What's the Point of Religion?

[Leyla Shen]

You certainly do need a theory, for example, if you plan to effectively influence something. That's what some humans actually do; and it's certainly still there, even if you personally have "thrown them away".

Reality and attachment/denial are different. The latter is certainly, however, a manifestation of the former.

[Dennis Mahar]

No theory is needed, nothing is missing.

emptiness is known as the theory of no-theory and the profound experience of it is experiencing no-theory where a metaphysical theory one might have evaporates and is seen as empty and meaningless.

Cogniting Nietzsche and his 'God is Dead' declaration opens it all up.

Religion is spotted as 'fishers of men'
an activity of herd-making

a cookie cutter machine turning out gingerbread men

[Cahoot]

To make more clear what I meant, most people experience existence/life, then think "What", "How", "From where?".

These are what I see as meaningless questions supposing some kind of 'answer'. Some thinking the "what" or "how" is the result of the body, or of compounded atoms, or a reflection of an independently existing world that we only receive sense data from, or from God,etc. Throw these away and what is left? What's actually there. No theory is needed, nothing is missing.

Consider that being born perfect does not necessarily confer perfect understanding of unborn, and wisdom requires understanding. Have you considered the Heart Sutra? Since Buddhism echoes many of your observations you may appreciate Michael Roach’s expanded translation, linked after the commentary.

http://www.buddhism.org/board/read.cgi? ... y_number=6

[SeekerOfWisdom]

emptiness is known as the theory of no-theory and the profound experience of it is experiencing no-theory where a metaphysical theory one might have evaporates and is seen as empty and meaningless.

Then there's no issue, as I've read before, 'Ineffable silence'.

lol you have an endless supply of metaphors tucked away somewhere don't you. But yeah not only religion, it seems any organisation or group with a particular point of view prefers to 'convert' people to the same view, maybe in some kind of attempt to convince others instead of having to convince themselves, as if the world revolves around whichever specific profession/belief one holds.

This is more obvious with certain 'studies' such as mathematics, but the same occurs for anything really. For a horse lover it appears to them that the whole world was designed so that they could ride horses and that is the epitome of all possible lifestyles.
Everyone else has no clue, missing out on this here!

Consider that being born perfect does not necessarily confer perfect understanding of unborn, and wisdom requires understanding. Have you considered the Heart Sutra? Since Buddhism echoes many of your observations you may appreciate Michael Roach’s expanded translation, linked after the commentary.

http://www.buddhism.org/board/read.cgi? ... y_number=6

"what is seen is empty, what is empty is seen.
It is the same for sense perception,
imagination, mental function and judgement.
O-oh Sariputra, all the empty forms of these dharmas
neither come to be nor pass away
and are not created or annihilated,
not impure or pure,
and cannot be increased or decreased.
Since in emptiness nothing can be seen,
there is no perception, imagination, mental function or judgement.
There is no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body or consciousness.
Nor are there sights, sounds, odors, tastes, objects or dharmas.
There is no visu-al world, world of consciousness or other world.
There is no ignorance or extinction of ignorance and so forth
down to no aging and death and also no extinction of aging and death.
There is neither suffering, causation, annihilation nor path.
There is no knowing or unknowing. Since nothing can be known,
Bodhisattvas rely upon Prajna Paramita and so their minds are unhindered.
Because there is no hindrance,
no fear exists and they are far from inverted and illusory thought
and thereby attain nirvana."


The thing that shines about this and any other writing from this 'perspective' is the similar denial of attachment to meaningless delusions expressed by all truly experiencing this.

Hence it isn't hard to see who is expressing this wisdom. Above resembles parts of 'the heart of awareness' very closely.

18.42
Some believe in existence;
others believe nothing exists.
Rare is the one who believes nothing
and is never confused.

