Terror for religious causes: Time for having a Spirituality sans religion !

Terror for religious causes: Time for having a Spirituality sans religion !

The attack and murder of the Journalists in Paris was the latest among the incidents of religious intolerance and terror that the world has witnessed recently. ( January, 2015)  The Peshawar( Pakistan)  killing of 142 school children by Taliban Terrorists took place on December 16th,2014. The intention of these men seems to invent such acts that could most shock the conscience of their perceived enemies, or the mainstream world!


One could straight away infer from these alleged religion-centered acts of terror, persecution, life-destructive rituals etc. that, religion is more a community oriented phenomenon than metaphysical and moral, because, if religions were more centered around Godliness,holiness and piousness, terrorist acts would never have originated from such a source. Hence, terrorist acts can not ever be purely for religious causes, as religions are basically spiritual in nature, and by goal.

Something or other has gone terribly wrong about religion in modern world, or some or other worldly agencies are using the name of God and religion for achieving personal or professional motives.Or, religion is causing dis-stabilization of the person-hood, or the sense of self of individuals. This write-up is an attempt to have a sincere and open probe into these areas of human mind, and emphasis that, it is high time for REINVENTING HUMAN SPIRITUALITY on a new footing, and on new foundations.

Besides the plain terrorist acts like the recent Peshawar killing of 142 school children, the Sidney ( Australia) 'lone-wolf' terrorist keeping dozens of people as hostages for more than 24 hours and finally the terrorist and two hostages getting killed, the Syrian/Iraq IS unrest etc, many other life and peace destroying activities are also being undertaken in the name of religion. The IS war and atrocities to establish an Islamist Caliphate in Gulf-region and the Boko-haram terror in Nigeria for a similar goal, the threat of the Indian right-wing Hindu outfits to convert its 2% Christian minority and the 13.5% Muslims in the country to Hindus within the next 10-12 years etc. are also equally deplorable acts in the name of religion.

A very strong and influential development in human history and civilization- -the emergence of religions; if it causes more harm to human-kind than any good, it deserves serious probe by every responsible society, and their respective socio-political institutions.

Let us consider a few very relevant arguments against people, institutions and groups, who use religious causes for terrorist and life-disturbing,destroying acts

Religion, like one's mother-tongue and native culture, was not chosen by any single individual !

Modern man is born into this or that religion today. No one chooses it. It is the same way one gets born to one's parents with a particular mother-tongue. We do not choose our religion or mother tongue,or the cultures and traditions associated with both. Religion, language and cultures are like the shape of our nose, eyes or our face that we inherit from the parents, ie. our inborn features. Like our eyes and nose, we are helpless but to accept them, as they are the very constituents of our sense of self and personality. 

The other with a different religion,language and culture is as helpless as we are, with regard to these in-born factors of their birth, selves and personalities ! This is an essential fact every right-minded person must consider before treating the man from other religions as a 'stranger-other', showing intolerance towards his 'otherness'.

Now, each one of us can not just function as independent  and functioning entities in life, without accepting the above factors into our veins. As I can not alter any of my particular body characteristics, I can not alter my religion, my mother tongue and my native culture too. If I attempt to alter, I become another person, another reality. Most of us do not ever intent to do this feat in any form, because liking and accepting our inborn characteristics and traits is a basic of human nature, unless such inborn features or conditions of life becomes cause of untold misery, inequality or such painful social isolation for him. Eg. Many lower caste men and women of India had embraced Christianity to escape the intolerable social inequality,and even un-touchability in the conservative Indian,upper-caste ruled society. Otherwise in normal life-conditions, no one wish to discard one's way of life, culture, tradition and worship norms.

Then, how did old nature-worshiping primeval communities had embraced modern religions ?

In the course of history, when individual selves were not as rigidly formed as on today, wherein large groups or communities had one single mind like that of animal herds, mass conversions to other faiths had often taken place.Those mass conversions  (or migrations) to major world religions of today had happened because man had a more or less tribal-life under a tribal-leader, ( like that of the origin of Islam) emergence of a distinct spiritual leader or a prophet like Jesus Christ, Buddha, or Mahavira or Confucius,  or some such religions becoming state-religion ( like Christianity under emperor Constantine,or Islam thrived under many powerful King-like figures in the later years of its development)

 Large scale forced conversions also took- place at many instances in history.As we know now, colonization was more on its way as adventures of Christian missionaries, to 'save' the lost souls of the world ! It was natural for that old Western world, who, by all standards of that age, were far ahead of men and communities living at other parts of the world, in areas like modern weaponary,life-affinities,scientific-spirit, education and health-care. Their wish was to share these signs of advancement,or 'modernity' with fellow-communities in the world, even by using 'force' to achieve this goal. It was like giving a painful injection to a sick tribal man even using force ! They thought they are doing 'good' for him,and the world ! When merchants and nations too followed these early missionary adventurers for economic and political goals, colonization had become an altogether different game, with clear signs of imperialism.

Basically, they were  not religious 'conversions' in the strict sense of  present times, as there weren't any organized religion prior to such periods in modern sense, from where these men could be 'converted' to.World was a congregation of various tribal societies and beliefs,largely worshiping various forms of nature, or some or other kind of traditionally followed myths and stories about super-natural powers ! So, we could only consider the old mass migrations to certain world religions as natural development of human mind or societies, internalizing these faiths for a more organized, or systematic moral and spiritual way of life. Or, perhaps, it might have offered them a sense of 'belonging-ness to an organised community'.

The story was more or less same with regard to conversions into Islam too. The Muslim conquerors who had traveled to many regions in the world had used force and compulsion to convert the natives into their way of life and beliefs. The total conversion of Zoroastrian Iran ( old Persia) into a Muslim nation was one prime example. All the Muslims in India too were,allegedly, forced converts from primitive Hinduism.

Every large collective entity in the world, who possess either military,industrial or sheer number Power, whether religious or political, wanted all other men like them, or under them, as deviations are thought to be signs that might weaken their superiority and majesty in the long run.

