--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote: <snip> > If I were to try to create a true secular spiriuality, I > wouldn't recommend meditation that used mantras at all. <snip> > I doubt I'd recommend heavy visualization techniques to folks > just starting meditation, but again my mythical org would > discuss the various types and their supposed benefits and tell > students where they could learn them. If we had to recommend a > starting point, I suspect that a lot of the geometric yantra > designs would pass the secular "sniff test." More traditional > mandalas or images of holy folks definitely would not.
I'm curious why you feel you could recommend geometric yantras but not mantras, at least not bija mantras, since both are deeply embedded in religious traditions in which they are said to be abstract representations of qualities of the divine. Why would geometric yantras pass the secular "sniff test," but bija mantras would not? Seems to me the explanations of why, despite their religious associations, a yantra or a mantra can be used in a purely secular meditation context would be very similar.