19.2
Where is meditation, pleasure,
prosperity or discrimination?
Where is duality?
Where even is Unity?
I abide in the glory of Self.
19.3
Where is past and future,
or even present?
Where is space, or even eternity?
I abide in the glory of Self.
19.4
Where is Self?
Where is not-Self?
Where is good and evil, confusion and clarity?
I abide in the glory of Self.
19.5
Where is sleeping, dreaming, waking,
or even the fourth state?
Where is fear?
I abide in the glory of Self.
19.6
Where is close or far,
in or out,
gross or subtle?
I abide in the glory of Self

20.1
Where are the elements, the body,
the organs, the mind?
Where is the void?
Where is despair?
My nature is transparent clearness.
20.2
Where is scripture?
Where is Self-knowledge?
Where is no-mind?
Where is contentment and freedom from desire?
I am empty of two-ness.
20.3
Where is Knowledge and ignorance?
Where is “I”?
Where is “this”?
Where is “mine”?
Where is bondage and liberation?
Self has no attributes.
20.4
Where is the unfolding of karma?
Where is liberation-in-life,
or even liberation at death?
There is only One.
20.5
Where is the doer or enjoyer?
Where is the origin or end of thought?
Where is direct or reflected knowledge?
There is no person here.20.6
Where is the world?
Where is the seeker of liberation”
Where is the contemplative?
Where is the man of Knowledge?
Where is the soul in bondage?
Where is the liberated soul?
My nature is Unity.
20.7
Where are creation and destruction?
Where is the end and the means?
Where is the seeker?
Where is attainment?
I am One.
20.8
Where is the knower?
Where is knowing?
Where is the known, or knowledge itself?
Where is anything?
Where is nothing?

[ewil]

The true nature of religion is to control emotions.

From this would you then conclude that until emptiness is realized, identity latching onto the transitory phenomena of emotions obscures awareness with the delusion of attachment, thus making attachment itself, rather than the phenomena (emotions) associated with any particular form (human) the dependent identity of self. Rather than suppressing emotion, controlling would then be defined as awareness spontaneously disassociating identity from delusion.

Your words are both resplendent and uncanny to my feeble mind. To answer your question, I can not make that conclusion since it, as it would seem to me, would make an unjustified leap in a line of reasoning.

[Leyla Shen]

I can express it much more succinctly: since nothing is really happening, if you don't believe what you see, you won't suffer.

[Leyla Shen]

Which, by the way, is also the point of religion.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Then I offer it to you as this: that "full awareness that... [etc]" (or non-immersion) is recognition of the relation between self-identity and the temporality of form in general and in particular. What one is comes into being (identified as and by) what one is not. In that sense, the self (and consciousness) is clearly not-every thing else. It's a fantastic dilemma! He wants everything without merging and without being separate!

Immersion, really, is this strange self-defeating desire, I think.

While it's certainly possible to witness the interplay between self-identity and temporary forms, this form of self-witnessing does cause its own set of problems. This is why the formless is also called an appearance in the Buddhist tradition: "seeing what is hidden", all by definition and something to twist ones mind around.

But yeah, immersion: there's no reason to lose (poor out) yourself into anything. Better to find oneself in everything! The difference between the artist and philosopher, to heavily paraphrase the ever popular Weininger.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

emptiness is known as the theory of no-theory and the profound experience of it is experiencing no-theory where a metaphysical theory one might have evaporates and is seen as empty and meaningless.

It doesn't replace any theory though.

Cogniting Nietzsche and his 'God is Dead' declaration opens it all up.

Just like Nietzsche's search with the lantern and accusations of "murdering" god does not replace "god" as need, as reality, as sun to orbit around.

[ewil]

I can express it much more succinctly: since nothing is really happening, if you don't believe what you see, you won't suffer.

I would say it is what you feel, and what you see may incite what you feel.

Which, by the way, is also the point of religion.

