aro und us is full of mystery. There are things that we believe without knowing about its existence. Science does not always find answers to all questions and that is why we still love to watch movies like "Lord of Harry Potter 'the Rings' and read' a few times Everything has a mysterious charm and appeal lies in the fact that we do. Do not know about all that of an old civilization to culture practices, the mystery has been associated with every part of world .. There are many places in the world that can be called a mystery for some reason or other Easter Island. Easter Island
easter  island Five Most Mystical Places of the World

The Pyramids of Giza

Pyramids  Giza Five Most Mystical Places of the World

Stonehenge

stonehenge Five Most Mystical Places of the World

Castlerigg Stone Circle

Castlerigg Stone Circle Five Most Mystical Places of the World

Cenote in Mayan Civilization

cenote  cancun mx Five Most Mystical Places of the World

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Friday, October 29, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

The Bermuda Triangle (also known as Devil's Triangle and Devil's Sea) is a nearly half-million square-mile (1.2 million km2) area of ocean roughly defined by Bermuda, Puerto Rico, and the southernmost tip of Florida. This area is noted for
a high incidence of unexplained losses of ships, small boats, and aircraft..

Click to view larger image
The Bermuda Triangle has become popular through representation by the mass media, in which it is a paranormal site in which the known laws of physics are either violated, altered, or both.
While there is a common belief that a number of ships and airplanes have disappeared under highly unusual circumstances in this region, the United States Coast Guard and others disagree with that assessment, citing statistics demonstrating that the number of incidents involving lost ships and aircraft is no larger than that of any other heavily traveled region of the world.


There is a common belief that a number of ships and airplanes have disappeared under highly unusual circumstances in the region called
Bermuda Triangle. Over 100 airplane disappearances and over
1000 lives lost since 1945
Many of the alleged mysteries have proven not so mysterious or unusual upon close examination, with inaccuracies and misinformation about the cases often circulating and recirculating over the decades.

The triangle is an arbitrary shape, crudely marking out a corridor of the Atlantic, stretching northward from the West Indies, along the North American seaboard, as far as the Carolinas. In the Age of Sail, ships returning to Europe from parts south would sail north to the Carolinas, then turn east for Europe, taking advantage of the prevailing wind direction across the North Atlantic. Even with the development of steam and internal-combustion engines, a great deal more shipping traffic was (and still is) found nearer the US coastline than towards the empty centre of the Atlantic. The Triangle also loosely conforms with the course of the Gulf Stream as it leaves the West Indies, and has always been an area of volatile weather. The combination of distinctly heavy maritime traffic and tempestuous weather meant that a certain, also distinctly large, number of vessels would flounder in storms.
Given the historical limitations of communications technology, most of those ships that sank without survivors would disappear without a trace. The advent of wireless communications, radar, and satellite navigation meant that the unexplained disappearances largely ceased at some point in the 20th Century. The occasional vessel still sinks, but rarely without a trace. It should be noted that both the concept and the name of the Bermuda Triangle date only to the 1960s, and were the products of an American journalist.

Other areas often purported to possess unusual characteristics are the Devil's Sea, located near Japan, and the Marysburgh Vortex or the Great Lakes Triangle, located in eastern Lake Ontario.
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle

