Energy: Reiki

Reiki (pronounounced RAY-kee) is a Japanese word meaning "Universal Life-Force-Energy". The "Ki" (pronounced CHEE) part is the same word as Chi or Qi, the Chinese word for the energy which underlies everything. Reiki is a system for channeling that energy to someone for the purpose of healing. It was discovered by Dr. Usui, said to be a teacher or perhaps dean of a Christian school in Japan, in the late 1800's. 

The Reiki practices of today are said to have originated in Japan in a clinic headed by Dr. Chujiro Hayashi, a Naval Commander in the Naval Reserve. Today there is little or no hard evidence of Reiki from before World War II. All of the histories of Reiki come from the verbal stories passed on from Mrs. Takata. With roots in Japan prior to World War II, much of the documentation was lost. Apparently the survivors of the war lost the resources allowing them to continue the Reiki clinic and perhaps stopped practicing Reiki. If it were not for Mrs. Takata learning Reiki before the war and bringing it to America, this healing technique could well have been lost to the world.

(Some sources say that Dr. Usui was Buddhist and that the claim he was dean of a Christian school was made by Mrs. Takata to make Reiki more acceptable to Christians in America.)

In its simplest form using Reiki is simply the practitioner placing his/her hands on the recipient with the intent of bringing healing, and willing for Reiki energy to flow. There is a set of traditionally taught hand positions which give good coverage over the recipients entire body. It is not necessary to follow those positions, they are merely taught as a starting position from which the practitioner can learn. If there is a specific area of concern, the practitioner can keep his/her hands right there for as long as necessary.

According to Reiki healers there are four unique qualities that identify energy healing techniques as Reiki:

1. The ability to do Reiki comes from receiving an attunement, rather than developing the ability over time though the use of meditation or other exercises. 

2. All Reiki techniques are part of a lineage. This means that the technique has been passed on from teacher to student through an attunement process starting with the one who first channeled the technique. 

3. Reiki does not require that one guide the energy with the mind, as it is guided by the higher power and knows where to go and how to act all on its own. 

4. Because of this, Reiki can do no harm.

(See also: Reiki , Alternative Health, Holistic Health, Body Mind and Soul)

Advaita:

Non-duality; a school of Vedanta philosophy teaching the oneness of God, soul, and universe, whose chief exponent was Sankaracharya.

(See also: Advaita , Sanskrit Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V X Y Z

Definition and meaning of Redeemers:

Redeemers

Redeemers were Southern Democrats who wrested control of govenrments in the former Confederacy, often through electoral fraud and violence, from Republicans beginning in 1870.

(Source: Madrid Waddington High School )

Also see these pages:  American History, American History Sitemap, History, History Sitemap

Theravada Lit., the School of the Elders; one of the two main forms of Buddhism known in the world today; practiced chiefly in south-east Asia; has the Pali Canon for textual foundation; this tradition advocates the Arahantship.

 (See also: Theravada , Buddhism, Body Mind and Soul)

Zen.

A major school of Mahayana Buddhism, with several branches.

One of its most popular techniques is meditation on koans, which leads to the generation of the Great Doubt. According to this method: The master gives the student a koan to think about, resolve, and then report back on to the master. Concentration intensifies as the student first tries to solve the koan intellectually. This initial effort proves impossible, however, for a koan cannot be solved rationally. Indeed, it is a kind of spoof on the human intellect.

Concentration and irrationality -- these two elements constitute the characteristic psychic situation that engulfs the student wrestling with a koan. As this persistent effort to concentrate intellectually becomes unbearable, anxiety sets in. The entirety of one's consciousness and psychic life is now filled with one thought. The exertion of the search is like wrestling with a deadly enemy or trying to make one's way through a ring of flames. Such assaults on the fortress of human reason inevitably give rise to a distrust of all rational perception.

This gnawing doubt (Great Doubt), combined with a futile search for a way out, creates a state of extreme and intense yearning for deliverance. The state may persist for days, weeks or even years; eventually the tension has to break. (Dumoulin, Zen Buddhism, Vol. I, p.253.)

