Monday, May 20, 2013

our human heritage-God-Wisdom II

In my last blog, I said that our human origination was from spiritual powers, which are the model structures upon which the physical human form was developed.  I than asked the question, What would our world view be, if based on spiritual powers templating our physical, human form?
(It would be a good idea to reread my first blog on "Our Human Heritage-God Wisdom).

At first glance, the Christian, Jewish, Muslim view on the origination of humans would seem to evenly line up with the stated view above.  God, Jehovah, Allah, although different names represent the same meaning, that an ultimate spiritual being, created humans and the universe. Since the spiritual, ultimate, supreme being originated/created the universe and humans, the sequence was from the spiritual to the physical.  So far the doctrines line up, but here is the "but," the supreme beings of the above religions not only created/originated humans and the universe, but supervise and ultimately judge each human as to which will receive salvation and which will not.  There is a logical, philosophical flaw with supreme beings supervising and judging their creations.  The above religions assign, out of their gods' essential natures, certain omni-qualities: infinitness, omniscient, etc.  An infinite being must operate on the plane of infinity and cannot operate on the plane of a mundane world without surrendering its infinitness. Simply put, an infinite being cannot become finite, in any way, shape or form. To have a supreme being step into the finite plane and supervise and judge its finite creations, seems from a  mystical point of view acceptable, but from a  philosophical point of view is untenable.  Lets take an analogy of Superman, (the comic book hero) to strengthen my point.  Superman is the man of steel; the strongest material on earth.  We can mystically accept Superman's steel like nature and his super abilities, but when we scrutinize, philosophize, his nature we find that steel isn't the strongest material, for instance, a diamond is stronger.  We also know from experience that a temperature of about a 1ooo+ degrees Fahrenheit, melts steel.  So! why use hard to find kryptonite to destroy the Man of Steel?  Thus we reduce the mystery of Superman to speculation, and must now reconfigure the idea of Superman to comform to the gathered, new truth.   The best argument the religions can put forth to justify their doctrine of  their gods supervising and judging their creations is, "It is not possible to know the will of omniscient god, therefore we must have complete faith in his judgements."  The religions are really asking their followers to have "blind faith."    

The practice of such a doctrine results in great fear and confusion for the religions' followers; the often heard question universally echos, "How can an omniscient, all merciful god let bad things happen to good people?"  Listen to Thomas Hardy's, a novelist and poet, confusion, in his poem, "Hap,"

"If but some vengeful god would call to me
From up the sky, and laugh: "Thou suffering thing,
Know that thy sorrow is my ecstasy,
That thy love's loss is my hate's profiting!

Then would I bear it, clench myself, and die,
Steeled by the sense of ire unmerited;
Half-eased in that a Powerfuller than I
Had willed and meted me the tears I shed.

But not so.  How arrives it joy lies slain,
And why unblooms the best hope ever sown?
-Crass Casualty obstructs the sun and rain,
And dicing Time for gladness casts a moan....
These purblind Doomsters had as readily strown
Blisses about my pilgrimage as pain."

The religions' doctrines have their gods jump from infinitness to finiteness, which primarily stems from an orthodox rendering of their scriptures.  Yet, it is not due to their scriptures in themselves, but solely to the wrong interpretation given them by priests and churches, and easily believed by a weak humanity that needs a support beyond itself on which to lean.  Not only do these misguided doctrines lead to confusion, but they also lead to searching for salvation from the outside, within the dualistic material world.  As soon as we postulate a Deity who is outside and beyond us we must bow our heads and lower our eyes,  and wait for his judgement.  To get a better grasp of the effects of a blind-faith belief searching for salvation from the outside, lets imagine a fictional character, Samuel Seeker, and examine his faith based views within any Christian sect.