Bermuda (or "Devil's") Triangle

The Bermuda Triangle (a.k.a. the Devil's Triangle) is a triangular area in the Atlantic Ocean bounded roughly at its points by Miami, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico. Legend has it that many people, ships and planes have mysteriously vanished in this area. How many have mysteriously disappeared depends on who is doing the locating and the counting. The size of the triangle varies from 500,000 square miles to three times that size, depending on the imagination of the author. (Some include the Azores, the Gulf of Mexico, and the West Indies in the "triangle.") Some trace the mystery back to the time of Columbus. Even so, estimates range from about 200 to no more than 1,000 incidents in the past 500 years. Howard Rosenberg claims that in 1973 the U.S. Coast Guard answered more than 8,000 distress calls in the area and that more than 50 ships and 20 planes have gone down in the Bermuda Triangle within the last century.
Many theories have been given to explain the extraordinary mystery of these missing ships and planes. Evil extraterrestrials, residue crystals from Atlantis, evil humans with anti-gravity devices or other weird technologies, and vile vortices from the fourth dimension are favorites among fantasy writers. Strange magnetic fields and oceanic flatulence (methane gas from the bottom of the ocean) are favorites among the technically-minded. Weather (thunderstorms, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, high waves, currents, etc.) bad luck, pirates, explosive cargoes, incompetent navigators, and other natural and human causes are favorites among skeptical investigators.
There are some skeptics who argue that the facts do not support the legend, that there is no mystery to be solved, and nothing that needs explaining.The number of wrecks in this area is not extraordinary, given its size, location and the amount of traffic it receives. Many of the ships and planes that have been identified as having disappeared mysteriously in the Bermuda Triangle were not in the Bermuda Triangle at all. Investigations to date have not produced scientific evidence of any unusual phenomena involved in the disappearances. Thus, any explanation, including so-called scientific ones in terms of methane gas being released from the ocean floor, magnetic disturbances, etc., are not needed. The real mystery is how the Bermuda Triangle became a mystery at all.
The modern legend of the Bermuda Triangle began soon after five Navy planes [Flight 19] vanished on a training mission during a severe storm in 1945. The most logical theory as to why they vanished is that lead pilot Lt. Charles Taylor’s compass failed. The trainees' planes were not equipped with working navigational instruments. The group was disoriented and simply, though tragically, ran out of fuel. No mysterious forces were likely to have been involved other than the mysterious force of gravity on planes with no fuel. It is true that one of the rescue planes blew up shortly after take-off, but this was likely due to a faulty gas tank rather than to any mysterious forces.
Over the years there have been dozens of articles, books, and television programs promoting the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle. In his study of this material, Larry Kushe found that few did any investigation into the mystery. Rather, they passed on the speculations of their predecessors as if they were passing on the mantle of truth. Of the many uncritical accounts of the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, perhaps no one has done more to create this myth than Charles Berlitz, who had a bestseller on the subject in 1974. After examining the 400+ page official report of the Navy Board of Investigation of the disappearance of the Navy planes in 1945, Kushe found that the Board wasn't baffled at all by the incident and did not mention alleged radio transmissions cited by Berlitz in his book. According to Kushe, what isn't misinterpreted by Berlitz is fabricated. Kushe writes: "If Berlitz were to report that a boat were red, the chance of it being some other color is almost a certainty." (Berlitz, by the way, did not invent the name; that was done by Vincent Gaddis in "The Deadly Bermuda Triangle," which appeared in the February, 1964, issue of Argosy, a magazine devoted to fiction.)
In short, the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle became a mystery by a kind of communal reinforcement among uncritical authors and a willing mass media to uncritically pass on the speculation that something mysterious is going on in the Atlantic.

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Thursday, October 28, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »


In 2002, a group of exceptional people from around the world signed up to explore the country that is home of the Dalai Lamas. But this was no common tourist trek. Guided by the renowned Tibetan Buddhist master Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the pilgrims found themselves engaged in a rare and powerful experience – one in which the realms of great yogis and saints were revealed and personal transformation beckoned closer each day on the trail.
This intense journey takes one directly into the culture of Tibet and its arresting, spiritually-rich landscape in a way that is not often seen.
The pilgrimage was led by the Tibetan master Lama Zopa Rinpoche, who was a native of Nepal and moved to Tibet to study Tibetan Buddhism as a child. Along with many other monks, he was forced to leave Tibet in 1959. He and his teacher, Lama Yeshe, founded the Kopan Monastery in the Katmandu Valley.  Later they developed the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, currently one of the leading Tibetan Buddhist foundations in the world with over 140 centers located in 31 countries.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche approached the pilgrimage as something much more than a normal excursion:
Normally when people go on pilgrimage, they are just like tourists; maybe they take some pictures, and that’s it. They don’t use the places to collect merit or to meditate or to get some benefit for their minds. If it’s just like sightseeing, then it won’t be of that much benefit.





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Wednesday, October 27, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

