Moon-Like Consciousness 

by John Philip Newell

The word kosmos in ancient Greek means "a harmony of parts." In the classical world, everything in the universe was viewed as moving in relation to everything else. This ancient understanding of the cosmos is being born afresh today in radically new ways. We are realizing that the whole of reality is one. In nearly every dimension of life--whether economic or religious, scientific or political--there is a growing awareness of earth's essential interrelatedness. This new-ancient way of seeing is radically challenging us to see ourselves as connected with everything else that exists. And it means that any true vision of reality must also be a cosmology, a way of relating the parts to the whole, of seeing our distinct journeys in relation to the one journey of the universe.

A few years ago, my wife and I went on pilgrimage to the Sinai. ~~~ On the last day, we made our way to Mount Sinai, climbed half of it on camel back, then hiked the centuries-old carved steps of stone to the peak for sunset. No one else was with us on the summit as the setting sun threw its red radiance across the great range of desert peaks. We visited the three shrines of prayer that honor the disclosure of the Holy Presence in this place--one Jewish, one Christian, one Muslim--and descended the mountain in silence. The moon was fat, and its whiteness shone off the desert sand, throwing moon shadows from the high rocks and the sharp turns of our descent. At the mountain base, we approached the fourth-century St. Catherine's Monastery where we were to spend the night. In the moonlight it looked as it might have looked at any time in its sixteen centuries. And although it held within its walls a Christian monastic community, a burning bush revered by Jewish pilgrims, and a mosque prayed in by Muslims from around the world, under the moon's light it looked as one.

To read the entire article, which is an excerpt from John Philip Newell's book, A New Harmony: The Spirit, the Earth, and the Human Soul, click here.