Shamcher - Intuition and Inner Reach

This issue is dedicated to the recorded talk on Shamcher with dear friends over at Dervish Coffee. How wonderful to connect with so many who had known Shamcher, or who are interested in discovering his viewpoint. The discussion went in many directions, and it was a surprise treat that Moinuddin Clarke had brought an audio recording of Shamcher speaking! The whole event was amplified by the loving hearts remembering Shamcher’s presence and influence, and I’m so grateful for the opportunity to speak about him and his work.

The full video recording is inserted below, and a transcript of the first third of the session is also included here.

Play the full video recording here

Carol: … It’s a clue to follow, like the improvisation of life. When Rani asked me to do this, what came in was that Shamcher was about the vehicle of intuition and silent reach, and I made that as the title, because everybody here has had contact and is involved deeply in the message, one way or the other. All that Shamcher did with anybody was try and point out: go into the vehicle of intuition, which is not a practice.

I remember that in his correspondence with Moinuddin Jablonski, he was very clear. He said, don’t necessarily believe everything that’s in the papers. If you happen to have the right whatever it is (I can’t remember now), you will be able to enter the vehicle of intuition, and when that happens for you, this and that. So he was talking to somebody who had received all kinds of communications, and blessings, all kinds of responsibilities, and within that Shamcher was saying: enter the vehicle of intuition. I try to remember that as I go through my daily life, though I don’t always, and that’s why Zikar is called remembrance. You’ve got to go there.

Shamcher also did the other thing, which he mentioned many times. Silent reach: entering beyond anything, beyond the physical, going as far as possible within silent reach. He named it that. He also had a word infeeling, meaning sensing within yourself.

I’ll just read a little something that came, popping out of a very old piece he wrote a long time ago. I have to thank Vakil Forest Shomer for gathering so many of Shamcher’s archives long ago and pulling it together so we would have this material available. It’s online and accessible, but the situation is it’s so much that you actually do need to follow your intuition to find what you need in there. It’s not really fully archived.

He talks about meditation here: “Meditation may develop to be not only cognitive but creative. What is at first imagination may be turned into reality, or into non-physical, or even physical systems.” I’ll read that again:”What is at first imagination may be turned into reality, or into non-physical, or even physical systems. Was this the way the whole world was once created, and is being maintained? Find out. Practice meditation until you know.”

I think about this in relation to the fires everywhere, (I was just reading about the fires in Spain) aware that there is a shamanistic quality to the meditation that Shamcher was discussing. There’s an activity in it, so this is the activity of silent reach. But first it has to be taken into us, and it’s very involved with the morning prayer. The simplest morning prayer, the early prayer that we always have learned. It’s elementary in a way, but it is the elements, and it’s the beginning of a profound depth and relationship, where if you stand and face the sun, or the direction of the sun, which has been done by peoples all over the world early early early peoples, to renew the diurnal system. That’s our responsibility. If we think we’re standing there to say our prayers so that we get attuned, that’s great, we need that, we need the balance, we need the internal justice, we need to know what the hell, where are we. We have to have that. But the other part, which is the responsibility part, comes when that intuition vehicle opens, and there’s just the potential that is it possible to affect something. Shamcher was doing that. I won’t go on and on, because everybody here has so many connections with Shamcher and understandings of their own.

I remember there was a time when he was still alive and people in San Francisco were really worried, because psychics were saying that there were going to be terrible earthquakes and everything would be destroyed, so many Sufis were moving to Santa Fe thinking that they’d be safer there. He said nothing will happen because I’m here. He wasn’t being ridiculous, he wasn’t making a joke, there was no hubris involve. He just knew. It wouldn’t happen when he was there. Just imagine if everyone who is a Sufi or non-sufi or whatever we are, started plugging in like that, there could be a difference.

Because he said, when he was in Suresnes, they would do the Healing sessions every Thursday, and someone said at the hospital near Suresnes, (this was at the Summerschool time) showed marked progression, everybody felt better when they were doing that healing. We know it affects things, and we still think somebody is to tell us how to do it. And like he said in that piece I just read: find out, practice meditation until you know. He wrote this, I think, in the 1960s, and he wasn’t fully cooked. He said he didn’t fully understand until he was in his 70s. So look around at this lovely zoom group here. And it’s time to ask for the next step. Climb up the stairs to the next potential. It’s always going on. It’s never going to stop. Might as well go for the full ride.

So many people here knew Shamcher, so it would be great to have a little back and forth around that. I don’t want to go on and on with some of these things. I did want to touch on his shamanistic relationship, because often we’re tuned, I am, anyway, thinking, oh, these are holy things that happen in this (particular) discipline. But if the message tells us anything, it’s that it’s all one discipline, and we discover whatever is open. Shamcher always said a Sufi is a seeker after truth, and wherever that brings you, that’s where you have to go. A Sufi is never bound to any man, woman, or being, any rule, dogma, or credo. Or any organization. You might have signed up, you might have a card, you might be committed, you might be donating, you might have received something, you’re not bound by anything. That’s what it is. He also liked to quote (and I think it’s terrific) that the message seeks out each separate individual and coaxes you to develop according to your own light, not to the patterns you’re receiving from whatever the teaching might be. It’s the unlearning so that starts to unfold. A Sufi, as he says, doesn’t teach dogma, theories, or philosophies, either in religion, science, or politics. There is a total freedom of consciousness.

