Defining religion

[henbane intl.]

Definitions are limited anyway.

I opt for space - the hard way out.

Hugs,
Hen

[henbane intl.]

Marx underestimated his own definition of 'religion' -  failing to undertsand that his own 'philosophy' would become the opium of the Chinese.

[jamadara]

Definitions are limited anyway.

I opt for space - the hard way out.

Reminds me of,

"All man's miseries derive from not being able to sit quietly in a room alone."--Blaise Pascal

Still, I have no more quarrel w/ definitions than w/ my own body.

[henbane intl.]

body is defined by something. yes?

[jamadara]

In the context in which I was using it, it *is* a defnition.

Breaks down pretty much like this for me...

The universe (mental, physical, or otherwise) moves by the dynamic interplay of opposing forces—at its most fundamental level, the difference between THIS and THAT. The line that separates the two is that of definition, analogous to the magic circle. Evolution—life—is about freedom, which is about overcoming boundaries (the Big One = entropic tendency), circles, definitions (I have a spacial analogy for this, related to the I Ching, but I will leave it out for now). But they are not overcome for long: as Norbert Wiener noted, progress imposes new limitations as well as new freedoms (overcoming old ones).

One way of looking at the model I just proposed is as the wheel of birth-and-death (cf, eros and thanatos: thanateros). Some religions concern themselves with how to improve one's position on the wheel; others w/ how to leave the wheel entirely. As usual, I take the middle ground.

For me, magic is also about freedom. If I could express exactly what I mean by that, then I would have done what I suspect is impossible: explained how magic works. But I will say that for me it often involves what I call a profound reconciliation of opposites (non-duality, if you like), which may lead to something like Spare's "free belief". It also often involves sitting quietly, doing nothing. I am a mystic in addition to a magician; the latter for me has to do w/ practical—"worldy", if you like—application of the former (eg, the practical results of reversing how one thinks and acts w/ re to sex and death). Gnosis is both a means and an end, but I would no more want to be gnosticated all the spacetime than be infinite and eternal all the time: when everything is one thing, nothing is anything. The last time that happened, someone said,

"Let there be light!" (And there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good, and God separated the light from darkness.)

While I am throwing around bits of creation myths, here is my usual fav:

The Seven Secret Sayings of God

1. Before "the beginning when God created the heaven and the earth, and the earth was without form, and void: and darkness was upon the face of the deep (Gen 1.1–2, Ps 33.6, Acts 14.15), god said I AM THAT (Ex 3.14, Jno 8.58). And it is so.

2. Also, being in eternity which is neither linear or sequential, where all is nowever, God said, YOU MUST DRAW THE LINE SOMEWHERE. And it was drawn.

3. But it was no dreary straight line or flat wall, for God then said, HAVE A BALL. And there was a ball, in the image whereof all stars and planets came to be formed.

4. Thereupon God said, THERE ARE TWO SIDES TO EVERYTHING. And there are: the inside and the outside, the dense and the spacious, the right and the wrong, the left and the taken, for, as it is written, One shall be taken, and the other left (Mat 24.40–41).

5. And God said, IT MUST BE IN TIME. And thereafter it was, is, and will be, for as it is written again, As it was in the beginning is now, and ever shall be, through all ages of ages. Amen (lit of St John Chrysostom).

6. And forthwith God said, SPACE IT OUT. Whereupon it came to pass that, beside this and that and now and then, there is also here and there.

7. And God beheld how firm a foundation this was (Hymn 564) and said unto himself, GET LOST. And there you are.

—Alan Watts, Cloud-Hidden, Whereabouts Unknown

[henbane intl.]

Thanks for explaining. I liked it.

I will use Madyamaka for my explanation. Madyamaka is a subtle pragmatic philosophical, yogic, and meditational school.