MYSTIC GIFTS
FROM ANCIENT EGYPT

(Some of the R+C traditional roots reach the Ancient Egypt)
The Ancient Egyptians Mystery Schools are a great source of our mystic teachings. Our tradition had two roots. One is in Ancient Egypt. The other is in Central Asia. However, because of Egypt's early mastery of writing and the caliber of the Greek scholars who studied there, Egypt has left us a definitive trail of mystical principles. These principles, these gifts, live in the heart of every Rosicrucian. Some are enacted at every Rosicrucian ritual.
MEMPHITE SCHOOL
Perhaps the greatest mystic gift comes from the Ancient Egyptian Memphite School of 4,000 to 5,000 years ago. The world's first historical statement on creation can be traced to that school. It is humanity's first recorded trinity. It presents the creator God Ptah's sequential steps to creation. 1
We owe the preservation of the Memphite School teaching to Pharaoh Shabaka. He was one of Egypt's Nubian black Pharaohs. He reigned from 716 to 698 B.C. Shabaka found some old, worm-eaten papyri records. He read them and realized their importance. To better preserve them he had them carved into a flat stone. As the teachings appeared to be those of the old Memphite School, the stone had been called the Memphite Stone. It is also known as the Shabaka Stone. It is on exhibit at the British Museum (No. 498).
Unfortunately, an Egyptian farmer, unaware of the stone's worth, had used it as a base stone for grinding wheat. There's a square hole in the stone's center and eleven grooves radiate from that center. So, part of the writings was destroyed. However, there is enough remaining that is still readable. This stone presents what is probably a record of humanity's first statement on creation.
The concepts expressed on the stone were probably taught in Memphis two to three thousand years before Christ. In brief, the stone states creation takes place from the thoughts that arise from the heart and reach the tongue.
Some 60 years ago, Dr. James Breasted, one of America's foremost Egyptologist translated the writings on the stone.

"...Came into being heart and there came into being tongue.... The heart thinks what it will and the tongue
commands what it will.... It is the latter (heart) which causes all decisions to be made, but it is the tongue
which reports what the heart has thought out. Thus is all action, whether simple or complex, carried out....
All is in accord with the command which the heart has devised and which has appeared upon the tongue.
Thus is determined the peculiar nature of everything."
It further states:

