The Sabaean Process by Keith Breeding

The Sabaean Process

Sabaean philosophy is at the same time both simple and profound. It is simple in that there are only a few tenants that are common among Sabaeans. The threads that hold us together are thin but exude a tremendous strength. People might be surprised to find how much Sabaeans actually disagree with other. Our philosophy is profound in the way it impacts our lives. Our conclusions might not always be the same rather; it is our methodology where we find common ground with each other.

Sabaeans are first and foremost thinkers. We do not blindly follow the teachings of any individual alive or dead. We use our judgment to discern truth from imposture. We are not so arrogant as to think we can solve all of the problems that life sends our way, so we seek guidance and advice from elders who have earned our respect. Sabaeans also turn to oracles. Regardless of the source, we examine the advice that comes our way and consider its merits.

Even when we have accepted advice from another source, in the end Sabaeans realize they are responsible for their own actions. We do not place blame on others for our trials. Personal responsibility allows us to shift our focus from complaining about the origins of what troubles us and instead focus on growth and learning. It forces us to examine our lives and make decisions to further ourselves in the world. We stay engaged in the process of life secure in the knowledge that for every positive action there will be a positive reaction. This leads to integrity, the heart of Sabaeanism.

Thought

Sabaeans are thinkers. One common belief amongst Sabaeans is that we are here in this life to learn through our experience. It might be a different lesson for each of us but nonetheless we are all students. We even go so far as to say that as soon as you know everything you came here to learn you will die. So anyone living still has something left to learn or is contributing to someone else’s evolution.

As good students we must gather as much information as possible and evaluate it. Since there is no one textbook on life to a Sabaean, he or she has to venture out into the world and learn as much as possible to be able to make informed, healthy decisions. If a single textbook on life such as a Bible or Koran were introduced to a Sabaean as holding the keys to life it would be questioned. No Sabaean would believe that a book written by mankind could be infallible. The idea that it was divinely inspired is quickly rejected after even a small amount of study. We came to experience and learn; not to blindly follow what some supposed god has laid out for us in a book. That is not to say that Sabaeans do not read or study books. Rather it is to suggest that Sabaeans do not take any one source of information to be so dear as to be trusted blindly. Only after careful consideration is a source of information considered valuable. This can apply to books, people, oracles or anything else.

For this reason it is important to stay engaged in the process of life. Sabaeans have much in common with Eastern thinking but one point of deviation is on the subject of staying engaged in life. Many in the East believe that in order to become enlightened, transcend one’s karma and evolve as a spirit, it is necessary to remove oneself from life and its various cycles, hence the idea of a yogi meditating in a cave. Sabaeans on he other hand believe that we come into each life with the need to experience what that particular life has to offer. To hide in a cave would be to cheat yourself of why you are here. The lessons of this incarnation must now pass to the next. One Hindu yogi expressed that “a balance between the activity of the West and calmness of the East is needed.”[i] This is Sabaean thought.

So Sabaeans strive to remain engaged in life but still keep in mind that life is transitory. Elegua teaches us to approach life with a sense of humor and at the same time with sobriety. This leads to a healthy expression of individuality and seeking as to the purpose and meaning of life. Naturally we have to think about it.

This thought can lead one to change their opinion on the same subject several times throughout their lives. To many this might seem to be a simple statement and to a certain extent it is. Many of us grew up believing that there was a Santa Claus but through a process of evaluation, learning and evolution eventually decided that Santa was fiction. In the case of religion, most monotheists would not condone much individual thinking. Sabaeanism is quite different in its approach. In Sabaeanism it is possible for a person to alternately believe in one god, many gods or no gods and still call himself a Sabaean. There is no punishment or excommunication for this changing belief. Rather thinking for oneself is encouraged. After giving someone advice it is probable that a Sabaean would further advise them to continue to seek other opinions on the subject until they were satisfied. Don’t take my word for it. Check for yourself.

What exactly then is thinking? Thought as a noun can be defined as ‘serious consideration’.[ii] Basically, we ponder. We evaluate. So what then exactly is evaluation? A leading teacher and coach on human achievement, tells a funny story of how he learned that evaluation is simply asking questions.

