Myswizard’s Art Store
Published on August 31, 2005
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Archive for August, 2005
New Section: Mys Podcast.
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Weekly Consciousness Tune-Up…Yehuda Berg 8/28-9/3 ‘05
Published on August 29, 2005
Weekly Consciousness Tune-Up
August 28th – September 3rd, 2005
Klippot Cracking
One of the greatest things we can learn from Kabbalah is how to pass through the pain of life without suffering.
The Zohar explains that pain purifies and removes the shells of negativity (klippot) that surround our inner Light. These shells are created by our negative deeds and they cover and limit our spiritual development. They are barriers between us and the Light.
Suffering is resistance to this pain.
We often approach our daily lives with the mentality of avoid pain at all costs. And the moment we do feel it, we immediately look for ways to anesthetize ourselves. The Zohar teaches that by resisting the pain, we are only creating bigger problems for ourselves in the future.
Pain is transitory but suffering sticks around and keeps us stuck.
The story of a student of mine in New York articulates this point. She had suffered from a chronic bad ankle for years. After endless searching, she finally found a healing modality, called Rolfing, which cured her ankle. Rolfing is a structural re-balancing technique developed to improve movement through intense, hands-on manipulation of rigid muscles, bones, and joints. What the Rolfer does, essentially, is pull the muscle and tendon tissue away from injured joints. And though it doesn’t always have to be, it usually is painful.
Through this process of using the hands to writhe the tissue away, the joint is freed up and given a chance to heal. You see, when the joint is injured and attached to all the surrounding tendons, the muscle tissue don’t have room enough to repair themselves.
That is how it is with the klippot constantly clinging to us - it makes it hard for us to grow and change. But if we want to go to our next level in spiritual awareness, love, friendships, career - we need to go through the painful process of separating ourselves from our klippot.
And we separate ourselves from our klippot every time we put our all into a job and it fails, every time someone we love goes away, every time our trust is broken – in other words, every time we take a risk and get hurt.
Contrary to what it feels like in the moment, the pain is actually a sign that something good is on the way. Think about the painful moments in your past. Does what I am writing ring true for you?
So it’s important to remind ourselves this week that the pain is good - it’s our klippot cracking. And once this separation heals, we will be stronger, healthier and one step closer to our true fulfillment.
All the Best,
Yehuda
Keywords: Kabbalah, Zohar, Rolfing
EBG Excerpt…Enlightened
Published on August 27, 2005
To become conscious is to ‘see’. To become enlightened is to “know”.
Keywords: Enlightened, Conscious
Socrates
Published on
Socrates left no writings of his own, thus our awareness of his teachings comes primarily from a few ancient authors who referred to them in their own works.
Plato
The words of Socrates, as quoted or portrayed in Plato’s works, which are the most extensive source available for our present knowledge about his ideas.
By means of beauty all beautiful things become beautiful. For this appears to me the safest answer to give both to myself and others; and adhering to this, I think that I shall never fall, but that it is a safe answer both for me and any one else to give—that by means of beauty beautiful things become beautiful.
Phædo
False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.
Phædo 91
In every one of us there are two ruling and directing principles, whose guidance we follow wherever they may lead; the one being an innate desire of pleasure; the other, an acquired judgment which aspires after excellence.
Phaedrus
All I know is that I know nothing.
Wisdom is knowing how little we know.
Could I climb to the highest place in Athens, I would lift my voice and proclaim, “Fellow citizens, why do you turn and scrape every stone to gather wealth, and take so little care of your children to whom one day you must relinquish it all?”
Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.
Apology
Plato’s famous account of the trial and death of Socrates.
The unexamined life is not worth living.
Variant translations: The life which is unexamined is not worth living.
An unexamined life is not worth living.
I do nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for your persons or your properties, but and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man, public as well as private. This is my teaching, and if this is the doctrine which corrupts the youth, I am a mischievous person.
I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled [poets] to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean.
If my life is to be prolonged now, I know that I must live out my old age, seeing worse, hearing less, learning with more difficulty, and forgetting more and more of what I have learned. If I see myself growing worse and reproach myself for it, tell me, how could I continue to live pleasantly? Perhaps even the god in his kindness is offering to end my life not only at the right time, but also in the easiest way possible…
So now, Athenian men, more than on my own behalf must I defend myself, as some may think, but on your behalf, so that you may not make a mistake concerning the gift of god by condemning me. For if you kill me, you will not easily find another such person at all, even if to say in a ludicrous way, attached on the city by the god, like on a large and well-bred horse, by its size and laziness both needing arousing by some gadfly; in this way the god seems to have fastened me on the city, some such one who arousing and persuading and reproaching each one of you I do not stop the whole day settling down all over. Thus such another will not easily come to you, men, but if you believe me, you will spare me; but perhaps you might possibly be offended, like the sleeping who are awakened, striking me, believing Anytus, you might easily kill, then the rest of your lives you might continue sleeping, unless the god caring for you should send you another.
Not I, but the city, teaches.
The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways— I to die and you to live. Which is the better, only God knows.
Last words of his speech following the sentence of death. Variant: The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways— I to die, and you to live. Which is better God only knows.
Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?
Last words.
Xenophon
Words of Socrates as quoted by Xenophon
You will know that the divine is so great and of such a nature that it sees and hears everything at once, is present everywhere, and is concerned with everything.
Memorabilia I. 4.18
If I am to live longer, perhaps I must live out my old age, seeing and hearing less, understanding worse, coming to learn with more difficulty and to be more forgetful, and growing worse than those to whom I was once superior. Indeed, life whould be unliveable, even if I did not notice the change. And if I see the change, how could life not be even more wretched and unpleasant?
Memorabilia IV. 8.8
Really, Ischomachus, I am disposed to ask: “Does teaching consist in putting questions?” Indeed, the secret of your system has just this instant dawned upon me. I seem to see the principle in which you put your questions. You lead me through the field of my own knowledge, and then by pointing out analogies to what I know, persuade me that I really know some things which hitherto, as I believed, I had no knowledge of.
Oeconomicus (The Economist) as translated by H.G. Dakyns
Plutarch
Socrates as quoted by Plutarch
I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.
Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.
Diogenes Laertius
Socrates as quoted in Lives of Eminent Philosophers
I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.
Often when looking at a mass of things for sale, he would say to himself, ‘How many things I have no need of!”
Having the fewest wants, I am nearest to the gods.
There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.
Variant: The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.
Quotes of others about Socrates
If anyone thinks that Socrates is proven to have lied about his daimon because the jury condemned him to death when he stated that a divinity revealed to him what he should and should not do, then let him take note of two things: first, that Socrates was so far advanced in age that he would have died soon, if not then; and second, that he escaped the most bitter part of life, when all men’s mental powers diminish. ~ Xenophon in Memorabilia IV. 8.1
Misattributions
Know thyself.
This statement actually predates Socrates, and was used as an Inscription at the Oracle of Delphi. It is a saying traditionally ascribed to one of the “Seven Sages” of ancient Greece, but accounts vary as to who. Socrates himself is reported to have quoted it.
I drank what?
This is a humorously dark punchline to the death of Socrates, which implies he didn’t realize hemlock was poison. In truth he knew full well he was drinking hemlock. Val Kilmer mentions this in the film Real Genius.
Attributed
All men’s souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.
An education obtained with money is worse than no education at all.
An honest man is always a child.
As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.
As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take the course he will. He will be sure to repent.
Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.
Be of good cheer about death and know this as a truth— that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.
Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in, continue firm and constant.
Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.
Beauty is the bait which with delight allures man to enlarge his kind.
Beware the barrenness of a busy life.
By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you’ll be happy. If you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.
Variant: By all means, marry. If you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; if you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.
Call no man unhappy until he is married.
The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.
Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.
Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.
Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.
Employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for.
Variant: Employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.
Envy is the ulcer of the soul.
Fame is the perfume of heroic deeds.
Flattery is like friendship in show, but not in fruit.
For who is there but you? who not only claim to be a good man and a gentleman, for many are this, and yet have not the power of making others good. Whereas you are not only good yourself, but also the cause of goodness in others.
Four things belong to a judge: to hear courteously, to answer wisely, to consider soberly, and to decide impartially.
From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.
Get not your friends by bare compliments, but by giving them sensible tokens of your love.
He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth of nature.
He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.
I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing.
I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.
I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled poets to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean.
I hold that to need nothing is divine, and the less a man needs the nearer he does approach divinity.
I pray Thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within.
I was afraid that by observing objects with my eyes and trying to comprehend them with each of my other senses I might blind my soul altogether.
I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.
If a man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.
If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.
Variant: If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.
If thou continuest to take delight in idle argumentation, thou mayest be qualified to combat with the sophists, but never know how to love with men.
Let him that would move the world first move himself.
May the outward and inward man be at one.
My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you’ll be happy; if not, you’ll become a philosopher.
My belief is that to have no wants is divine.
Not life, but good life, is to be chiefly valued.
O beloved Pan, and all ye other gods of this place, grant me to become beautiful in the inner man.
Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior.
One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing.
One who is injured ought not to return the injury, for on no account can it be right to do an injustice; and it is not right to return an injury, or to do evil to any man, however much we have suffered from him.
Our prayers should be for blessings in general, for God knows best what is good for us.
Philosophy begins with wonder.
Regard your good name as the richest jewel you can possibly be possessed of— for credit is like fire; when once you have kindled it you may easily preserve it, but if you once extinguish it, you will find it an arduous task to rekindle it again. The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
Remember that there is nothing stable in human affairs; therefore avoid undue elation in prosperity, or undue depression in adversity.
Variant: Remember, no human condition is ever permanent. Then you will not be overjoyed in good fortune nor too scornful in misfortune.
Remember what is unbecoming to do is also unbecoming to speak of.
See one promontory, one mountain, one sea, one river and see all.
Such as thy words are, such will thy affections be esteemed; and such will thy deeds be as thy affections and such thy life as thy deeds.
The fear of death is indeed the pretense of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being a pretense of knowing the unknown . . . and no one knows whether death which men in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good. . . .
The fewer our wants, the nearer we resemble the gods.
The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.
The nearest way to glory is to strive to be what you wish to be thought to be.
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
The poets are only the interpreters of the Gods.
The shortest and surest way to live with honour in the world, is to be in reality what we would appear to be; and if we observe, we shall find, that all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice of them.
The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions; but those who kindly reprove thy faults.
Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.
To find yourself, think for yourself.
To need nothing is divine, and the less a man needs the nearer does he approach to divinity.
True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.
True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.
Upon the score of fore-knowledge and divining I am infinitely inferior to the swans. When they perceive approaching death they sing more merrily than before, because of the joy they have in going to the God they serve.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is a habit.
What a lot of things there are a man can do without.
What you cannot enforce, do not command.
Wind buffs up empty bladders; opinion, fools.
Wisdom begins in wonder.
Woman once made equal to man becomes his superior.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article “Socrates”.
DRH…love quotation
Published on August 23, 2005
“That which is love you can’t get rid of, and that which is not love you cannot obtain.”
David Hawkins
Keywords: love, Dr. David Hawkins
Weekly Consciousness Tune-Up…Yehuda Berg 8/21-8/27 ‘05
Published on
Weekly Consciousness Tune-Up
August 21st – August 27th, 2005
Universe Splits
There are countless realities, all of which exist at the same time. This is what is known as parallel universes.
According to physics, the moment we make a decision, the universe splits and our alternative decision and fate branch out into another reality. According to Kabbalah, parallel universes grow progressively more orderly, eventually reaching a world of paradise, happiness, and unending life.
Which reality we enter is entirely up to us.
Will it be a reality where our friends support us, our family believes in us, and our heart is filled with understanding? Or will it be a reality where the deal never quite closes; we’re always missing the boat, and trouble is never far away?
Both realities exist at the same time. But the determining factor is not our thoughts, but our actions.
The kabbalists teach us that our ego-driven actions imprison us in the chaotic realities. But at the same time, every moment we resist our reactive responses, we make a quantum jump into an entirely different reality. And each new universe features a more fulfilled version of our lives.
