This is the main page describing POEE.
Most interesting to me is the five degrees of POEE. As a member of this POEE, you’d climb up the hierarchy as you learned about Eris. But the Polyfather is not the highest rank, the popes are. And most of the popes don’t know anything about Discordia. And anybody can be a pope, every man woman and child on this earth is a genuine and certified Pope. So you don’t have to go through the other four steps to be the head of POEE.
There’s a lesson here about no-mind. The Buddha says that everybody’s a Buddha, they just don’t realize it. Students of Zen spend years training their minds to be childlike. The POEE hierarchy recognizes that there’s nothing really mystical or occult about enlightenment, it’s accessible to everybody. There are people who walk around confident, aware, and unconflicted, doing what they’re supposed to be doing, and they didn’t need a single spiritual teaching to do that. A seeker could spend decades on a spiritual path, and then meet somebody who seems to have mastered the teaching, despite having never heard of it.
"Riel Monkey" by Riel Hilario, from the exhibit "if an apostle looks in no monkey can look out"
The hierarchy is also a reminder to be humble. We are not walking on the “true spiritual path”, and to entertain that idea is an ego game. Regular pedestrians “get” Discordianism a lot better than any of us, so give them a break. They are the highest members of POEE, they are totally free of Discordian orthodoxy and dogma. You could learn a thing or two from them!
The quote at the bottom of the page is from Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, a German scientist and satirist. This line is one of his most famous aphorisms. Originally, it’s not talking about the Principia, but all books. In another similar aphorism, Lichtenberg clarifies, “When a book and a head collide and it sounds hollow, then the book doesn’t need to be blamed for it.” This is line shares a chord with a warning later in the book: If you think the Principia is just a joke, go back and read it again.
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Thanks for the info on the Lichtenberg quote. I was trying to remember it the other day but couldn’t remember enough of it to even google it. Sounds like he was a very interesting man. Assume he is a de facto Discordian saint due to his inclusion on this page.
Just looked up some of Lichtenberg’s other quotes. He also said, “To do just the opposite is also a form of imitation.” He is definitely one of ours.
Are they still esoteric if we’re paying attention to them? Shouldn’t they be called the POEP (Paratheoanametamystikhood of Eris Popular)?
Does virginity come in silver? or is it locked to the gold standard? How about fiat virginity?
Is the scruple key-chain a holy relic? Can we quest for it?
Is Discordia biased against monkeys? Are monkeys forbidden from becoming apostles?
If some people “get” the teachings without study or practice, then aren’t we simply glorifying one class of human psychology? What stance does Discordia take towards the neuro-atypical? (By definition, the neuro-atypical cannot be the Popes: the Popes “get” it, the neuro-atypical don’t.)
Discordia is not biased against monkeys, even though it was an ape who gave the revelation to Malaclypse and Omar. But we are biased against cabbages.
By the way Cramulus, when you get to the Discordians against cabbages part, you might note the connection with a quote by Ambrose Bierce we use in the soon-to-be-professionally-published Ek-sen-trik-kuh Discordia: The Tales of Shamlicht (I do manage to mention that book a lot, don’t I?)
‘Cabbage: A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man’s head.’ — Ambrose Bierce