I thought, “Well, right now I’m evaluating aren’t I? I’m trying to evaluate how to describe what evaluation is. What am I doing right now? And then I realized I had just been asking myself a series of questions, and obviously those questions were:

How do I go about evaluating?

What exactly is an evaluation?

Right now I’m evaluating, aren’t I?

What am I doing right now?

Then I thought, “Is it possible that evaluations are nothing but questions?” And I started laughing and thought, “Well, isn’t that a questions?”[iii]

As we go through the day we are constantly asking questions. On a micro level, the kind of questions we ask ourselves will determine what kind of day we have. To illustrate the point consider two people. The first person wakes up in the morning and asks “How am I going to get through another day?”, “Why am I so dumb?” and “Why is everyone always so mean to me?” Another person wakes up and says “How can I enjoy today?” What’s exciting in my life?” and “How can I help my children with school?”. What we ask ourselves determines what we focus our energy on so it is important to ask good questions. Another consideration to thinking and evaluation is that the human mind will offer up an answer to whatever it is asked. If we ask negative questions like “Why doesn’t anyone love me?” our mind will find the answer and make it our reality. [iv]

As we go through life we continue asking questions. On a macro level the questions we constantly focus on will determine the direction of our lives and our ultimate destinies. Sabaeans want to avoid questions such as “Why me god?” and “How could this happen?” Not only are questions like this nonproductive but they focus us on negative aspects of our lives. If we constantly dwell in the negativity of our lives and world we only create a miserable existence for ourselves. More productive questions would be “What am I here to learn?” and “How can I make my life meaningful?” This is in an effort to progress and to be happy in our pursuits.

Sabaeans therefore guard the focus of the questions of their lives with each individual focused on their particular purpose. Collectively groups will support each other in their efforts and a very strong sense of community develops. When people come together in search of meaning and purpose well meaning people naturally support and help each other. People of greater experience and knowledge seek to help those with less. As student-teacher relationships form, however, the evaluation continues. The responsibility lies with the student in the end to evaluate what they hear.

Learning

The point of asking questions – evaluating – is to eventually learn. To learn is to obtain knowledge for oneself. Regardless of whom we are in this life in the end we will all be stripped of everything we have except for our knowledge. Since we can take nothing else with us, knowledge becomes a precious commodity. Sabaeans value all learning be it in religion, art, dance, science or any other human endeavor. Learning is why we are here.

Learning starts for all of us at the moment of birth if not sooner. Early on learning is a process of experiencing our surroundings. We touch, taste, smell and employ every sense available to us in an effort to gather information about our environment. We do not come into the world with preconceived notions. We have to experience some sort of feedback. This feedback can be pleasant, such as discovering how soft a blanket can be, or it can be unpleasant, such as discovering how hot the stove can get. This learning is instinctive and basic to our nature as babies and children.

As we grow older we discover a new way of learning. It turns out that it is not always necessary for us to experience feedback directly in order to learn something. When we get to school we discover how to learn through the experience of others. We can learn all about flying without actually having to experience it. We can discuss the causes of volcanoes, earthquakes and floods without actually having to see one. This is much more practical and efficient for two reasons. First is that it opens up to us knowledge of things that simply cannot be experienced even if we wanted to. Take history for example. Second is that it is much more time effective. Even if we could experience history it would be much more efficient to read a book about the American Revolution than to go back in time and experience many years of the time leading up to the event, the actual Revolution and the period that followed.

When we transition into this second type of learning where we benefit from the experience and knowledge of others a new variable is entered into the equation. We now have to evaluate or question whether the source of the information is both trustworthy and credible. The source must be trustworthy in the sense that the person would not intentionally mislead us through malicious intent. The source must also be credible in the sense that they actually know what they are talking about. It would be just as bad for us personally to have someone with good intentions inadvertently lead us astray as it would be to be duped by some sort of trickster.

