Sound Against Flame: The Process of Yoga and Atheism in America
An excerpt from Sound Against Flame: The Process of Yoga and Atheism in America by Derek Beres, out now from Outside the Box Publishing.
The
half-cocked-brow gaze over slightly glazed eyes when I tried to explain the
premise of my book to friends insured that I'd have some serious
explaining to do. A comparative philosophy book on the practices of yoga and
atheism, two systems with so (seemingly) little in common? Trying to establish
a common ground between a devotional practice with images of blue-skinned,
elephant-headed, flute-playing gods, and the complete opposite, the blasphemous
idea of no God at all? Beyond a surface grazing – that of a South Asian spiritual
practice mostly known in America as an exercise routine and for polytheistic
iconography, alongside the outright denial of a Supreme Anything – there is
plenty of shared wisdom. The premise of this work, and the underlying
foundation of both yoga and atheism, directly pertains to the experience of life, not the abstraction
of it.
There is little surprise that these two forms of belief/practice (or unbelief, depending on your definition) are the most rapidly expanding philosophies in our country. This is not to deny the brute strength of megachurches growing like wild weeds across the nation. (And this is not to necessitate the idea that such churches are inherently bad for us, as many atheists, as well as many sitting on the fence in the God question, put forth.) True, we are a Christian nation. There is little doubt about that. Even if we do not claim that as our faith, the forms of thought that arise in our brains have been conditioned by a specific cause-and-effect, rewards/benefits musculature defined and developed through biblical and political training. Indeed, it is impossible not to have been taught in such a manner if you have gone through the public school system. (And if you attended a private school, all the more so, as religion has a strong hold on nearly all of these institutions, as well as the majority of parents who home-school children.) Churches, it must be remembered, constructed the original educational system in America, so it is not surprising that the way we learn is dictated by theology. In many ways, this psychological underpinning is more relevant than outright belief, for when the manners in which we are conditioned stay hidden, we become prime targets for anxiety, depression, social confusion and general dis-ease.
What the basic ideological thinkers of the three major religious traditions of the West – Christianity, Judaism and Islam – have conceived is that your actions on this planet are preparations for a) some sort of kingdom of which people of your faith will lord over, and b) some form of afterlife, where a style of judgment will occur. This judgment comes in many varieties. Some maintain that you can convert to the faith and be "saved," while other sects are so bullheaded that only those born into families of their specific faith are righteous. Regardless of the degree of severity, anything done for another life beyond this one is rooted in egoistic idealism, something both yoga and atheism (at their best) aim to dissolve. To get to the roots of this comparison, which is just as much a survey of the social and spiritual state of American ideologies as it is these two specific practices, we will have to apply the wisdom of philosopher Daniel Dennett: "If we want to understand the nature of religion today, as a natural phenomenon, we have to look not just at what it is today, but at what it used to be." And this involves looking into the way all humans used to be, not just examining the doctrines passed down by a few men with specific agendas. The paths we will take may surprise you, and may not always be pleasant, but they will prove worthwhile.
Yoga, while given an Indian veneer due to its geographical roots, has been remixed and redefined in innumerable ways in its two century-plus history on American soil. Today it is believed that over forty million Americans have tried some form of yoga, and there is little doubt that millions more are in tow. Yoga has successfully been transplanted from a noun to a verb to an adjective, used to describe everything from the physical asana practice to bread, tea, clothing, and spa services. While there are many ways to dissect and explore this aged philosophical system, we will focus on two: by utilizing the tools of yoga that enrich the everyday through an appropriate understanding of the symbolic references of its mythology, and by contemplating the importance of the body (and how we treat it). We will look at these predominantly through the gaze of jnana yoga, the yoga of knowledge -- otherwise known as the art of discrimination. I will not be confined to one time period or culture in this investigation, and will do my best to avoid the trappings of the modern yogi in this advice from anthropology professor Joseph S. Alter: "If there is one single thing that characterizes the literature on Yoga, it is repetition and redundancy in the guise of novelty and independent invention."
