GENIUS FORUMS

I define it as the endeavor to understand and identify one's self with their origin and relation to the universe. I believe it's a fundamental human trait. We want to know who we are. We want to know where we came from. We want to know what we're doing here. We even want to know what our destiny holds for us. These types of questions are the essence of spirituality. The answers are our identity.

Spirituality is the deep, even primal connection we have with our world/universe/existence. That feeling of elation, that tingle in your spine when you feel you connected on a fundamental level with something beyond humanity is spirituality. I am very atheist. I'm under the impression atheism is the purest, most inspiring expression of spirituality there is.

What are your thoughts on spirituality?

You provide the meaning.
gathering symbols for symbolic security.

In Essence,
Spirituality~

the quality or fact of being spiritual.

Disappointing. That seems more pseudo-intellectual than genius. Not that I don't appreciate the new-agey metaphysical BS attempt. It's just that I'm a lot more astrophysicist than hippy.

there you go then,
looking for symbolic security.

I suppose the beauty of that approach is if you are equally enlightened in all areas, sharing your wisdom won't take long.

What can I say?
You're looking for symbolic security
Yes?

No. I'm here to assert spirituality is a fundamental human trait. Actually, a trait of sentience. Spirituality is the mark of humanity being born into sentience. But we don't have to concern ourselves with that.

Suffice it say if that's the extent of your association or understanding of spirituality then I might be in the wrong place.

Perhaps I should tell you where continents came from.

Or that neutrons are the universe's ultimate power source. -it what powers supernova, magnetars and quasars. Quasars are actually full spectrum lasers, except its pure energy in resonance... Somehow, I question if this site could keep up with me at all.

Depends on causes/conditions?

Um, was that even relevant to anything I said?

Is there a classically defined genius here?

As much as I'm enjoying your antics, it's not what I came for.

'I assert' is insufficient reason.
there must be a possibility 'to assert' present..

Rift, you'd do yourself a favor if you lurked around the place for a bit to try get a feel of the regulars here before you converse with them. Even better is if you put this forum on the back burner for a while and browse through the material of those who created this forum. Start at theabsolute.net. Solway's site is the Thinking Minefield, Quinn's site is clearly listed there, and the youtube channel has a good amount of videos of Rowdan and Solway across various topics, username MenOfTheInfinite.

Your definition of spirituality is impressive. The only thing I would add to it is the absolute pursuit of Truth. Being an atheist is a good place to start.

Upon what basis is atheism imputed.
what are its parts.

don't say I assert.
there has to be a method behind I assert.

Rift Zone wrote: That feeling of elation, that tingle in your spine when you feel you connected on a fundamental level with something beyond humanity is spirituality.

The art remains in giving that hands and feet without coming across as some crazy idiot. It's a feeling which can flow in personal understandings but can still be grounded by logic, reason, practical wisdom while fueling any journey into the sciences or sharing the experience through other means. The observation which could be made is that it seems so many people around us don't even have a tingle or even connect with anything beyond their own concerns in their immediate life. Spirituality always has attempted to address this as it's generally better to broaden understanding than to close it off. It's not a fix as such but connectedness just tends to express itself in various inspirational manners, perhaps because that just is what it does. Then again selfcenteredness can also be contagious. Not to mention the various simulations of being connected with something while it's just another version of orbiting self.

Dennis Mahar wrote:Upon what basis is atheism imputed.
what are its parts.

don't say I assert.
there has to be a method behind I assert.

Jes.

The-Hebrew(s).

Asserted Wisdom......

As, the Deer panteth for the water(s) of my 'soul' longeth after thee...

A Psalm

Spirituality is the knowledge of the Absolute, and a method of realising and integrating this knowledge, which is religion.

It is, in a related sense, all that pertains to those levels of being above the physical and mental. Namely: Beyond-Being (the Absolute, Parabrahman, Godhead, All-Possibility, Chaos, Infinitude, Potentiality, Beauty, Divine Feminine), Pure Being (God, Creator, Necessity, Order, Truth, Divine Masculine), the Intellect (in its etymological meaning: spiritus, pneuma, nous, Holy Ghost), and the timeless Archetypes (Archangels, Divine Names, Platonic ideas).

Schuon offers the following definition:

"...spirituality has essentially two factors, namely discernment between the Real and the illusory and permanent concentration on the Real."

Which implies:

"...a relationship between discernment and understanding on the one hand and between concentration and faith on the other; faith, whatever its degree, always means an existential participation in Being or in Reality.... In other terms, faith is the participation of the will in the intelligence; just as on the physical plane man adapts his action to the physical facts which determine its nature, so also, on the spiritual plane, he should act in accordance with his convictions, by inward activity even more than outward activity.... The soul must be to the intelligence what beauty is to truth, and this is what
we might call the 'moral qualification' that should accompany the 'intellectual qualification'."

Urizen wrote:Spirituality is the knowledge of the Absolute, and a method of realising and integrating this knowledge, which is religion.

I'd hardly call spirituality knowledge or religion. Actually, religion can be the furthest thing from spirituality. Spirituality is the experience of the Absolute.

