From belief to Experience

[Guest guest]

Hari OM

 

a few amusing posts from Abhrahams was the inspiration for this posting

 

1) All religions are nothing but belief-systems, formed by the personal experience of one or few people passed down from generation to generation (probably with some additions, modifications and deletions)

 

2) Most (mainly Abhrahams, but few non-Abhrahams too) think that their "Belief System" is the Truth while all other Belief Systems are false/evil. Even though there is no evidence for or against any of the Belief system

 

3) They become so stupid that they don't realise they are fighting for their belief system but think they are fighting for the "truth" and fighting against "false"

 

4) Nothing much can be done here since no logic or rationality appeals to them

 

5) However dear hindus, who still have some sense and intelligence left, dont cling on to belief , belief is just the first step , move from belief to Experience .

 

6) Experience is the truth and the goal and destination, all beliefs are only paths towards that goal. Even if you find a beautiful resting place in the path, it is foolish to stay there and refusing to move towards the destination

 

[shravankm]

I think you summed up things beautifully.

 

At the end of it, it's only our belief (whether true or false), and we are fighting for it.

 

In absence of any concrete proofs for various belief systems, everyone is thinking that only their belief (read religion) is the right one and all other's are wrong. Almost all the law and order problems of this world boil down to this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[gurukul]

 

Hari OM

a few amusing posts from Abhrahams was the inspiration for this posting

1) All religions are nothing but belief-systems, formed by the personal experience of one or few people passed down from generation to generation (probably with some additions, modifications and deletions)

If you are holding to any view other than the above view then yours too is a beleif system with some experience. Life cannot be seperated from belief and experience.

 

6) Experience is the truth and the goal and destination, all beliefs are only paths towards that goal. Even if you find a beautiful resting place in the path, it is foolish to stay there and refusing to move towards the destination

How does one know that what he or she experiences is truth or not without knowing what is truth? for example a drug addict has the same experience as that of a mystical yogi both of them feels that there experiences are real ones and hence what they experience are also a real entity.truth only becomes real when what is said in the belief system is actually attained. but before that one need to know what he beleives is truth or not.

How do you know that all beleifs are paths towards the same goal ?-now to say that one need to know all the paths and experience them.secondly all the beliefs does not talks about the same goals.buddhism talks of the goal of nothingness ,hinduism talks of union with brahman ,Islam talks about pelasure paradise and chrsitianity talks about being with God in heaven- and that too through diffrent methods that are contradictory to one another.

[sporkubus]

 

5) However dear hindus, who still have some sense and intelligence left, dont cling on to belief , belief is just the first step , move from belief to Experience .

I don't think it is just Hindus that do this, nor do all Hindus necessarilly do this. Hindus may get caught up in cultural dogma and superstition just like anyone else and be unable to progress spiritually for those or other reasons. All spiritual traditions have a fantastic mystical tradition, and many of these mystics throughout time have said that experience of divinity is beyond all belief. St. John of the Cross and St. Theresa (Christianity), Rabia'h and Rumi (Islam) are just a few of these from spiritual traditions that are often not thought of as being compatible with that idea.

[Guest guest]

 

If you are holding to any view other than the above view then yours too is a beleif system with some experience. Life cannot be seperated from belief and experience.

I agree, our lives are based on belief and experience. If we neither believed, nor experienced anything, how could we live? Life is about experience, and from that experience we should form beliefs, and most often we do. However, the problem with many of us, is that we base our beliefs on OTHER people's experiences, and many of those experiences are subjective. You can't base your own beliefs on other people's subjective experiences, although they can surely help to substantiate your experiences to solidify a belief system of yours.

 

 

How does one know that what he or she experiences is truth or not without knowing what is truth? for example a drug addict has the same experience as that of a mystical yogi both of them feels that there experiences are real ones and hence what they experience are also a real entity.truth only becomes real when what is said in the belief system is actually attained. but before that one need to know what he beleives is truth or not.

 

I disagree here, a drug addict and a mystical yogi may have SIMILAR experiences, but the drug addict is dependent upon an external stimulant for his experiences, and lacks control of the mind, while the mystical yogi has no need for such things to bring about an altered consciousness, and he has complete control of his mind. The only validation for their experiences being real is to see if they have a correlation with this plane of consciousness, i.e. this world. The drug addict won't generally have such a correlation, and he has no power over his thoughts and actions, while the yogi may be able to share this experience for others with the slightest touch, or may manifest supernatural powers such as levitation or other such things as verification of Truth. Truth is not only contained in belief systems, it was there BEFORE any belief systems were formed, so if there were no belief systems in the first place, how could someone claim something was Truth according to your logic?

 

How do you know that all beleifs are paths towards the same goal ?-now to say that one need to know all the paths and experience them.secondly all the beliefs does not talks about the same goals.buddhism talks of the goal of nothingness ,hinduism talks of union with brahman ,Islam talks about pelasure paradise and chrsitianity talks about being with God in heaven- and that too through diffrent methods that are contradictory to one another.

