Thursday, January 01, 2009

Agni-Yoga - Luxury

Fiery World - Book 2 (1934) - 76. Verily luxury must leave the new constructive order, the more so since luxury is akin neither to beauty nor to knowledge. But sinuous are the boundary lines of luxury. It is impossible to define them by one law. One must completely eradicate every vulgarity, which is the fellow-traveler of luxury.

Fiery World - Book 2 (1934) - 335. It has been said that humanity must abandon luxury. Not without reason have people themselves so isolated this concept. Luxury is not beauty, not spirituality, not perfectionment, not construction, not benevolence, not compassion; no good concept can replace it. Luxury is destruction of resources and possibilities. Luxury is dissolution, for all structures without rhythm mean only disintegration. One can see clearly enough that worldly luxury has already been shaken, but, as a cure, harmonious cooperation must be found in order to rid the world of the plague of luxury. Egoism will raise the objection that luxury is an earned abundance. It will also be said that luxury is regal. This will be slander. Luxury has been always a sign of decay and eclipse of the spirit. The chains of luxury are most terrible too for the Subtle World. Needed there are advancement and continuous perfectionment of thought. The encumbrance of luxury will not help one to the next Gates.

Other elements are to be included in the pondering:

luxury = opulence = hedonism?

Less is more.

Culture is the best vaccine against empty luxury. Ultimately, it's all in the mind and the attitude. When does Beauty ceases to be so and becomnes luxury?

Also

Supermundane I, paragraph 162: Urusvati knows that the Great Pilgrim mingled with both the rich and the poor. Not all the rich were advised to give away their wealth, for when the Teacher saw a right attitude toward earthly treasures, He did not indicate a need to renounce them. In interpreting the attitude of the Teacher toward earthly riches, it is important to know that He advised giving up possessions only when they were dragging down the spiritually weak ones. He did not reject earthly riches, for how can one deny what already exists? He taught that it is essential to find a sensible attitude toward all that exists in life. Indeed, the Teacher did not want to see uniform poverty. He used to emphasize that even people of small means should cultivate pure joy, without envy of wealthy neighbors.


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