"I was the maker of myself, in that I formed myself according to my desire and in accord with my heart."
Here we see the first impressions of today's Rosicrucian principles of Love, Light, and Life. Love leads to Light. Light leads to creative acts. Symbolically Heart leads to Tongue. Tongue leads to Hands. There seems to be a cyclical snowballing effect in this process. Greater Love can lead to greater Knowledge. Greater Knowledge can lead to greater Deeds. Greater Deeds can lead to greater Love, and on and on - a true mystical path.
The Rosicrucian rituals and practices carry on, even today, this sequential symbolical process of creation. It is a path through which we may improve our service to humanity. When we turn to the "God of our Heart," we turn to the source of this ancient Egyptian process. These Memphite teachings connect present day Rosicrucians to these ancient Egyptians. This process is one of our traditional roots- a gift from our Egyptian forebears.
HELIOPOLITAN SCHOOL
The Memphite Mystery School teaching appears to have the greatest significance to today's Rosicrucians. However, the Heliopolitan Mystery School of Ancient Egypt was the first to state all comes from NU or NUN, i.e., the primal waters. Physiology tells us we are mostly water, and we may have come from the sea. Our blood, which preserves our life, is much like seawater. Our body cells feed from our blood and remove their wastes into our blood. Further there is some evolutionary significance to the fact that, as our fetal body develops in a mother's womb, there is a stage where gill-like structures develop. These all tend to confirm ancient Egypt's ideas of our watery birth.
FINAL JUDGEMENT SCENE
Another mystic gift from ancient Egypt is the Final Judgement Scene. This scene is prevalent on the walls of some pyramids. It is another reference to the Memphite teachings. It shows the judgement after death. A person's heart is weighed against a feather. As a feather is the Egyptian symbol for maat or truth, we can easily substitute it with tongue or voice. The heart is weighed against the tongue. Has this person's tongue been equal to the heart's prompting? Did this person listen and act upon what the heart presented to the tongue? Has my speech reflected my heart? Have I used my tongue for creative purposes? Or, have I used it to deceive and destroy? Has my word been my bond? Was my life more tongue and less heart? Did I walk the talk? So, again in the Final Judgement Scene we are faced with the heart-tongue connection.
The deceased is also faced with the Egyptian Negative Confession to maat. The deceased is asked to deny doing 42 misdeeds.2
Today's Rosicrucian strives to listen to and act upon the words from his or her heart. From an aroused love from the God of our Heart, we seek to act upon the heart's voice. In this we would manifest love and care for all humanity. The ancient Egyptians had a word for anyone who followed the mystic path of doing the word from the heart. He or she was called a maa-kheru3, i.e., "True of voice".
The literature of ancient Egyptian is filled with this fascinating marriage of the heart and speech. Ptahotep, Grand Vizier of Memphis wrote, "He will do right when his heart is straight", "Follow your heart as long as you live", "Speaking is harder than all other works, he who understands it makes it serve", "Be deliberate when you speak, so as to say things that count: Then the officials who listen will say: 'How good is what comes from his mouth."
Amenope said, "Divorce not thy heart from thy tongue."
About 2100 B.C., an ancient Egyptian noble's tomb read, "A man's virtue is his monument, (but) forgotten is the man of ill repute."
Perhaps Ptahotep said it best, "The wise is known by his wisdom, (but) the great (is known) by his good actions. His heart 'matches' his tongue."4
REINCARNATION IN ANCIENT EGYPT?
The Confraternity of the Rose Cross, CR+C, attempts to help a student remember more about his or her past lives. This is done naturally. It is not forced. Nor is it an essential to mystical growth to have specific recalls. Memory comes when it will come. In this, we do not find hypnosis an essential to this process. The past best reveals itself when it is needed for us to better go forward. Knowingly or unknowingly, we do from who we've been. The essential thing is our closer and closer communication with our heart.
But, did these ancient Egyptians believe in reincarnation? Herodotus tells us that's where the ancient Greeks learned about it. Egyptologist Dr. Margaret A. Murray, in "The Splendour that was Egypt" states, "The ka-names of the first two kings of the XIIth dynasty show this belief clearly. Amonenhat I's name was 'He who repeats births', and Senusert I's name was 'He whose births live.' In the XIX dynasty the ka-name of Setekhy I was 'Repeater of births'..."
In the Egyptian Book of the Dead we read, "I am the Benu, the soul of Ra, and the guide of the gods in the Tuat (underworld). Their divine souls come forth upon the earth to do the will of their kas, let therefore the soul of Osiris Ani come forth to do the will of his ka. ...
"Homage to thee Osiris, O Governor of those who are in Amenti (heaven) who maketh mortals to be born again, who renewest thy youth....
"Nebensi, the lord of reverence, saith: 'I am Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, (and I have) the power to be born a second time."
Dr. Murray states, "Pythagoras is usually credited with having invented the theory of reincarnation, but it was already hoary with age before the Greeks had emerged from barbarism."5
Osiris in his character as a great being among men asks, "How long... have I to live? (answer) It is decreed that thou shalt live for millions and millions of years. (Osiris) May it be granted unto me that I pass on unto the holy princes, for indeed, I am doing away with all the wrong which I did, from the time when this earth came into being."
