THE NECESSITY OF RELIGION

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Posted by: " Uttishthata " uttishthata

Fri Jul 13, 2007 8:10 pm (PST)

 

THE NECESSITY OF RELIGION - Swami Vivekananda

 

But by this time the search had begun, and the search was inward, and

man continued inquiring more deeply into the different stages of the

mind and discovered higher states than either the waking or the

dreaming. This state of things we find in all the organised religions

of the world, called either ecstasy or inspiration. In all organised

religions, their founders, prophets, and messengers are declared to

have gone into states of mind that were neither waking nor sleeping,

in which they came face to face with a new series of facts relating

to what is called the spiritual kingdom. They realised things there

much more intensely than we realise facts around us in our waking

state. Take, for instance, the religions of the Brahmins. The Vedas

are said to be written by Rishis. These Rishis were sages who

realised certain facts. The exact definition of the Sanskrit word

Rishi is a Seer of Mantras -- of the thoughts conveyed in the Vedic

hymns. These men declared that they had realised -- sensed, if that

word can be used with regard to the supersensuous -- certain facts,

and these facts they proceeded to put on record. We find the same

truth declared amongst both the Jews and the Christians.

 

Some exceptions may be taken in the case of the Buddhists as

represented by the Southern sect. It may be asked -- if the Buddhists

do not believe in any God or soul, how can their religion be derived

from the supersensuous state of existence? The answer to this is that

even the Buddhists find an eternal moral law, and that moral law was

not reasoned out in our sense of the word. But Buddha found it,

discovered it, in a supersensuous state. Those of you who have

studied the life of Buddha, even as briefly given in that beautiful

poem, The Light of Asia, may remember that Buddha is represented as

sitting under the Bo-tree until he reached that supersensuous state

of mind. All his teachings came through this, and not through

intellectual cogitations.

 

Thus, a tremendous statement is made by all religions; that the human

mind, at certain moments, transcends not only the limitations of the

senses, but also the power of reasoning. It then comes face to face

with facts which it could never have sensed, could never have

reasoned out. These facts are the basis of all the religions of the

world. Of course we have the right to challenge these facts, to put

them to the test of reason. Nevertheless, all the existing religions

of the world claim for the human mind this peculiar power of

transcending the limits of the senses and the limits of reason; and

this power they put forward as a statement of fact.

 

The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda Volume 2 [ Page : 60 ]

(Delivered in London)

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QUOTE OF THE DAY:

It is only by doing good to others that one attains to one's own good.

- Swami Vivekananda