When supreme importance over takes something, what you feel is focused around it.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I'm taking the term 'atom' as a reference to a fundamental or essential nature of things? Yes I would say our experiences, the arising and fading of forms, or the 'seemings'/imaginations we see form from the darkness, are all of the same essential nature and I take this 'mind' experience (these all being meaningless referential terms) as the essence of what is. But I definitely wouldn't support 'slicing every form up in separate sense experiences', when I say 'sights/sounds/etc' I'm only blatantly trying to point to what we know/'see'. If anything I see these as of the same nature barely distinguishable. To the point that dreams/waking experience is merged and undifferentiated or thoughts/sounds are often experienced as arising identically.

There's a problem with your notion of an "essential nature of things". It's a movement in your mind, a doing of consciousness yes. But what good does it do to have experiences "barely distinguishable" and "undifferentiated". If anything they should with increasing insight become more distinct once their essential nature (lack of essence!) is thoroughly understood.

I don't believe reality to be much of a question. Or if it is, not a conceptual one, any 'answer' being found through awareness.

Reality might be called nothing but the continuous question: "what is reality". To evaluate that as participants. No reason to react on phantoms and shadows after all.

I believe this, what we experience each day, the illusory-like and impermanent appearances, to be the essential nature of 'what is', not requiring any kind of conceptual explanation.

But living your life equals living some kind of conceptual explanation, made or borrowed. It's not a matter of it being required or not. It just works out that way. It's possible to get less attached to one explanation and become flexible and responsive. For that you need to question the sense of "essential" natures. It sounds like one giant appearance you have there which replaces the meaning of all other appearances. Why not consider deflating that last giant balloon and with that the appearance of an overly attached self supplying all the air?

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Ok but what are you getting at, where do you see this leading toward? Something more specific would be helpful, you've mentioned a few metaphors as to why I'm not quiet understanding it, but not yet what I'm missing.

[Cahoot]

The true nature of religion is to control emotions.

From this would you then conclude that until emptiness is realized, identity latching onto the transitory phenomena of emotions obscures awareness with the delusion of attachment, thus making attachment itself, rather than the phenomena (emotions) associated with any particular form (human) the dependent identity of self. Rather than suppressing emotion, controlling would then be defined as awareness spontaneously disassociating identity from delusion.

Your words are both resplendent and uncanny to my feeble mind. To answer your question, I can not make that conclusion since it, as it would seem to me, would make an unjustified leap in a line of reasoning.

In addition to your declaration of identity, the fact that your initial assertion concerning religion, control, and emotion is unsubstantiated by evidence or reasoning, or even the less convincing substantiation of belief, also bolsters your self-identified feeble-mindedness.

[Dennis Mahar]

Diebert,

It doesn't replace any theory though.

what do you mean?
it fronts up as a door of perception.

is it slamming doors,
leaving doors ajar
opening doors wide
moving out of doors

Just like Nietzsche's search with the lantern and accusations of "murdering" god does not replace "god" as need, as reality, as sun to orbit around.

you've got a knack for wonderful sentences.
I get a sense you mean them as wings to take flight upon.
parachute free zone.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

It doesn't replace any theory though.

What do you mean? It fronts up as a door of perception.

is it slamming doors,
leaving doors ajar
opening doors wide
moving out of doors

The theorizing is not superseded: only experience becoming "enhanced" -- discernment more than ever possible. Doors keep opening and closing: even revolving! Spread your wings, Dennis Seagull but you'll still need a place to perch again, pulling it all together again. Expand, contract. Exhale, inhale.

Just like Nietzsche's search with the lantern and accusations of "murdering" god does not replace "god" as need, as reality, as sun to orbit around.

You've got a knack for wonderful sentences. I get a sense you mean them as wings to take flight upon: parachute free zone.

But it was meant as criticism as well. Can you take it or are you "too big and heavy"? Nietzsche's announcement was not just about freedom but about decline, Götterdämmerung, together with the new horizons opening up. Nihilism might have "wiped" out the sun but that doesn't mean we don't need light anymore of any kind. But people living in the twilight zone sometimes think they can...