In Manfred Lurker's "The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Egypt" we find another quote from the Book of the Dead, "Undergoing my repeated births I remain powerful and young."
Ralph M. Lewis, Past Rosicrucian Imperator, encouraged Rosicrucians to distinguish between those teachings used by some Egyptian Priesthood to instill fear and those teachings of the advanced Egyptian Mystery Schools to provide enlightenment. Mr. Lewis related, "There is no doubt that the conception of reincarnation had its inception in Egypt....6
In considering reincarnation the ancient Egyptians entertained ideas about the ka and the ba. Their precise meaning can be baffling. This writer interprets the ba to be the soul personality that parts from the body at death. On the other hand, the ka, so often associated with the heart, was the summation of all our past lives expressions. In other words, our ka is the accumulation of our many bas. I may have the whole thing reversed. However, the amazing thing is that such thoughts were entertained so long ago.
AMEN
It is common to end a discourse on spiritual matters with Amen.
Few of us realize the word Amen is an Egyptian word. It refers to the Egyptian god of Thebes, Amun (the hidden one).
The Hebrews adopted the word in their expression "By Amun!" It passed into Christian use as Amen. It has come to mean, "So be it" or "So mote it be". It is a petition for God's fulfillment of our words.
So we end this discourse on the mystic gifts from ancient Egypt.------ AMEN!
___________________________________________
1  Ptah is the Memphite god of creation. It was from Ptah that Egypt got its name.
Memphis was Egypt's first capital. It was once called HIKAPTAH. HI meant house. KA meant heart. So, Memphis was the home of god.
The Greeks corrupted HIKAPTAH into AIGYPTOS, which later became EGYPT. Thus, name for Memphis HIKAPTAH then became the name for the whole country- EGYPT.
The Arabs corrupted HIKAPTAH into COPT. The word COPT also came to mean the land of Egypt. It comes down to us as the Coptic Orthodox Christian Church, meaning Egyptian Orthodox Christian Church.
The country Egypt was also once called KAM. This meant black. It referred to Egypt's fertile black soil. The melting snows, at the southern source of the Nile River, would cause an overflow onto the land bordering the river. This overflow brought a continual, rich, black alluvium to Egypt. Despite a lack of rain, this water and mud made for excellent farming. The deserts east and west of the black land were called the red land.
The Hebrews once called Egypt, Mitzrayim. Ayim meant two parts. It referred to upper and lower Egypt. The name became Mizrain. Actually the Egyptian Rites of Mizrain are the Egyptian Rites of Egypt.
2  In mummification the viscera are removed and placed in jars. However, the heart was usually not removed. It had to be weighed on a scale against the tongue (maat). When the heart was removed, it was replaced by a sculptured scarab. (The beetle symbolized the creator.)
Like you and I, the Egyptians knew they did not always lead ideal lives, They were only human. So, we find on the flat side of some of these heart replacement scarabs some understandably human inscriptions. Some of these writings said, "Please, just tell the good things about me."
If may be of some interest that the word Christ comes from the Egyptian word Kheru. Kheru meant 'Word" or "Voice". When we add Maa or Maat for truth, we have maa-kheru. Christ can be well depicted as a maa-kheru, "True of Voice"
The Egyptian priests were known as kheri-hebs.
4  The ideas of Love, Light and Life were apparently first presented in ancient Memphis. It is our first human record of it. Since then we also see this trinity presented, in some form, in the ancient Hindu and Zoroastrian faiths.
The ancient Hindu writings from Central Asia, present three parts of God. They are Bakhti (Love) Manga, Jahna (Knowledge) Manga, and Karma (Acts) Manga. These are legitimate mystical paths. However, the Hindus did not place these paths into a creative sequence, as did the Egyptians.
Zoroaster may have lived between 1500-2000 B.C., i.e., before Moses, Buddha, Christ and Mohammed. He is probably one of the world's earliest mystic. His three Commandments were Good Thoughts, Good Words, and Good Deeds. They seem to come closest to the Memphite sequential creative process. The Zoroastrians refer to the eternal name in the heart whose dictates must be followed. He is believed to have been born in eastern Iran (Persia). His teachings brought a mystical tradition from Central Asia.
5  Pythagoras (born about 582 B.C.) studied in Egypt. He then promulgated reincarnation.
In the Hindu Bhagavad Gita we also find the idea of reincarnation. In advising Arjuna, Krishna reminds him of the cause of his dilemma. Krishna tells him it came from his inability to remember his past lives. Krishna says, "You and I have had many births Arjuan. I know then all. You do not."
Reincarnation is part of the Jain, Zoroastrian, Buddhist, Sufi-Muslim, and other faiths. It was once part of the Christian faith as taught by Bishop Origen. Jesus once asked, "Who do they say I am?" He was told, "Elijah", Jesus answered, "No, that's John!" And, Jesus also said that before Elijah and Abraham, he was.
Reincarnation makes us more responsible for righting our wrongs. Good deeds are the answer to bad deeds. Talents developed in one life are open to further development and flowering in the next. Nothing is ever lost. The evolution of the body is secondary to the evolution of the soul personality from one life after another.
The principle of reincarnation is another of ancient Egypt's great mystic gifts to the world.