 Here stands Sam, immersed within his blind-faith from early childhood; believing in an infinite, omniscient, jealous, judging and supervising god being, along with god's only begotten son, Jesus the Christ who descended to earth, was crucifixied, died, and resurrected to establish a pathway for salvation.  Along side Sam's god is an incarnate being, the source of all evil, "Satan;" one of Sam's god's prior, highest hosts, who turned away from god because of archangel pride, " who would rather reign on earth, than serve in heaven."  Sam is instructed, in his one life on earth, even though he is brought into earth life marked by "original sin" to live a righteous life according to the sacred scriptures and to prepare himself for the "last judgement;" where he will receive his reward of eternal heaven, or punishment of purification in purgatory or eternal damnation in hell.  Of course Sam's hope is for eternal heaven, and although Alexander Pope says ..."Hope springs eternal in the heart of  man"... his next line, which no one ever quotes is  ..." man never is, but always to be blessed."  Sam's hope for salvation for eternal heaven, is conditioned by the judgement of his god and/or his devotion to Jesus, and all that is based on god's grace and mercifulness.  Sam understands those conditions and estimates that his chances for eternal heaven are less than fifth percent.  He came into this world with a black mark of sin on his soul, and into an environment tilted towards sin.  Add to that an incarnate being, Satan, on par with god, strongly influencing  his conduct towards sin, and he believes that the odds are stacked up against him.  He thinks that if Jesus can be tempted, against Jeaus' will, by the Devil what chance will he have against Satan's influence, because he is no where near being a Jesus or a saint.  The very best Sam can hope for is purification in purgatory, and even that may be tempered by god's final judgement, leaving an out come of eternal hell fire. Sam's life is therefore filled with great confusion and fear.

There is a saying, by Shrimat Shankaracharya, a Hindu sage, and whose commentaries on Hindu scriptures are the most recognized and authoritative, "The foolish being who lives making even the slightest distinction between the Self and his own Self will always be subject to fear."  Here Shankara is not referring to the ego/personality self, but to the Higher Self, the Self that resides, beyond all duality, and beyond the reach of thought,  There is an Upanishad, literally meaning "sitting down next to or at the feet of" a master of spiritual knowledge, it is called "Chandogya Upanishad."  In chapter VI, Uddalaka, the father, is answering his son, Shvetaketu's question, about the Self:

..."In the beginning was only Being,
 One without a second.
 Out of Himself he brought forth the cosmos
 And entered into everything in it.
 There is nothing that does not come from him.
 Of everything he is the inmost Self.
 He is truth; he is the Self supreme.
 You are that, Shvetaketu; you are that."

"Please, Father, tell me more about the Self."
"Yes dear one, I will," said Uddalaka.

"Bring me a fruit from the nyagrodha tree."
"Here it is sir."
"Break it.  What do you see?"
"These seeds, Father, all exceedingly small."
"Break one.  What do you see?"
"Nothing at all."
"That hidden essence you do not see, dear
         one,
From that a whole nyagrodha tree will grow.
There is nothing that does not come from
          him.
Of everything he is the inmost Self.
He is the truth; he is the Self supreme.
You are that, Shvetaketu; you are that."

The Self can be known because it is the Knower, a spark of divine consciousness, who resides in every human being who has not degraded himself through material desire.  This must, however be admitted before any approach is made to the Higher Self.  As  Krishna says in the Bhagavad-Gita, ..."Among thousands of mortals a single one perhaps strives for perfection, and among those so striving a single one knows me as I am."...   The path to the Self is long and arduous, demanding, courage, determination, diligence, and devotion.  It is the only refuge where the restless mind can find complete satisfaction and truth, and finally rest in peace.

The religions that follow this teaching, of lifting the veil of ignorance to revel the true reality of  divine consciousness within us, are Hindu, Buddhist, and Sufi, a mystic branch of Islam; there may be others that I am unaware of.  These religions follow the god-wisdom about the Self supreme 's, infinitness.  The Self builds His house within His own being and lives within it, yet pervades it and transcends it, while emanating countless beings and entities to architect and build, with the Self's ideation, the Universe.

In the almost infinite multiplicity of manifestation, there must be a universal constant, otherwise how could there be any understanding, knowledge or wisdom.  The universe, without a infinite constant would be a bundle of chaos.  There would be no relationship of experience to experience, thought to thought, no recognized causal effect; only haphazard events.  In the movie, "Space Odyssey 2001," there appeared, at various transition points in the movie, or you might say evolutionary transition points, this relatively thin piece of four sided, some kind of metal like substance beam, and ever time it appeared a chanting sound, like that of Buddhist Monks chanting the sacred "Om," would be heard.  I did not understand the symbolism at first, but over a period of reflection I have come to understand.  It was an attempt, by the movie, to show that there was an infinite constant, that permeats, indwelts and infills, all manifistation.  This is the Self, the spark of divine consciousness.  Reader! you are That; you are That.