By recognizing opportunities to end reactive, egocentric behavior, we literally move from one world into another.
And it’s not always easy to catch our reactions, but I will share with you a useful tip. The Zohar says it’s easiest to restrict in the first few seconds. If we don’t inject Light in these fleeting moments, the restriction becomes harder and harder - sometimes impossible.
This week we have the power to spot these opportunities for upgrading our reality. We can achieve the ultimate wisdom – seeing into the future - by practicing the kabbalistic teaching of seeing the future in our present actions.
We must each pay attention to how our blinding desire to receive for the self alone shows up in our lives and find ways to restrict it. And let’s be excited about it. Because every time we move against this overwhelming drive for the self alone, the spiritual energy we will be revealing will move us closer to our best reality.
Have a great week.
All the Best,
Yehuda
Keywords: Kabbalah, parallel universes
God
Published on August 22, 2005
This article focuses on the term God as it is very often used to refer to a monotheistic concept. See deity, gods or goddesses for details on polytheistic usages.
The term God (capitalized in English language as a proper noun) is often used to refer vaguely to a Supreme Being. However, there are many other definitions of the term, a common trait of which is a reference to absoluteness or superlative qualities. For example:
God may be Supreme but is not necessarily a Being.
Some concepts of God may include anthropomorphic attributes, gender, particular names, and ethnic exclusivity while others are purely transcendent or philosophic concepts.
The concept of God is often embedded in definitions of truth, where the sum of all truth is equated to God. In this sense science may be seen as a quest for God.
There are variations on defining God either as a person, or not as a person but as an ambiguous impersonal force. Also at stake are questions concerning the possibilities of human/God relations. There are countless variations in traditions of worship and/or appeasement of God.
Some concepts of God centre on a view of God as ultimate, immanent, transcendent, eternal Reality beyond the shifting and constantly mutable multiplicities of the sensible world.
In much religious and philosophic thought, God is considered to be the creator of the omniverse.
Some traditions hold that the creator of the omniverse is also the sustainer of the omniverse (as in theism), while others argue that their God is no longer involved in the world after creation (as in deism).
The common definition of God assumes omnipotence, omniscience and benevolence. However, not all systems hold that God is necessarily morally good (see summum bonum). Some hold that God is the very definition of moral goodness. Others maintain that God is beyond morality. Some combinations of attributes can entail a falsum. For example, if God is The Creator, Omnipotent, Omniscient, and the Ultimate Judge, then (s)he created all people, including atheists and pagans, knowing exactly what (s)he was doing and then sends them to hell. This God cannot also be Good.
Negative theology argues that no true statements about attributes of God can be made at all, while agnostic positions argue that limited human understanding does not allow for any conclusive opinions on God whatsoever. Some mystical traditions ascribe limits to God’s powers, arguing that God’s supreme nature leaves no room for spontaneity.
The concept of a singular God is characteristic of monotheism, but there is no universal definition of monotheism. The differences between monotheism and polytheism vary among traditions (see also trinity, dualism, and henotheism).
Some espouse an exclusionist view, holding to one sole definition of God. Others hold an inclusionist view, accepting the possibility of more than one definition of God to be true at the same time.
There are also atheistic explanations for the concept of God that can include psychological and/or sociological factors.
Etymology
Earliest attestation of the Germanic word in the 6th century Codex Argenteus (Mt 5:9)The word God continues Old English/Germanic god (guþ, gudis in Gothic, Gott in modern German). The original meaning and etymology of the Germanic word god has been hotly disputed, though most agree to a reconstructed Proto-Indo-European form *ǵhutóm, which is a passive perfect participle from the root *ǵhu-, which likely meant “libation”, “sacrifice”. Compare:-
Vedic Sanskrit hu- = “to sacrifice”.
Greek khu-, kheu- = “to pour”.
Common Germanic strong verb geutan (Anglo-Saxon gēotan) = “to pour”, English in-got.
The connection between these meanings is likely via the meaning “pour a libation”. Another possible meaning of *ǵhutóm is “invocation”, related to Sanskrit hūta.
The word God was used to represent Greek theos, Latin deus in Bible translations, first in the Gothic translation of the New Testament by Ulfilas.
Philologically, Gk. theos is said to be akin to Zeus, the chief god in Greek mythology, who has Dios in a genitive form. L. Diespiter means Jupiter, chief god in L. mythology, dies + pater, day + father. In Skr. deva is a god, as derived from the root div, heaven, and diu denoting day, shine and brightness (L. niter). See Sky Father, and Dyeus.
Capitalisation
KJV of 1611 (Psalms 23:1,2): Occurrence of “Lord” (and “God” in the heading)The development of English orthography was dominated by Christian texts. Capitalised “God” was first used to refer to the Judeo-Christian concept, and may now signify any monotheistic conception of God, including the translations of the Arabic Allah and the African Masai Engai.
In early English bibles, the Tetragrammaton was rendered in capitals: “IEHOUAH” in William Tyndale’s version of 1525. The King James Version of 1611 renders
YHWH as “The Lord”
Elohim as “God”
Adonay YHWH and Adonay Elohim as “Lord God”
kurios ho theos as “Lord God” (in the New Testament)
The use of capitalisation, as for a proper noun, has persisted to disambiguate the concept of a singular God from pagan deities for which lowercase god has continued to be applied, mirroring the use of Latin deus. Pronouns referring to God are also often capitalised and are traditionally in the masculine gender, i.e. “He”, “His” etc.
Names of Gods
The generic term God is the proper English name used for the deity of monotheistic faiths. Different names for God exist within different religious traditions.
Allah—Islam/Arabic. See also the Ninety-nine names of Allah
Jehovah, Yahweh (based on the Hebrew name YHVH (יהוה), I am, and Elohim are some of the names used for God in the Christian Bible
See The name of God in Judaism for Jewish names of God. (Note: when written or typed as a proper noun, some observant Jews will use the form “G-d” to prevent the written name of God from becoming desecrated later on. Some Orthodox Jews consider this unnecessary because English is not the Holy Language.)
The Holy Trinity (meaning the Father, the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit/”Holy Ghost”) - A name used primarily in Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox prayers and liturgy.
Most Hindus worship the personal form of God or Saguna Brahman, or Hindu trinity, as Vishnu, Shiva, or directly as Brahman through the Gayatri mantra. A common prayer for Hindus is the Vishnu sahasranama, which is a hymn describing the one thousand names of God. See
Sikhs worship God with the name Waheguru.
Jah is the name of God in the Rastafari movement.
God is called Xavier in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
Some churches (United Church of Canada, Religious Science) are using “the One” alongside “God” as a more gender-neutral way of referring to God (See also Oneness).
The Maasai name for “God” is Ngai, which occurs in the volcano name Ol Doinyo Lengai (”the mountain of God”).
History of monotheism
The religions widely thought of as monotheistic today are of relatively recent origin historically, although Eastern religions (notably religions of China and India) that have concepts of panentheism are difficult to classify along Western notions of monotheism vs. polytheism, and sometimes have claims of being very ancient, if not eternal.
In the Ancient Orient, many cities had their own local god, but this henotheistic worship of a single god did not imply denial of the existence of other gods. The Hebrew Ark of the Covenant adapted this practice to a nomadic lifestyle, paving their way for a singular God. The cult of the solar god Aten is often cited as the earliest known example of monotheism, but even if Akhetaten’s hymn to Aten praises this god as omnipotent creator, worship of other gods beside him never ceased. Early examples of monotheism also include two late rigvedic hymns (10.129,130) to a Panentheistic creator god, Shri Rudram, a Vedic hymn to Rudra, an earlier aspect of Shiva, which expressed monistic theism, and is still chanted today, the Zoroastrian Ahuramazda and Chinese Shang Ti. The worship of polytheistic gods, on the other hand, is seen by many to predate monotheism, reaching back as far as the paleolithic. Today, monotheistic religions are dominant, but other systems of belief still exist.
The existence of God
While belief in God can be considered solely a matter of faith (Fideism), there are also many intellectual arguments for as well as arguments against the existence of God.
Theology
Theology is the study of religious beliefs. Theologians attempt to explicate (and in some cases systematize) beliefs; some express their own experience of the divine. Theologians ask questions such as: What is the nature of God? What does it mean for God to be singular? If people believe in God as a duality or trinity, what do these terms signify? Is God transcendent, immanent, or some mix of the two? What is the relationship between God and the universe, and God and mankind?
Theism holds that God is both transcendent and immanent; thus, God is simultaneously infinite and in some way present in the affairs of the world. Catholic theology holds that God is infinitely simple and is outside of time. Most theists hold that God is omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent, although this belief raises questions about God’s responsibility for evil and suffering in the world. Some theists ascribe to God a self-conscious or purposeful limiting of omnipotence, omniscience, or benevolence. Open Theism, by contrast, asserts that God has limits. “Theism” is sometimes used to refer in general to any belief in a god or gods, i.e., monotheism or polytheism.
Deism holds that God is wholly transcendent: God exists, but does not intervene in the world beyond what was necessary for God to create it. In this view, God is not anthropomorphic, and does not literally answer prayers or cause miracles to occur.
Monotheism holds that there is only one God, and/or that the one true God is worshipped in different religions under different names. It is important to note, however, that monotheists of one religion can, and often do, consider the monotheistic god of a different religion to be a false god. For instance, many Christian fundamentalists consider the God of Islam (Allah) to be a false god or demon. However, theologians and linguists argue that “Allah” is merely the Arabic word for “God,” and not the literal name of a specifically Muslim god (to Muslims, the bible is a holy scripture and Jesus is a prophet, so Christianity might be seen as a subset of Islam). Many Jews consider the messiah of Christianity (Jesus) to be a false god and some monotheists (notably fundamentalist Christians) hold that there is one triune God, and that all gods of other religions are actually demons in disguise (as in 2nd Corinthians 11 verse 14). Eastern religious believers and Liberal Christians are more likely to assume those of other faiths worship the same God as they.
Pantheism holds that God is the universe and the universe is God. Panentheism holds that God contains, but is not identical to, the Universe. The distinctions between the two are subtle, and many consider them unhelpful. Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism, paints a pantheistic/panentheistic view of God, which has wide acceptance in Hasidic Judaism, particularly from their founder The Baal Shem Tov. It is also the view of the Liberal Catholic Church, Theosophy, Hinduism, some divisions of Buddhism, and Taoism, along with many varying denominations and individuals within denominations.
Dystheism is a form of theism which holds that God is malevolent as a consequence of the problem of evil. Dystheistic speculation is common in theology, but there is no known church of practicing dystheists. See also Satanism.
Most believers allow for the existence of other, less powerful spiritual beings, and give them names such as angels, saints, Djinn, demons, and devas.
Conceptions of God
Jewish, Christian and Muslim conceptions
Judaism, Christianity and Islam see God as a being who created the world and rules over the universe. God is usually held to have the properties of holiness (separate from sin and incorruptible), justness (fair, right, and true in all His judgements), sovereignty (unthwartable in His will), omnipotence (all-powerful), omniscience (all-knowing), omnibenevolence (all-loving), and omnipresence (everywhere-present).
Jews, Christians and Muslims often conceive of God as a personal God, with a will and personality. However, many medieval rationalist philosophers of these religions felt that one should not view God as personal, and that such personal descriptions of God are only meant as metaphors. Some within these three faiths still accept these views as valid, although many of the laity today do not have a wide awareness of them.
In Eastern Christianity, it remains essential that God be personal; hence it speaks of the three persons of the Trinity. It also emphasizes that God has a will, and that God the Son has two wills, divine and human, though these are never in conflict. The personhood of God and of all human people is essential to the concept of theosis or deification.
Biblical definition of God
16th century Christian view of Genesis: God creates Adam (Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel)The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) characterizes God by these attributes: “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” (Exodus 34:6–7)
The Hebrew Bible contains no systematic theology: No attempt is made to give a philosophical or rigorous definition of God, nor of how God acts in the world. It does not explicitly describe God’s nature, exemplified by God’s assertion in Exodus that “you cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live”. Nowhere in the Hebrew Bible are the words omnipotent, omniscient, or omnibenevolent used to define God in a systematic sense.