As we mature as human beings our ability to discern and judge whether someone can be trusted grows to a certain extent on its own. There are definitely, however, differences in ability between us. Many people seem forever gullible while others won’t fall for anything. Gullibility can be tolerated to a certain extent in a child but as adults we need to minimize it. This can only be done through constant evaluation of information that is presented to us. Trust can and should be eventually won between seekers and givers of knowledge but this trust must be earned. It should certainly never be given lightly.

So once we actually learn something it becomes knowledge; personal knowledge that we know to be true. At least for now we treat it as true. If new information becomes available to us we have to be willing to reconsider and revise our positions on just about any subject. The world used to be flat you know.

At first this might sound somewhat unnerving. If there are no core unchanging beliefs where is there a sense of security? That sense of security comes from the knowledge that what we do hold to be true has been well tested and withstood our arguments against it. There is a stronger sense of security in questioning and testing what you hold to be true than to blindly accept what you are told on faith and faith alone. The later is to put one’s head in the sand.

Moving through life we accumulate knowledge. What we do with this knowledge is to evolve as human beings. We start out as innocent babes and evolve into wise women and men. For this evolution to occur, however, the knowledge we obtain has to be applied. It does no good to know that cigarettes are bad for you and to exercise is good if we do not act on the knowledge. This can be the true challenge of life because it forces us to change who we are.

If we really think about it though we are changing all the time anyway whether we want to or not. Consider this. The human body completely changes its stomach lining every three weeks, we get a new set of skin every five weeks and even our skeleton is nothing of what it was three months ago.[v] Change is part of evolution and it is natural. The way of the universe is to change and as part of the universe we cannot fight this change. Our task therefore is to take responsibility for the changes within us.

Responsibility

Responsibility is a key concept. One possible definition for the word responsible is ‘being the cause or explanation.’[vi] This has significant meaning if one is to take responsibility for one’s own life. Not only must we admit to being the cause of what happens to us in life, we must also admit to being the cause of being alive. Not necessarily in the sense that we brought ourselves into being in the universe but at least in the sense of choosing the circumstances of our birth. Whether we were born into a rich or poor family, a healthy environment full of love or a neglectful one of fear, it was our choice.

Why would anyone then choose to come into the world with anything less than wealthy, adoring parents? We all came into our lives to accomplish and learn certain things unique to us. Much of this growth cannot take place in whatever we have in our minds as a perfect life. Besides, there really isn’t such a thing as a perfect life anyway. Every story has its antagonist or conflict. Whatever it is a person might feel deprived of having would not make life perfect. At the very least one has to deal with aging and death.

If we decide to give ourselves some credit we can feel confident that the person we came into the world as is the person we should be. After all, why would we choose to come into the world as anything else? If we believe in reincarnation, and that we do have guidance in making decisions, why would we act in any way other than what is in our best interests?

So here we are the person we chose to be where we chose to be that person. Taking full responsibility for the circumstances of our lives that otherwise appear out of our control can have a big effect on how we view the world. For one it takes away our right to complain. We can no longer tell ourselves how unfair life has treated us as we look to people born with advantages over us. If we wanted more advantages we should have been someone else. We chose to be who we are for a reason. Part of the meaning of life is to seek those reasons.

That doesn’t change the fact that some of us have it harder than others. Someone born in a refugee camp in Africa infected with the AIDS virus certainly has more to deal with than your average middle class American. In either case, however, it would be healthy to accept responsibility for the situation. It allows us to focus on growing and learning rather than wasting energy complaining about things supposedly out of our control and feeling sorry for ourselves. The African in this example has more to feel bad about than the American. Still, if the soul that chose that existence can overcome its tendencies to feel that way it will better accomplish what it came here to do.

When we look at our own lives in this way it starts to reshape what we focus on. Someone born in advantageous circumstances might start to ponder what they can do to help other people. A person born into wealth might question why they chose that existence. Maybe it was to do more than simply travel the world and throw decadent parties for friends. A search for meaning and purpose now ensues. A person born into abuse realizes this is something they have to overcome. It does not mean they have to accept their circumstance as permanent. They just have to deal with it.