One's sense of right will always get self-doubt, or even sense of self-threat, when others around too lead equally confident, or more contented lives ! This might be due to the existential necessity of every man to be grounded to his own kind of reality. If the other leads a different kind of life with a different culture, language, or tradition, the sense of self of the former starts losing his sense of absolute reality. Man indeed requires this sense of absolute reality and truth about his self and 'being', per nature's mysterious ways ! It seems, even in these days of enlightened modernity and progress, mankind and communities suffer from these old and primeval obsessions, fears and weakness.

As once referred above, modern Hindus in India now try to 're-convert' Christians and Muslims in the country, under the new confidence they gained from having the newly elected Hindu majority party ( BJP) in power. The logic is that, India must be free of these foreign religions, as they can not have 'belongingness' to the father nation ! Christian and Muslim minorities, who comprise about a total of 15% of the population of the country, are living in the land for more 10 to 20 centuries in many cases ! Still, the majority religion feels that the land should belong only to them exclusively, and they can not bear the sight of any 'other' in their habitat ! Every one should live in a particular land with same the beliefs, myths, life style and also with particular Gods the majority believe-in ! The majority religion also forgets or ignore that, pre-British India was not one nation in nay sense.It was comprising more than 600 local Kingdoms, engaged in perpetual war between each other. It was first the Muslim invasion, and then the British colonization that made the land integrate into one geographical and then one cultural whole !

The resurgent Hindu right-wing elements prefer to call this objective of converting Christians and Muslims  'Home-returning', in the sense that the entire land had only Hindus in the past!  As mentioned above, modern Hindus fail to recognize the fact that such re-conversions will tear-off the sense of self of Christians and Muslims, as each individual of these two minority communities had been born into these faiths and religions, their customs,beliefs, life-style etc.except perhaps a minority new converts, who got converted due to various other reasons, including perhaps, succumbing to some kind of allurement, or force. Now these minorities feel threatened and terrorized like every minority religious or cultural groups in other lands where the majority population belong to a different religion or culture. Hindus in Muslim majority Pakistan feels the same as Muslims and Christians in India !

More over, Hinduism is one of the few religions in the world today that still keeps it primordial nature worshiping traditions. Its deeper metaphysical thought system  ( like Upanishads etc)  were developed perhaps centuries later, after their remaining as plain nature-worshipers through-out. But this deeper Hinduism and its unique universality and thorough spiritual nature, remains unknown to majority of its believers, chiefly due to its unavailability to the ordinary class of people under the fierce hegemony of the old priestly class in the past, and the strict caste-system within the Hindu-tradition.In the sense as nature worshipers, every primordial society in the world should be called Hindus, as that was the only religious sign and tradition for every ancient human-community. So, calling back the world to go back as Hinduism now will be a calling back to the entire earth population to become nature-worshipers once again !

By this logic, every organized modern religion should be treated as some or other kind of 'development', or a step ahead in the natural progress of humanity. At this stage, it is unnatural that any one religion attempt to establish its own superiority over other religions, as religions are like languages, or colour of the skin, or food and cultural habits that human-kind got from their parents and communities in near or remote past. World has no option but to accept all such events,or courses of the past, mass or individual conversions as irreversible course of history.

Better we compare these past conversions with the modern phenomenon of men getting converted into different economic classes,( such as the modern middle class) drastically altering their life-styles, behaviour, food-habits, man-woman relation, dress-codes etc. Irrespective of the religion, skin-colour, language or past-culture, modern middle class,employed in corporate sector live and behave as if they are an altogether different global class, and a different social-group in the world !

Modern phenomenon of Democratic Politics, and its number-strength oriented entanglement with religions 

How come these modern religions then had become means of terror and cruelty ? Let us consider another angle.

We have seen that our modern world religions were more or less different 'life-style' communities, and different 'social-entities' than large groups of men believing in different Gods. Spirituality always stood-away, more or less personal and independent for human-beings, even while their belongingness to the above culture and life-style' based deep religious-groups.

After the advent of democratic politics in modern world, wherein it was the 'rule of majority', or the rule of the 'most organized' political group('gang', if we use Ayn Rand's wording !) with maximum number of followers, or at least that group or individual who manage to collect maximum electoral votes, keeping larger groups by religion, culture, language, geography, occupation or whatever, has become the top priority of those who wish to grab the THRONE ! This inevitable requirement of needing to have the vote and support of larger groups of people in the country to form government and to occupy the throne led every political party to woo religious groups, one of the best source for having large-masses under one umbrella, or one pack ! Though after the reign of Science in the world from 17-18th centuries, the intensity of belief in God and religions had greatly deceased. For cure of illness or ensuring better life, medicine and hard-work were thought better options respectively, than praying to Gods.


This reason had hugely affected the number of temple,church and mosque goers all the world. But the cunning-ness of the newly emerged political parties who were stuck with the necessity of large-vote-banks, had used every ammunition in their strategy armory to integrate various religious groups in nations like India. Intentional inter-religious conflicts and tension had been planned well and executed, causing fierce religious polarization. People were put under compulsion to stick on to their religious identities, for more voice and representation in political affairs of the country. Thus, even those who were earlier liberal about their own religious identity had decided to be more-religion oriented, and mindful of their respective and unique religious identities. Political parties had succeeded in creating a new sense of 'entitlement' and representation  based on each one's religious identity.

No open minded man can ignore the above role of modern democratic-politics in creating and sustaining social tension under compulsions of modern 'number-strength' oriented politics. Religious conversion is also one in such dubious political strategies of modern politics.

The counter-effect: Identity deprived men under modern politics seek other identities for rooting their selves !

The fiercely 'impersonal'nature of modern democratic-politics, ie. embracing and considering large masses of men as more real and concrete for head-count oriented modern politics, had in-fact caused serious isolation and alienation of modern man today. Forces of industry, forces of religion and politics are constantly trying to target him, his attention, support and vote has seriously affected the integrity of his sense of self ! He is once again forced to seek his lost individual identity in religion, as, without linking one's self with some concrete reality, one tend to loses his sense of person-hood.