Although Scripture does not describe God systematically, however, it does provide a poetic depiction of God and His relationship with people. According to the biblical historian Yehezkal Kaufmann, the essential innovation of Biblical theology was to posit a God that cares about people, and that cares about whether people care about Him. Most people believe that the Bible should be viewed as humanity’s view of God, but theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel described the Biblical God as “anthropopathic”, which means that one should read the Bible as God’s view of humanity, and not as humanity’s view of God.
Similarly, the New Testament contains no systematic theology: no attempt is made to give a philosophical or rigorous definition of God, nor of how God acts in the world. The New Testament does, however, provide an implicit theology as it teaches that God interacted directly with people, in the person of Jesus, and that he subsequently sent the Holy Spirit. In this view, God becomes someone that can be seen and touched, and may speak and act in a manner easily perceived by humans, while also remaining transcendent and invisible. This appears to be a radical departure from the concepts of God found in Hebrew Bible. The New Testament’s statements regarding the nature of God were eventually developed into the doctrine of the Trinity.
Kabbalistic definition of God
Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism) teaches that God is neither matter nor spirit. Rather God is the creator of both, but is himself neither. But if God is so different from his creation, how can there be any interaction between the Creator and the created? This question prompted Kabbalists to envision two aspects of God, (a) God himself, who in the end is unknowable, and (b) the revealed aspect of God who created the universe, preserves the universe, and interacts with mankind in a personal way. Kabbalists believe that these two aspects are not contradictory but complement one another.
Quranic definitions of God, i.e. Allah
Allah (Arabic allāhu الله) is traditionally used by Muslims as the Arabic word for “God” (not “God’s personal name”, but the equivalent of the Hebrew word El as opposed to YHWH). The word Allah is not specific to Islam; Arab Christians and Arab Jews also use it to refer to the monotheist deity. Arabic translations of the Bible also employ it, as do the Catholics of Malta who pronounce it as “Alla” in Maltese, a language derived from and most closely related to Arabic, as well as Christians in Indonesia, who pronounce it “Allah Bapa” (Allah the Father).
Many linguists believe that the term Allāh is derived from a contraction of the Arabic words al (the) + ilah (male deity). In addition, one of the main pagan goddesses of pre-Islamic Arabia, Allāt (al + ilāh + at, or ‘the female deity’), is cited as being etymologically (though not synchronically) the feminine linguistic counterpart to the grammatically masculine Allah. If so, the word Allāh is an abbreviated title, meaning ‘the deity’, rather than a name. For this reason, both Muslim and non-Muslim scholars often translate Allāh directly into English as ‘God’ especially the Quran Alone Muslims; however, some Muslim scholars feel that “Allāh” should not be translated, because it expresses the uniqueness of God more accurately than “God”, which can take a plural “Gods”, whereas “Allāh” has no plural. This is a significant issue in translation of the Qur’an. This also explains why Arabic-speaking Jews and Christians freely refer to God as Allāh.
Most of the 99 names of God found in the Qur’an are not actually names, but attributes. One, however, Al Haq, meaning The Truth, seems to equate to absolute truth as that which cannot be negated. Al Haq is more than a reflection of faith in the existence of The God, and links the concept of God to all creation forever. Thus Allah transcends the prophetic origins of Islam and is thus universal in all time and applies to all existence — past, present, and future.
Negative theology
Some Jewish, Christian and Muslim medieval philosophers developed what is termed as negative theology, the idea of approaching a knowledge of God through negative attributes. For example, we should not say that God exists in the usual sense of the term; all we can safely say is that God is not nonexistent. We should not say that God is wise, but we can say that God is not ignorant. We should not say that God is One, but we can state that there is no multiplicity in God’s being.
God as Unity or Trinity
Jews, Muslims, and a small fraction of Christians are unitarian monotheists. The vast majority of Christians have been and still are Trinitarian monotheists.
Unitarian monotheists hold that there is only one “person” (so to speak), or one basic substance, in God. Some adherents of this position consider Trinitarianism to be a form of polytheism.
Trinitarian monotheists believe in one God that exists as three distinct persons who share the same substance/essence; the Christian version of this is called the Trinity, the Hindu version Trimurti. Trinitarians hold that the three persons have the same purpose, holiness, and sovereignty, and therefore each can be worshipped as God, without violating the idea that there is only one God to which worship belongs.
Mormons believe that there are three separate divine personages. One of these personages is a spirit without a body referred to as the Holy Ghost. The other two personages are spirits with perfected or glorified (often called celestial) bodies referred to as Heavenly Father (or less commonly “Elohim”) and his son, Jesus Christ. Mormons hold that God is a Holy Man who advanced to his divine status through a repeatable process of progression. They believe that by following their religion’s teachings, humans can literally become gods (sometimes phrased as “become like Heavenly Father”) at some point after death and resurrection; this is also called Exaltation.
Rastafarians believe that Haile Selassie is both God the Father and God the Son, made manifest in human flesh as the reincarnation of Jesus, while the Holy Spirit is seen to dwell within all believers (of Rastafari), and within all people (believed by some).
Hasidic Jews hold that there are ten Sefirot (emanations) of God. Each of these are more distinct than a characteristic, but less distinct than a separate personage.
Monism is the metaphysical position that all is of one essential essence, substance or energy, that being a pantheist, or panentheist, immanent God. Monism can be inclusive of other interpretations of God.
Dualism is the idea of two, nearly equal divine entities, one being the good God, and the other being an evil god, or Satan. All beings are under the influence of one side, or the other, if they know it or not. Zoroastrianism is an example of dualism.
Hindu Conceptions of God
In Shaivism and Vaishnavism, Hindus believe that God, whether in the form of Shiva or Vishnu has six attributes. However, the actual number of auspicious qualities of God, are countless, with the following six qualities being the most important.
The number six is invariably given, but the individual attributes listed vary.
One set of attributes (and their common interpretations) are
Jnana (Omniscience), defined as the power to know about all beings simultaneously;
Aishvarya (Sovereignty), which consists in unchallenged rule over all;
Shakti (Energy), or power, which is the capacity to make the impossible possible;
Bala (Strength), which is the capacity to support everything by will and without any fatigue;
Virya (Vigour), or valour which indicates the power to retain immateriality as the supreme being in spite of being the material cause of mutable creations; and
Tejas (Splendour), which expresses his self-sufficiency and the capacity to overpower everything by his spiritual effulgence.; cited from Bhakti Schools of Vedanta, by Swami Tapasyananda.
A second set of six characteristics are
Jnana (Omniscience),
Vairagya (Detachment),
Yasas (Fame),
Aisvarya (Sovereignty),
Sri (Glory) and
Dharma (Righteousness).
Other important qualities attributed to God are Gambhirya (grandeur), Audarya (generosity), and Karunya (compassion).
Chanted prayers, or mantras, are central to Hindu worship. Among the most chanted mantras in Hinduism are the Vishnu sahasranama (a prayer to Vishnu that dates from the time of the Mahabharata and describes him as the Universal Brahman), Shri Rudram (a Vedic hymn to Rudra, an earlier aspect of Shiva that also describes Him as Brahman) and the Gayatri mantra, (another Vedic hymn that initially was meant as a prayer to the Sun, an aspect of Brahman but has other interpretations. It is now interpreted as a prayer to the impersonal absolute Brahman). Another famous hymn, Lalitha Sahasranama, describes the 1000 names of Devi, worshipped as God the Divine Mother, or God’s Shakti or Power personified by Hindus.
It is important to add that in Hinduism (Sanatan Dharam) God is considered the Supreme Being, and many views of God range from panentheism to dualism. His appearance, in its entirety, cannot be comprehended by the common man. His appearance with form is only a manifestation of certain characteristics.
In Hinduism there are two methods of worship:
To worship God through meditation on an icon (murti).
To worship God without icon worship.
The Ultimate
Arguably, Eastern conceptions of The Ultimate (this, too, has many different names) are not conceptions of a personal divinity, though certain Western conceptions of what is at least called “God” (e.g., Spinoza’s pantheistic conception and various kinds of mysticism) resemble Eastern conceptions of The Ultimate.
Aristotelian definition of God
In his Metaphysics, Aristotle discusses the meaning of “being as being”. Aristotle holds that “being” primarily refers to the Unmoved Movers, and assigned one of these to each movement in the heavens. Each Unmoved Mover continuously contemplates its own contemplation, and everything that fits the second meaning of “being” by having its source of motion in itself, moves because the knowledge of its Mover causes it to emulate this Mover (or should).
Modern views
Mathematical definitions
The mathematician Georg Cantor identified God with the mathematical concept of the Absolute Infinite.
Kurt Gödel’s “ontological proof” is a mathematical formulation of Saint Anselm’s ontological argument.
Process philosophy and Open Theism definition of God
Process theology is a school of thought influenced by the metaphysical process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947).
Open theism, a theological movement that began in the 1990s, is similar, but not identical, to Process theology.
In both views, God is not omnipotent in the classical sense of a coercive being. Reality is not made up of material substances that endure through time, but serially-ordered events, which are experiential in nature. The universe is characterized by process and change carried out by the agents of free will. Self-determination characterizes everything in the universe, not just human beings. God and creatures co-create. God cannot force anything to happen, but rather only influence the exercise of this universal free will by offering possibilities. See the entries on Process theology, Panentheism, and Open theism.
Posthuman God
Similar to this theory is the belief or aspiration that humans will create a God entity, emerging from an artificial intelligence. Arthur C. Clarke, a science fiction writer, said in an interview that: It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God, but to create him. Another SF writer, the late Issac Asimov, postulated in his story The Last Question a merger between humanity and machine intelligence that ultimately produces a deity capable of reversing entropy and subsequently initiates a new Creation trillions of years from the present era when the Universe is in the last stage of heat death.
Another variant on this hypothesis is that humanity or a segment of humanity will create or evolve into a posthuman God by itself; for some examples, see cosmotheism, transhumanism, technological singularity.
Extraterrestrials
Some comparatively new belief systems and books portray God as Extraterrestrial life. Many of these theories hold that intelligent beings from another world have been visiting Earth for many thousands of years, and have influenced the development of our religions. Some of these books posit that prophets or messiahs were sent to the human race in order to teach morality and encourage the development of civilization. (See e.g. Rael).
Phenomenological definition
The philosopher Michel Henry defines God in a phenomenological point of view. He says : « God is Life, he is the essence of Life, or, if we prefer, the essence of Life is God. Saying this we already know what is God, we know it not by the effect of a learning or of some knowledge, we don’t know it by the thought, on the background of the truth of the world ; we know it and we can know it only in and by the Life itself. We can know it only in God. » (I Am the Truth. Toward a Philosophy of Christianity).
For Michel Henry, God is in himself revelation, he is the primordial Revelation that extracts every thing to nothingness, a revelation which is the pathetic self-revelation and the absolute self-enjoyment of Life. As John says, God is love, because Life loves itself in an infinite and eternal love.
Michel Henry opposes to the notion of creation, which is the creation of the world, the notion of generation of Life. The creation of the world consists in the opening of this exteriority horizon where every thing becomes visible. Whereas Life never stops to generate itself and to generate all the livings in its radical immanence, in its absolute phenomenological interiority that is without gap nor distance.
As we are generated continually by Life, as it never stops to give us life, as we never stop to be born in life by the acting power of this absolute Life, God is our Father and we are its Sons, the Sons of the living God.
Some of this article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article “God”.
Keywords: God
The Diamond Sutra..Simpified
Published on August 18, 2005
The Diamond Sutra, simplified
A directory of stanzas following the introductory remarks:
The following discourse is attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, later called the Buddha Shakyamuni (the holy sage of the Shakya clan), passed on by word of mouth throughout the centuries from around 500 BC until the second century AD, when it was written down by Nagarjuna. Hui-neng, the sixth Patriarch of Ch’an, identified Nagarjuna as being about halfway in the line of dharma-succession from Siddhartha to Bodhidharma, who carried the Great Jewel from India to China.
