THE WONDERS OF COOPERATIVE INDIVIDUALISM
 

There is absolutely nothing wrong, awkward, vicious or disreputable about individualism if it is well understood, and perfectly adapted to social service and collective rehabilitation.

Individualism is a nefaste affaire only when it is a form of selfishness, or expressive of personal exclusivism regardless of spiritual values and universal principles.

Morbid and foolhardy individualism turns into tyranny, and its methods of action are always limited, egocentric and monopolistic, autocratic and personal.

Yet, the person is never separated from the whole Universe. There are no defined or specific frontiers between the personality and the Universal or between thoughts and environment, and feelings and aspirations and eternity. Besides, we continually draw energy, and live by force of inspiration which reaches us from everywhere, even from the remotest regions of the Infinite which our mind is unable to compass or completely understand.

Cooperativism needs no longer be explained or defended. It has gained a place in the world that challenges the goodness of all other existing economic systems.

Individualism is taboo to Christendom, because it appears as defiance to human intelligence to Divine powers. On ultimate analysis, we believe that individualism is one of the most wonderful attributes that distinguishes intelligent creatures.  Many other Religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism, nonetheless are profoundly individualistic, because they leave to each atom the right to make decisions and choose ideals its course in life.

Respect to what concern to us, we consider new fundamentals of life have been discovered in the way Economics and a Worldwide COMMONWEALTH are conceived, making them function like a clock-work, without regimenting man or imposing dogmas or compulsory measures. Moreover, we have introduced in the human idearium a set of new imperatives, which were perhaps always known and suffered, but never until now explained and claimed as fundamental, vital needs. These are, namely, the need of insured Health, Happiness, Peace, Respect, Dignity, Assistance (Service), and economic Certainty. All these conditions have become integrant parts of human life only thanks to our constant pounding on such Universal Principles, which we deem as Vital Imperatives.

Economy suffers from terrible cancers, and these may be named outright MONEY and INTEREST. Both rest on the principle or assumption of SELFISH PROFIT that is a source for all forms of defame, vice, crime and war. Man looses or sells its virtue because of it, falls into perversion, becomes barbarian, despise all spiritual values, and even trading with sacred  ideals in their own detriment.

The greatest evil of modern economics lies, no doubt, in the fact that MONEY, instead of being a simple commodity, has become the symbol of CREDIT and a tool of PROFIT. Thanks to profiteering selfishness, Money has become, precisely that, by means of INTEREST functioning as its stimulant factor, which is frequently the most poisonous of all elements known to man.

All advanced philosophers and enlightened sages agree that this system of Economics is what makes materialistic civilization such a tragic curse. Yet, none seems to realize that all their Teachings and doctrines remain futile until such a curse is removed from the world. People cannot attain heavenly grandeur and perfection while they are possessed and spured along by this devil of divine-made powers.

Money reformers abound, offering different schemas to remedy world ills. To say the truth, none really offers consistent solutions. Nevertheless, stability and Peace around the world depend entirely on a constructive solution to all economic problems. Social unrest and political chaos also rest on such an issue.

The problem of wealth is subordinated to the accepted system of finance that is ancient. Unfortunately, a general overhauling of world economy must ensue, ere we find a real and lasting solution. Money as a commodity would not be so loaded with evils after all, if it could lose its force value upon being used the first time, in the same way as banknotes or letters of credit. But what makes Money so evil, is the fact that it is an interest-bearing item, and at the same time a medium of CREDIT. This is basically immoral, and a source of all sorts of wrongs and tragedies, because people will find no end to their troubles and will get in serious difficulties too, in order to obtain it, even without working, without earning it by their own production. Instead, they will try to acquire it by flawed ways by cheating or through murder.

The concept of WEALTH is what we must change. Economics, or science of management and production of wealth, needs not to become a source of social injustice and unrest, and of political strife and war. If we engineer a system of economy whereby wealth is common (COMMONWEALTH), people can continue to be strenuously individualists, yet not enemies of society, with all individuals managing to earn it honestly, by producing. In sound analysis, MONEY should only be the means to permit the marketing, transportation and distribution of produced goods, and nothing else. A simple voucher proving that value has been recognized and corresponded to.

MONEY has become a devilish gadget or item when it can be obtained through theft, lottery, gambling, monopoly, vice, plunder, murder or war.  And an economy founded on such possibilities is decidedly not moral, honest or dignified.

Cooperative Individualism can abolish MONEY altogether, and establish the COMMONWEALTH structure and mechanism, whereby all individuals are participants (Partners) and owners of shares proportional to their actual contribution to this COMMONWEALTH.

The Tibetan

 

From: The Spiritual Call, Foyers de Conscience Spirituelle “BODHA”, Ecole Esotérique de l´Union Spirituelle de Service Universel. Splendours of Eternity, March 21,1973, Fasc.4