An interesting koan is the koan of Buddha Recitation. Unlike other koans, it works in two ways. First of all, if a cultivator succeeds in his meditation through this koan, he can achieve awakening as with other koans. However, if he does not succeed, and experience shows that many cultivators do not, then the meditation on the Buddha's narne helps him to achieve rebirth in the Pure Land.

This is so provided he believes (as most practitioners in Asia do) in Amitabha and the expedient Pure Land. Thus, the Buddha Recitation koan provides a safety net, and demonstrates the underlying unity of Zen and Pure Land.

 (See also: Zen , Buddhism, Body Mind and Soul)

Orphism, Orphic Mysteries [from Greek orphikos]

Orphism originally taught of the Causeless Cause on which all speculation is impossible; the periodical appearance and disappearance of all things, from atom to universe; reimbodiment; cyclic law; the essential divinity of all beings and things; and the duality in manifestation of the universe. It postulated seven emanations from the Boundless: aether (spirit) and chaos (matter), from which two spring the world egg, out of which is born Phanes, the First Logos; then Uranus (and Gaia) the Second Logos, with Kronos (and Rhea, mother of the Olympian gods) a later phase of the Second Logos; and Zeus, the Third Logos or Demiurge -- who starts a minor sevenfold hierarchy of emanation by begetting Zagreus-Dionysos the god-man, the divine son.

Characteristic of Orphic cosmogony is the important place given to the number seven. "The rise of the Orphic worship of Dionysos is the most important fact in the history of Greek religion, and marks a great spiritual awakening. Its three great ideas are (1) a belief in the essential Divinity of humanity and the complete immortality or eternity of the soul, its pre-existence and its post-existence; (2) the necessity for individual responsibility and righteousness; and (3) the regeneration or redemption of man's lower nature by his own higher Self" (F. S. Darrow).

The Orphic teachings were kept intact by the Golden or Hermetic Chain of Succession down to the days of the Neoplatonists after which (as symbolically told in the archaic story of Eurydice) they were killed -- obscured or lost, so far as the public was concerned. Their keynote was consecration to the mandates of the god within: perfect purity, perfect impersonal love, perfect understanding, and devotion to the interests of humanity.

The three Orphic mystery-gods were Zeus, the divine All-father; Demeter-Kore, the earth goddess as both mother and maid; and Zagreus-Dionysos, the divine son. This trinity finds its counterpart in Egyptian, Indian, Chaldean, Christian, and other religions. There were two forms of baptism, one purification by water, later adopted into the Christian ritual; and the other a ceremony in which the face of the neophyte was cleansed with a mixture of earth and bran, symbolizing the washing away of stains from the soul.

The ceremony of the Eucharist was also adopted by the Christians and as Orphic ritual forbade the use of wine (substituting for it a mead of honey and milk), in the rite as adopted by the primitive Christians the neophyte drank not only wine but also milk and honey. Under Orphism, the honey symbolized not only purification and preservation, or endless life and bliss, but the secret knowledge obtained during initiation. Bees, the gatherers of honey, were emblems of the reincarnating soul, as was the butterfly; and as the bees gathered the nectar from flowers and made it into honey, so the human soul in its various peregrinations gathers from the beings and things of life the mystic experience and stores it away in the chambers of the soul. Milk symbolized knowledge, which fed the inner man, as a child of eternity, just as milk feeds the human child.

Orphism flourished from before the 14th until the 6th century BC, and again, after some five centuries of obscuration, during the first four centuries of the Christian era. Plato, Empedocles, the Pythagorean teachings, some of the Greek dramatists and poets are our main source material for the earlier period, as well as the various Orphic fragments including the Orphic Tablets.

These Tablets, with the Orphic Hymns, consist of eight gold plates containing inscriptions, dating from about the 4th century BC. They consist of instructions given to the soul for its journey through the afterdeath worlds or states very reminiscent of the Egyptian Book of the Dead. The keynote is spoken by the soul: "I am a child of earth and of starry Heaven, but my race is of Heaven (alone). . . . Lo, I am parched with thirst . . ." For the later period we have the writings of the Neoplatonists and their opponents, the early Christian Fathers.

That the entire Orphic mythogony is intentionally allegorical does not invalidate that a great prehistoric religious reformer named Orpheus lived, worked, taught, and founded a religion as the outgrowth of a genuine Mystery school.