1. The Convocation of the Assembly
In Jeta Grove, the park of Anatha-pindika near the once-great city Shravasti, the “city of wonders” in northern India close to the border of Nepal, twelve hundred and fifty wandering mendicants broke their fast then gathered round to hear the words of the Buddha.
2. Subhuti Makes a Request
The disciple Subhuti arose and, raising his hands with palms joined in respect, said: World-Honored One, if good men and women seek enlightenment, how should they then conduct themselves?
3. The Real Teaching of the Great Way
They should discipline their thoughts as follows, Buddha replied. All living creatures are caused by me to attain unbounded liberation. Yet when vast numbers of beings have thus been liberated, in truth no being has been liberated. And why is this? Because no enlightened being cherishes the idea of a separate individuality.
4. Even the Most Beneficent Practices are Relative
Furthermore, the Buddha said, a bodhisattva [aspirant] should practice good acts without regard to appearances, without attachment to sight, sound or any other quality.
Thus is merit gained, as Krishna instructed Arjuna in The Song of the Blessed One [Bhagavad Gita], when action is performed with detachment.
5. Understanding the Ultimate Principle of Reality
Do you think that Reality is to be recognized by some material characteristic? [Is Reality perceivable by the senses?]
No, World-Honored One.
That’s right, Subhuti. Wherever there are material characteristics, there is delusion. But whoever perceives that all characteristics are in fact no-characteristics, perceives Reality.
6. Rare is True Faith
Will there always be men who truly believe after hearing this teaching? Subhuti asked.
Twenty-five hundred years after the passing of the Buddha [i.e., circa 2000], men hearing this teaching will have an uprising of pure faith, and the Buddha will recognize them, Siddhartha answered.
Yes, he will clearly perceive all those of pure heart. And why is that? It is because such men will not cherish the idea of individuality, of a separate being. Neither will they cherish the idea that things have intrinsic qualities, which includes the idea of an ego or individuality, nor even that things are devoid of intrinsic qualities. For the latter ideas imply the former.
My teaching of the dharma, the good law, is like a raft that has carried one safely across a flood. One does not continue the journey carrying the raft upon his head. Thus even the buddha-teaching must be relinquished.
7. Great Ones, Perfect beyond Learning, Utter no Words of Teaching
Has the Buddha attained enlightenment, Subhuti? Has he a teaching to enunciate?
As I understand Buddha’s meaning there is no formulation of truth called enlightenment, he answered. Moreover there is no teaching to enunciate. The Buddha has said that truth is uncontainable and inexpressible. It neither is nor is not.
This unformulated principle is the foundation of the different systems of all true sages, Subhuti.
8. The Fruits of Meritorious Actions
If anyone filled three thousand galaxies with all the treasures of the universe and gave it all away in alms, would he gain great merit? Buddha asked.
Great indeed World-Honored One.
On the other hand, Buddha said, if anyone received and retained even four lines of this discourse and taught them to others, his merit would be the greater. From this discourse issue forth all the buddhas and the enlightenment teachings of all the buddhas.
[This seems like a device for ensuring that the teaching would be carried on to succeeding generations verbatim, which was probably a major concern before the advent of widespread recording media. On the other hand, Buddha has just said that there is no teaching to enunciate and that truth is inexpressible. Apparently he didn’t assume there would be an unbroken chain of enlightened teachers to keep the lamp burning. Although words cannot express Truth, they can be catalysts for the advent of awakening, as Hui-neng describes his first hearing of the Diamond Sutra — and as two friends and fellow students of Richard Rose found out in 1999, one upon reading something written by Alfred Pulyan, the other when reading something written by Franklin Merrell-Wolff (see the Maximum Systems page).]
9. Real Designation is Undesignate
Does a venerable one who will never more be reborn as a mortal say to himself, “I obtain the fruit of a nonreturner”?
No, World-Honored One. “Nonreturner” is just a name. There is no nonreturning; hence the designation “nonreturner.”
Does a holy one say to himself, “I have obtained perfect enlightenment”?
No, World-Honored One, for that would partake of the idea of an ego or individual self. Claiming spiritual superiority is separative and enhances the illusory personality.
10. Setting forth Pure Lands
[The reference is to a bodhisattva who has attained complete enlightenment and who may preside as a king over a world of beings whom he never ceases to help until they are free and perfected.]
Does a buddha set forth any majestic buddha-lands?
No, Subhuti answered, because such “setting forth” is not a majestic setting forth but merely a name.
Therefore, Buddha said, all bodhisattvas should develop a pure, lucid mind that alights upon nothing whatsoever.
11. The Superiority of Unformulated Truth
If a good man or woman filled three thousand galaxies with all the treasures in the universe as many times over as there are grains of sand in all their great rivers and gave all away in gifts to the needy, would he gain great merit?
Great indeed, World-Honored One.
Nevertheless, if a good man or woman studies this discourse only so far as to receive and retain four lines, and teaches and explains them to others, the consequent merit would be far greater.
[Richard Rose felt strongly that a person’s path is accelerated by a vow to help others. He remarked that while few have ears to hear Truth, even fewer can act — pointing out that while Jesus had about seventy disciples, there were only twelve apostles. Following this proportion as a guide, every seeker should be helping six other seekers on the rung of the ladder below his own.]
12. Veneration of the True Doctrine
Furthermore, you should know that wherever this discourse is proclaimed, by even so little as four lines, that place should be venerated by all the realms of sentient beings.
How much more is this so in the case of one who is able to receive and retain the whole. Such a one attains the highest and most wonderful truth.
13. How this Teaching Should Be Received and Retained
By what name should this discourse be known, World-Honored One, and how should we receive and retain it?
It should be known as the Diamond Cutter of Perfect Wisdom. But according to the buddha-teaching, the perfection of transcendental wisdom is not really such, but just the name given to it.
Would there be many molecules in three thousand galaxies, Subhuti?
Many, indeed, Subhuti said.
The Tathagata [another title for Buddha composed in Chinese of the characters for “thus” and “come”] declares that all these molecules are not really such; they are merely called molecules. Furthermore, a world is not really a world; it is merely called such.
If on the one hand a good man or woman sacrifices as many lives as sand grains on the Ganges, and on the other hand anyone receives and retains only four lines of this discourse, and teaches it to others, the merit of the latter will be greater.
14. Perfect Peace Lies in Freedom from Characteristic Distinctions
Upon hearing the discourse Subhuti had an interior realization and was moved to tears. It is a most precious thing, World-Honored One, that you should deliver this supremely profound discourse, he said. Never have I heard such an exposition since my eye of wisdom first opened. If anyone listens to this discourse in faith with a pure, lucid mind, he will thereupon conceive an idea of fundamental reality.
Just as you say, Buddha replied. If anyone listens to this discourse and is filled with neither alarm nor awe nor dread, be it known that such a one is of remarkable achievement.
The first perfection, the perfection of charity, is not, in fact, the first perfection; it is merely a name. Likewise the perfection of patience is not such. Therefore bodhisattvas should leave behind all phenomenal distinctions and awaken the thought of enlightenment by not allowing the mind to depend upon notions evoked by the sensible world.
The mind should be kept independent of any thoughts that arise within it, or it has no sure haven. As bodhisattvas practice charity for the welfare of all living beings, they should do it in this manner. Just as the Tathagata declares that characteristics are not characteristics, so he declares that all living beings are not, in fact, living beings.
The Tathagata is he who declares that which is true, he who declares that which is fundamental, he who declares that which is ultimate. The truth to which the Tathagata has attained is neither real nor unreal.
If there be good men and women in future ages able to receive, read and recite this discourse in its entirety, the Tathagata will clearly perceive and recognize them by means of his buddha-knowledge; and each one of them will bring immeasurable and incalculable merit to fruition.
[The conversion of an ordinary man to a bodhisattva is said to be marked by three events: 1) he awakens the thought of enlightenment; 2) he dedicates himself to the ideal of service for the salvation of all creatures; and 3) he receives a prediction from a buddha of his attainment of the goal.]
15. The Incomparable Value of this Teaching
If on the one hand a good man or woman performs in the morning as many charitable acts of self-denial as the sand grains of the Ganges, and performs as many again in the noonday and as many again in the evening, and continues so doing throughout numberless ages, and, on the other hand, anyone listens to this discourse with heart of faith and without contention, the latter would be the more blessed. But how can any comparison be made with one who writes it down, receives it, retains it, and explains it to others!
The full value of this discourse can be neither conceived nor estimated, nor can any limit be set to it. The Tathagata has declared this teaching for the benefit of the initiates of the great way; he has declared it for the benefit of the initiates of the supreme way.
16. Purgation through Suffering the Retribution for Past Sins
If good men and women who receive and retain this discourse are downtrodden, their evil destiny is the inevitable retributive result of sins committed in their past mortal lives. By virtue of their present misfortunes the reacting effects of their past will be thereby worked out, and they will be in a position to attain the consummation of incomparable enlightenment.
If I fully detailed the merit gained by good men and women coming to receive, retain, study and recite this discourse, my hearers would be filled with doubt and might become disordered in mind, suspicious and unbelieving. You should know, Subhuti, that the significance of this discourse is beyond conception; likewise the fruit of its rewards is beyond conception.
[The above remark is consistent with the teachings of the Ch’an masters, which is that reality cannot be conceived by the intellect but can only be realized through direct experience.]
17. No One Attains Transcendental Wisdom
World-Honored One, if good men and women seek enlightenment, how should they abide and how control their thoughts?
They must create this resolved attitude of mind, Buddha replied: “I must liberate all living beings; yet when all have been liberated, verily not anyone is liberated.”
In reality there is no formula that gives rise to the consummation of incomparable enlightenment. Tathagata is a signification implying all formulas. The basis of the Tathagata’s attainment of enlightenment is wholly BEYOND; it is neither real nor unreal.
If a bodhisattva announces “I will liberate all living creatures,” he is not rightly called a bodhisattva. There is really no such condition as bodhisattvaship, because all things are devoid of separate individuality. Bodhisattvas who are truly devoid of any conception of separate selfhood are truthfully called bodhisattvas.
18. All Modes of Mind Are Really Only Mind
If there were as many Ganges rivers as the sand grains of the Ganges and there was a buddha-land for each sand grain in all those rivers, would those buddha-lands be many?
Many, indeed.
However many living beings there are in all those buddha-lands, though they have manifold modes of mind, the Tathagata understands them all. All these are not mind; they are merely called mind. It is impossible to retain past mind, impossible to hold on to present mind, and impossible to grasp future mind.
19. Absolute Reality Is the Only Foundation
If anyone filled three thousand galaxies with treasure and gave it all away, would he gain great merit?
Indeed, World-Honored One, he would gain great merit.
If such merit were real, the Tathagata would not have declared it to be great, but because it is without a foundation the Tathagata characterized it as “great”.
20. The Unreality of Phenomenal Distinctions
Can the Buddha be perceived by his perfectly formed body?
No, World-Honored One. A perfectly formed body is not really such; it is merely called that.
Can the Absolute be perceived by means of any phenomenal characteristics [that is, perceptible by the senses]?
No, Subhuti replied, because phenomenal characteristics are not really such but are merely called so.
21. Words Cannot Express Truth; That which Words Express is not Truth Directory
If anyone says that the Tathagata sets forth a teaching he really slanders Buddha and is unable to explain what I teach. As to any truth-declaring system, truth is undeclarable; so an “enunciation of truth” is just the name give to it.
In future ages, Subhuti asked, will there be men coming to hear a declaration of this teaching who will be inspired with belief?
Those to whom you refer are neither living beings nor not-living beings. “Living beings” are not really such; they are just called that.
22. It Cannot Be Said that Anything Is Attainable
Subhuti asked: In the attainment of enlightenment did the Buddha make no acquisition whatever?
Just so, Buddha replied. Through the consummation of incomparable enlightenment I acquired not the least thing.