So, should we listen to that recording that popped up in your world, Moinuddin? Moinuddin just had something come up that dovetails nicely. We can listen to Shamcher talk about the Essenes.

Moinuddin Clarke: Yeah, that sounds great. This is one of my teachers, call her Mother Mary. She knew Shamcher quite well and he would visit her from time to time. In this particular four-and-a-half-minute sound bite we get to hear Shamcher’s voice talking to Mary, whom he called Josephine (her given name, her spiritual name was Mary). He’s talking to her and answering a question she asked. Let’s play it. Raise your hand if you don’t hear it, but here we go.

Shamcher - from recording: “Dear Josephine, you graciously asked me to tell you about the Essenes and what they did, and what others did in ancient Palestine. I find it difficult to do this without looking at your gracious being, but now I am among friends, and I have the same feeling as when I look at you, so maybe we can go ahead. Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan told us about the Essenes. What were they? They were Sufis. The Essenes stand for S, and at various periods in history the Sufis were persecuted. They stood for the truth, and truth is not always welcome, so they called themselves S, or Essenes. Practically all the great prophets of the Hebrews were Essenes: John the Baptist, Jesus, the disciples. The Essenes were great healers. They knew all the secrets of the herbs. They knew the secret of training your moral and physical stamina to become better healers.

Now the story I’m going to tell is, as I said, partly from Inayat Khan, partly from what people told me in the foothills and higher regions of the Himalayas, in the plains of India, in Turkey, in Syria, in Egypt, in Algeria and Tunisia, in China and Japan. When Jesus had his ordeal on the cross, people eventually left, and the Essenes took him down and nursed him and healed him. After he had healed, some of them travelled with him to the Himalayas, and he lived in the Himalayas in yogi ashrams. So he knew the Far Eastern tradition, the yoga tradition, just as well as the Near Eastern tradition, the Sufi tradition; the two, perhaps only, religious traditions we have on Earth, which may have been one, but that most of us don’t know. After having lived, and trained, and taught in the Himalayas, he went north to China and to Japan. And what do we have there? An American missionary chaplain discovered a tribe of Japanese in one of the islands who had a completely Christian education and belief, and faith, long before any missionaries from the West came there. Jesus lived until he was 105 years old, happily among the Japanese, and taught them.

Josephine, this is all I have to say now. I’m so sorry about the rest of the beautiful tape you sent me. Put some music in it, I’ll play some music for you when I see you next, I must remember to take a tape with me. That will make up for the lack in my presentation, dear Josephine.”

Carol: Well, isn’t it lovely to hear Shamcher’s voice? And isn’t it lovely to hear him speaking directly to somebody, in their own language? It’s very poetic and very timeless. He always integrated everything. We’ve just had a vision of the whole world, or a good part of the East, and we’ve had a vision of understandings that have come through various people. It reminds me of Abe Burnstick, a Cree elder who was in Edmonton, in northern Alberta, in Canada, who told a story of a man who came to their people, who travelled across the country of Canada, giving them wisdom. And the story was the people could fly before this man came, and he came and everybody settled down to their places and lived based on his teachings. He said it was like Jesus. Abe told this story and it seemed a little far-fetched. Was it? What’s the mythopoesis of everything? What’s the wisdom of everything? We do not look it up in words. I think Vakil, you understand that from the touching of nature. When Shamcher was on his way out, lying in state as he said, on his couch, and Nirtan, you’ll remember this — he said, “Everybody’s trying to bamboozle you about what is the truth. Nature is the only holy book.”

Does anybody else have something sparked, just for a couple of minutes, or should I go back into my notes? What’s next? Don’t be shy. All right, I have some notes. They were just this brief outpouring, I’ll just read them, riff on them.

Connecting with Shamcher helps you understand directly that this isn’t a group process that we’re involved in. The group comes after. It’s an individual awakening, and then from there you take it into the group, or out of the group, as needed. But the group will attune you to a sense, a process, where then may or may not take you to the next aspect. We imagine that there’s the group vehicle: like let’s say we’re doing the zikr and we’re all up, we’re going, that’s true. What about our lives? It’s fine when you’re in the hothouse and the flowers are blooming and everything. But when you’re outside of that greenhouse dome, beautiful dome that it is? What about the personal temple, and how that functions? That’s where we do the work also. So there’s that note.

In the world of mythopoetics - I’m doing a lot of study of Platonism right now - it came to me that Shamcher is my Socrates. Shamcher was just like Socrates: he did everything for free, he even paid sometimes rather than accept. He kept the balance. He believed in the laws of the world even though he didn’t always follow the conventions of the world. He did respect what was going on and used it for his play. In his connection with people he would see somebody, connect with them, and pour out as much as they could stand, just like Socrates, just like the Platonic dialogues.