This thinking can be carried further to many issues. If you are a woman it is because you chose to be one. It is the same for a man. If you are White, Black, Hispanic, Asian, Native American or whatever it is of your own choosing. If you feel oppressed or discriminated against, by all means struggle to correct the injustice. Just don’t feel sorry for yourself.

This kind of thinking is in obvious contrast to popular monotheistic thought that god put us here of his own choosing. The point of thinking this way is not to elevate ourselves to the status of deities. It is simply another way to view things. With Sabaean thinking one never asks “Why me god?” Instead one asks “What is it that I am hear to learn?” I submit that the later is more healthy and constructive.

Upon further reflection one might eventually ask about the choices made by an infant that is born with an incurable disease and can only survive a few months. This and other such examples are truly mysterious. One can speculate that the birth of this soul was really there in order to help the parents with something they needed to experience.

So being responsible has a lot to do with dealing with disadvantage and hardship. It doesn’t mean we should not struggle, however. A healthy way to look at problems is illustrated in a story of unknown origin. This story was posted on the web:

…Maybe you’ve seen the Great Barrier Reef, stretching some 1,800 miles from New Guinea to Australia. Tour guides regularly take visitors to view The Reef. On one tour, the guide was asked an interesting question. “I notice that the lagoon side of the reef looks pale and lifeless, while the ocean side is vibrant and colorful,” a traveler observed. “Why is this?”

The guide gave an interesting answer: “The coral around the lagoon side is in still water, with no challenge for its survival. It dies early. The coral on the ocean side is constantly being tested by wind, waves, storms – surges of power. It has to fight for survival every day of its life. As it is challenged and tested it changes and adapts. It grows healthy. It grows strong. And it reproduces.” Then he added this telling note, “That’s the way it is with every living organism.” That’s how it is with people…[vii]

Another definition of the word responsible is ‘able to choose for oneself right and wrong.’[viii] Here we really deviate from monotheistic thought where right and wrong are determined by a higher being. Now we have to think and consider things for ourselves.

It is convenient to set a list of rules that define right and wrong. Society does it after all. All of our laws are basically a set of definitions on what we agree is right and wrong. In America these rules are debated by our elected leaders until a consensus is reached and they become law. It is necessary for society to do this in order to function and stay cohesive. These laws can change over time as society changes. Certain laws are likely to remain fixed. Murder and rape will probably remain illegal. Alcohol consumption on the other hand has been made legal, illegal and legal again. It used to be legal to own slaves. As societies grow and change it is necessary to modify laws to allow the society to progress.

Monotheistic religion, however, tends to make laws – ideas of right and wrong – that are absolute and unchanging. Let’s take a couple of the Ten Commandments. ‘Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.’ Many people take this to mean that no work should be done on the Sabbath. What about a case where a man is married and has five children? His wife, whom he loves dearly, is dying from cancer and is in pain. He needs the health insurance that he gets from his minimum wage job to buy her medicine to ease her pain. The wages he earns barely keep a roof over their heads and buy food for the children. What should this man do if his boss tells him he has to work the next seven days straight or be fired? I venture to guess that most of us would say he should work.

Another one is ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Most would agree that this law can be safely applied to situations involving random violence, domestic squabbles and disagreements at the post office. What about war? If a soldier is ordered to kill someone does that become an exception to the rule? This same question can be applied to the death penalty. Can killing someone to benefit the majority of a state be justified? The difference is that states are open to debate the issue. Monotheistic fundamentalists are not.

Humans have an intuitive sense of right and wrong. Not everyone, however, feels what is right and wrong in the same way. I saw an example of this the other day. Off the side of the highway was a billboard advertising breast enlargements for a bargain price. Someone spray painted on top of it ‘Love yourself; you are beautiful as you are.’ Probably the person who paid for the sign felt is was wrong of the person to commit vandalism by painting over his advertisement. At the same time the person who did it felt perfectly justified. Two views of the same situation and both people think they are right.