23. The Cultivation of Goodness Purifies the Mind
Furthermore, THIS is altogether everywhere, without differentiation or degree. It is straightly attained by freedom from separate selfhood and by cultivating all kinds of goodness. But, though we speak of “goodness,” the Tathagata declares that there is no goodness.
24. The Incomparable Merit of this Teaching
If one gives the needy a mass of treasures equal in extent to as many mighty Mount Sumerus as there would be in three thousand galaxies, and if another selects even four lines from this discourse upon the perfection of the transcendental wisdom, receiving and retaining them, and clearly expounding them to others, the merit of the latter will be so far greater than that of the former that no conceivable comparison can be made between them.
25. The Illusion of the Ego
Let no one say the Tathagata cherishes the idea “I must liberate all living beings.” In reality there are no living beings to be liberated by the Tathagata. If there were living beings for the Tathagata to liberate, he would partake of the idea of selfhood, personality, ego entity and separate individuality.
26. The Body of Truth Has No Mark
May the Tathagata be perceived by the thirty-two marks of a great man? Buddha asked.
As I understand the meaning of Buddha’s words, the Tathagata may not be perceived by the thirty-two marks, Subhuti replied.
Whereupon the World-Honored One uttered this verse:
Who seeks me by form,
Who seeks me in sound,
Perverted are his footsteps upon the way;
For he cannot perceive the Absolute.
27. It Is Erroneous to Affirm that All Things Are Ever Extinguished
The Tathagata’s attainment of enlightenment was not by reason of his perfected form [I believe he’s referring to the entire organism, physical and mental, as well as its manifested actions]. On the other hand, do not believe that anyone in whom dawns the consummation of incomparable enlightenment would declare that all manifest standards are ended and extinguished. Such a man does not affirm concerning any formula that it is finally extinguished.
28. Attachment to Rewards of Merit
If one bodhisattva bestows in charity sufficient treasures to fill as many worlds as there are sand grains in the Ganges, and another, realizing that all things are egoless, attains perfection through patient forbearance, the merit of the latter will far exceed that of the former.
What is the saying, World-Honored One, that bodhisattvas are insentient as to rewards of merit?
Bodhisattvas who achieve merit should not be fettered with desire for rewards. Thus it is said that the rewards of merit are not received.
[From the Bhagavad-Gita: Thy right is to work, but never to its fruits; let not the fruit of thy work be thy motive, nor take refuge in abstinence from works. Standing in union with the Soul, carry out thy work, putting away attachment, O conqueror of wealth; equal in success and failure, for equalness is called union with the Soul.]
29. Perfect Tranquility
If anyone should say that the Tathagata comes or goes or sits or reclines, he fails to understand my teaching. Why? Because the Tathagata has neither whence or whither.
30. The Integral Principle
If a good man or woman ground an infinite number of worlds to dust, would the resulting minute particles be many, Subhuti?
Many, indeed! Because if such were really minute particles Buddha would not have spoken of them as minute particles. “Minute particles” is just the name given to them. Also, when the Tathagata speaks of worlds, these are not worlds; for if reality could be predicated of a world it would be a self-existent cosmos, and the Tathagata teaches that there is really no such thing.
Words cannot explain the real nature of a cosmos, Buddha agreed. Only common people fettered with desire make use of this arbitrary method.
31. Conventional Truth Should Be Cut Off
If anyone should say that Buddha declares any conception of egoity, would he understand my teaching?
No, Subhuti replied, because the World-Honored One declares that notions of selfhood, personality, entity and separate individuality are erroneous; these terms are merely figures of speech.
Those who aspire to the consummation of incomparable enlightenment should recognize and understand all the varieties of things in the same way and cut off the arising of aspects, Buddha said.
32. The Delusion of Appearances
Someone might fill innumerable worlds with treasure and give all away in gifts of alms, but if any good man or woman awakens the thought of enlightenment and takes even four lines from this discourse, reciting, using, receiving, retaining and spreading them abroad and explaining them for the benefit of others, it will be far more meritorious.
In what manner may he explain them to others? By detachment from appearances - abiding in real truth.
Keywords: The Diamond Sutra, Buddha
Huang Po
Published on
Dhyana-Practice (From Blofeld’s introduction to his rendering of The Zen Teaching of Huang Po on the Transmission of Mind):
The book tells us very little about the practice of what, for want of a better translation, is often called meditation or contemplation. Unfortunately both these words are misleading as they imply some object of meditation or of contemplation; and, if objectlessness be stipulated, then they may well be taken to lead to a blank or sleeplike trance, which is not at all the goal of Zen. Huang Po seems to have assumed that his audience knew something about the practice - as most keen Buddhists do, of course. He gives few instructions as to how to “meditate,” but he does tell us what to avoid. If, conceiving of the phenomenal world as illusion, we try to shut it out, we make a false distinction between the “real” and the “unreal.” So we must not shut anything out, but try to reach the point where all distinctions are seen to be void, where nothing is seen as desirable or undesirable, existing or not existing. Yet this does not mean that we should make our minds blank, for then we should be no better than blocks of wood or lumps of stone; moreover, if we remained in this state, we should not be able to deal with the circumstances of daily life or be capable of observing the Zen precept” “When hungry, eat.” Rather, we must cultivate dispassion, realizing that none of the attractive or unattractive attributes of things have any absolute existence.
Enlightenment, when it comes, will come in a flash. There can be no gradual, no partial, Enlightenment. The highly trained and zealous adept may be said to have prepared himself for Enlightenment, but by no means can he be regarded as partially Enlightened - just as a drop of water may get hotter and hotter and then, suddenly, boil; at no stage is it partly boiling, and, until the very moment of boiling, no qualitative change has occurred. In effect, however, we may go through three stages - two of non-Enlightenment and one of Enlightenment. To the great majority of people, the moon is the moon and the trees are the trees. The next stage (not really higher than the first) is to perceive that moon and trees are not at all what they seem to be, since “all is the One Mind.” When this stage is achieved, we have the concept of a vast uniformity in which all distinctions are void; and, to some adepts, this concept may come as an actual perception, as “real” to them as the moon and the trees before. It is said that, when Enlightenment really comes, the moon is again very much the moon and the trees exactly trees; but with a difference, for the Enlightened man is capable of perceiving both unity and multiplicity without the least contradiction between them!
Conceptual Thinking:
To make use of your minds to think conceptually is to leave the substance [of Mind, Buddha] and attach yourselves to form.
The Mind is no mind of conceptual thought, and it is completely detached from form…. There are those who, upon hearing this teaching, rid themselves of conceptual thought in a flash…. But whether they transcend conceptual thought by a longer or shorter way, the result is a state of BEING: there is no practicing and no action of realizing. That there is nothing which can be attained is not idle talk; it is the truth.
If you would spend all your time - walking, standing, sitting or lying down - learning to halt the concept-forming activities of your own mind, you could be sure of ultimately attaining the goal.
Perception:
…If you students of the Way seek to progress through seeing, hearing, feeling and knowing, when you are deprived of your perceptions, your ways to Mind will be cut off and you will find nowhere to enter.
Do not keep them nor abandon them nor dwell in them nor cleave to them. Above, below and around you, all is spontaneously existing, for there is nowhere which is outside Buddha-Mind.
One Mind:
Only awake to the One Mind and there is nothing whatever to be attained.
This pure Mind, the source of everything, shines forever and on all with the brilliance of its own perfection. But the people of the world do not awake to it, regarding only that which sees, hears, feels and knows as mind…. If they would only eliminate all conceptual thought in a flash, that source-substance would manifest itself like a sun….
Fear:
Ordinary people look to their surroundings, while followers of the Way look to Mind, but the true Dharma is to forget them both. The former is easy enough, the latter very difficult. Men are afraid to forget their minds, fearing to fall through the Void with nothing to stay their fall. They do not know that the Void is not really void, but the realm of the real Dharma.
Intuition:
So you students of the Way should immediately refrain from all conceptual thought. Let a tacit understanding be all! Any mental processes must lead to error. There is just a transmission of Mind with Mind.
The Place of Precious Things:
That which is called the Place of Precious Things is the real Mind, the original Buddha-Essence, the treasure of our own real Nature…. Where is the Place of Precious Things? It is a place to which no directions can be given…. All we can say is that it is close by.
The Ignorant Seeker:
Many people are afraid to empty their minds lest they may plunge into the Void. They do not know that their own Mind is the void. The ignorant [seekers] eschew phenomena but not thought; the wise [seekers] eschew thought but not phenomena.
The World-Transcendor:
If an ordinary man, when he is about to die, could only see the five elements of his consciousness as void; the four physical elements as not constituting an ‘I’; the real Mind as formless and neither coming nor going; his nature as something neither commencing at his birth nor perishing at his death, but as whole and motionless in its very depths; his Mind and environmental objects as one - if he could really accomplish this, he would receive Enlightenment in a flash. He would no longer be entangled by the Triple World; he would be a World-Transcendor.
The Supreme Way:
…To awaken suddenly to the fact that your own Mind is the Buddha, that there is nothing to be attained or a single action to be performed - this is the Supreme Way….
“…his words were simple, his reasoning direct, his way of life exalted and his habits unlike the habits of other men. Disciples hastened to him from all quarters, looking up to him as to a lofty mountain, and through their contact with him awoke to Reality. Of the crowds which flocked to see him, there were always more than a thousand with him at a time.”
Thus P’ei Hsiu (pronounced pay shoo), a scholar-official of great learning according to Blofeld, described Huang Po (hwong bo; Japanese: Obaku), whose teachings he recorded for posterity. Blofeld also tells us that P’ei Hsiu was devoted to Huang Po, so we can forgive him if he may have used a little puffery in describing the size of the crowds always in attendance, but his description of the man rings with honest conviction.
Lest you get the impression that Huang Po was mild-mannered, though, you might be interested to know that his teacher, Pai-chang (whose teacher was Ma-tsu), compared him to a tiger in his ferociousness.
Similarity to the Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation, from Blofeld’s introductory comments:
The present volume is a complete translation of the Huang Po Ch’uan Hsin Fa Yao, a ninth-century Chinese Buddhist text, much of which now appears in English for the first time. It contains a concise account of the sublime teachings of a great Master of the Dhyana Sect, to which, in accordance with current Western practice, I shall henceforth refer to by its Japanese name of Zen. Zen is often regarded as a uniquely Far Eastern development of Buddhism, but Zen followers claim that their Doctrine stems directly from Gautama Buddha himself. This text, which is one of the principle Zen works, follows closely the teachings proclaimed in the Diamond Sutra or Jewel of Transcendental Wisdom, which has been ably translated by Arnold Price and published by the Buddhist Society, London. It is also close in spirit to The Sutra of Wei Lang (Hui Nêng), another of the Buddhist Society’s publications. But I have been deeply struck by the astonishing similarity to our text in spirit and terminology of the not-so-Far Eastern, eighth-century Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation, edited by Evens-Wentz and published by the Oxford University Press. In my opinion, these four books are among the most brilliant expositions of the highest Wisdom which have so far appeared in our language; and, of them all, the present text and the Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation present the Doctrine in a form best suited to the needs of Western readers.
Transmission:
When the people of the world hear it said that the Buddhas transmit the Doctrine of the Mind, they suppose that there is something to be attained or realized apart from Mind, and thereupon they use Mind to seek the Dharma [the Way], not knowing that Mind and the object of their search are one. Mind cannot be used to search for something from Mind….
… Mind is transmitted with Mind and those Minds do not differ. Transmitting and receiving transmission are both a most difficult kind of mysterious understanding, so that few indeed have been able to receive it. In fact, however, Mind is not Mind and transmission is not really transmission. [That is, all terms are merely makeshifts. Richard Rose, in Psychology of the Observer, describes the six kinds of perception, two of which encompass transmission and reception of Mind.]
