The Emptiness Of The Intellectual Approach

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In the ordinary nature a thinker is a philosopher, a person who uses his intellect to make observations and collect data, and on that basis formulates a range of hypotheses, for instance about the origin or meaning of life, or about God, the universe, and so on.

You are probably familiar with many such products of philosophical thought, formulated by nature-born egos. But this kind of thought never  goes further than the seeking phase. It is largely speculation. There have been many clever thinkers. There still are, and many more, no doubt, are yet to come. Many of them write thick books about their theories, and their ideas help countless seeking people to go further in their search. In this way, the mental capacities of many people are trained -- albeit in a purely intellectual sense -- and the result is that, ultimately, they realize they are lacking some fundamental missing link.

In the beginning, logically enough, the seeker thinks it is simply the problem of not knowing enough as yet; he thinks his cerebral apparatus just needs to be trained more, that he must accumulate still more facts. At long last, however, the awareness will dawn on him that the deficiency lies not so much in what he is capable of knowing, as in what he is capable of doing. The mental apparatus of the brain is meant to be an instrument of the thinking faculty. But the real thinking faculty is of quite another nature and essence. It is meant to be the fourth vehicle of the human personality, but it is only in an embryonic state in nature-born human beings. And it will remain so as long as the human being remains in his nature-born state.

It is very important to realize this, because there is an immeasurable difference between intellectuality and Wisdom. Intellectual knowledge may sometimes be useful to the nature-born person, but it has no value at all as a means of penetrating to The Great Reality.

You may find this somewhat unacceptable, but we hope you will try to understand it. People who are intellectually-trained and whose heads are full of intellectual knowledge, are not interested in the Wisdom of the New Life, which only arouses in them a feeling of mild contempt or the inclination to laugh. The sage, however, regards the purely intellectual approach as a dangerous course which leads only to delusion. The intellectual approach does not give access to Wisdom's inner depths, nor even to its first glimmerings.

From "The Sage Always Excels In Caring For People" - The Chinese Gnosis - Catharose di Petri, Jan van Rijckenborgh

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