On the Order of Nature

The date of Parmenides' birth is uncertain but, according to the indications of Apollodoros, it can be placed between the sixth and the fifth centuries B.C. Parmenides was born in Magna Graecia, in Elea (today's Velia) located on the coast of Campania south of Paestum, into a family of noble lineage and quite well off. It is known that he governed and gave very good laws to his city (in those days, as it happened, cities were governed by Philosophers), and every year the Eleans pledged their loyalty to those laws.

Raphael having attained a synthesis of Knowledge (with which eclecticism or syncretism are not to be confused) aims at 'presenting' the Universal Tradition in its many Eastern and Western expressions. He has spent a substantial number of years writing and publishing books on spiritual experience, and his works include commentaries on the Qabbalah, Hermeticism and Alchemy. He has also commented on and compared the Orphic Tradition with the works of Plato, Parmenides and Plotinus. Furthermore, Raphael is the author of several books on the pathway of non-duality (Advaita), which he has translated from the original Sanskrit, offering commentaries on a number of key Vedantic texts. After more than sixty years of teaching, both oral and written, Raphael has withdrawn into mahasamadhi.