Atheism is, believe it or not, rooted in a similar soil. It was founded as a reaction to the political and social situations of the surrounding environment by people yearning for something deeper than the rigid and unscientific laws of religious codes. Yoga too was a reaction, a fusing of the Samkhya philosophy and an ever-expanding Vedic literature of differing schools of yoga, all of which opposed the façade constructed by religious and political leaders. Like the Buddhism that grew from yogic teachings, yoga was inherently atheistic, even if that specific term had not yet been coined. The term comes from the Greek atheistos and originally meant a denial of the Athenian establishment, not the flat-out refusal of a divine figurehead. Like most concepts, it began to have a universal connotation as cultures picked up the trend, and today is used in reference to anyone who does not believe in God. Unlike the agnostic, who believes that there are certain things that cannot be answered (or, put another way, that we ask the wrong questions), the atheist has no room for fluffy mystery.
The question of belief plays a major role in my thinking, though I want to make a precautionary note in the usage of this word compared to the term faith. The two often walk hand-in-hand, but there is a subtle, yet crucial difference, at least in the way I want to approach them. Belief is the idea that something is true regardless of proof, while faith relates to something instinctual and primal, and does not necessarily have to be applied to a god. Faith is often defined as a belief, but I want to reorient it for the context of this work. This constant default of religionists to phrases like "It just is" is why the immediate colleague to atheism, science, is in dismay over movements like those led by champions of Intelligent Design (ID). There is simply nothing realistic in their claims. It is pure, untested belief that only reflects their particular view on the world, and not the actions and habits of the world itself. As Alan Watts wrote, "The believer will open his mind to the truth on condition that it fits in with his preconceived ideas and wishes." Cloaking science in biblical creationism with no evidence does not make for good science, good religion, or even good humanity.
Let us treat faith as something necessary to the human condition -- not as an untested hypothesis, but the innate ability to feel a connection to something beyond our everyday lives. More importantly, let us try not to give it form, color or taste. I do not want to label it, for there are already so many names and so little evidence that any fit the description. It is more of a connection to instinct, a sort of foresight that the experiences and the world at large are united as a process moving at the same speed and in similar directions. It is important to remember that both the words "yoga" and "religion" come from root words that mean "union." And, as we will touch upon, it is the seemingly innocuous usage of language that separates the innumerable aspects of what could be seen as part of the same process -- that is, life. Words, the letters and meaning that bring us together, are equally perilous when used to divide.
What we're looking for is an understanding of the process of life. This is not an easy task, as it requires stripping away commonly accepted companions to the ideologies under scrutiny: dogmas and rituals, of course, although we need to go deeper than those. In order to grasp the process of an idea, the iconography and visual/emotional association must also be removed. Christmas cards, Easter eggs, mandalas, menorahs, cute little baby gods with blue skin and sheep are parts of the manifestation of the process, but not the process itself; they are forms, not essence. We have to get to the pure process, of belief, of faith, as well as the promises that these supposedly lead to: liberation, salvation and equanimity. We need to go beyond "righteousness through Christ" and "liberation through yoga." We need to push through the verb and get to the essence, which requires a proper understanding of the symbolic meanings of rituals, and not the form that they happened to take once, somewhere else.
Let's try an actual example. One day I was dining with a fellow yoga teacher. We were planning a retreat, and before either of us committed to anything, we had to make sure that our philosophies played along well together. She told me that the foundation of her style was that the "universe pulsates with love." Her system extended out from that idea, one that she believed embodied the "true" nature of yoga. I then asked her why it couldn't stop with the "universe pulsates." Why did love have to be the definitive attachment to the universe? I reminded her that at the basis of yoga was the shadow, and that by introducing a concept (love) you by default create its opposite (hate). I suppose this is why the Buddha did not preach that freedom arises from love, but from compassion. It's a much more sane philosophy, and not so open to misinterpretation. Needless to say, we never went on that retreat.
Having decided to devote my life to the practice of yoga, there are many precepts that I adhere to. But I do not subscribe to them simply because some book told me to do so. Classic texts like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, Patanjali's Yoga Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita are important resources to understanding the psychology and practicality of yoga. Books, however, are not experiences; they are reflections of experiences. They do not suit each person, as a suit will not fit every skin. As much as the atheism movement has lashed against the hypocrisies and tyranny of Christianity, yoga is not free from such unforgiving surveillance. The presentation of yoga in America has been bastardized in many forms, and not all of them are helpful. Like cherry pickers seeking out sweet sayings from biblical scripture, yogis are equally guilty of accommodating their needs and discarding the rest (or, as is often the case, not researching if a "rest" even exists).
