The Seven Days of Our Spiritual Creation

An Interpretation by Laura Shulman

From the Chuang Tzu (Taoist Tradition):

"The ruler of the South Sea was called Light; the ruler of the North Sea, Darkness; and the ruler of the middle kingdom, Primal Chaos. From time to time, Light and Darkness met one another in the kingdom of Primal Chaos, who made them welcome. Light and Darkness wanted to repay his kindness and said, "All men have seven openings with which they see, hear, eat and breathe, but Primal Chaos has none. Let us try to give him some." So every day they bored one hole, and on the seventh day, Primal Chaos died."    This is the creation of the universe, the elimination of chaos. Creating something in your image of perfection may very well destroy something else. Chaos is a mixing of all things into one (the Chinese word is "Won-ton" as in Won-ton soup). This unity of all is non-differentiation. As soon as the chaos is sorted out and ordered it is differentiated, it becomes many. Differentiation is what makes the universe what it is: a collection of many different things where the ultimate unity of all is difficult to detect.

* * *

    The Western story of creation also takes place over a period of seven days. The Western story of creation also involves the distinction between light and darkness and the elimination of chaos ("unformed and void," Gen. 1:2). God "separated" or "divided" light from dark (Gen. 1:4), Earth from Sea (Gen. 1:6) and distinguished between all the living things on Earth. And, in the end, God (the differentiator) rested (if God is defined as the Unity of all and all is differentiated than the unity is dead - "rest in peace").

    But, from a metaphysical perspective, we can interpret these seven days of creation as seven stages of human spiritual development. The first stage is the moment of our initial enLIGHTenment ("Let there be light," Gen. 1:3). In the second stage there is a distinction between our spiritual and physical reality (between the "waters above and the waters below," Gen. 1:6). In the third stage (when Land is formed) we gain a firm footing upon which we may grow spiritually and "bear the fruits" (Gen. 1:11) of that growth. In the forth stage (when the sun, moon and stars are created "for signs" to "give light upon the earth," Gen. 1:14-15) we are given signs and revelations to further enLIGHTen us. In the fifth and sixth stages (when animals, first simple fish, amphibians, reptiles and birds, are created and then more complicated mammals, [Gen. 1:20-24]) our spiritual life matures until, in our full spiritual maturity, we are finally "created in God's own image" (Gen. 1:27) - what man was intended to be. At this point, all creation can provide spiritual nourishment ("to you it shall be for food," Gen. 1:29). In the seventh stage of our spiritual development "God rests" (Gen. 2:2) as we reach a plateau where it can sometimes seem as if our relationship with God is dead. But it is not. A rest is simply breathing space and the creation of this spiritual awakening is merely the beginning of the spiritual His(God's)-story of our life (the rest of the Bible, viewed as the religious history of humanity can be interpreted metaphysically as the spiritual life of any single human being - the history of the entire human race is reflected in the history of any one human being).

Interesting Reflections:

    It is said that 1000 years is as one day for God. By Jewish Biblical reckoning of time it is some two hundred plus years to the year 6000 -- which, for God, would be the end of the sixth day of creation. And, on the sixth day of creation, God created man in God's image. Thus, humanity is approaching its spiritual fulfillment. We are nearing the completion of our creation/transformation into fully spiritual beings. (a note of interest: recorded history of human civilization is approximately 5500 years -- back to the year 3500 BCE - in agreement with Jewish reckoning of time. An intriguing coincidence[?]).
    The "Axis Age" of human history (6th cent BCE), when philosophy and religion world wide is going through significant and sudden advancement, would coincide with the middle of the fourth day of our spiritual creation when we are given signs and revelations (sun, moon, stars) to further enLIGHTen us.


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