Definitions are limited, but are 'conventionally valid'. This means they are agreed upon by most and 'semantically' approved. For instance, when we see a table, we can all pretty much agree that it is a table. It is a symbol that is 'relected' in mind and then consensually becomes 'valid' through linguistic imposition and mental contract. This is the tables' 'relative' reality. But if one looks at the table, using Madyamaka, one can begin to see that the table is merely an assemblage of parts. If one breaks down the parts one sees more parts and more parts. Each part is made up of another part and another, ad infinitum. Science seems to be searching for the partless part, the essence, shall we say, of the part. I say that they will not find it. They will probably realize that the smallest, most scrutable parts arise out of empty space. I think they may have come close.
 
Madyamaka brings one to the realization that the aforementioned 'table' is empty of inherent existence. It is not born of itself. It is not born of other. From this view we are limited by definiitions, because we believe 'things' are 'inherently existing' without seeing that they are interdependent, fluid and empty. So the table has the relative reality of us assigning and agreeing upon it as a table, but is also 'ultimately' empty of inherent existence. And these two, relative and ultimate are actually non-dual. If one practices this method can, one see it.

Hen

[jamadara]

Thank you, Hen. I enjoyed your explanation as well.

I agree w/ your expectations of science. There is a Hindu (?) adage that if you go to everything in the universe that can be pointed to (ie, named) and say, "you are not God," whatever remains is God. I have said that God is (among other things) the fundamental tautology of existence: I AM THAT I AM.

W/ re to space, I suppose my different mis/use of it is mostly semantic. I do not equate space w/ that sort of mystical emptiness—that no-thing—of which (I heard) you speak. Like in The Neverending Story: "A hole would have been something; nah, it was nothing." Although I commune-icate w/ what I suppose we could call Space-with-a-capital-S, synonymous w/ Void, I tend to think of space-in-lower-case as being more (useful) duality. (I do maintain some interest in spatial intelligence, and I learned a neat trick from Antero Alli for putting myself in an altered state: concentrate only on the space/s between the things in my environment for about an hour or so. Can do the same w/ the space between thoughts, though that is bit trickier [at least for me].)

W/ re to seeing the inherent existence-lessness of the table, I have not yet experienced it on such a level that I could not feel the table if someone pushed me into it just then or vice versa (but I have hope!). Further, I am not opposed to the notion of objective reality. Rather, I consider the subject-object dichotomy (continuum?) a useful (albeit limiting) duality, and attempt to learn from reconciling the two as I would w/ any other pair.

[henbane intl.]

Thanks!

The Space I allude to is not nothing, but is rather pure potential from which all form arises. Not god, because I 'believe' in no creator. Nothing is a nihilist interpretation of space. Void is a misinterpretation of emptiness made by western scholars trying to wrap their tiny heads, intellectually, around an experience...

I like your idea of space though. It is neat.

I enjoy Space very much...especially the space between thoughts.

'I think therefore I am' - what are you if you are not thinking?

[jamadara]

"'I think therefore I am' - what are you if you are not thinking?"

:-) Well said.

[Isis]

What of the violinist who knows the instrument, the nomenclature, the history, the technique,
the, well..., all of it.
And yet cannot make the damn thing really work.
In the arts, this rarely happens.

We have the idea that almost all humans who ascribe mainstream religious thought
as their model for achieving sundry unlikely desires
have the same success with thier magico-religious systems
as the most dedicated and competent sorcerer will have with thiers.
Which is to say, almost no success at all.

Beliefs are tools.

As such they are the  violins in the art.

When a magician plays that violin
he will play a different piece of music everytime.
When a religious person plays that violin
she will play the same music over and over again.
When a sceptic plays the violin he too will
play the same music all over again,
however he feels that his music comes with the
proof that it is music, therefore his violin is a real
violin.

In the end what we all get out of our beliefs is our window
through which we look at reality, ourselves and on others.
But since one can't life live from an observerpoint alone and
one has also to experience it,
the consequence is that one has to live in the reality one sees.
Lucky for all of us  reality comes a lot bigger.