Seeing a badly Photoshopped rendering of a bearded man in a white robe sitting on a cloud does not help promote the ideology of yoga, yet it appears constantly in the pages of yoga and natural health publications. It cheapens the practice, pushing forth the notion that a) there is an image to liberation and b) this particular person embodies it. An idol is an idol, and what's worse, is idle. The earth does not stop movement, and so has no need for fixed images. There is good reason that you never see images of the Buddha gazing at you with a mask of anger, yet to say that he never experienced such an emotion is to take away his humanity.
There is much good to be learned from both yoga and atheism, and like mushrooms hiding under a canopy of leaves in dark forests, sometimes it takes a little research. You have to know where, and how, to look. There are also amazing benefits from religion, even as the western model has manufactured it. We just cannot treat any of these paths as the "goal." It is in this exact seeking of a goal – of some reward or promise – that we lose ourselves, time and again. We need to be critical in our pursuit, opening our deepest held beliefs for debate, and, what's more, being compassionate in the process. Only through questioning will we uncover answers, and we may even find there's more power in the former.
- 6-18-08
- Derek Beres's blog
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Faith
We have faith, because we can only ever make individual small steps; Faith makes for the continuity after the present moment, or even the present life.
Expressions are always paradoxical; Working with others requires an eagerness to connect across unique expressions, though we can't always connect up, even if we want to.
atheist yoga=Buddhism
i was givin a kinsology test
nope
Agnostic?
belief, faith, and little questions
I thought it was interesting how you defined belief and faith, because I always felt it to be the opposite. That's probably because I was raised in a Catholic school where they told me to "have faith." Later on, I articulated it to myself as a difference between "belief in" and "belief that". I don't believe in evolution any more than I believe in the Bible. But I believe that small genetic changes can gather over time to change a creature's form. Or ... I believe that the universe is living and connected. It's hard to articulate, but my "belief that" feels natural.
I like the way you use faith, because faith seems to imply a surrender. I imagine myself surrendering to my inner faith.
"Cloaking science in biblical creationism with no evidence does not make for good science, good religion, or even good humanity." Well said!
And finally, I am just curious about what sort of audience you want to reach in your book. Is it wider than the people we see in RS? (I guess this is already a wide group.)
abstraction
Interesting!
O, Brother.
[Edited, exterpated, amended, emended by RScott for being rude. Apologies...again...].
[I sometimes think our] "ideas" about yoga are perforce merely objects of thought, deframed from first-hand experience and thus developed by "vicarious atonement" with a description of such.
[I tend to think t]his cannot be done. [That we] cannot understand the consciousness of people born and raised in Arabia, Persia (IRAQ), Iran or Mesopotamia or anywhere we were not born and raised. So all forms of popularistic thinking - - - as if we are being 'open-minded' by imitation - - - is merely exploration, not "knowing".
[I also TEND to believe that] one born anywhere other than India can know what "yoga" means. [Some may feel or truly believe] they think they are re-incarnated yogis or Hindus or what have you. [Are these, then,] "other" . . . similacrums, posers[?]
[I admit I can't answer this from a principle of adherance to first hand experience to judge.]
If [such] are in heart disappointed with their current culture, then [I suppose] they can get pass-ports, and go 'back home'[or remain 'strangers in a strange land', and otherwise forever 'out of their element.' I suppose this explains many 'expatriates' who chose to live elsewhere: whether it be France, India or Canada or anywhere other than where they were born. Can everyone be an "American" then? Our common definition of this nation is, yes. But time and space restricts everything. Can my kids understand what 'our America' of yesterday was? Seems highly doubtful. Our failure.]
But such souls would by default be not at-one with where they were born, or where they 'want to be'. They are in-between-ers. They cannot talk about anything [from memories or first hand knowledge.] They must live in a world of imagination and creation.