Though religions were originally originated with the intention of linking man with the 'other world', away and free from the turbulence and changes of life, they had ended up as different 'life-style' communities as seen above. Every religion has become this worldly, mostly rituals and collectivism oriented. Their metaphysical and spiritual dimension totally lost. Spirituality as such today, truly speaking, has become a very personal relation of each person with ultimate reality and source of his 'being'. Prayers and other intense-linking with his spiritual roots has become an essential need of many men today, that he always fulfill while he is alone, during or after the participating in the community level gathering and rituals. While religion is a social umbrella that define his collective identity, spirituality of each person, if every one frankly look within and examine, has become every one's very personal interaction or synergy with God, or whatever he has kept and defined as his source of origin. Whether Hindu, Muslim, Christian or Sikh, each individual has kept his spirituality a very subjective and personal affair.(Please share a dedicated blog that dwells deep into this SPIRITUAL INTEGRITY need of modern man, at link: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/spiritual-integrity-man-possible-existence-abraham-j-palakudy?trk=mp-author-card)

In short, modern democratic politics has absolutely failed to uphold individual's much-required, unique sense of self. Though it was the post-enlightenment, LIBERALISM oriented social and political ideals that had given birth to modern democracy, it ended-up in the DISINTEGRATING man's sense of person-hood. He has, more or less got lost in the crowd, ever groping in the dark, searching for his real self ! Instead of providing him his real sense of self and freedom, modern democratic system left him as an irreverent piece in the mass-crowd. This factor also has prompted modern man to seek increased bond with his/her religious identity, to compensate his lost personal identity in the impersonal political jungle !

What has become special about the Muslim world ?

Unlike all the other world religious followers or the followers of local religions like Sikhism and Jainism, Muslims find it extremely difficult to merge and mingle with the mainstream,globalized population, by the very way they are supposed to dress, groom the body,( keeping a beard etc)  odd religious practices like circumcision and the mutilation of women's body, 5 times a day prayer etc. So, these men always find themselves at odd with the mainstream world. Even if they want, they can not throw -away these strict religious codes and practices without rousing the ire, and even the threat of excommunication from the community fold ! Physical threats, and even killing can not be ruled out. So, these men are forced to be different in the mainstream in every sense, this cultural and social isolation is, without doubt, could be a major cause for serious internal conflicts.

Unfortunately, the so called mainstream world is a western-culture oriented world. As we have seen above, masses of people get mingled and even migrated to cultural and social trends and ways, many a times as a social and personal need. The self of man tend to internalize whatever ever he thinks fit and right to glorify his self. This could be learning of new language and culture norms, adopting new dress-codes, behavior and food habits etc. Vast majority of modern world, thanks to the contemporary globalization tendency, adopt the ways and style of this trend, and merge with the said mainstream, irrespective of whether these new converts like or not. Many of them do so out of professional ( read 'survival' needs !)

But for the Muslim world, despite the unbelievable oil based affluence of the Gulf-nations, their men are still outsiders to the said mainstream for reasons above seen ! Any kind of cultural or education reforms will not, or can not unlock their above, very particular,visible differences ! Even when they convert into the above referred 'new economic-middle class', they fail to mix into its cultural separateness due to the hard-pull of their close religious community. So, they are a kind of 'locked-into' the same old mold of that ancient Prophet.Mohammed started Islam religion and tradition for ever.

Most of the Gulf-nations are Kingdoms, wherein citizens enjoy only limited personal freedom. The world these men see in media sources like TV makes them excessively aware of their stark-difference from the mainstream. The generally known TWO reactions of conservative societies upon encountering modernity is,either to change themselves and become 'modern', or to contemn modernity as undesirable. Here, the second option was the only possible reaction to Muslim world, as they can never think of leaving their traditions and practices on account of their subdued individual-freedom. So, it was natural for the more-intense ones among them to go for severe fundamentalism about own beliefs and practices,and FIND VITAL SELF_EXPRESSION needs of the EGO,within their own theology, and religion.

The very direct role that Iraq-invasion played to trigger this revived Islamist revivalism is well-known. Al-Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed future Caliphate of of Islamic-wold was an Iraqi-prisoner under US authorities.( see references at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20141201095034-97217672-ferguson-killing-why-democratic-states-rat-hunt-citizens?trk=mp-author-card)

The only way out before them is to create their own world supremacy or hegemony, wherein they need not feel 'outsiders' anymore ! This is psychologically compelling at least some of its followers to establish a modern Caliphate, where it is an altogether Muslim world, where every Muslim could feel at-home in every sense, ending the 'locked-in' state explained above. In a way, it is metaphysically and psychologically a very valid aspiration, as living as outsiders in a world that is going fast and changed every-day, far remote and different from their locked-in ways of life !

A recent 'The Economist' News paper article ( Jan,20th 2015) shows the same line of argument: ' rather than mimic the modernized West, and rather than allow it to intervene in their affairs, as it has done through much of recent history, Muslims should create new forms of politics and government proper to their faith.' (Article 'A struggle that shames' )

The so called 'mainstream' in modern world is predominantly a Western world,  with its chief affinity towards the Western way of life, norms and culture. The above said modern, huge population of 'middle-class', irrespective of their nationality, language, skin-colour or ethnicity, is predominantly western in culture, aspirations and life-style. From this world, Muslims in most of the nations sense an uncomfortable distance !
This uncomfortable status, together with the alienation of those who are not part of the above mainstream in any sense, are extremely prone to hate their lives, socially, psychologically and metaphysically ! They fail to relate to anything in the immediate world around. They do not belong to it in any sense ! A strange sense of alienation is a certainty.

The ways of the modern corporate entities, with their ferocious aspiration and appetite for huge-market share for their produce, and total control over the mind of consumers, have turned the world into a 'market-place' in every sense. They let nothing more serious and deep to exist in the market-place called the world, because if they let it, the spirit of 'consumerism' will greatly subside. With the extreme eye for detail of the modern industry, they will do everything possible to prevent the 'market-place' called the world from deviating to anything else !

This particular impersonal nature of modern world mounts the hatred of the 'outsiders',towards the world, as well as towards themselves and others. These unfortunate mass of men, their kind turning 'self deprived' every day in thousands at every corner of the world, are the ones who either turn a petty criminal, a murderer, a thief or rapist, organize themselves into large rebel gangs against States seeking freedom,( eg. the Maoists in India )   or the hard-core terrorists in the hands of indoctrinating-forces og religions ! They are not human-beings at all in its true sense, features and meaning. They, like agitated atoms in the sub-atomic particle world, are core-lost entities. Because of their huge-self hatred, they could do any cruel and shameless act, without any prick of conscience. They are a species apart, for all practical meaning !

