is a long vessel oriented eastwards and anchored in the earth. As soon as we penetrate into the cathedral vessel, we feel attracted by the lights of the choir lancet windows and we automatically start walking eastwards, towards sunrise ; doing so, we participate in the great cosmic navigation of the earth.

On entering the cathedral we can only see the windows of the choir and we have to walk up to the transept to discover the two huge North and South rose windows of the transept and the Western rose window of the nave, and there, we marvel at their Beauty. These three rose windows of the cathedral are like paddle-wheels that give the vessel necessary light energy to keep on navigating. From outside the roses let us only see their structure, it is to say, a circular hole from which a number of stone rays spring forth like as many isoceles triangles coming from and converging towards what is called the « eye » of the window. Outside the structure looks white, the windows look black.

But as soon as we are inside, the structure looks black and the windows are sparkling with wonderful colours.

Considering the Western rose. We can see in the very center Virgin Mary holding her son on her lab, and around in the quadrifolled circles the twelve apostles. In the upper part of the rose there is « the moral miror » with, in the inner circle the vices which are mastered by the vertues of the outer circle ; whereas in the lower part, there is « the nature miror » with the signs of the zodiac in the inner circle facing the farm works of the year in the outer circle. It is as if the material and the spiritual worlds were all moved by the love of Virgin Mother and her son. In other roses, in the «eye » of the window there is the Apocalypse Christ who is also the symbol of love and eternal life.

The artists who made the roses were conducted by a glass-master called « the Adept ». The adept did not only know all the symbols, but he had to master all the secrets to make coloured glass as sparkling and as pure as possible.

To become an adept , one had to travel for years through Europe and Middle-East, know all the chemical process to make coloured glass, but the future adept also had to make a spiritual quest because his work could only be perfect if it was pure alchemy.

For the adept glass becomes light-water that never stops flowing in and out of the stone eye. The rose window is a pure light-symphony always changing colours according to the clouds, the sun and the sky light ; it is a treasure of many different-sparkling-coloured-jewels, it has become a permanent treasure for everybody .

What about today ?

Today thanks to expert-systems and a more and more powerful technology, we have increased our material power in a way that had never been reached before. But what about our spiritual quest ? We have created the world-wide-web, we can investigate the Cosmos and we can dive deep into the micro-world.

What are we going to do with all this ? What is going to happen ?

Like « Little Prince » in Saint-Exupéry’s book, we are responsible for our planet and we have to keep it alive.

R.W. Emerson wrote : « We successively live trough divisions, parts, atoms. However in man lies the Whole Soul… We see our world piece by piece, but the Whole, whose objects are the bright parts, is the Soul. The Soul is not an organ but it gives life to them all ».

Every time we create something which is in harmony with the Great Whole, we give birth to Beauty and create a new energy that makes the Universal Cosmic Soul vibrate and sound.

Conclusions

Pascal wrote : “ All the visible world is but an imperceptible dot in Nature’s Spacious Bosom. No idea can approach it. No matter how much we inflate our concepts, we only give birth to atoms compared with the reality of things ”.

So we know very little about “ reality ”, therefore we may believe that we live in “ a world of illusion ”. And yet, this world where we are living in seems to be real to us, all the more so that creation is permanent. Unceasingly new simple or compound bodies appear, expand and finally die, but through the chemical process of decomposition other bodies appear and all this forms a chain that goes on and on...

For any creation a minimum of two elements is needed, and it is through the connection of these elements that something new appears. This is what happens in Nature for the mineral, vegetable, animal, and human world.

Creativity, which could be called mental creation, is completely different since one has to be conscious of what he is doing. Yet, here again, at least two elements are needed to create something new. Now the bigger the number of connected elements, the more elaborate the creation is.

Man like nature is in a state of permanent creation, creating is a basic need that fascinates everyone, but as soon as someone wants to achieve a work of art, whatever could be the field of his art, artistic, scientific, economic or other... he needs something else. Let us call this something else : “ Intuition ”, but it is difficult to give this word a definition. In fact, to be in touch with this intuition, there should be an attempt to perfection which could be reached by listening to the echo of something which is beyond logics, which is not action but rather a tuning-in with the sound-post of the Great Human Soul. Here I think is the way to touch Beauty. When the two elements, logics and intuition, reach the highest perfection, one achieves a masterpiece that will for ever be a treasure for the whole humanity.

Now whether we live in a world of illusion or in a world of reality, what is important is that there seems to be no limits to man’s creativity. Then it is up to us to make our world beautiful or not, and that depends on our thirst for Beauty.