--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "curtisdeltablues" <curtisdeltabl...@...> wrote: > > First of all if we want to talk about having a simplistic > understanding of the Hindu religious beliefs I have to > object to your using Krishna's statement about the > unfathomable nature of Karma out of context. He is > referring to the future effect of an action and all its > implications for a group of people and an individual > trying to make a decision.
Exactly. One of the things that always amuses me is that the very people who tend to trot out the olde "Unfathomable are the ways of karma" saw are the very ones who seem to get up on their high horses the most when they perceive something as "unfair" and feel the need to "correct" it. Some- how the ways of karma suddenly become not only fathomable to them but self-evident when this magical whatever-it-is-that-allows-them-to-fight- on-the-side-of-right happens. :-) > As far as the specific punishments for various actions and the > specific type of birth punishment meted out by Karma the Hindu > scriptures are very clear. If you read the Laws of Manu you will > find very detailed descriptions of what happens for trying to > buck the caste system. (and we have already dealt with Maharishi attempted > dodge, it doesn't hold up if you actually read the book.) The Laws of Manu has to be one of the most horrific texts ever created by human beings. WAY worse in its specificity than anything written by Hitler or the fundiest Christian Fundamentalist. The whole thing is about fostering an attitude of unblinking obeisance to The Law Of Preserving The Elite Status Of Those Who Claim To Be Able To Perceive The Law. Icky. > Here is where Sam Harris and I agree. The absurdity of religious > beliefs are being protected by people who are assuming a modified > version that removes the most obviously antisocial elements. I am > not arguing against your personal mix of ideas Judy. They are none > of my business. > > I am arguing against a system of beliefs that claims to know how > the universe works after death. And a society that uses that > system to oppress people for generations. Why limit it to "after death." Most of the "laws" that those who have oppressed people with have written are dealing with what they (the oppressors) are allowed to do to those who don't do what they want them to *before* death. I think that you can edit your statement above, Curtis, and make it more accurate. The problem with religious beliefs is people who claim to "know," period. If the people who claim to "know" are few and have no social power or status, they are merely cultists. But if the people who claim to "know" happen to be the ruling class of a country, what they "know" tends to become formalized not only in religious "laws" but in social ones as well. Then you get laws like being able to kill an untouchable for looking askance at a Brahmin. > What you believe in your self determined life in your free > society has nothing to do with my objection. You have the > luxury of believing anything you want precisely because our > society has rejected the Vedic claim ... And the Christian claim, and the Jewish claim, and... > ...that they know everything about how life works based on > old books and a tradition that tells a child: "you will > never be good enough." I have *never* understood those who make excuses for the Indian caste system merely because Maharishi did. I mean, his whole *life* can be viewed as a form of rebellion against the caste system he portrayed himself as believing in. If he had really believed in it, he would never have begun teaching *because his caste is not allowed to set themselves up as teachers*. He would *certainly* never have created a bunch of out-caste white people as "rajas" or "kings" of an imaginary Vedic country if he had truly believed in the caste system. Maharishi believed in the caste system when it allowed him to get his way. As has everyone else in human history who either invented it or used it to suppress others *to* get their way. I think that anyone who *dares* to support the idea of the caste system should get to live a little of the karma of being ridiculed for doing so. The *only* reasons they can ever seem to come with for defending it are 1) Maha- rishi did, so it must have been right, or 2) it says so in "the Vedic literature," which was written by People Who Knew. I don't think any of them ever "knew." I don't think any human being in history has ever "known." I think they only pretended to know because that made it easier for them to get their own way. As far as I know, not a single one of the "holy tradition" of teachers whom TMers revere ever paid their own way in life. Not one. Their lives were paid for by others, whom they had convinced *to* pay for them by convincing these others that they "knew" something. I think that to be kind the only thing we can be certain that any of them ever "knew" was how to get others to pay for their lives so they didn't have to.