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Ok but what are you getting at, where do you see this leading toward?

That the "essential nature of things" you are experiencing is another appearance. Just a biggie, that's all.

[Dennis Mahar]

But it was meant as criticism as well. Can you take it or are you "too big and heavy"?

looks like a form of prisoner's dilemma.

co-operate
or
10 years solitary confinement?

the 'I' wants the good cop :}

[Diebert van Rhijn]

But it was meant as criticism as well. Can you take it or are you "too big and heavy"?

looks like a form of prisoner's dilemma.

co-operate
or
10 years solitary confinement?

the 'I' wants the good cop :}

You forget: co-operate and later on your head will be cut off for being a snitch :-x

[Dennis Mahar]

You forget: co-operate and later on your head will be cut off for being a snitch :-x

Oh yeah, the subtleties are endless.

Leyla's research hits the nail:

I can express it much more succinctly: since nothing is really happening, if you don't believe what you see, you won't suffer.

it's that 'knowing' that is the 'getting' of her blithe Spirit.
Pye has that research.

It's the blithe Spirit that is 'caught' in the romance with the great thinkers.

It's a pity 'the ass' had no access to subtlety.

[Cahoot]

I can express it much more succinctly: since nothing is really happening, if you don't believe what you see, you won't suffer.

Sounds like the political left’s secular religion … fantasy fervently believed.

Eventually feeble-minded belief encounters reality.

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/detr ... uptcy.html

Don’t be too quick to discount the power of denial and deceit to sustain delusion not bound by geo-political borders.

[ewil]

In addition to your declaration of identity, the fact that your initial assertion concerning religion, control, and emotion is unsubstantiated by evidence or reasoning, or even the less convincing substantiation of belief, also bolsters your self-identified feeble-mindedness.

Unsubstantiated by evidence or reasoning? Just examine any religion in the world, they are the evidence. They all place great importance on something, such as a concept, set of practices, entity or belief. When such importance is placed, it becomes part of identity and a focal point for emotions. Thus it is the nature of religion.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I can express it much more succinctly: since nothing is really happening, if you don't believe what you see, you won't suffer.

I've tried to understand this. Which statement was this referring to? You're right though, it's also the point of religion...

In reality however:

Everything is actually happening.
There's no big difference between seeing and believing as both work with interpretations and anticipations.
There's still suffering no matter what you believe or not.

[Cahoot]

In addition to your declaration of identity, the fact that your initial assertion concerning religion, control, and emotion is unsubstantiated by evidence or reasoning, or even the less convincing substantiation of belief, also bolsters your self-identified feeble-mindedness.

Unsubstantiated by evidence or reasoning? Just examine any religion in the world, they are the evidence. They all place great importance on something, such as a concept, set of practices, entity or belief. When such importance is placed, it becomes part of identity and a focal point for emotions. Thus it is the nature of religion.

That’s the spirit. So that’s why you wrote what you wrote.
I guess until you’ve witnessed the emotional frenzy of a Catholic mass you ain’t seen nothin, eh?
But … I understand your point.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

After reading a lot of Buddhist core texts again this week, I've to say, what a load of waffle! No wonder Zen had to come along to burn it all down.

It's important to develop your own understandings, in your own thoughts and words since there's just as much big deception as truth in all these texts.

You burn something down and you build something new. But sometimes the forum reads like a halfway house for pyromaniacs :-)

[Cahoot]

Well yeah kill the Buddha. But that was way back there, wasn’t it?

Question everything, not just Buddhism but anything else, until you’ve cleared it down to who you are, until the phenomenal world is directly perceived as temporal, and thus on the scale of the absolute, a delusion.

Realize it in real time, perpetually, and seek what the Buddha sought, not what he is purported to have found. You know when you find it. Buddhism not required, which is probably why the essence of Buddhism, either empirically or through reflection with intellect, or both, is realized and appreciated according to capacity.