Can religion get one to spirituality? Religion is a method that spiritual leaders put in place to help people get closer to spirituality (as well as a method used by charlatans to control the masses), but even with knowledge of the Absolute, it can't get you there. Only the transcendent state can get one there, and that can no more be explained than one can explain to a baby how to move its leg for the first time. One can try, but it kind of has to be naturally figured out.

Urizen wrote:It is, in a related sense, all that pertains to those levels of being above the physical and mental. Namely: Beyond-Being (the Absolute, Parabrahman, Godhead, All-Possibility, Chaos, Infinitude, Potentiality, Beauty, Divine Feminine), Pure Being (God, Creator, Necessity, Order, Truth, Divine Masculine), the Intellect (in its etymological meaning: spiritus, pneuma, nous, Holy Ghost), and the timeless Archetypes (Archangels, Divine Names, Platonic ideas).

If you mean essentially becoming all of these things on some level, yes, I would agree with that. If you mean the accouterments, obviously not.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:I'd hardly call spirituality knowledge or religion.

By Knowledge is meant the consciousness of the distinction between the Real and the illusory, and of the potential unity of the human self with the divine Self. Knowledge is the summit of all authentic spiritual paths. There is direct knowledge, which is intellective in nature, and called gnosis; and there is indirect knowledge, which is volitional in nature, and is called Faith. Both lead to salvation.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:Actually, religion can be the furthest thing from spirituality.

Not religion as such, but only the distortion and abuse of religion.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:Spirituality is the experience of the Absolute.

Spirituality certainly involves experience, but the Absolute as such is beyond all experience. Experience pertains to the Material World and the Psyche. Above the Psyche is the Spirit and the Divine (which encompasses the Archangelic, the Intellect, Pure Being, and Beyond-Being). The gnostic and contemplative transcends the Psyche and enters the realm of Spirit, while pseudo-spirituality doesn't go beyond mental experience.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:Religion is a method that spiritual leaders put in place to help people get closer to spirituality

Religion consists of three elements: the truth, prayer (in its three forms: personal, canonical, and contemplative, which last is equivalent to meditation), and virtue or morality. All of which are essential for the realisation of gnosis.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:Only the transcendent state can get one there,

It is not a state.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:and that can no more be explained than one can explain to a baby how to move its leg for the first time.

True. We speak of knowledge, not explanation.

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:If you mean essentially becoming all of these things on some level, yes, I would agree with that. If you mean the accouterments, obviously not.

Beyond-Being is all that is.

Religion is a 'towards-which'.
that means an always/already 'divorced from' position.
It turns out to be a beggar.

bodyminds in pews wailing forgiveness for sins.
drama queens.

egos craving eternal existence.

ego depends on bodymind complex for existence.
no bodymind, no ego.

A misnomer.

it must be acknowledged that the concrete world is unitary and contiguous, and it’s us that cut and dice it into discrete chunks and apply labels to things thru' abstraction.

human nature is 'knowledge-how'.
a disposition.

this 'knowledge-how' is prior as a disposedness.
a cognitive possibility,
before the occurrence of a priori and a posteriori 'knowledge-that' propositions.

knowledge-that must be dethroned from its assumed foundation.

the left hand has to know what the right hand is doing.

this 'knowledge-how', the imputing mind, generates environment, bodies, activities, pleasures and sorrows.

Urizen,

I think that we are saying basically the same thing, but using different language. I just want to clear up some semantics to make sure.

Urizen wrote:Spirituality certainly involves experience, but the Absolute as such is beyond all experience.

One can not experience the whole of the Absolute without being the whole Absolute, that is for sure - but one can experience being part of the Absolute because that is what we are.

Urizen wrote:Experience pertains to the Material World and the Psyche.

I disagree with your limiting of "experience." Whatever we are, we can experience by becoming conscious of being in it. If we were only of the material world and the psyche, then that would be all that we could experience - but we are more than that, and the "more" is the key element of spirituality ("key element" meaning that which can not be described as anything else). What you are pointing at is corporeal life. Spirit transcends that.

Urizen wrote:

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote: Only the transcendent state can get one there,

It is not a state.

Then what would you say that it is?

Urizen wrote:

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote: Actually, religion can be the furthest thing from spirituality.

Not religion as such, but only the distortion and abuse of religion.

Urizen wrote:Religion consists of three elements: the truth, prayer (in its three forms: personal, canonical, and contemplative, which last is equivalent to meditation), and virtue or morality. All of which are essential for the realisation of gnosis.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on the definition of religion. To my mind, religion is a set of rules and rituals demanding unquestioning belief. What you have described is a spiritual path, but does not cover all of religion - again, to my mind.

Dennis Mahar wrote:Religion is a 'towards-which'.
that means an always/already 'divorced from' position.
It turns out to be a beggar.

bodyminds in pews wailing forgiveness for sins.

That describes the Abrahamic religions, but not all religions.

Dennis Mahar wrote:egos craving eternal existence.

ego depends on bodymind complex for existence.
no bodymind, no ego.

That's the ego alright.