All progress of the world would become meaningless and empty, unless it identify and recognize the above process of thousands of its men turning anti-social every day. Just one of them is enough to turn life up-side-down for a city, like what happened in Sydney hostage issue recently. The threat and fear of such phenomenon itself is enough to make every progress of modern world futile. No progress is progress by its name, if the system that leads to such progress disturb, or ignore even one's person's sense of self  in the process !

If every one adopts my way, or our way, I/we can be their leader, and then control them !

One of the most conspicuous features of human ego, or human-self is that it constantly look for self-glorification. It wanted to feel superior and special always. This is perhaps instilled by  nature so that it gives a warning-shot to those individuals who tend to be passive and subdued in society. Without these aggressive other group, there would have been no cry for freedom and liberty ! These passive men will always be kept under control and servitude by the other group, so that social tension always remain in human-societies, a must for intellectual and moral wake-ups and enlightenment.

So, there always had men and their leaders who desired to keep control over others around, as well as large masses of people if opportunity arise. The onus of recognizing this natural feature of man lies with enlightened societies, so that they learn the primary lesson of keeping every individual free and liberated, and never attempt to keep anyone subdued and subjugated. It is lack of this vital knowledge that modern world and its institutions suffer from most ! Whether it is polity, religion or industry, what each look-forward to having mastery and hegemony in the world. Military powers attempt to show-off their strength so that all others remain under their silent control, industries attempt to have the same goal by having absolute control over the governments and the world, and religions also look-forward to have the same kind of control over large masses of people. This is the metaphysical reason behind Muslims aim at the establishment of Caliphate,and the Western world under the leadership of USA want the globalized world under the western-free market hegemony, a disguised version of the old colonial world-control.

The crux and key this modern world must realize is that, only by liberating and ensuring the freedom of every other person that it could achieve sustainable freedom of the world, NOT by controlling every one around.

What world needs is, a Spirituality sans religions 

From what we have seen above, it has come out that though religions were originated with spiritual goals, they turned different 'life-style' and cultural  groups in their course of development.Every religious group was under existential compulsion to stick-on as one single life-style group for various reason listed and described above. For the inevitable spiritual need, each person, irrespective of his religious identity and life-style, tend to keep and maintain his own kind of very subjective and personal spirituality through out human-history.

With existence, it looks like that, nature or God is keeping an exclusive or unique kind of relation or contract. with every human-being. His gene-equation is so unique that no other person would be having such an equation ( the gene-combination from his father and mother, another unique pair) his very unique life-surroundings, ( the unique relation with his parents, his small community, his unique geographic location etc) his equally unique relation making with other unique people around etc etc. All the above factors make each person in the world a unique 'aggregate' in every sense and meaning.No one exactly like him exists anywhere in the wold !

Life, in this sense, is a unique opportunity, a unique aperture for each person. If God or whatever the ultimate source of reality and energies behind life and existence be, man can not connect with Him/It through collective prayer/communication process, because, what is personal is personal, and no group approach would be appropriate and effective. Collective or group rituals only would help to induce certain very personal and subjective thought-frame this way ! Every one has to go back to this source also all alone one day ! So, spirituality need to be, and should be a very personal communion or communication for every human being.

Good 'sense' in understanding God, or the ultimate essence as a PREDISPOSITION / Predilection 

Instead of keeping different images of God by each religion, it would make extreme sense to understand Him as His predisposition, or predilection. The ultimate CAUSE behind creation, or having 'existence' of man,beats,plants,planets,milky-ways, space and time could be, in all possibility, the RESULT OF AN ALL PERVADING 'emotion', or a 'motivation'. The physical form the world and the emotional nature of all living beings must be 'sharing' this emotion from such an essence, and what better way to understand ULTIMATE TRUTH than getting to know such a cause ?

Common-sense would tell that even science attributes a certain 'predisposition' to existence; a certain mathematical coldness, without verification and evidence. Such a zero-sum 'coldness' is what explains the physical theories of the world, or the 'structure of the world'. It is plain that 'structure' is always determined by a hidden essence. By this logic, instead of randomly attributing different predispositions to God by different religions, if sensible agreement is arrived among all religions on this CENTRAL POINT, it itself could start a new religion sans  different dogmas and belief systems- a SPIRITUALITY without religions !
( please see our work on such a sensible predisposition at links: http://patternsofapproachtodiscoverreality.blogspot.in/, http://thewhyquestionofexistenceanswered.blogspot.in/)


If the contemporary world proceed in the direction of propagating such a universal spirituality, not in any particular religious sense but as an essential personal discipline of every child and grown-up person, it will gain much in the way of avoiding religious based hatred, violence and wars. Citizens would then be lesser exploited by political entities in the world for their dubious number games. It might also end the dangerous hold of religious leaders and institutions upon human communities. Instead, every religion could encourage its followers to be simply spiritual, leaving divisions and conflicts in the name of life-style and ritualistic differences.

( for further reading on the path of new SPIRITUALITY, refer link: http://metaphysicsofthehumansoul.blogspot.in/
http://valueofdecontrollingtheother.blogspot.in/)

Contact the blogger: ajoseph1@rediffmail.com
He is an ardent seeker and researcher of Truth,especially in areas like Mind&Reason, philosopy,Spirituality,and Polity

Twitter: Voice of philosophy@jopan1
His profile and other blogs at:https://www.blogger.com/profile/14249415589712707293

Spiritual evolution of man: From age of body to age of mind, and now to the age of the spirit 

Observing closely at the development of man, one would observe a distinct pattern of his spiritual development. Spiritual in the sense, from lesser form of consciousness to higher forms of consciousness about himself, his existential roots etc.

We all know that for millions of years we shared the body level existence with animals in the jungles. While animals are still in the same form of consciousness, man could jump to his mind level consciousness some time later. Man developed a mind organ, that could let him free from the exclusive bounds of his body. A new entity embraced him after the full development of mind.