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Voodoo Ash Trick

David Blaine's Street Magic Trick,  made famous on 

Effect: A name is written on a piece of paper on a notepad by the spectator, the paper is torn off  unseen by the magician, crumpled up and placed in an ashtray.  It is then set alight.
The ashes are then rubbed on the magicians arm and the name of the person written on the paper mysteriously appears.
Preparation : You will need a small notepad, pen, ashtray, lighter and a small piece of soap or wax.
Method: The spectator is asked to write the name of a person or favourite anything of theirs on a notepad.
Then to tear of the sheet of notepaper, crumple it up and place it in the ashtray, where the magician then sets the paper alight.
The magician takes the notepad of the spectator and should be able to see the imprint of the name written on the paper above in the next sheet of the notepad.
Looking at the pad should not be made obvious and some misdirection carried out while he carefully takes the small piece of wax or soap and writes the name on the imprint on his arm or hand  ( this  action should not be visible to anyone ).
The magician can then take some ash from the ashtray and rub it over the wax where it will stick and create an impression of the spectators word to their amazement.
This is a great trick but depends on the magician creating an atmosphere with an entertaining routine and patter about black magic to enhance the effect and create misdirection to allow him time to pull off the trick.


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Sunday, October 24, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

Magician David Copperfield's assistant sucked into the blades of a giant wind machine as horrified audience looks on


Horror: David Copperfield was forced to cancel Wednesday's show after his assistant Brandon was severely injured
Illusionist David Copperfield's assistant was rushed to hospital on Wednesday night after suffering horrific injuries during a live show.
A technician named Brandon was accidentally pulled into the vortex of an oversized fan on stage of Copperfield's An Intimate Evening of Grand Illusion at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
Audience members watched in horror as the assistant was sucked into the fan, before another staff member rushed to switch it off.
Brandon, who is in his twenties, suffered puncture wounds in his face and broke his arm in several places.
He was rushed to University Medical Center where he underwent emergency surgery to his arm.
A representative for Copperfield told UsMagazine.com: 'During an illusion where David attempts to walk through the rotating blades of a 12-foot high industrial fan, the fan and its platform were being rotated by one of David's illusion technicians.
'Just prior to David himself walking through the fan, [the assistant] was accidentally pulled into the vortex of the moving fan blades, causing injury to his arm and face.
'The surgery was several hours wherein the doctors could insert pins and bolts. There was a puncture on his face requiring eight or nine stitches. The Copperfield crew waited at the hospital during his arm and face surgery.'
Copperfield was with his assistant when he woke up after surgery on Thursday morning and presented him with a children's magic kit as a get well present.
 




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Certain events in one's life leave an indelible mark. For me, even though more than four decades have past, I can still clearly recall my childhood quest for an enchanted object: a magic stone.   



some believe this stone has magical power to cure

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Friday, October 22, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »




One of the principal heroes of the Mahabharata, eldest of the five Pandavas, son of Kunti by the god of justice, Dharma. Because he possessed virtuous character and all the attributes of a model ruler, he was selected as heir apparent to the throne of Hastinapura by his uncle Dhritarashtra: this choice led to the enmity of his cousin Duryodhana and his followers (the Kauravas or Kurus), and eventually to the great conflict on the field of Kurukshetra described in the opening chapter of the Bhagavad-Gita. The Pandavas were victorious in this struggle, and Arjuna was crowned king.

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Wednesday, October 20, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

at least with MPU  Gandring heirloom Chris, Chris has certain privileges, one of which is material from a stone dagger stars that incredible perseverance, hard metal, which will not be able to meet her. The MPU Gandring Chris production mixture of human blood, to get the connection alive and bloodthirsty.

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Sunday, October 17, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

Everyone already knows about of the efficacy of a distinguished heritage kris called MPU Gandring this. But what there is who knows where the current and historical objects as Kramat?

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Death Magic is a necromancer secondary attribute, meaning that any character with necromancer as their primary or secondary profession can put points into this attribute.

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Friday, October 15, 2010 Posted in | | 0 Comments »

To study the mystic experience one must turn initially to material that appears unscientific, is couched in religious terms, and seems completely subjective. Yet these religious writings are data and not to be dismissed as something divorced from the reality with which psychological science is concerned. The following passage, from "The Cloud of Unknowing," a fourteenth-century religious treatise, describes a procedure to be followed in order to attain an intuitive knowledge of God. Such an intuitive experience is called mystical because it is considered beyond the scope of language to convey. However, a careful reading will show that these instructions contain within their religious idiom psychological ideas pertinent to the study and understanding of a wide range of phenomena not necessarily connected with theological issues:
     . . . forget all the creatures that ever God made and the works of them, so that thy thought or thy desire be not directed or stretched to any of them, neither in general nor in special .... At the first time when thou dost it, thou findst but a darkness and as it were a kind of unknowing, thou knowest not what, saving that thou feelest in thy will a naked intent unto God . . thou mayest neither see him clearly by light of understanding in thy reason, nor feel him in sweetness of love in thy affection . . if ever thou shalt see him or feel him as it may be here, It must always be in this cloud and in this darkness .... Smite upon that thick cloud of unknowing with a sharp dart of longing love.1
   Specific questions are raised by this subjective account: What constitutes a state of consciousness whose content is not rational thought ("understanding in thy reason'), affective ("sweetness of love"), or sensate ("darkness," "cloud of unknowing")? By what means do both an active "forgetting" and an objectless "longing" bring about such a state? A comparison of this passage with others in the classical mystic literature indicates that the author is referring to the activities of renunciation and contemplative meditation. This paper will present a psychological model of the mystic experience based on the assumptions that meditation and renunciation are primary techniques for producing it, and that the process can be conceptualized as one of de-automatization.

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