Sabaean thought borrows a story from Santeria to illustrate how two people can be right and yet contradict each other (this might not be the most accurate telling of the story but it will make the point). The god Elegua one day noticed two men who were arrogant in their belief of always being right. Not being a big fan of arrogance Elegua decided to have a little fun. He stood on a street corner and one of the men who saw him said ‘Look at that man with the red face.’ The other man was looking from the other direction and said ‘Look at that man with the black face.’ A huge fight ensued with both men convinced they were right. In reality both were correct for Elegua had changed his face to be red on one side and black on the other.

We should keep this in mind when dealing with other people. People around us may be coming from different perspectives. Human interactions would be quite a bit easier if we went into situations considering another person’s point of view. Think of a typical traffic accident. It’s rare when someone says to themselves ‘I think I’ll race up to that car over there and run into it just for kicks.’

The point here is that the world of human interaction is seldom black and white. Our perspectives change with time and experience and a changing perspective of right and wrong is healthy. To manage this growth we have to step up to the plate and make some decisions. If we stay true to ourselves and really listen to what we know to be right in our hearts we will be fine. We just have to be responsible to choose.

The last definition of responsibility to look at is ‘able to answer for one’s conduct and actions.’[ix] Here we start to touch on the idea of karma or cause and effect so popular in Eastern religion.

It is a generally accepted principal in physics that for every action there is a reaction. If you hit a ball with a bat, the ball will fly in a direction and to a distance proportional to the angle and force with which you hit it. Likewise we can predict with some degree of accuracy what will happen if we step on a cat’s tail.

There is a similar law in effect in the moral universe. Some obvious examples are that if someone says to their spouse “I hate you’ they will illicit a particular reaction. If you watch a scary movie you might have trouble falling asleep for awhile. These situations are fairly obvious. The idea of karma, however, can be much more subtle. At the same time, it can be much more profound.

The Dalai Lama said “The consequences of karma are definite: negative actions always bring about suffering, and positive actions always bring happiness. If you do good, you will have happiness; if you do bad, you yourself will suffer.”[x] Here we are introduced to the ideas of happiness and suffering. Every action we take will inspire one or the other. This is the measure of correct action in the Buddhist sense. The difficulty can come in predicting the outcome of a choice. We must, however, make choices and be responsible for them. The laws of karma will not let us escape this responsibility.

Similar thinking is echoed in ancient Greek thinking. Socrates while on trial said, “You are mistaken … if you think that a man who is worth anything ought to spend his time weighing up the prospects of life and death. He has only one thing to consider in performing any action – that is, whether he is acting rightly or wrongly.”[xi] Socrates is also quoted as saying, “The soul is that which is mutilated by wrong actions and benefited by right ones.”[xii]

So how can we be sure our decisions will always produce good karma? Perhaps some enlightened saint can be sure of an action’s cause and effect. Unfortunately most of us cannot. As with most things there will be situations that are obviously black and white and others that are grey. We must therefore rely on our heads and our hearts, knowing that we are responsible for what we get. As we grow and learn we will become more adept. Conscious awareness helps the process.

Where we are now in life is simply the effect of all the karmic causation we have brought into our own lives. If something does not feel right or there is suffering it is due to some past action, possibly in another lifetime, that brought that suffering into being. Likewise the same is true for the happiness in our lives.

This is not meant to say that we should look upon our fellow men and women who are suffering and say “Well, they probably deserve it.” That in itself might produce its own negative karma for us. Rather we should look at our own situations and realize that we ourselves are the cause. When we do this we don’t feel as sorry for ourselves. We are not the victim, instead we are the culprit. Once we assume responsibility for our situation we can start taking action to improve it. The opposite applies as well by the way. If things are going well then keep it up.

The ideas of karma and sin are similar yet different. Sin can be defined as ‘transgression against the law of god.’[xiii] If the law of god is defined in a book somewhere, then anything not addressed by that book is not a sin. Neglecting to get your breaks serviced when they need it wouldn’t count as a sin in most peoples’ view. Does the situation change if this action leads to a car accident later? Karma is not so forgiving. A cause has been put into motion and an effect is to be expected. We still accept the responsibility, learn from the experience and move on.