For every object of his experience, whether it was food, self protective urges, or things of beauty alone, he could give it all a new dimension other than that of the mere animal level, or biological level existence. He developed many social institutions that helped to give such new dimensions to all the objects in the world, and all his actions, experiences and events around him. The world and life of mind was unimaginably different from that of world and life of the body. If he had experienced these objects and events in life at his blind instinctive level, fit for animals, now he experience the same objects and events in a very different dimension and light, with the new eye of the mind.

What changed was not his external sense organs, but his ENTITY that used the same sense organs through the new MEDIUM, ie. the mind. Or in other words, when he started looking at the world through the new medium of mind, his ‘self’ got transcended. He was not his old animal self. His canvas widened. While there were only mere instinctual experiences in his animal 'inners' during the jungle time, now there were million time more materials and concepts that the mind had gathered, and stored within, that enabled his transcending to the new entity !

Is it not the time for man to transcend his entity to still further levels ?   

When his developing from the animal level to mind level is an empirical reality, we can not infer that, it could be the last in man’s stages of development. It has already been somewhat confirmed at his sub-atomic particle level experiments that the ultimate reality of matter as a possible building block of the universe was an unrealistic hypothesis. Physics, even after her half a century of efforts and trials, could not isolate the event of the motion of an atom, or any other sub-atomic particle, into an independent, measurable and identifiable episode. In simple scientific term, what happened here was the failure of the hypothesis that universe was matter-centric. Matter could have provided only the structural form of existence, and a complete understanding is feasible only when man gets to know reality at the ‘essence’ level . 

It is only sensible to realize that structure of anything is always determined by its essence. The former is only a means towards achieving the ends of the latter. Here essence may be understood as the ‘purpose’ of existence as a whole, the answer to the ever elusive ‘why’ question of science.

The above failed attempt of man to understand reality that lies behind the obvious and overt world pin points to the fact that, it is time for him to have, or recognize the unknown inner organs or ‘knowing devices’ higher than mind, like mind was once developed after millions of years of his leading life with body alone stage !

Now man is at least able to understand that there is more to existence than what his known sense organs provide to him. How does this important understanding landed at man’s awareness ? It must have been through the work of some yet unidentified internal faculties ! This indicates that it is time for him to go for another transcending of his self, and have more wider spectrum of experience through newly found sense organs, in a similar expansion of the spectrum when the MIND organ had developed into a new kind of organ millions of years ago.

It may not happen within a few months or years, but clear signs are there in the air for a start. Once what happened at the sub-atomic particle research field comes to the clear understanding of one and all, in its full philosophic relevance, man will naturally become aware of the wider world and wider realities that in store for him in future. This very realization will trigger the next stage of his intellectual evolution, to the realm of the soul.

Like what happened with the onset of the mind, a million more concepts and ideas would creep into his various languages, and man will start experiencing a new transcend. His socio-political institutions, his education and business management sector will have new syllabuses to teach the young. New governmental forms and new media norms will emerge. Life will not be the same for our future generations !

( To know more about the new organ in wait, replacing the mind, please visit our blog link: http://philosopherskorner.blogspot.in/2010/12/consciousness-beyond-ego.html. Also please refer to our small book published at Amazon.com titled ‘ Is Reason a sense organ ? A super mind above the known mind ?’ at link:  http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008NOEE9I )

Human soul: The ultimate enigma of spirituality

While the concept of God is distinct and clear to most of the minds, that of human soul is entrenched in serious confusions. At surface, the concept of soul  too may appear a distinct and clear idea, but when one goes deep to the task of defining it by a relation to God, serious confusions come to surface.This is an attempt to discuss the various questions around the definition, role, relation between the soul and world, and that between soul and God etc.

Every religion, as well as all spiritually oriented men unanimously agree that man indeed has a soul, a secret or hidden extra entity besides his empirical self (social entity) that he lives with, in the objective world. Most religions think that man turns into his pure soul after death,though soul is sublimely present even when man is alive.When alive, the soul is trapped in the world, or in the human body, and with death it gets free, and enters its own other realm of existence. It is a part of, or at least related to God, or to the supreme creator in some or other way. 

The purpose of this study is to bring out and analyze the most difficult aspects about knowledge, or plain questions about human soul:

1)  ie .whether it has a stand-alone substance of its own destined by God, and if yes, its exact relation with the ultimate essence of existence,God. Is it what people usually seek to know through various meditation techniques?

2) what entity of man actually lives in the world, whether as his soul dressed-up as the ego immersed in the Maya (illusion of the sensory world) always NOT knowing who he is

3) OR whether the soul of man is an independent,standalone phenomenon that emerges to play his role only after death,

4) OR, whether his body-mind entity that meant to live its life here in the world is really his soul, that his EGO is quite unaware of, but can come to true senses, or SELF-AWARENESS ( spiritual awareness with methods like meditation etc) during the life span it self !

5) Is soul an entity associated with human-being preceding his birth, and also surviving his death. If yes, is it not necessary for man to have at least vague consciousness about its existence as his own original substance,separate from his ego ?

6) Finally, and most importantly, what entity of man out of all the above  that is now engaged in this act of social communication, as the empirical entity that you know as me and I know as the other to you and all others.: is it exclusively my social self, ( the ego) or my secret self- the soul- also is there in the picture, mixing certain degree of non-worldly wisdom also in the act?

Let us take-up the above questions and dilemmas one by one for some sort of elaboration, so that we gain more clarity.

1)Whether it has a stand-alone substance of its own destined by God, and if yes, its exact relation with the ultimate essence of existence,God.

The superficial consciousness of every person about himself is restricted to his consciousness as a member in society, or world ,like everyone else around. At rare intervals, it is not ruled out that every person suffer from the pricks of his 'inners' about the actual 'substance' if any, other than that of his social identity. He at times feels that his ego entity is a temporal affair, and he belongs to somewhere else beyond the obvious world,where he is destined to go after the death.

But despite the many number of times he gets this feel of an ethereal reality beyond his ego, he is not able to know of any extra entity beside him living with him as a separate spirit, distinct from his ego. He simply gets aware of the existence of ethereal forces controlling his thought, behaviour and destiny. He is never able to transcend himself as any other entity, and look at life and world from the different platform of a different being. Even if some spirit, which is a soul, exists with me as a separate entity, it is not me, but a parallel entity other than me, as I could never enter its shoes and feels like a different entity.