Put a Stop to Conceptual Thought and Forget Your Anxiety (from the Chun Chou Record of the Zen Master Huang Po (Tuan Chi), a collection of sermons and dialogues recorded by P’ei Hsiu while in the city of Chun Chou):
The Master said to me: All the Buddhas and all sentient beings are nothing but the One Mind, beside which nothing exists. This Mind, which is without beginning, is unborn and indestructible. It is not green nor yellow, and has neither form nor appearance. It does not belong to the categories of things which exist or do not exist, nor can it be thought of in terms of new or old. It is neither long nor short, big nor small, for it transcends all limits, measure, names, traces and comparisons. It is that which you see before you - begin to reason about it and you at once fall into error. It is like the boundless void which cannot be fathomed or measured. The One Mind alone is the Buddha, and there is no distinction between the Buddha and sentient things, but that sentient beings are attached to forms and so seek externally for Buddhahood. By their very seeking they lose it, for that is using the Buddha to seek for the Buddha and using mind to grasp Mind. Even though they do their utmost for a full aeon, they will not be able to attain it. They do not know that, if they put a stop to conceptual thought and forget their anxiety, the Buddha will appear before them, for this Mind is the Buddha and the Buddha is all living beings. It is not the less for being manifested in ordinary beings, nor is it greater for being manifest in the Buddhas.
What is the Way?
Q: What is the Way and how must it be followed?
A: What sort of THING do you suppose the Way to be, that you should wish to FOLLOW it?
Q: What instructions have the Masters everywhere given for dhyana-practice and the study of the Dharma?
A: Words used to attract the dull of wit are not to be relied on.
Q: If those teachings were meant for the dull-witted, I have yet to hear what Dharma has been taught to those of really high capacity.
A: If they are really men of high capacity, where could they find people to follow? If they seek from within themselves, they will find nothing tangible; how much less can they find a Dharma worthy of their attention elsewhere! Do not look to what is called the Dharma by preachers, for what sort of Dharma could that be?
Q: If that is so, should we not seek for anything at all?
A: By conceding this, you would save yourself a lot of mental effort.
Q: But in this way everything would be eliminated. There cannot just be nothing.
A: Who called it nothing? Who was this fellow? But you wanted to SEEK for something.
Q: Since there is no need to seek, why do you also say that not everything is eliminated?
A: Not to seek is to rest tranquil. Who told you to eliminate anything? Look at the void in front of your eyes. How can you produce it or eliminate it?
Q: If I could reach this Dharma, would it be like the void?
A: Morning and night I have explained to you that the Void is both One and Manifold. I said this as a temporary expedient, but you are building up concepts from it.
Q: Do you mean that we should not form concepts as human beings normally do?
A: I have not prevented you; but concepts are related to the senses; and, when feeling takes place, wisdom is shut out.
Q: Then should we avoid any feeling in relation to the Dharma?
A: Where no feeling arises, who can say that you are right?
Q: Why do you speak as though I was mistaken in all the questions I have asked Your Reverence?
A: You are a man who doesn’t understand what is said to him. What is all this about being mistaken?
The Way is not something which can be studied. Study leads to the retention of concepts and so the Way is entirely misunderstood. Moreover, the Way is not something specially existing; it is called the Mahayana Mind - Mind which is not to be found inside, outside, or in the middle. Truly it is not located anywhere. The first step is to refrain from knowledge-based concepts.
The Way is spiritual Truth and was originally without name or title. It was only because people ignorantly sought for it empirically that the Buddhas appeared and taught them to eradicate this method of approach. Fearing that nobody would understand, they selected the name ‘Way.’
… The Way of the Buddhas and the Way of devils are equally wide of the mark.
The Absolute:
The substance of the Absolute is inwardly like wood or stone, in that it is motionless, and outwardly like the void, in that it is without bounds or obstructions…. Those who hasten towards it dare not enter, fearing to hurtle down through the void with nothing to cling to or to stay their fall. So they look to the brink and retreat. This refers to all who seek such a goal through cognition. Thus, those who seek the goal through cognition are like the fur (many), while those who obtain to intuitive knowledge of the Way are like the horns (few).
Keywords: Huang Po, Buddha, Dharma, Zen, enlightenment, The Way, mind, being
Noetic
Published on August 16, 2005
What is “Noetic”?
The word “noetic” comes from the ancient Greek nous, for which there is no exact equivalent in English. It refers to “inner knowing,” a kind of intuitive consciousness—direct and immediate access to knowledge beyond what is available to our normal senses and the power of reason.
What are ‘Noetic Sciences’?
Noetic sciences are explorations into the nature and potentials of consciousness using multiple ways of knowing—including intuition, feeling, reason, and the senses. Noetic sciences explore the “inner cosmos” of the mind (consciousness, soul, spirit) and how it relates to the “outer cosmos” of the physical world.
Noetic
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Noetic, from the Greek νοῦς (nous) is usually translated as “mind”, “understanding”, “intellect”, or “reason”. Most dictionaries define the term noetic as a synonym of “mental” or “intellectual.” However, in recent decades, the term has taken on new usages among New Age authors and teachers. The Institute of Noetic Sciences defines noetic as, roughly, ‘relating to consciousness or intuition’.
The ancient Pythagoreans and Platonists used the term to mean “the cosmic soul”. According to Neo-Platonic cosmology, the nous emanates from the One.
Anaxagoras wrote:
All other things partake in a portion of everything, while Nous is infinite and self-ruled, and is mixed with nothing, but is alone, itself by itself. For if it were not by itself, but were mixed with anything else, it would partake in all things if it were mixed with any; for in everything there is a portion of everything, as has been said by me in what goes before, and the things mixed with it would hinder it, so that it would have power over nothing in the same way that it has now being alone by itself. For it is the thinnest of all things and the purest, and it has all knowledge about everything and the greatest strength; and Nous has power over all things, both greater and smaller, that have soul. (Translation by J. Burnet)
From the nous emerges the world soul, which gives rise to the manifest realm. These mystical, cosmic and holistic connotations are why the New Age movement has embraced the term noetic and used it to refer to the exploration of individual or cosmic consciousness.
See mind-body-spirit…links
Keywords: noetic, soul, consciousness, intuition
What’s the Point?
Published on August 15, 2005
Excerpt from a NDW e mail I received…..
What’s the Point?
Living and dying has no purpose save the purpose you give it.
Life is purposeless; pointless.
So if you think you are involved in an experience that is pointless, you are right.
That is God’s greatest gift to us. You see, if God had given Life a point, Life would have no choice but to obey. Then the point of everybody’s life would have had to have been the same! So God, in infinite wisdom, imbued Life with no purpose whatever — in order that each and every one of us might imbue it with a purpose of our own… thus to define and create, announce and declare, express and experience Who We Really Are.
Thus, I suppose it could be said that the purpose of life is to create and experience Who You Really Are. Mind you, not to discover Who You Are, but to create it. You see, there is nothing to discover. In essence, you are nothing. Until you decide and create Who You Are.
I just said a mouthful there. I said, in essence, you are nothing. I mean that literally. I mean that the essence of you — that which you are — is nothing at all. That is, you are not any particular thing. You are no-thing! Did you know that? You are NO-thing! That’s how you start out… being no thing. And then you decide and declare, create and become, that which you say you Are.
This is God in the act of God-ing! This is what’s going on! Do you understand it? God is creating and experiencing Godself, through you.
So that, ultimately, is the “purpose of it all.” Or, more correctly, it is the purpose that’s going on. It is what’s taking place. I mean that literally, too. We are, quite literally, “what is taking place” in Time and Space. How we “take our place,” what we choose to be and do, is totally up to us. Depends on what we’d like God to be.
So, where does this cycle lead? You tell me. And I mean that literally, too! You tell me, every day with your life. Your life is your decision as to where this all leads.
You do not “find out” the purpose of life, you decide its purpose.
Life is not a Process of Discovery. It is a Process of Creation. We keep waiting for God to tell us, show us — and God keeps waiting for us to tell HIM, show HER. You see? We’re waiting for the One Who Waits for Us.
Stop waiting. And stop asking. Start declaring. Life is not a question. Life is a declaration. ~ NDW
Keywords: God, purpose, life, living, dying
EBG Excerpt…Love
Published on August 14, 2005
Love comes with no sets of rules. We human beings make up our own rules, expectations and guidelines for love……and then we wonder what went wrong.
Keywords: Love, expectations
Yoga
Published on August 1, 2005
Yoga
Yoga is a form of mysticism that developed on the Indian subcontinent in the Hindu cultural context. Its origin is impossible to trace, because it dates back to before recorded history. Yoga comes in many forms specifically designed to suit different types of people. As a result, some forms of yoga have gained significant popularity outside India, particularly in the West during the past century.
Introduction
The word Yoga originates from the Sanskrit word “Yuj” (”to yoke”) and is generally translated as “union” or “integration”. According to Yoga experts, the union referred to by the name is that of the individual soul (”atma”) with the cosmos, or the Supreme (”Brahma,”).
The many Yoga disciplines are of course the religious practices of Hinduism and taught by qualified Hindus. The basic, progressive forms of Yoga are: Karma Yoga (ethics), Bhakti Yoga (devotions), Raja Yoga (meditations) and Jnana Yoga (enlightenment).
Yoga has both a philosophical and a practical dimension. The philosophy of yoga (”union”) deals with the nature of the individual soul and the cosmos, and how the two are related. The practice of yoga, on the other hand, can be any activity that leads or brings the practitioner closer to this mystical union - a state called self-realization. Over thousands of years, special practical yoga techniques have been developed by experts in yoga, who are referred to as Yogis (male) and Yoginis (female).
These Yoga techniques cover a broad range, encompassing physical, mental, and spiritual activities. Traditionally, they have been classified into four categories or paths: the path of meditation (Raja Yoga), the path of devotion (Bhakti Yoga), the path of selfless service to the Divine (Karma Yoga), and the path of intellectual analysis or the discrimination of truth and reality (Jnana Yoga). The most conspicuous form of yoga in the West, Hatha Yoga - consisting of various physical and breathing exercises and purification techniques - is actually the third and the fourth stages of Ashtanga Yoga of Yoga Sutras by Patanjali.
This statue of a yogini goddess was created in Kaveripakkam in Tamil Nadu during the 10th century. There were 64 such yoginis worshiped in a cult later incorporated into Hinduism.
Different forms of yogic movements which occur automatically in the body during meditation.
History
Pre-Vedic (ca. 6000 - 3000 BCE [?])
The history of yoga may go back anywhere from two to eight thousand years ago, depending on the perspective the historian. However, its basic text is the Yoga Sutras by Patañjali (c. 2nd century BC?). It is associated with the land of India, and while it is supposed by some scholars that yogic practices were originally the domain of the indigenous, non-Aryan (and pre-Vedic) peoples, it was first clearly expounded in the great Vedic shastras (religious texts).
Pre-Vedic findings are taken, by some commentators, to show that “yoga” existed in some form well before the establishment of Aryan culture in the north Indian subcontinent.
A triangular amulet seal uncovered at the Mohenjo-daro archeological excavation site depicts a male, seated on a low platform in a cross legged position, with arms outstretched. His head is crowned with the horns of a water-buffalo. He is surrounded by animals (a fish, an alligator, and a snake) and diverse symbols. The likeness on the seal and understandings of the surrounding culture have led to its widely accepted identification as “Pashupati”, Lord of the Beasts, a prototype and predecessor of the modern day Hindu god Shiva. The pose is a very familiar one to yogins, representing Shiva much as he is seen today, the meditating ascetic contemplating divine truth in “yoga-posture.”
(Ref. 1, 2)
Vedic (ca. 2000-1500 BCE)
David Frawley, a Vedic scholar, writes: “Yoga can be traced back to the Rig Veda itself, the oldest Hindu text which speaks about yoking our mind and insight to the Sun of Truth. Great teachers of early Yoga include the names of many famous Vedic sages like Vasishta, Yajnavalkya, and Jaigishavya.”
Ideas of uniting mind, body and soul in the cosmic one, however, do not find real yogic explication until the most important mystic texts of Hinduism, the Upanishads or Vedanta, commentaries on the Vedas.