Let’s take the man who is enlisted in the army and ordered to kill for his country for instance. If he feels he has sinned he might beg forgiveness from his god and feel guilty for some amount of time, possibly forever. If he feels his plea is accepted that might be the end of it in his view. He might even go so far as justify the whole thing by saying it was the will of god.

A Sabaean would look at the situation differently. There would be no guilt involved. He would accept responsibility for the situation and that might be the end of it. Whatever consequences come into his life as result would be accepted and dealt with. He would try to learn from the experience, possibly reflecting on the wastefulness of war. Perhaps he would feel motivated to leave the service or just accept it as a job to do and make it an adventurous career. Either way he is approaching the situation from a completely different angle than the sinner. He is taking responsibility for himself and not looking to any deity to justify his action or absolve him.

Another significant difference between the karmic view of things and monotheistic thought is the idea of time. In monotheistic thought there is a definite beginning point for the origin of the soul which is at birth (or at conception but we won’t go there). From this magical moment of origin time moves forward until death. After death, perhaps after some time in purgatory or perhaps not, the surviving soul is then either rewarded or punished according to his or her deeds. We should pity a person who is born in a crack house with no father and a diseased mother. If that child grows into a bad person then off to hell they go. Will of god and all that. Some even believe the same fate awaits someone born in a remote part of the world who never heard of being baptized. We don’t need to be concerned whether that person was good or not.

In the view of the Sabaean time stretches out in infinite directions from the current moment, both forwards and backwards. We carry karma with us that can be good or bad from previous lives. This karma in fact leads us to choose our current existence. What we do from this point on will impact our future in both this life and those to come. If we bring suffering into the world through our actions in this life we may indeed experience a sort of hell in the next. There is still hope for us though and through future correct action we can improve our lot and overcome our previous bad deeds.

So taking responsibility for our actions really has a significant impact on how we approach life. It takes away our excuses. It focuses us on problem solving rather than complaining about the problem. Life becomes a learning experience for us; part of a grand, infinitely large existence that we are fortunate enough to experience. Contrast this to absolving oneself of all responsibility and assigning it to the will of god.

Integrity

A strong sense of personal responsibility sets the basis for a sense of morality through personal integrity. Integrity is defined as ‘firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values.’[xiv] Personal integrity can therefore be looked at as adherence to personal moral values. Questions of morality have plagued man since the beyond the beginnings of civilization and recorded history. It is therefore appropriate to study, compare, contrast and learn from teachers who came before us.

Socrates suggested that, “no one acts contrary to what is best in the belief that he is doing so, but through error.”[xv] This could be taken to simply mean that people do what is in their best interest and that could be the end of it where it not for the fact that Socrates emphasized the importance of morality through his entire life, both in teachings and deeds. It is reasonable then to infer that he felt no one acts immorally except by mistake. The mistake is based on the belief of the individual. Morality is therefore a function of personal belief.

Protagoras goes even further to say that all experience is strictly subjective. There are no universal truths in his view. A simple example is that you and I both look outside at the weather. You decide that today is a beautiful day and for you it is. If I decide it too hot and therefore a terrible day then for me it is. Both of us are experiencing our own truths. In this belief we create our own worlds and what we create for ourselves is indeed truth, although not universal. This view is popularly known as relativism and best summed in Protagoras’ own words, “Man is the measure of all things.”[xvi]

In living a life of integrity then it is necessary for individuals to form their own moral compass. This compass can be formed through thought, learning and taking responsibility for ones own life. From time to time changes may occur in ones views of morality or right action but this is growth and evolution.

To have integrity then, all that remains is to have the courage necessary to follow what you believe to be right. In doing so however, it is advisable to continue to think about what is moral and what is not. Horrible acts have been committed throughout history by people who thought they were acting with integrity.

So at the end of it all, living a life of integrity is the goal of the Sabaean Process but the process does not end. A constant evolution is needed to revise one’s views and compass as new information and experience becomes available. This evolution occurs everyday, in every life – whether we think about it or not.

Peace & Light,

Keith Breeding