Or, is it that the subtle close relation every human-being feels towards his life as a metaphysical entity as referred above, independent of any society, and independent of even his close human relations in life, the one who travels from birth to death solely and lonely, is the SOUL ?  At this mode of consciousness,man is face to face with the eternal truths about life and existence ! He feels an utter responsibility towards his existence that he is not able to wish away on account of any external influence and temptation. Here his sense of responsibility to make or break his life, ie.as a free-willed entity, is complete.

If we consider the above mode of consciousness as man's SOUL, the question that we raised at the para-heading above rises-up: what is the relation this soul or spirit is expected to establish and maintain with God, or the center of existence and meaning ?

The most relevant aspect of  this 'center' of consciousness also is that, it (the soul in this meaning) does not feel that it is an independent substance of self-origin. It only feels an inseparable relation with everything else around him, including with the Center of everything that caused its being here in life, with his ego, with a society around him, and with the existence of a physical and biological special surrounding also around him. He feels like having a root, and some sense in life and existence as a whole.

But one thing we must notice here: this secondary, or root consciousness could emerge as a result of the primary origin of the ego as man's elementary self. If ego was originated from external world, the deeper self,  was originated from the turmoils of the life experience of the ego.

Whatever we have observed above about the probable 'soul' of man points out to the fact that this 'soul' originated as a by-product of man's life process. Soul in the sense that we have seen above has not preceded man's birth. It was not a God sent spirit merging with man's human spirit, or that exist as a parallel spirit along with that of the human spirit. These should have been central questions for our major religions, as many of these religions assert that it is a God sent spirit that lives parallel with the worldly spirit of man.If this was true, important questions arise here: Would such God sent spirit that merge with, or exist parallel with the human-spirit, keep a separate and independent 'consciousnesses' ?

If yes, then such spirits can not be considered as the 'soul' of man, as the man has no awareness of such spirits travelling with his spirit as a part of his deeper self.

If such God sent spirit does merge with the man's spirit and becomes one with it, giving him spiritual insight and guidance during his lifetime, matters become more sensible.

But this arrangement won't be anything different from man's own worldly spirit attaining closeness with God, and internalize His spirit, as it is usual with every other human relation.As every one knows, when someone enters into a deep human relation, the spirit of both the parties gets merged, each internalizing aspects from other's spirit and character. Considering the above basic nature of relation between any two spirits, it would be sensible to conclude that in case of human soul also, the truth would be the merging of God's spirit with man's spirit when the latter relentlessly seek Him,and wish to remain in close union with Him during his lifetime. Such human spirits indeed might be TRANSCENDING their human spirit to a true ethereal spirit, that might survive beyond death too, and join abodes of existence beyond life !    

It would be appropriate here to quote what St.Paul, the spirited Apostle of Christ, had referred to the subject of soul in the most specific terms: ( His letter to the Corinthians-3, God's Wisdom) ' the wisdom I proclaim is God's secret wisdom, which is hidden from mankind,but which he had chosen for our glory even before the world was made....the spirit searches everything,even the hidden depths of God's purposes. It is only a person's own spirit within him that knows all about him;in the same way,only God's own Spirit knows all about God.We have not received this world's spirit, but the spirit sent by God,so that we may know all that God has given us'.

Though St.Paul gave us lot of hope about great knowledge coming from him when he had mentioned that what he was going to reveal is God's secret wisdom, he had not made it clear as to what was the nature of relation between man's spirit and God's spirit that he refers as having sent to man.When he mentions about a spirit within God too, that knows all about Him, what he refers as Spirit could be One that dwells within us even without our least awareness during our lifetime, or even after death, as It lives within us as a separate entity, without ever merging with our worldly spirit. Or, probably, this God sent spirit might be what gets merged with our spirit when we enter into the intimate kind of union with God as referred in the above paragraph. This might have slipped the Apostle's attention while drafting the letter under discussion.

There are of course some differences among various sects of Hinduism with regards to the nature of soul. The dualist tradition says that the soul will not merge with, and become one with God after the culmination life cycles, but it remains in a different realm of 'being' as distinct entities/souls,enjoying the bliss of the eternal proximity to God. Here, our above nagging enigma will haunt us; how to define,or understand the soul's relation with God while on earth in the realm of life, and also at the end of the cycle of lives, in the special company of God.

Whereas the 'singularity' (advaita) tradition of Hinduism states that the human soul (atman) and the cosmic soul ( Brahman) are not different, except that the 'atman' is finite.'Shankara clearly says that Jivo Brahmaiva naparah., that is, the individual self (jiva) is non-different from Brahman. The individual self is limited, finite whereas Brahman is unlimited, infinite' (source: http://scienceofsoul.com/special.asp?sid=250) 

Obviously, in both Christian and Hindu traditions, one can not plainly infer a clear answer as to what SOUL really is, and what relation it maintain with the ego and God during the lifetime.

Our task is to arrive at some sensible conclusion. 

It is quite possible that when ardent seekers abandon their egos after a certain point in the journey of seeking, the God's spirit might be virtually replacing the self of man(ego) and then remain in the ethereal realm (that actually is the world - - -and the corporeal reality simply is an illusionary realm (maya) of the ego !) every moment of his/her remaining life ! At such a stage, there are no two entities, as God's spirit is what thereupon live in the world, occupying the vacuum that ego had created by its exit. This seems to be the best and the last explanation that fits the depiction of human soul ! It is some-kind of a total surrendering of the self to the subtle ways of God !

There is a general feeling that through meditation techniques, one could get awareness of the soul within. Upon close analysis we will realize that what happens under meditation is the TRANSCENDING of our selves; during meditation, we succeed in weeding out the 'world' and our ego identity from the mind. Naturally we achieve a transcended state of our selves. It calms the mind and entire body-mind system. 

When such synergy takes place between man's spirit and God sent spirit,the duality between mans spirit and God's spirit ends. Some special features of this TRANSCENDED stage is that, the multiplicity of objects and events before the ego vanishes. Life as a whole presents itself as the one and only event for the new entity. It simply undergoes the event of life, with the firm consciousness of its integral relation with God. It could be said that such a life is a walking 'samadhi' stage: the physical entity is only namesake for such enlightened souls ! Though he is fully into life, it is with certain sense of detachment. This detached stage of existence is familiar to all the religions. 