When he did the morning prayer, first he did a kasab: just a basic breath, in the left, out the mouth, in the mouth, out the left, in the right, back and forth, and then he did the element breaths. They weren’t fancy, they weren’t with “high attunement.” They were just the element breaths. He did when he was walking from his apartment in Berkeley over to where he was to pick up his car or get the bus to the Richmond Field Station, where he was still working on OTEC late, late in life. He would just do it that way. It was always happening simultaneously. Then, when he said the prayer, first he would think of a personal beloved. So he wouldn’t start with “beloved Lord Almighty God,” he’d start with the personal beloved, the beloved of nature all around, and then he went to to Almighty God. So he moved through a three-step process: opening the heart, opening the being, and then opening a greater consciousness. That’s some of my notes.

He said that practices were medicine. If there’s something wrong, you give a practice, you receive a practice and you do it. Otherwise you just keep yourself in tune, and then the relationship starts. It’s fun to do these things and to get high, and we need that - we need to sustain our soul-being in this vehicle. We can illuminate the temple, but it doesn’t replace our life on Earth. Just like with OTEC; he was so keen on it, he carried the idea with him from France and tried to establish it in North America. Mansur was very involved, and you were very involved with Shamcher in helping make OTEC a reality. It’s a very yogic thing, a very Taoist thing as well. The heat of the air and the cold of the undersea turn to make a turbine, extremely balanced, this is our yoga as well - left and right, up and down. Nirtan was quite involved in the ADEE organization — Alternative Directions in Energy and Economics — that coalesced around Shamcher for a little while.

A friend gave me some notes and minutes from that organization to put into the archives just last week. So, where am I going with this? Everything he did was integrated into the system and the yogic system within himself was being expressed outwardly. He also did a lot of yoga based on the Self-Realization Fellowship, the SRF, Yogananda’s teaching. He was keen on Yogananda, understood the Kriya Yoga. It was a practice that he also followed for a period of time.

So — questions, answers? I don’t want to go through all my notes right now. Anything? …

Rani: Oh, thank you. He didn’t want to be bound by doctrine and dogma — so what was his attitude, as you might know or intuit, toward the prayers, and towards the teaching that we’ve often heard, don’t change the words of the prayers?

Carol: I’m hearing some music. Speaker 6: Yeah. Carol: Well, he said he’d complete his talk with music, so I guess that’s the answer.

Rani: Okay, but what do you think?

Carol: What do I think? I’ll tell you, though I know everybody here has other thoughts. …

I think he went right into the prayers himself. In one of the first letters I had from him, he said that Paul Reps had shocked the Ruhaniyat Sufis of the time by telling them they didn’t need the prayers. And Shamcher said they had been trained with the prayers, they believed in the prayers, and Reps shouldn’t have done that. There’s no reason to break the faith of anybody. Reps was right for himself. He went off to Zen, and that’s fine, that’s cool. But as far as changing the words of the prayers: let’s say there’s delight in going deeply into what the prayers actually are, why change them?

He spoke many languages. I took him to the airport at one time, when he visited, in Edmonton (where everything in Canada is in English and French) he said, “Oh, the prayers in French are so beautiful,” and then he said one of the prayers in French, and it was like music. It’s so beautiful. We don’t know the rhythms that have been embedded in those prayers, the rhythms of the words themselves. We can say any prayer we want, I don’t think that’s a problem. If we’re teaching a prayer, we say, this is based on this, and now we do it this way, no problem. But if the steamroller comes through and removes whatever was archival, whatever had been known? Back to my Platonist studies, it says: do not change the names of the gods. In other words, if you’re translating and there’s a word you can’t understand, don’t give your own translation to it, because you don’t know what’s carried in that package. Everything is to be carried, opened, and given in a code that may or may not be transmitted.

In my notes, there’s something that he had written about the morning prayer, which I’ll read to you. You know some people don’t like the word “Lord,” “beloved Lord,” “Master,” they think it’s archaic. Yes, it is archaic, and yet it’s in there. He wrote: “A typical example is the morning prayer some people use (he always couched it this way) Addressing the creative force field that creates and maintains the world (that’s huge, right?) You pray through the rays of the sun, through the waves of the air, through the all-pervading life in space, purify and revivify me. If, while saying this, you just picture a moderately warm ball the size of the sun as you see it from here, you don’t really meditate. But if your own creative force rushes into the center of the sun and helps create a huge flaming body, so hot it nearly burns you — though in the non-physical force field, heat doesn’t really burn you, but your vivid imagination, sustained by physical experience, may make you feel slightly burned — then you know you are meditating, and so effectively that it may stretch your consciousness beyond what we have usually called mind.” It’s a long sentence, hard to read, but the point that he’s making quite clear: what’s in you meets what’s in the prayer, and it’s not a physical experience. So at that point, translation? I don’t know. We do our own translation, and then understand who we’re talking to, in our own understanding. … (Transcript Part 2 coming next issue.)

The AI transcript removed and changed some emphasis, so some of the words and details it had taken out had to be added back in. (Transcribed through https://otter.ai — reformatted into paragraph form, speaker attributions retained.) Interestingly, the transcribing process echoed some of the topics on translation mentioned in the discussion.

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