(See also: Orphism, Orphic Mysteries , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Hyderabad is an important seat of learning in southern India. It has ten universities and many professional colleges. The universities are Osmania University, the University of Hyderabad, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Mawlana Azad National Urdu University, Dr B R Ambedkar Open University, the first Open University in India, Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) a Super Speciality medical institution of International reputation, the Central Institute of English & Foreign Languages (CIEFL), Potti Sreeramulu Telugu Unive ...

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smriti: (Sanskrit) "That which is remembered; the tradition."

Hinduism's nonrevealed, secondary but deeply revered scriptures, derived from man's insight and experience. Smriti speaks of secular matters - science, law, history, agriculture, etc. - as well as spiritual lore, ranging from day-to-day rules and regulations to superconscious outpourings.

1)    The term smriti refers to a specific collection of ancient Sanskritic texts as follows: the six or more Vedangas, the four Upavedas, the two Itihasas, and the 18 main Puranas. Among the Vedangas, the Kalpa Vedanga defines codes of ritual in the Shrauta and Shulba Shastras, and domestic-civil laws in the Grihya and Dharma Shastras. Also included as classical smriti are the founding sutras of six ancient philosophies called shad darshana (Sankhya, Yoga, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Mimamsa and Vedanta).

2)    In a general sense, smriti may refer to any text other than shruti (revealed scripture) that is revered as scripture within a particular sect. From the vast body of sacred literature, shastra, each sect and school claims its own preferred texts as secondary scripture, e.g., the Ramayana of Vaishnavism and Smartism, or the Tirumurai of Saiva Siddhanta. Thus, the selection of smriti varies widely from one sect and lineage to another.

See: Mahabharata, Ramayana, Tirumurai.

(See also: Smriti , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Transpersonal Psychology / Transpersonal Counseling

A school of psychology that aims at integrating Western science and Eastern thought by moving beyond Humanistic Psychology and its focus on the self or ego. Its orientation is a holistic one that focuses on the integration of mind, body and spirit and has ultimate psychological growth and well-being as its goals.

(See also: Transpersonal Psychology/Counseling , New Age Spirituality, Body Mind and Soul)

Hedonism (from Greek hedone, pleasure)

In ethics, the doctrine that the gratification of natural inclinations is the chief good, and that the moral law is thereby fulfilled. The value of this doctrine depends entirely on what we are to understand by pleasure or inclination. In the best sense, which was that of Epicurus and his followers, these words may be considered as one way of trying to express the summum bonum, the goal of human endeavor; and this school pointedly taught that neither happiness nor peace are ever attainable by the subjection of human thought, mind, and conscience to the instincts or inclinations of the body.

Some aspects of modern utilitarianism may be considered as a form of hedonism. But the doctrine as stated is easily degraded, and in its worst form becomes the pursuit of sensual gratification. In fact, hedonism as a word, and as understood now and by many even in ancient times, is the exact opposite of what these early philosophers believed and taught.

See also EPICUREAN PHILOSOPHY

(See also: Hedonism , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Participating in the NCAA's Division III Independent intercollegiate play, Chapman University's athletic program consists of 18 intercollegiate teams, and 3 club sports. The men's intercollegiate program competes in baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, soccer, tennis, and water polo. The women's program competes in basketball, crew, cross country, soccer, softball, swimming, tennis, track and field, volleyball, and water polo. Chapman's baseball, tennis, and softball teams have combined for 6 NCAA national championships. ...

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Chapman University, Chapman University - Colleges and programs, Chapman University - School athletics, Chapman University - Club sports, Chapman University - Notable Chapman University alumni

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The school was moved to its present site in 1872 by the then headmaster, the Revd. Dr. Haig Brown - a decision influenced by the findings of the Public Schools Commission of 1864. The school bought a 68 acre (270,000 m²) site on top of a hill just outside Godalming. In addition to the main school buildings (designed by architect Philip Charles Hardwick), they constructed three boarding houses, known as Saunderites (once the headmaster's house), Verites and Gownboys ( ...

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Charterhouse School, Charterhouse School - History, Charterhouse School - Charterhouse and the origins of football, Charterhouse School - Famous pupils, Charterhouse School - External link

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Peratae (Latin) Peratai (Greek) One of the Gnostic bodies or associations, the Naaseni or Ophites, the "Serpent Gnostics," so called because of the mystical prominence of the serpent symbol in their rites and observances.