Not that that is bad. It has to do with something altogether other than first-hand, living-in-the-flesh experience. It is novelty or literature or "fiction".
Western Culture is Western Culture. "Atheism" is indefinable. What we people in the USA think about or define as "God" cannot be transfered to another continent and its cultures.
And, likewise what the people of Europe or Asia or the Middle-East, what all these zones of our planet speak and think or act in accordance with their temporal received feelings, their languages and beliefs, they are not perceivable by people born-and-raised outside these zones. We can travel there and be exhilerated by these new things, but we are not going to "get in there".
Not that is a bad thing. Variety is the very spice of life. And whoever we are, we are such. We are varied from all others. We are products of our time and space and, PLUS, our personal wills, thoughts, words and acts . . . from within our born environs.
"God" can mean to a Hindu something so outside our personal experience as Westerners as to completely render a term like "atheism" completely meaningless.
Or what? Does the Catholic or Protestant see anything from within their adopted system of thought as unchanged or equal between them both? Do you think so? Really? What does "orthodoxy" mean then? What does "heterodoxy" mean then? Why would a "Methodist of the 1857 convention" take exception and issue with a "Methodist of the 1894" convention or whatever? They have different "heavens".
To the Saivait, or follower of Sivaism in Hinduism, 'atheism' means something far different from a Vaisnava, or follower of Visnu (Vishnu). To a true Buddhist, both Siva and Vishnu and Krishna or whom have you are mere people who have been idolized. It is 'hero worship'. "Atheism" to a 'true' Buddhist, a Mahayanist, say, is belief that a single particle of the universe will NOT or CANNOT attain ultimate enlightenment.
The practice of Dzogchen, or perhaps "Divinity Yoga" of the founder of the Yellow Robe sect of Buddhism, Tsong Kappa, is deemd "atheism" by Vaisnava Hindus. And Vasinavas are seen as "idolators" by followers of Tsong Kappa. So, "athiesm" is a willy-nilly perjorative. "Other". "Alien". "Enemy".
Here in the USA, we see George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, or Patrick Henry as exemplars of what is "divine" or "good" or "God". Unless we are amongst such as seek to retrospectively seek to impose current beliefs on history and its personalities. Or do we pretend that we know what really moved them? Records may show they attended some such chapel or church or another. But their actions are their ultimate record. Perhaps, to be an "equal of Jesus", or someone who thought as Jesus thought, would mean something modern day "christians" would deem "athiesm". Or what?
"Atheism", as such, is not easily defined. Isaiah was an 'athiest', if we consider 'Baal' as the 'one true god'. Isaiah's system of thought or faith was invested in something against "Baal" or "Balarama" or "Krishna" or what have you.
Isaiah's writings are not perfect or completely internally consistant, but what survives of Isaiah, has to do with something obviously 'other' than what his culture thought was "God" as received from Moses. Isaiah's writing, as received, was ATHEISTIC. It wasn't the same BEING promulgated by Moses, if we are to believe that such BEING developed all the rules that had to be followed to be "saved" or to "please" the "god" of Moses. To avoid the "curse" of the "god" of the Mosaic priestcraft, washing hands was more important than helping a widow, an orphan or pulling an ox out of a ditch. Go figure. We can develop a principle here. As time goes on in the literature, kindness becomes more an more important, and "rules", "dogmas" and "regulations" become less and less important.
Moses would have had Isaiah stoned.
At least, as we are given to understand Moses. I don't think Moses was like that. His name has been appended to some real bone-headed ideas. Period.
Well, as an American, a citizen of the USA, let me ask about our American 'prophets'.
Was Jefferson an 'atheist'?
Was Franklin?
We are told they were "Deists". Washington was without any doubt a believer in Jesus and devoted to him. But that doesn't make him a "christian", if by such, we are to equate that with modern day evangelists. For all we know, Washington WAS Jesus, or saw him as the perfect 'older brother'. Not as an object of worship, but as an example. Washington loved Jesus' life. His true love was to the principle of that life. Is it not possible?
