Dear Jerry,

I was thinking of signs like the Tarot images that Sosostris  
interprets. They always signify something mysterious that an adept  
needs to explain.

People who read horoscopes find signs of the future in the arrangement  
of planets at the time of one's birth. I was told my "moon is in  
Taurus" which signifies something or other.

I take it that's not how Eliot meant "signs."

Diana

Sent from my iPod

On Mar 14, 2010, at 5:22 PM, Terry Traynor <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Diana, when you posted this:
>
> >Dear Nancy,
>
> >I was responding to your point in an another post in which
> >you questioned whether Enlightenment could be an object
> >of attachment.
>
> were you referring to the following?
>
> >As I understand it, Buddhism says that _any_thing that a
> >disciple gets attached to could prevent enlightenment.  If so,
> >wouldn't distinguishing between one object of attachment
> >(sign) and another (wonder) be irrelevant?
>
> The above was written by me, not Nancy. It doesn't question "whether  
> Enlightenment could be an object of attachment." I'm at a loss to  
> understand why you construed it that way. It speaks of attachments  
> that could _prevent_ enlightenment. It was written in response to  
> your post that talked about attachments that could prevent  
> enlightenment:
>
> >he was always asked for miracle stories, which he said were a
> >sign along the non-rational path that could prevent enlightenment
> >if the disciple got attached to them.
> >
> >I see a connection here to Eliot's distinction between signs and
> >wonders.
>
> What connection could you have seen, given that currently you say:
>
> >"Wonders" and "signs" seem equivalent to me; I don't get the
> >difference.
>
> I thought Jerry did a great job of explaining the difference, but  
> let me give it a shot. There's a wide range of phenomena --  
> everything from cascading waterfalls to dead people coming back to  
> life -- that inspire astonishment, awe, and WONDER. A few of these  
> wonders, however, go beyond being spectacular in and of themselves.  
> They also symbolize something else or point to something else the  
> way that SIGNS do. For example, thunder is wondrous to listen to,  
> but it's also a sign that rain is coming. Some people in the gospels  
> fail to recognize that various wonders they've witnessed are not  
> just wonders, but also signs -- specifically, signs of Jesus's  
> divinity. Mistaking these signs for wonders, they keep asking for  
> what they've already been given.
>
> Terry
>