This Gnostic body is said by scholars to have been founded by Euphrates, who possessed wide astrological knowledge, and because of the teachings which his school followed were they named Peratai -- wanderers, i.e., on this earth of trial and tribulation; or "those of the other side," signifying individuals who regarded themselves as merely wanderers or pilgrims in regions far from their native home, the spirit.

Among other ideas, they held that the celestial bodies in a person's horoscope are the instruments of destiny or karma, which because of causes engendered in other lives bring the individuals to birth on this earth under the destined yoke marked in the celestial spaces by the sun, moon, and planets; and in order to protect themselves from the malignant influence of the genii of the planets they wore serpent sigils or talismans.

C. W. King states that the Ophites were the descendants of the Bacchic Mystae, basing this on the fact that coins of the period bear the Bacchic serpent, which is represented as raising himself out of the sacred coffer, while the reverse side of the coin shows two serpents entwined around torches (Gnostics and Their Remains 225).

(See also: Peratae, Peratai , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Certain members of the Dover Board of Education expressed concern about the teaching of evolution. In the summer of 2004 they were given legal advice by the Discovery Institute and around July accepted an offer to represent the board made by the Thomas More Law Center. On October 18, 2004, the school board voted 6–3 to add the following statement to their biology curriculum: Students will be made aware of the gaps/problems in Darwin’s theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not l ...

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Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Background, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Litigants, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Plaintiffs, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Defendants, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Trial, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Opening statements, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Witnesses, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Closing arguments, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Decision

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Avalokiteswara (Sanskrit) "The on-looking Lord" In the exoteric interpretation, he is Padmapani (the lotus bearer and the lotus-born) in Tibet, the first divine ancestor of the Tibetans, the complete incarnation or Avatar of Avalokiteswara; but in esoteric philosophy Avaloki, the "on-looker", is the Higher Self, while Padmapani is the Higher Ego or Manas.

The mystic formula "Om mani padme hum" is specially used to invoke their joint help. While popular fancy claims for Avalokiteswara many incarnations on earth, and sees in him, not very wrongly, the spiritual guide of every believer, the esoteric interpretation sees in him the Logos, both celestial and human.

Therefore, when the Yogacharya School has declared Avalokiteswara as Padmapani "to be the Dhyani Bodhisattva of Amitabha Buddha", it is indeed, because the former is the spiritual reflex in the world of forms of the latter, both being one - one in heaven, the other on earth.

(See also: Avalokiteswara , Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary,)

Stuyvesant High School is named after Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch governor of New Netherland before the ownership of the colony was transferred to England in 1664. The school was established in 1904 as a manual training school for boys, hosting 155 students and 12 faculty. In 1907, it moved from its original location at 225 East 23rd Street to 345 East 15th Street, where it remained for the following 85 years. Its reputation for excellence in math and science continued to grow, and the school had to be put on a double session in ...

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Stuyvesant High School, Stuyvesant High School - Enrollment, Stuyvesant High School - History, Stuyvesant High School - School facilities, Stuyvesant High School - Centennial celebration, Stuyvesant High School - Academics, Stuyvesant High School - Extracurricular activities, Stuyvesant High School - Student body, Stuyvesant High School - September 11 and Stuyvesant, Stuyvesant High School - Notable alumni, Stuyvesant High School - Feeder patterns and admissions, Stuyvesant High School - Faculty scholarship, Stuyvesant High School - In pop culture

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Trisarana (Sanskrit) The three refuges or protections, also called triratna or ratnatraya (three jewels); the Buddhist formula Buddha, dharma, sangha or samgha. Originally bodhi, dharma, and sangha (wisdom, its laws, and its priests or spiritual exponents).