There is evidence that both Washington and Lincoln felt themselves to be "channels" of "Divine spirit". In other words, that they were prophets or 'seers' or influenced by some higher 'thing'. This is something common amongst people of sensitive hearts. And I am very well aware that some think Lincoln a 'cold' soul. As a writer, and having read Lincoln, and Washington, I would have to say: here's some deep thought. Not easily dismissed. I would never, of course, by such respects begin to render to them worship, as 'incarnations'. That's not an American attitude at all. WE ARE ICONOCLASTS HERE.
Well, then, again what as Jefferson? What was John Dewey?
What were these two men about? Neither one of whom ever expressed an idea of "yoga" as such, nor of being channels of "Divine Mind" or any mind outside their own. Yet Jefferson and Dewey have a continuity that bleeds into the present from the past on no claim of 'authority' by "Divine" accession or credance or approval but something common to all.
These two deal with something about an internal principle most common and relating to something utterly unrelated to an elitist doctrine or injected ideation. They talk about something any and all already have within them.
This principle is easily reduced, for lack of sacrosanct terminology or selection of elected personality, to mundanity or pedestrian status. The commonest thing, the 'least' thing may yet be shown to be the greatest thing. The 'first' shall be last, the 'last' first, it seems to me, refers to this.
Here a Dewey or a Jefferon intersect with Jesus as I view him. Where Jesus alters from such men is in harmony with the most liberal forms of Hinduism, especially ideas espoused in the various Upanishads, which by and large espouse no personality at all, but a principle that can overcome all limitations. Much later, the so-called Vashistha Yoga, a presumed "chapter" of the Ramayana, delineates this principle and unashamedly forces its readers to consider "first principles" as personal consciousness, and the immorality of living in accord with invented accomodations to "beliefs" based on a demotion of consciousness.
If one chooses to think their highest, most valued thing is mortal, and impotent, that is their right to so believe. If one chooses to think their highest and most valued thing is general, immortal, and something ascendant, that, too, is their right to so believe.
We are, of course, talking today in anticipation of the ascendancy of one. One uses fear tactics to prevent exploration of the other. The other, of course, says the other yields death. "There is a way that seems right, but the ends thereof is death".
Of these two views, one speaks of "rewards" after death. The other says death itself is a mere mistake, and, even, doesn't really exist. Both schools say the other are "athiestic".
The American tradition is pragmatic and idealistic at once. "Atheism" really has no meaning with us. Niether does any "religiosity" or "theism" when such boil down to meanness or fatalism or 'doomism'.
But, I suppose, the same goes for our brothers and sisters in India, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, China.... you name the place.
Collectively, we Americans are a melting pot of ALL people, with hope as uppermost and no lack of faith.
Most of this faith is something other than what typical 'athiests' decry. Our faith is that every single living individual is the entire "Divine" principle, writ small. If Jesus' life means anything, genereally, I think, this is the American idealism: all things are possible. If we believe.
Our only problem is internal consistancy. Living the principle through thick and thin. Eliminating all contradictions is the work. Or, put another way, living true. Caring not about opposition. No matter the source. Hence: renunciation. Being true to the ideal. Hard work. No doubt.
O Brother where art thou?
I have no idea what my title has anything to do with my comment. I am making a quick response the article and all the others comments but most specifically O Brother, by Rogerscott which preceeds mine.
I too thought 'what a load of crap.' then was able to gather a few bits of insight by reading the whole thing, mostly the only insight being that the author had more to say than i first thought and said something quite a bit different than i had assumed from the beginning and nearly didn't read on.
Next, like the article and all the comments including my own, there really seemed to be some pointedness, ignorance and general letdown upon reading...i didn't know where to start...much like i feel about whatever point the author of the article is trying to make....more power to express your own discoveries along your journey but it seems to be asserting something for the sake of having something to write about...
Finally on to Rogerscott....you really seemed to lose me(in the sense i wasn't finding what you were trying to say relative to my own understandings, opinions and truth or faith or belief), then i read on and though your first point is well made, that we must really be mindfull of the differences in the worlds in which we think, and i understand your point and it is very important to make.