Upanishadic (ca. 800-100 BCE)
Explicit examples of the concept and terminology of yoga appear in the Upanishads (primarily thirteen principal texts of the Vedanta, or the “End of the Vedas,” that are the culmination of all Vedic philosophy)
While protracted discussions of the ultimate, infinite Self, or Atman, and realization of Brahman, are the true legacy of the Upanishads, the first principal Yoga text was the Bhagavad Gita (”The Lord’s Song”), also known as Gitopanishad.
In the Maitrayaniya Upanishad (ca. 200-300 BCE) yoga surfaces as:
“Shadanga-Yoga - The uniting discipline of the six limbs (shad-anga), as expounded in the Maitrayaniya-Upanishad: (1) breath control (pranayama), (2) sensory inhibition (pratyahara), (3) meditation (dhyana), (4) concentration (dharana), (5) examination (tarka), and (6) ecstasy (samadhi).”
Reference: http://www.orientalia.org/term3923.html
In the Katha Upanishad yoga surfaces as:
“When the five instruments of knowledge stand still, together with the mind and when the intellect does not move, that is called the Supreme State. - III.10
This, the firm Control of the senses, is what is called yoga. One must then be vigilant; for yoga can be both beneficial and injurious. - III.11″
“Having received this wisdom taught by the King of Death and the entire process of yoga, Nachiketa became free from impurities and death and attained Brahman. Thus it will be also with any other who knows, in this manner, the inmost Self. - III.18″
Commentary
“In the Kathopanishad there is a hint given to us as to how we can practice Yoga. There are one or two verses in the Kathopanishad which give the sum and substance of the practice of Yoga, which is also the same Yoga explained in greater detail in the system of Patanjali. The Kathopanishad says, in these verses, that the subtle essences of objects are superior to the sensory powers, they are higher in their degree and in quality. Higher than these essences of objects is the mind; higher than the mind is the intellect; higher than the intellect is the cosmic intellect called Mahat. It is also called Hiranyagarbha. Higher than that is the peaceful undifferentiated causal state called Avyakta. Higher than that is supreme Absolute, Purusha. The same Upanishad mentions the system of practice in another verse. The senses have to be rooted in the mind. The mind has to be centered in the intellect. The intellect has to be fixed in the Cosmic Intellect, and the Cosmic Intellect has to be united with the Peaceful Being. Sometimes this Peaceful Being, Shanta-Atman, is identified with the Isvara of the Vedanta. This is how we have to control the mind.”
Reference The Essence of The Aitareya and Taittiriya Upanishads by Swami Krishnananda The Divine Life Society Sivananda Ashram, Rishikesh, India [1]
See also: Wikisources - Aitareya Upanishad, Wikisource - Taittiriya Upanishad
Classical (ca. 200 CE)
Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras
After the Bhagavad Gita, the next seminal work on Yoga is the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. The Yoga Sutras are a compilation of Yogic thought that is largely Raja Yogic in nature, it was codified some time between the 2nd century BC and the 3rd century by Patanjali, and prescribes adherence to “eight limbs” (the sum of which constitute “Ashtanga Yoga”) to quiet one’s mind and merge with the infinite. These eight limbs not only systematized conventional moral principles espoused by the Gita, but elucidated the practice of Raja Yoga in a more detailed manner. Indeed, his “eight-limbed” path has formed the foundation for Raja Yoga and much of Tantra Yoga (a Hindu deific, Shiva-Shakti yoga system) and Vajrayana Buddhism (Buddhist Tantra Yoga) that came after. It goes as follows:
• Yama (moral codes)
• Niyama (self-purification and study)
• Asana (posture)
• Pranayama (breath control)
• Pratyahara (sense control)
• Dharana (concentration)
• Dhyana (contemplation)
• Samadhi (veridical meditation)
Patanjali, whose own life is virtually unknown, had the impact of further spreading in compact form the essence of Raja Yoga. Some legends speak of his being Adinaga, the first snake, the lower half of his body being that of a snake, upon which the great Hindu God Vishnu reclines. Many say that he was the same Patanjali who wrote commentaries on Panini’s singular masterwork on Sanskrit grammar. Others speak of the legends of his birth. A few even dispute his existence and attribute the Yoga Sutras to many authors, but this is highly unlikely due to the structural, linguistic and stylistic uniformity of the short work. His base is Hindu Samkhya philosophy and shows itself to have been highly influenced by the Upanishads.
His Yoga Sutras espouse a threefold system for attainment of samadhi through tapas (austerities; discipline; literally “heat”), swadhyaya (self-study) and ishwar-pranidhana (contemplation of God).
While Patanjali accepts the idea of what he terms “ishta-devata” (worship of deities as manifestations of the single Brahman), his overall “ishwar” is not a conventional God with personal form and speaks more to a universal, attributeless Brahman, an impersonal, unknowable, infinite force that is all and transcends all.
Together, the Bhagavad Gita and Yoga Sutras form the theoretical and philosophical base of all yoga. However, as far as Raja Yoga (meditation yoga) goes, it is most precisely captured by Patanjali’s Yoga-Sutras.
450 - 850 CE
The Yoga-bhasya, Veda Vyasa’s commentary on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali could have been written as early as 450 CE. Professor J. H. Woods, places the date of the Yoga-bhasya between 650 CE to 850 CE. Trevor Leggett places the date closer to 600 CE based on a commentary to the Yoga-bhasya published in Sanskrit in 1952 in the Madras Government Oriental Series #94 by Polakam Sri Rama Sastri and S. R. Krishnamurti Sastri. Evidence strongly suggests that this sub-commentary was written by Sankara who lived about 700 CE.
Vacaspati Mishra’s Tattva Vaisharadi, a commentary on the Yoga-bhasya was written in ca. 850 CE. An authoritative translation of this work can be found in “The Yoga System of Patanjali” by Professor James Haughton Woods.
Reference: “Sankara on the Yoga Sutras” Trevor Leggett, Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, Delhi, ISBN 81-208-1028-7
Reference: “The Yoga System of Patanjali” James Haughton Woods, Harvard Oriental Series, 1914, (out of print) ISBN 81-208-0577-1 (reprint: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, Delhi)
This statue of a yogini goddess was created in Kaveripakkam in Tamil Nadu during the 10th century. There were 64 such yoginis worshiped in a cult later incorporated into Hinduism.
1350 - 1400 CE
Hatha Yoga Pradipika In the West, outside of Hindu culture, “yoga” is usually understood to refer to “hatha yoga.” Hatha Yoga is, however, a particular system propagated by Swami Swatamarama, a yogic sage of the 15th century in India.
After the Bhagavad Gita and Yoga Sutras, the most fundamental text of Yoga is the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, written by Swami Swatamarama, that in great detail lists all the main asanas, pranayama, mudra and bandha that are familiar to today’s yoga student. It runs in the line of Hindu yoga (to distinguish from Buddhist and Jain yoga) and is dedicated to Lord Adinath, a name for Lord Shiva (the Hindu god of destruction), who is alleged to have imparted the secret of Hatha Yoga to his divine consort Parvati. It is common for yogins and tantriks of several disciplines to dedicate their practices to a deity under the Hindu ishta-devata concept (see Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras) while always striving to achieve beyond that: Brahman. Hindu philosophy in the Vedanta and Yoga streams, as the reader will remember, views only one thing as being ultimately real: Satchidananda Atman, the Existence-Consciousness-Blissful Self. Very Upanishadic in its notions, worship of Gods is a secondary means of focus on the higher being, a conduit to realization of the Divine Ground. Hatha Yoga follows in that vein and thus successfully transcends being particularly grounded in any one religion.
Hatha is a Sanskrit word meaning ’sun’ (ha) and ‘moon’ (tha), representing opposing energies: hot and cold, male and female, positive and negative, similar but not completely analogous to yin and yang. Hatha yoga attempts to balance mind and body via physical exercises, or “asanas”, controlled breathing, and the calming of the mind through relaxation and meditation. Asanas teach poise, balance & strength and were originally (and still) practiced to improve the body’s physical health and clear the mind in preparation for meditation in the pursuit of enlightenment. “Asana” means “immovable”, i.e. static, and often confused with the dynamic 108 natya karanas described in Natya Shastra and, along with the elements of Bhakti Yoga, is embodied in the contemporary form of Bharatanatyam.
By balancing two streams, often known as ida (mental) and pingala (bodily) currents, the sushumna nadi (current of the Self) is said to rise, opening various chakras (cosmic power points within the body, starting from the base of the spine and ending right above the head) until samadhi is attained. Ida and pingala are represented in the dynamism of natya yoga by lasya (female) and tandava (male) aspects, and bear direct reference to the Taoist dualism.
By forging a powerful depth of concentration and mastery of the body and mind, Hatha Yoga practices seek to still the mental waters and allow for apprehension of oneself as that which one always was, Brahman. Hatha Yoga is essentially a manual for scientifically taking one’s body through stages of control to a point at which one-pointed focus on the unmanifested Brahman is possible: it is said to take its practitioner to the peaks of Raja Yoga.
In the West, hatha yoga has become wildly popular as a purely physical exercise regimen divorced of its original purpose, and thus, devoid of its original efficacy. Currently, it is estimated that about 30 million Americans practice hatha yoga. But in the Indian subcontinent the traditional practice is still to be found. The guru-shishya (teacher-student) relationship that exists without need for sanction from non-religious institutions, and which gave rise to all the great yogins who made way into international consciousness in the 20th century, has been maintained in Indian, Nepalese, and some Tibetan circles.
In India, whose Hindu population combines to a staggering 800 million, Yoga is a daily part of life. It is common to see people performing Surya Namaskar (a yogic set of asanas and pranayam dedicated to Surya, the Hindu God of the Sun) in the morning or speaking about food diets and body therapy entirely based on Yoga or the Hindu healing system of Ayurveda. The age-old tradition of Yoga has continued uninterrupted by the its popularity in the west (although more established schools like the Bihar School of Yoga work from within India to produce Yoga texts to send abroad).
In addition, hundreds and thousands sanyasins (renunciates) and sadhus (Hindu monks) wander in and out of city temples, village country sides and are to be found smattered all across the foothills of the Himalaya and the Vindhya Range of central India. For India’s holy-men, Yoga is as fundamental as lifeblood. To see a man meditating at the steps of a temple, or even wondering contemplatively on the roadside, is not uncommon even to the more Westernized crowds. It is the same in Tibet, where the Buddhist establishment’s lifestyle is permeated with Yoga or yogic practices, which is ultimately not a once-a-day routine, but a constant immersion in self-discovery.
Western development of yoga has taken less of a spiritual approach and focused more on the mind/body connection. While Yoga is a religion to many, most practitioners in the west separate yoga from their spiritual beliefs, causing yoga to strictly stay within the containment of an exercise class or just within the “keeping healthy” aspect of life.
Yoga Terminology
Due to its Indic roots, Yoga philosophy makes heavy use of Sanskrit. Because these Sanskrit terms reflect a specific world-view and historical development of thought, many Sanskrit terms do not have precise equivalents in other languages, and consequently are translated in various ways. As differences in translation can be confusing, it is often more expedient and precise to use the original Sanskrit terms. Most yoga guidebooks include glossaries of these terms with local language explanations.
Today, the word yoga is written in different ways: יוגה, योग, Joga, Ioga, Jooga, zh:瑜伽, ja:ヨーガ. Yoga (the most common around the world), Yôga.
Yoga Philosophy
Yogic philosophy is primarily Upanishadic with roots in Samkhya, and some scholars see some influence by Buddhism. It is a universal philosophy that enjoins the practitioner to pursue his or her own path to enlightenment, depending on personality and inclination. It is very much in line with its Vedic roots and the traditional pluralism of Hinduism. For this reason, it is easy for a “Christian”, for example, to see Jesus the Christ as his or her own ishta-devata (personal deity). “Christ the Yogi” is not an uncommon concept in the world of Yoga today. Most religions, when viewed through their ethical and spiritual standpoints without the trappings of dogma, are easily reconcilable with Yoga philosophy in general because of its transcendental message.
Yoga a Religion?
