Deliverance

It follows that life itself necessitates social order, and social order necessitates hierarchy. But it is important to note that hierarchy is then organized and structured around the “Universal Man.” What differentiates the “Universal Man” from all other men in the social hierarchy is the individual “essence.” A man cannot be what he is not. To assume that equality exists over hierarchy would be to assume that every man is the same and that a man can simply change his nature to be something else, which obviously is not the case. It cannot be true that man can change his individual nature in order to be something else. 

And while the “essence” of the “Universal Man” is unknown, it is still “impossible to be ignorant of it.” As one poet wrote:

“Have I learnt all, globally and distinctly, 

Of Thine Essence, O Thou, in Whom all Qualities are united?

Or is Thy Face too sublime for Thy Nature to be grasped?

I understand then that His Essence cannot be understood.

Far be it from Thee that anyone may fathom Thee, and far be it from Thee

That anyone ignore Thee, — Oh perplexity!”

In essence, it is all a mystery, especially when we consider that it is the “essence” of the “Universal Man” which keeps social order together when all is said and done. But whatever this essence is, and even if the essence may be unknowable yet impossible to ignore, one can infer that the essence is spiritual in character and nature. Hence, our social hierarchy – given that it revolves around the “Universal Man” and in turn the “Universal Man” is determined by the “essence” – is spiritual in character and nature. “Deliverance” is the state of the “Universal Man” in the sense that the “Universal Man” has achieved the sum of all contingencies, degrees, and states of being. Ultimately, and when all is said and done, there is the “delivered” on one hand, and the “undelivered” on the other hand.

Hence, it is only obvious that there will be an intellectual and spiritual “elite” on one hand, and everyone else on the other hand. But no such elite exists in the Western world at the moment which could then run the affairs of the society and rule and govern. To borrow from René Guénon:

“At present…the intellectual elite, according to our idea of it, simply does not exist in the West: the exceptions are too rare and too isolated to be looked on as constituting anything that might be so called, and, besides, they are on the whole really quite un-Western, since they consist of individuals who intellectually owe everything to the East, and who are thus almost in the same situation as the Easterners in Europe, knowing only too well what abyss separates them mentally from the men who surround them. Under these conditions one is certainly tempted to take refuge in silence rather than run the risk of being bruised against the wall of general indifference in an attempt to express certain ideas, or even of provoking hostile reactions; however, the conviction that certain changes are necessary brings with it an obligation to begin doing something toward them, and at least to give those who are capable of developing their latent faculties (for, after all, there must be some who are) the opportunity of doing so.” 

Some individuals are qualified to be part of the intellectual and spiritual elite, and some are not. That is simply how the world works. And it requires reaching out to those who are qualified and turning away those who are not qualified. And it is an “initiative” which the West must undertake, not the East, with the basic purpose and task of this initiative being the entrance into at least a semblance of normal relations with the East after centuries of conflict, turmoil, war, and social strife. It is only through the constitution of an intellectual and spiritual “elite” in the West which would then enter into normal relations with the East that would in turn bring Western society back to normal, convert the West back into a traditional society like all other societies, and in turn bring the West out of what is essentially a “restless atmosphere.”