I won't go as far(perhaps your thoughts expressed here are limited to what you chose to make time to say) ...i won't go as far to say that amongst all the individual attempts and mixing of knowledge of different cultural myths that none of them result in really reprogramming one's thought processes..in plain speak, i think sincere attempts at rethinking can be had and understanding achieved and gaps bridged across the traditions..again your point is essential i just don't agree it is that final but do agree that it is rare amongst the slew of individuals and the slinging around of proposed knowledge of a way of thinking that is not inate to your culture.
To make my point, I want to thank you most for what i concluded on your whole writing. It was the best thoughts i found responding to this crap...Very good assessment of America and the the atheist question/dialogue..., faith, the divine, religion, christians, belief, individuals, Divine principle writ smal. and a collective idea of what we can hope hold true to the basis of the american identity. You have a really good subject to continue writing on....it is definately not exclusive to american culture, and in many ways absent in many of of its citizens, yet is definately a cultural identity that is not held by many throughout the world and other attitudes inherintly seek to destroy it. (make any sense???) and so to ALL quoting Rogerscott to make this easier....
"Our only problem is internal consistancy. Living the principle through thick and thin. Eliminating all contradictions is the work. Or, put another way, living true. Caring not about opposition. No matter the source. Hence: renunciation. Being true to the ideal. Hard work. No doubt."
I have found the physical practice of yoga and any spiritual insight it brings to be a great aid in learning the self and practicing a positive life. I am no A-theist. Does that mean i believe in God? or i don't have a belief in a theology? An Adiest? have i just coined a word? i am still confused with these terms/ess ; )
Here I am
I have to laugh at my own former post, as it reminds me of that phrase "half-cocked" Derek used. It made me think of "ready....fire!" "Aim" being left out. In another way, it is akin to the meaning of a "short fuse". All these terms are expressed wherever the "gun" has gone, but they are paticularly American expressions about the danger of rushing into a fray unprepared. Or, maybe where there is no fray to begin with.
As I've said to the editors of this site, I sometimes write with "three sheets to the wind". A phrase born of the times when tall ships controlled their courses by men managing sails with ropes, called "sheets"; and if you lose "six" sheets I suppose, your ship is adrift and its course completely wild. It refers to drunken sailors or half-sober or half drunk sailors. A 'sloppy' course is obligatorilly to follow under such conditions. So, my apologies.
Beres' article wasn't as bad as, perhaps, my response might have made out. After rereading Derek's piece, I tend to think maybe I must have been "firing" at some of the responses. I don't recall. See? "Aim" missing. Just firing off. Scatter-gun.
I tend to see the USA, America, as an experiment wherein we do filter the 'wheat from the chaff'. We pick and choose ideas that hue close to the line our pragmatic and essentialistic natures that were founded to some extent on an ideal of freedom from our European and Asian precedents....where these precedents are mere momentum or mindless traditions of limitation and imitation.
Obviously, not all of our "Old World" roots consists of worthless chaff.
As far as the vocabulary of yoga is concerned, "it" is definitely melded into our lexicon and will never be removed. What this vocabulary meant in India may be highly strange, to them, how we use these terms here today.
I have often mentioned the ideas espoused by the Siddha tradition. I have also, elsewhere, noted that reading Krishna in places other than the "Gita", one would be hard-pressed to think this wasn't Jefferson speaking or John Dewey. Krishna once mocked the idea of "attainment" by "thought alone". He said one can think of food all day long, but getting up and eating is the "fruition" of the idea. "Wishing for freedom" from the oppression of their enemies was vain and pointless and cowardly, Krishna told the Pandavas. Patrick Henry said many of these very same things, but I doubt he ever studied Hinduism or "yoga". He spoke to his own: Americans. Remember: the majority of Americans weren't involved in the "Revolution". One third for, one third against, one third abstaining. The chords were cut by the slimmest of majority of active participants.
Many scholars of Hinduism have pointed out that Jesus' own words can be seen as expressions of yogic content. But "yoga" in America today is almost entirely restricted to ideas of Hatha, physical discipline or that Aryurvedic medicine is "yoga" medicine. For most Americans, Yoga and Aryurveda have two or three major representatives: Paramhansa Yogananda, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and Deepok Chopra. History tells a different story, but, so goes popular knowledge.