Supposedly Ramakrishna knew all the paths and experienced all of them to validate this idea. Of course, we cannot truly be dependent upon simply his perception, but all paths do lead to at least an alteration in consciousness as there are Sufi saints in Islam, Priests in Christianity, Kabbalists in Judaism, and yogis in Hinduism. Also, you have to remember experience can't be truly captured in any words. Truth is different things to different people. It FEELS different, it seems different, they describe it differently, yet it's all Truth to them.

 

You also have to understand what they're describing and WHAT they're actually talking about. A lot of things written back then were full of metaphors of their experiences, and they described the mechanism of action such as Kundalini in the manner of a rod turning into a snake (Moses experiences this in the Bible, with a sudden vision of a burning bush then and gaining elocutionary ability that he never had before, and the ability to perform miracles by talking to Yahweh the I AM principle of consciousness, which is also shared by the Upanishads which talk about consciousness being the base of all things.

[gurukul]

 

I agree, our lives are based on belief and experience. If we neither believed, nor experienced anything, how could we live? Life is about experience, and from that experience we should form beliefs, and most often we do. However, the problem with many of us, is that we base our beliefs on OTHER people's experiences, and many of those experiences are subjective. You can't base your own beliefs on other people's subjective experiences, although they can surely help to substantiate your experiences to solidify a belief system of yours..

I appreciate your response in the way you have put it.

Can we be open to all experiences of this world?. For sure We must not open to all experiences of life.now the question arises-what must we choose from the list of belief system or experiences to be experienced?.I think that is were reason plays a very important role.you see in every religion people have great experiences- but are they all good for us and provide us to live in reality?,can we expose ourselves to all experiences?,how does they provide us basis to live in this world? these are some of the important questions that need to be asked.for example a person may have an experience were he is told to get married by a supernatural being many times or divorce his wife or kill his child or choose the experience of an drug addict?-can such become the basis of his/her/our beleif system?. hence an experience to become a belief system must be logically consistent ,coherent with reality and life.It also must provide us views from an universal point of view and not subjected to specific geographical locations and kinds.

Though an experience surely plays an important part of forming a beleif system there are other key factors that plays also the role so that we can confidently tread that path.

 

 

I disagree here, a drug addict and a mystical yogi may have SIMILAR experiences, but the drug addict is dependent upon an external stimulant for his experiences, and lacks control of the mind, while the mystical yogi has no need for such things to bring about an altered consciousness, and he has complete control of his mind. The only validation for their experiences being real is to see if they have a correlation with this plane of consciousness, i.e. this world. The drug addict won't generally have such a correlation, and he has no power over his thoughts and actions, while the yogi may be able to share this experience for others with the slightest touch, or may manifest supernatural powers such as levitation or other such things as verification of Truth. Truth is not only contained in belief systems, it was there BEFORE any belief systems were formed, so if there were no belief systems in the first place, how could someone claim something was Truth according to your logic?.

The point I made when used the example of an yogi and drug addict is that experiences alone cannot be the basis of forming a beleif system.because what one experiences can also be experienced through another means.the yogi uses yoga through focussing which itself is an altered method because a normal human being cannot have that kind of experience and a drug addict uses another method to stimulate his brain.for sure the diffrence is vast between them the experience are on similar lines. hence with experience one should also look to the means , reality,future implications on our systems etc.

 

Supposedly Ramakrishna knew all the paths and experienced all of them to validate this idea. Of course, we cannot truly be dependent upon simply his perception, but all paths do lead to at least an alteration in consciousness as there are Sufi saints in Islam, Priests in Christianity, Kabbalists in Judaism, and yogis in Hinduism. Also, you have to remember experience can't be truly captured in any words. Truth is different things to different people. It FEELS different, it seems different, they describe it differently, yet it's all Truth to them. ?.

Well thats a big speculation that a person might have experienced all paths to validate this data for the simple reasons that all greatly contradicts one another at fundamental levels.As rightly pointed by you we cannot and must not trust until one himself validate that data through reasonable means.therefore its imperative to check through reasonable means all the beleif system as pointed above.alteration in consciousness does not mean they all leads to the same destination.therefore a truth canot be tested only through experiences though the experience maybe genuine.

 

IYou also have to understand what they're describing and WHAT they're actually talking about. A lot of things written back then were full of metaphors of their experiences, and they described the mechanism of action such as Kundalini in the manner of a rod turning into a snake (Moses experiences this in the Bible, with a sudden vision of a burning bush then and gaining elocutionary ability that he never had before, and the ability to perform miracles by talking to Yahweh the I AM principle of consciousness, which is also shared by the Upanishads which talk about consciousness being the base of all things.

Do you think that what moses talked about was metaphors? well for the sake of reason its a recorded history and that the later miracolous experiences were seen by many peoples.the I AM is not a principle or conciousness as recorded in the bible but its a revelation of God who was seperate and other than human beings.