At this stage, though he is an ordinary entity in life for others, for him and for nature/God, he is already existing in the ethereal world, with firm awareness that what he undergoes is a dual-entity existence. 

The relation of such a soul with God has no parallel in the realm of human experience. We could only assume that it was the best of best arrangement of nature/God for getting LIFE and EXISTENCE experienced by some sensible entities ! Life not experienced by someone is a VOID, that is against the very tenet of BEING !

There is a real danger when man decides to abandon his ego self and gets united with the ethereal spirit within.(if any?) Here ego, who has to live in the world with all its world-oriented paraphernalia of senses and drives, tend to lose its consciousness of itself, and gets boasted and inflated with its new exalted sense of self ! The ethereal soul is a passive and silent entity within, and it is the responsibility of the ego to keep its thoughts and deeds in check, in order NOT to wither-away into world's wayward ways. It is an extremely hard task, and often ego fails in the task, and man ends-up lost into spiritual wilderness again ! 

2) What entity of man actually lives in the world, whether his God sent soul dressed-up as the ego, immersed in the Maya, (illusion of the sensory world) always NOT knowing who he is? 

From what we have seen from our discussions at point Srl-1, it is quite obvious that man lives in the world only as his 'worldly spirit', the ego. It is primarily and predominantly a social product, emerged on the principle of 'you are, therefore I am'. Everyone is compelled to wear the mantle of a self because the other person already has one such entity. Before him, I do not have any other form of entity than as one like him. Like heavenly bodies are there in their assigned places and orbit due to the gravitational pull of other bodies around them, man is also compelled to be egos on account of the way society has been made of many individual units, with no escape route for anyone. Our blog: http://anatomyofrealities.blogspot.in/ illustrates how does this scheme actually work.

This scheme was the most smart and the cleverest ploy of God/nature to achieve her existential necessity of having KNOWERS , or EXPERIENCERS of life !

Here, it seems Nature/God has certain very specific pattern of development of EGO into spiritual ways. When ego blindly dwells in the world for considerable time periods, succumbing to the inbuilt DRIVES, urges and instincts of human-nature, a certain trend of tiredness of the world usually grips ego. It shows a tendency to withdraw from the world and from its ways.It had enough. It wants to search for higher realities and at least different realities. Everyone who has been in life for 3-4 decades of spirited activity and indulgement might be familiar with this definite pattern. He seeks his roots.

It is quite usual that after such temporary stages of withdrawal, ego gets back again to life with the same vigour as before. But this call for withdrawal can be attributed to human life as a routine experience for most of the people.

A few among them permanently withdraws from life, and take-up institutionalized or individual SPIRITUAL life and ways.

But our question no.2 can be confidently answered that what lives in the world is a totally blind ego, in the vacuum called world, where mostly sense provided knowledge only prevails.It is a totally cut-off realm from every ethereal realities, and what man individually and collectively builds-up are realities.

3) Or, whether the soul of man is an independent,standalone phenomenon that emerges to play his role only after death ?

From what we have seen and discussed above, it does not seem a possibility. A soul that never made its presence felt to the human entity during his lifetime, but claims being his soul after death does not make sense at all. What was the role of such a soul in the scheme of life ? Noting, in the above sense and meaning. 

4)Or, whether his body-mind entity that meant to live its life here in the world is really his soul, that his EGO is quite unaware of, but can come to true senses, or SELF-AWARENESS ( spiritual awareness with methods like meditation etc) during the life span it self !

This question does make sense. It was what we have accepted and explained at item No. 1. Ego was only an inevitable primary entity for the soul to evolve from. But those egos who wish to spend the entire lifetime unaware of its real cosmic status will remain as a world being till death, and vanish into VOID even after death. This explanation is our only alternative. 

5) Is soul an entity associated with human-being preceding his birth, and also surviving his death. If yes, is it not necessary for man to have at least vague consciousness about its existence as his own original substance,separate from his ego ?

As generally believed, or taught by religions, soul is joined with man's spirit from birth. It travels with him all the way his life, and survives even after death. This is the most common concept of soul. 

But when one does not experience the presence of such a soul any time during his lifetime, how could such a belief gain rational support ? The christian concept of Guardian Angel is still can make sense, as it has specific role in the life of man, as it safeguards man both from physical and spiritual dangers. 

Unlike the concept of Guardian Angel, such a third party soul does not have any sensible role in the life of man, except perhaps living alongside his spirit as a reflection of his spiritual root. Something beyond man's experience,or consciousness range is difficult to be accepted as true.

6) Finally, and most importantly, what entity of man out of all the above  that is now engaged in this act of social communication, as the empirical entity that you know as me,and I know as the 'other' to you, and all others: is it exclusively my social self, ( the ego) or is my secret self- the soul- also there in the picture, mixing certain degree of non-worldly wisdom also in the act?

This is one of the most difficult of all the above questions. Ego, with its typical life and survival centered concerns and priorities, can not be expected to enter itself into a pursuit of the nature that I am engaged in now; ie. seeking the metaphysical roots of man's soul. It means, there exists some other more subtle and deep self within man who is most concerned about matters of soul. life after death, and moral and intellectual obligations during lifetime. What is there in life that compels many men to engage in such extra-survival pursuits such as art, beauty, literature, knowledge, science,philanthropy etc ? 

It straight away indicates the meaning of life beyond mere physical survival as professed by Charles Darwin.Life is definitely something beyond mere physical survival. It is about man's experiencing LIFE as an exalted event. He effortlessly senses this exalted state of life from his internal sources, that, (such sources) unfortunately modern science does not believe in, or support. For science, mind is merely a by-product of matter and every mental activity is triggered by some or other kind of chemical excretion into the brain.The invisible existential DRIVES that compels man to act in certain ways and manners, like the laws of motion of Newton for physical objects, is not at all in the awareness of science. Our blog link that depicts the working of these DRIVES is: http://unrecognizedobjectsofthemind.blogspot.in/

Here the central fact of 'free-will' comes to picture. The primary 'self' that gets born from the 'sense and world' interaction uses its FREE-WILL to define itself. He can either live in the life sphere as a pure ego
( related only to the world ) till death, and vanish as dead matter, or he could use his hidden sources within to sense his ethereal roots, and transcend his 'self' into a higher being. When one relates himself with total existence and its secret sources, instead of remaining as mere ego, this transcending takes place. From this point, the self starts looking at himself, others, world and life as whole in  very different angle. It is such a transcended self that usually indulge in activities similar to the one that this author is engaged in.