I can understand why Americans fail to see in Jefferson, Emerson, or Dewey forms of thinking that are liberating: they don't carry enough of the ultimate hope of an internal power that can reach across time and space and transform conditions by something easier than wielding axe, plow and sweat of the brow. The "Masters" of the Far Eastern milieau seem to tell us that such power is really, and factually at hand. It isn't simply a philopshy of how to accomodate the oppressor. Whether a person or an idea.
Well, doesn't Jesus also promise this? So, we have taken Jesus out of the materialistic constraints of Western reading and used the ideals and practical demonstrations or anecdotes of Yoga and yogis as substantiation of that form of faith.
We have "wed" these things because, we have also not been able to BE real yogis, not being Hindus. We are Americans, but we, normal for us, WANT MORE. And so, see that not only is Hinduis for us not satisfying, but neither is Christianity as it is received. We think, I think rightly, that we can realize something deeper.
I don't see any problem with Derek's friend in wanting to see Yoga as inherantly about "love". And I don't think it automatically impels a contrary thought about "hate".
Yogananda's guru wrote a neat little book called "The Holy Science" which he said was commissioned by his "paramguru" Babaji, a "Siddha". It states that the 'salvation' of yoga is based on stimulation of the love faculty focused upon or elicited by the 'guru' or new-found gravitational locus. The teacher's accomplishments and help or aid is seen as stimulous of both disciplined action and faith, but above all: love.
That is something I see as inherant in the Indian culture which we Americans can only sparsely understand. It is important for us, I believe, to understand the limitations inherent in trying to adopt a Hindu conception of life and action apart from an environment and culture conducive to such. Our culture doesn't provide the same supports. So one may end up being a "ship adrift". No port. And if you have not that "guru", and see yourself not such, you are without a captain or direction. But I don't see any necessity for such, and think we short-shrift ourselves when we seek like that.
I agree in essence with what Derek has delineated in his piece and, again, my critique wasn't aimed en toto at what he wrote.
"Books, however, are not experiences; they are reflections of experiences. They do not suit each person, as a suit will not fit every skin."
I especially appreciate the dichotomy that Derek speaks about, or experienes, in discussing "belief" versus "faith".
"Let us treat faith as something necessary to the human condition -- not as an untested hypothesis, but the innate ability to feel a connection to something beyond our everyday lives."
We do tend to take a proposition, an hypothesis, or "dogma" and call it "faith" rather than a "belief". But the "faith" is that the belief is true, and will be realized.
What every American Christian might hope for in the life and teaching of Jesus also fits only so many. Yet it is part and parcel of part of what we call the "American dream". The additional data that can be derived from the terminology and spectrum of concepts in Hinduism can truly enrich this "dream". We do have to understand these as "supportive" datums, and not fool ourselves into trying to so alter our worlds by adopting a "patch" that might shrink and rip our garments however.
Pick and choose, apply what works. Reject the rest with no apologies, is one way of looking at this.
Today, there are some coming to us from India who have castigated our shallow reading of what yoga means and adoption of similarly shallow practices of that system. They would say that we cannot really "practice" without following "the instructions to the letter". And they are Hindus. But we are not Hindus. So, do we have to die and be reborn in India to "practice"?
Well, maybe we should just accept what we have here: we all have parents or their stand-ins, people who love us and whom we love and we can take the "advice" and believe that "love" is key to "realization".
Jesus was highly iconoclastic in this regard: "call no man on earth "Father". "You have no need that any man should teach you". "The Kingdom of heaven is within you." "If you don't release what is within you, what is within you will destroy you".
It is a sinking of self, and acting not for any reward, but because the act is good in and of itself. This is a simple and easily realized method of realization of love and its power. Love unexpressed is only an unexpressed impulse. When love dies, we die.
We can still say that mortal limitation is foreign to a thinking being. And as we learn to discipline thoughts, even to the point of holding it or them in complete abeyance as we do our duties or daily chores, we can experience an alteration of both body and mind and neighborhood. And so on.