In the context of Hinduism, yoga is one of the six major schools of Hindu philosophy and as such means specifically Raja Yoga. In light of this and yoga’s Indic origins, some people consider it to be a part or subset of Hinduism, implying that all yoga practitioners are Hindus. Although opinions on this may vary, most yogis would probably agree that there is nothing inherently religious about most yoga techniques. The sole exception to this is Bhakti yoga, which is a special yoga path designed for practioners who are religiously inclined. Even Bhakti yoga, however, does not prescribe any particular form of worship and specifically allows for and encourages its practice in the context of any religion, including but not limited to Hinduism. All said and done though, Yoga is a concept that emerged out of Sanatan Dharma (or Hinduism) and as such credit cannot be denied.
Seminal Works on Yoga
Bhagavad Gita
The Bhagavad Gita is the archetype of Yoga scripture. Capturing the essence and at the same time going into detail about the various Yogas and their philosophies, it was the groundstone to Yogic thought, and constantly refers to itself as such, the “Scripture of Yoga” (see the final verses of each chapter).
It is spoken in the format of Lord Krishna, self-identified as the Supreme Lord, to Arjuna, a warrior and friend who is loathe to go to battle that would involve his killing his own gurus (teachers) and family members. The book is contained within the Mahabharata, and is thought to have been written some time between the 5th and the 2nd century BC.
Bharata Natyam dancer. The right hand is in Bhramara (bumblebee) Hasta. The bumblebee is regarded as auspicious. The left hand is in Alapadma Hasta, the rotating lotus of spiritual light. The eyes are directed towards the Supreme Lord. The left leg is lifted, symbolizing the swift ascent of the consciousness in one step from the Earth to the Heaven.
Yoga Sutras of Patanjali
Yoga is also one of the six darshanas (schools) of Vedic/Hindu philosophy, and as such specifically refers to Raja Yoga, the royal path of divine meditation on the one Brahman, which was codified by the sage Patanjali in his Yoga Sutras.
Hatha Yoga Pradipika
The most famous of the traditional Hindu schools of yoga, and a basis for nearly all modern systems, is Hatha Yoga. It is representative of all non-Bhakti-Karma-Jnana Yoga that has become so popular over the past century. The seminal work on Hatha Yoga is the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, written by Swami Svatmarama.
Natya Shastra
The guide to Natya Yoga was written by Bharata Muni. Sage Narada along with Gandharvas were the first to practise Natya Yoga, which comprise all the four main yoga’s. Natya Yoga was practised by the medieval devadasis, and is currently taught in a few orthodox schools of Bharatanatyam and Odissi.
Yoga and Tantra
Yoga is often mentioned in company with Tantra, but the two are not the same. The principal difference is that Yoga sees body consciousness as the root cause of bondage and rising above body consciousness as the goal, while Tantra views the body as a means, rather than as an obstruction, to understanding. For more information see the article on Tantra.
While the Bhagavad Gita, Yoga Sutras and Hatha Yoga Pradipika are clearly founded on Upanishadic and Brahmanical thought, much of Yoga has been influenced by and expanded into Tantra. Tantra is more ritual based, having its roots in the first millennium CE, and incorporates much more of a deist base. Almost entirely founded on Shiva and Shakti worship, Tantra visualizes the ultimate Brahman as Param Shiva, manifested through Shiva (the passive, masculine force of Lord Shiva) and Shakti (the active, creative feminine force of his consort, variously known as Ma Kali, Durga, Shakti, Parvati and others). It focuses on the kundalini, a three and a half-coiled ’snake’ of spiritual energy at the base of the spine that rises through the chakras until union between Shiva and Shakti (also known as samadhi) is achieved.
It views the body as means, rather than as obstruction, to understanding, and as such incorporates mantra (Sanskrit prayers, often to gods, that are repeated), yantra (complex symbols representing Shakti in her various forms through intricate geometric figures) and rituals that range from simple murti (statue representations of deities) or image worship to meditation on a corpse! While much tantra certainly, through its many texts (see kaularvatantra, mahanirvana tantra) and teachers (e.g. Abhinava Gupta, Ramakrishna, a saint who practiced Kali bhakti, Advaita Vedanta and tantra, etc.) seems odd and highly arcane at times, it is transparent as being completely yogic. Also, injunctions are made that most people are not suitable for Tantra, especially those of pashu-bhava (animal disposition). This implies that anyone who has not observed celibacy, honesty, respect of elders, bodily cleansing, ritual cleansing through prayer, and various other processes for up to twelve years at a time, and still retains base desires, greed, sexual motivations, etc. one is not fit to practice Tantra. For this reason, even more stringently than other Yogas, Tantra, both Hindu and Buddhist, remains a strictly Guru-initiated system that as yet finds few true adepts outside of India.
Teachers
Traditionally, knowledge of yoga has been passed down through the generations from teacher to student. In Sanskrit, the teacher is called the guru, and a disciple is called shishya. Emphasized to varying degrees by all schools of yoga, in some the Guru takes on quasi-divine proportions. The Guru guides the shisya (student) through yogic discipline from the beginning. When doing yoga, the student is urged to look long and hard for a sadguru (True Teacher) and then devote himself to imbibing that Guru’s learning.
Beginning with the arrival of Swami Vivekananda in 1893, there has been a steady flow of learned teachers that have brought the transcendental message of Yoga to the West. Although the influence of these Yogins is deeply inscribed into the surface of the modern yogic ethos, both in India and America, a proliferation of ‘yoga clinics’ and non-spiritual yoga systems has been seen in the West, especially in the United States. While many Americans view it as an exercise system that simply enhances one’s health, a much greater number in India (and a minority in America) still see it as it has been for over 5,000 years, whether in the Bhagavad Gita, the Yoga Sutras, the writings of the Dalai Lama, or the “Yoga Boom” of the twentieth century, a system of spirituality universal in its application.
Great Modern Yogis
First brought into America as early as the 1890s by the great yogi and disciple of Shri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda, the Hindu representative in the Chicago Parliament of World Religions, Yoga has also been transported in the arms of many other great yogis and formed into stratified schools seeking to propagate Yoga in its great spiritual context. But these teachers have made their imprint in both India and America, and continue to serve as modern embodiments of Yoga.
Swami Ramalal Siyag It may be possible to explain the yogic cure of acquired diseases like AIDS, but it is not possible for medical science to cure congenital or hereditary ailments. This impossible looking task has also been made possible by the Indian Yoga Philosophy. A patient of Haemophilia, Master Hemant, has been completely cured through Siddha Yoga. His cure is an open challenge to physical sciences. For details see http://the-comforter.org/html/yoga.html .
According to Vedic Psychology, whole Universe is present within human body. Therefore, Biologists, Astronomers, Geologists and all other scientists can also find solutions to their problems through this Yoga.
Swami Rama Tirtha, who came from a deep yoga tradition in the Himalayas of India, was the founding spiritual head of the Himalayan Institute. He was the first yogi to come to America and be subjected to the scrutiny of modern science. Among other things, he stunned doctors by stopping the beat of his heart completely for several minutes.
Many modern schools of Hatha Yoga derive from the school of Sri Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, who taught in Mysore, India from 1924 until 1947, at which time he moved to Madras, where he taught until his death in 1989. Among his students prominent in popularizing Yoga in the West were Sri K. Pattabhi Jois famous for popularizing the vigorous Ashtanga Vinyasa style, B.K.S. Iyengar who emphasizes alignment and the use of props, Indra Devi and Krishnamacharya’s son T.K.V. Desikachar who developed the Viniyoga style. Desikachar founded the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram in Madras (now Chennai), with the aim of making available the heritage of yoga as taught by Krishnamacharya.
Other great yogis are Paramahansa Yogananda, practitioner of Kriya Yoga who arrived in America as a powerful example of the universality of Yoga. Sporting a cross, he came to the U.S. with the Hindu Bhagavad Gita in one hand and the Christian New Testament in the other, speaking to his disciples in pluralist ideology with Yoga as the binding force.
Sri Aurobindo, referred to as Aurobindo Ghosh by those who consider him as merely a philosopher rather than an Avatar, was not simply an intellectual genius born in West Bengal and educated in the best university in England. His masterful translations and interpretations of Hindu and Yogic scriptures are mystic and esoteric, and often are the opposite of what you will find in Max Muller’s and other purely intellectual translations of the sacred Sanskrit texts, among which his translations/commentaries on the Hindu texts of the Upanishads and Gita are mystic in nature, and his epic Hindu/Yoga poem Savitri is a treasure of Hindu Yogic literature, formally being the longest poem ever written in English. Beyond this, his personal life is a fascinating testimony of the life of a true yogi. After the goddess Sri entered his being, he became Sri Aurobindo. Besides his influence and scholarly writing on Yoga, he also founded Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, that continues to propagate the practice of Integral Yoga, which is a Tantric synthesis of the four main Yogas (Karma, Jnana, Bhakti and Raja).
Gopi Krishna was a Kashmiri office worker and spiritual seeker who was born in 1903, and wrote autobiographical accounts of his spiritual experiences with Yoga. His most famous one is “Kundalini”: Path to Higher Consciousness.” Gopi Krishna’s graphic accounts of his experiences stand out as among the clearest journals documenting a spiritual transformation. They are highly recommended as reading for anyone interested in Yogic phenomena.
Swami Sivananda (born in Pattamadai, Tamil Nadu, India in 1887), one of the greatest yoga masters of 20th century has authored over 200 highly inspiring books on yoga. Sivananda has also established Sivananda ashram of Rishikesh, India and is the founder of Divine Life Society. His disciple, Swami Satyananda (born in Almorah, Uttar Pradesh, India in 1923), has established International Yoga Fellowship movement, Bihar School of Yoga and Bihar Yoga Bharati, world’s first university on yoga. The university is now headed by his disciple, Swami Niranjananda. Another disciple of his, Swami Vishnu-Devananda, has founded the international yoga vedanta centers in the west.
Swami Ramdevji Maharaj the modern Indian yogi who has hold mass campainings all over India is revolutionising the feild of yoga. The actual processes and exercises of yoga were kept secret in India because yogi didn’t want the knowledge to be spread. So the entire concept of yoga remained merely some exercises even in Indian society. The exercises viz. asana is only a limb or a part of the astanga yoga discovered by Maharshi Patanjali. While the important part the pranayama was neglected and feared due to its lack of popularity and its side effects resulting from improper and wrong practices. Swami Ramdevji Maharaj broadcasted it over a satellite channel AASTHA and held mass campainings all over the country to teach pranayama acurately. His teaching of Yoga has permanently cured millions of sufferers and patients of diabetics, athesma, cancer, hepatites B, mental stress, hernia, cervical spondilysis,heart blockage, angina, psorasis, liver damages, renal impairment,fibrosis,hypertension, eye disoder etc, which medical science had failed to cure. His works is creating a stir all over india.
He is also looking forward to create The Patanjali Yoga Pith, a multi-million dollar rescearch project to investigate on the theory of yoga scientifically. The proffs and proper documentation of the cure and clinical statements are present with him and his trust Divya Yoga Mandir, Kirpalubagh, Haridwar,Uttaranchal,India. For more details and sceptics see [1]
Shrii Shrii Anandamurti, Bengal, India, 1921-1990 is a great master of tantric yoga. His teachings incorporated full system of Raja Yoga with advanced meditation techniques from the tantras. Social movement Ananda Marga is based on his teachings called Ananda Sūtram given in traditional form of slokas (aphorisms) in sanskrit language.
Mahamandaleshwar Paramhans Swami Maheshwarananda (Swamiji) comes from Rajasthan, India, and has been living in Vienna, Austria since 1972. Swamiji is the author of the scientific master-system Yoga in Daily Life and founder of the International Sri Deep Madhavananda Ashram Fellowship and Yoga in Daily Life ashrams and centres worldwide. He also inspired the foundations of the Yoga in Daily Life Youth Union and the Ayurveda Academy of Yoga in Daily Life.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article “yoga”.
Keywords: Yoga, Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita, Patanjali, Karma Yoga, Hatha Yoga, Yoga Sutras, Raja Yoga, Brahma, Bhakti Yoga, Swami Ramdevji Maharaj