Such 'transcended selves' realizes that what he, as an ego, is not the end thing. He links himself with the hidden source of existence, and live a life of 'duality', as we have seen in one of the above paragraphs. Though he is indulged in all worldly activities with a sense of detachment, his consciousness is centered around his relation with the whole existence, and its source itself . In short, he is living in the world as his SOUL,and might be surviving his death also in his ethereal identity.

As a child can not ever imagine in real terms what would happen to him when he attains youth-hood, his body and mind change, the soul here on earth at the life sphere can not ever imagine what would be he, and where would be he after crossing the life sphere upon death.

The only source to have knowledge on these affairs is man's not yet recognized hidden sense-organ. To know more on such sources, please refer to our blog: http://hiddenobserveronthelimitationsofmind.blogspot.in/ ( para; Role of Reason in mind, and its metaphysical links)



Authored by : Abraham J.Palakudy

He is a seeker and researcher in fields like Mind&Reason, soul, and ego, self and world, Spirituality, metaphysics, and finally, Polity of man

contact him: ajoseph1@rediffmail.com
Twitter: Voice of Philosophy@jopan1

His profile and other blogs:https://www.blogger.com/profile/14249415589712707293

      

  

Spirits of the world, and that of the world above

The metaphysics of the human personality, and that of his not yet recognized 'spirit'

The criterion of truthfulness of man’s realities and inferences were always decided by its degree of closeness with nature’s own laws. Hence, the reality of man’s soul ( or spirit) if any, must be decided by what nature, or GOD intended by this concept, or reality.

If the concept of Ego is better understood as some kind of a SPIRIT of the world, a phenomenon that has its origin in man’s various encounters in his tenure of life, SOUL also is better understood on the same lines - - -as a SPIRIT that originates when man encounters his extra-physical dimension of life. 

The intense 'urge for spiritual seeking!

It should be assumed, that every human person experiences many times during his life- time,a burning urge to seek the truth about who is he? This urge shud be treated as the most distinct sign that marks him different from animals !

This 'urge', those who have experienced must be knowing, at times turn so compelling and persistent, that it becomes unbearable ! This suffocating spiritual urge must have pushed many 'sages' and rishis of the past to head for mountains to meditate, seeking knowledge, and deliverance from the pain of knowing the truth. It is very real an urge, many a time, more unbearable than the most intense body urge, that for having sex !

Both the above referred SPIRITS deserve eligibility to be treated as real and distinct ENTITIES, as they are found capable of bringing forth real time changes in their respective HABITATS - - the world for EGO, and the domain of existence beyond the world, for the SOUL. These two spirits, or entities, have the real role in the act of EXPERIENCE - -experience as units of knowledge differs according to who among the above two, that experiences !  This who factor completely alter the very concept of human experience, as it is a new factor that determines the quality, and the genus of experience.

Science, with all its might of inquiry, should probe into this phenomenon of spirit formation,that really act as ‘contra-physical’ in the real world, as well as, possibly, in the world of ultimate reality too. ( hopefully, our parapsychologist are well aware of this phenomenon of the formation of strange spirits in mentally sick people. When someone is forced to encounter abnormal life experiences, a spirit forms within him to live with such synthetic realities. Ego is a common spirit of all, that forms when men encounter the same world, hence it is accepted as normal )


It seems existence has this plan, as Her ploy to achieve the inevitable ‘duality’, for the act of BEING.

The contra world-spirit that man is able to form in the act of his spiritual seeking, play the much-needed role of ‘duality’ that God has schemed in his plan of BEING, by knowing. Knowing by a counter entity is existentially essential for ‘being’. For the act of knowing, two entities are essential. Nothing can BE, without some other entity existing for knowing it. Knowing is what gives birth to the entities in their mutual interaction, in the enactment of the drama of existence. Hence, duality is the net, essential principle of existence. Bishop Berkeley had hinted on this existential scheme, but we do not know whether he had the above 'DUALITY' principle in his mind or not !( He said 'nothing can Be,without being perceived')


This principle necessity of a 'perceiver' for spiritual entities is very evident from the example of human ego.Ego gains its entity by transposing the external world around him as the perceiving 'other'. Ego places itself as an 'object', or an entity before such a third party 'other'. It is similar to the necessity of a canvas for a picture to exist. German philosopher Fichte also had hinted on this phenomenon of Ego making. His concept of inter-subjectivity says one's self-consciousness emerges when he see other individuals around him. ( readers may please see a much-needed link on 'world' here:http://selfandworldblogs.blogspot.in/2015/03/is-world-absolute-object-or-relative.html) 

When God becomes man's 'other',replacing the role of 'world', spirituality turns real!


By this logic,the soul also might be needing God as its perceiving,entity giver, in real terms! When ego gains its synthetic entity by transposing external world and its members as the 'other', SOUL is gaining its entity when the source of life,GOD, perceive such spiritual entity in real time.  

Thus, the human soul seems to be developing as a spirit during man’s life time, in the same way, Ego develops as the ‘spirit of the world’ when one start encountering the world in his life time.  The Soul emerges, when man, haunted by the call of his Reason, transcends his experiences to higher realms, stay there for a considerable period of time, till a spirit formation happens. Here his very entity, as well as his future life experiences will alter.  

Unlike the synthetic realities of the Ego, the soul seems to be able to touch with real energies behind existence. The world of reality beyond the world and ego, is the habitat of the SOUL thus formed, hence the wall between man and the reality of the ultimate stuff no more exists here, it seems. A door, hence, towards glimpses of truth is not prohibited for man, it looks like. It is not any particular formation of thoughts that makes it possible, but a transformation of one’s very entity.