So, if I were to say anything was "crap" about any yoga or atheism, it is the denial of love as key to self-unfoldment, realization of ascendent and transcendant transmutive power lying latent within. We have to act, express this potency in thought, word and act. That is "union" or "yoking" the outer self to the direction of the higher self, the Christ or paramatman, within. I think these terms mean only YOU. You congruant with yourself. Unified as the inner self, but with varied and diverse "voices" without. Hence, the "sifting wheat from chaff" or "weeds from crop". It is pragmatic, and I think every person has to go through this process without exception. Including the greatest "yogis" or "masters" and even Jesus and Krishna or whom have you. It is typical. A belief I have.
But holding oneself in a constant state of "seeking" is a contradiction of "faith". If you have asked, we are told, believe you have received. Then we are obliged to give thanks from then on out. Going back and asking again is a contradiction.
The funniest part of all this "asking" business is, that all the wise tell us that asking for anything other than to be of service, and not for self, is bound to be self-defeating. Many atheists have done great works or charity for the world. It is rediculous to think that when they die, they are bound for torment. Their will, I'm sure, characterizes their states.
Why is it so hard for us to have faith in our own ability to enjoy living for a universal good? And that such a life might, indeed, mean being willing to say no to "popular" ideas, and the possibility that saying no will result in castigation, persecution and even being murdered?
Faith in intelligence native to us all, sometimes results in following the weakest, smallest, stillest little "voice". And when we don't, we complain for having listened to the louder voices, the numerous voices. But we have merely had a wrong criterion. We can't complain that the inner voice wasn't "loud enough". Is it not possible it is so "small" because it is but one?
The criterion of that leading or inner advice isn't about force or compulsion. Its attraction is in its meekness and sweetness. Like the voice of a mother or father we know and trust. Easily missed until we have experienced love. Love gives discernment. If "yoga" or "atheism" isn't based on love. Why should I be interested in either? There must be love in any idea for the idea to be of any use, whatever.
And I think, "Adeism" is a valid term. If we know what "Deism" entails. As for me, I see divinity in everyone and everything. Incarnate, but not always expressed. That makes a big difference. But it is about something we value. Not some value injected from without.
i guess my previous post
Triggers
We are in a game most of the time when we interract with others. And the typical dynamic of "game" is that one wins, the other loses. It is the same dyamic of war and politics. The typical idealism of mortal man is that "God is on OUR side".
"God" is the same as "x" in algebra: an unknown quantity. We aren't required to "believe" in "x", we are, on the basis of scientific, open-minded enquiry into the question of truth or facts, only required to test different conditions whereby we can come to characterize "x" and develop an understanding of cause and effect and so resolve uncertainty about "x".
It would be nice if we could apply some single, self-complete formula and finally completely define "x". I'm going beyond simple math here. Existence and moral character and consciousness as the substrate of research makes resolving "x" far from simple or straightforward.
Your "therapist" concluded something. She felt you didn't believe in her "God", her "x".
That's not fair. And it can never be fair. She ignored the fact you were expressing faith in her healing method. So, is "God" here to be meant, she was "x"? Or that she had some inside line to "x" or "God"?
The fact you weren't cooperating might have been what she was talking about. If she had some insights about her personal former experience of reactions with so-called "atheists", maybe she might have just been honest and said: "your reactions seem similar to others I've worked on who don't believe in..."
Well, what do we put in there? "Jesus"? "Allah"? Krishna? the Popes, or what?
Was she saying you were the reincarnation of Hitler? Or Ivan the terrible? What?
Or, maybe she experienced in you simple contrariness. And that is what she meant. That's her limitation.
It is a touching, and somehow very sad story. Imagine that! A "doktore"/"healer" who is full of "blankety blank"! <
without launching into a long
drawn out, psychological look at the use of arm testing to tell a person what They believe in or don't, i just would say that the Breath-work type of therapy that uses intense breathing with trigger points and adds a kind of "positive suggestion" set of words, seems a good way to help people deal with deep held patterns, that may cause addictions, ect. is fine, and good, just that i don't think "God", is a simple arm test.
So i think the woman that did that, was good at what she learned, but she put her own interpretation of the training and got that part mixed up.But i think this illustrated just how this whole confusion of what we believe in, and what trigger factors in our psyche makes us think and feel the way we do.So in my case i was just too complex for this woman's simple need to quickly place me, so she could proceed.