"The philosopher of the Yoga-charya School would say -- as well he could -- 'Dharma is not a person but an unconditioned and underived entity, combining in itself the spiritual and material principles of the universe, whilst from Dharma proceeded, by emanation, Buddha ['reflected' Bodhi rather]

as the creative energy which produced, in conjunction with Dharma, the third factor in the trinity, viz., "Samgha," which is the comprehensive sum total of all real life.' Samgha, then, is not and cannot be that which it is now understood to be, namely, the actual 'priesthood'; for the latter is not the sum total of all real life, but only of religious life. The real primitive significance of the word Samgha or 'Sangha' applies to the Arhats or Bhikshus, or the 'initiates,' alone, that is to say to the real exponents of Dharma -- the divine law and wisdom, coming to them as a reflex light from the one 'boundless light' " (TG 342).

Further, the Buddha meant is not any particular Buddha but Adi-Bodhi or the First Logos, "whose primordial ray is Mahabuddhi, the Universal Seal, Alaya, whose flame is ubiquitous, and whose influence has a different sphere on each of the three forms of existence, because, once again, it is Universal Being itself or the reflex of the Absolute" (TG 343).

(See also: Trisarana , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Eclectic (from Greek eklektikos selective, picking out)

Applied to systems of philosophy or religion which cull the best from a variety of systems, with the view of thus arriving at essentials.

It was applied to the School of Ammonius Saccas and other Alexandrian philosophers, implying that they picked out what was best in all faiths in order to make a new system, doing so because they knew that all the major systems of human religion and philosophy fundamentally derive from a common wisdom-religion of remote antiquity, and therefore that each such system contains at least some elements of truth.

Hence they were teaching the wisdom-religion through synthesizing, and by illustrating it from various faiths. The word is also applied to other matters, e.g. schools of painting.

(See also: Eclectic , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Early warning signs regarding the attacks first surfaced in 1996, when Eric Harris created a private website on America Online. The original site was set up to host Doom levels that he and Klebold had created, mainly for friends. Throughout the year, Harris began a primitive blog on the site, which included jokes and small journal entries concerning his thoughts on parents, school, and friends. By the end of the year, the site contained instructions on how to cause mischief, as well as instructions on how to make explosives, and logs of the ...

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Columbine High School massacre, Columbine High School massacre - Warning signs, Columbine High School massacre - Crime punishment and retaliation, Columbine High School massacre - Journals and videos, Columbine High School massacre - Firearms, Columbine High School massacre - April 20 1999: shooting at Columbine High, Columbine High School massacre - The shooting begins, Columbine High School massacre - The library massacre, Columbine High School massacre - Suicide of the shooters, Columbine High School massacre - The shooting ends, Columbine High School massacre - Aftermath, Columbine High School massacre - Third shooter theory, Columbine High School massacre - Aftershock and the search for reasons, Columbine High School massacre - Long-term impact, Columbine High School massacre - Cultural impact, Columbine High School massacre - Notes

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Brooklyn Technical High School - The original plan. In 1918, Dr. Albert L. Colston, as chair of the Math Department at Manual Training HS, recommended the establishment of a technical high school for Brooklyn boys. His plan envisioned a school with a heavy concentration of courses in math, science, and drafting with parallel paths leading either to college or to a technical career in industry. By 1922, Dr. Colston’s concept was approved by the Board of Education and Brooklyn Technical High School opened in a converted ware ...

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Mondo: Related to the Japanese word mondai, meaning to question, mondo may mean the way of the gate (mon), or to the crest (mon). Each of these connotations fits the purpose of mondo. During mondo the master asks questions quickly, and the student must respond quickly. This is done to prevent the student from thinking, to allow intuition to control. Used notably in the Rinzai school.

 (See also: Mondo , Buddhism, Body Mind and Soul)

Dean began his acting career with a Pepsi-Cola television commercial followed by a stint as a stunt tester in the game show Beat the Clock. He quit college to focus on his budding career but struggled to get jobs in Hollywood and succeeded in paying his bills only by working as a parking lot attendant at CBS studios. Following the advice of friends Dean moved to New York City to pursue live stage acting, where he was accepted to study under Lee Strasberg in the storied Actors Studio. His career picked up and Dean did several ep ...

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James Dean, James Dean - Childhood and education, James Dean - Acting career, James Dean - East of Eden, James Dean - Rebel Without a Cause, James Dean - Giant, James Dean - Death, James Dean - Porsche 550 Spyder, James Dean - Legacy, James Dean - Sexuality, James Dean - Memorial, James Dean - Filmography, James Dean - Stage, James Dean - Television

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