--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Rick Archer" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > From: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > On Behalf Of John Davis > Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2007 8:02 AM > To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com > Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Advice Sought > > > > Hi OffWorld, > > >> Moreover, when meditating I am in effect praying to a god not of > >>my culture, > >> and of whom I have no knowledge, which leaves me deeply > >>uncomfortable.>> > > >Why are you afraid of Gods? You are human for chrise sakes ! > >Grow-up man. > > Afraid? No, that was not my meaning at all. But rather, seeing no reason to > believe in the existence of an anthropomorphic interventionalist god or > gods, the act of praying to one natrually leaves me feeling uncomfortable, > both as sitting uneasily with my own beliefs, and as being potentially > insulting to one who does believe. > > John > > Try thinking of gods not as they are depicted in Hindu mythology, > but as higher, more fundamental or more comprehensive impulses of > organizing intelligence. For instance, just as a liver cell might > think of the entire liver as a god, or the liver might think of > the entire body as a god, perhaps there are intelligent systems, > conscious beings actually, who have a broader range of > responsibility than we humans. They govern or coordinate > the universe from a deeper or more comprehensive perspective. > That's how I understand gods, as best as I can explain it. So I > don't feel that I'm praying to or worshiping some dude with four > arms and a lot of beads, rather that I'm attuning myself to a more > cosmic expression of nature's intelligence, and thereby > benefitting from that association.
"Conscious beings" is still too anthropomorphic for me, although I can go along with the last sentence here. I think of the "gods" as entirely abstract fundamental governing principles, "laws of nature" in TM-speak but operating at a far more profound level than, say, the laws of physics-- more like pure math, at the "Fermat's Last Theorem" level and beyond. The explanation of the relationship between the mantras TM uses and the Hindu deities that makes the most sense to me is that the mantras *predate* the deities. The mantras are fundamental vibrations that actually structure our minds from right at the "border" between mind and transcendent, mind and pure consciousness. These mantras have existed as long as human beings have existed; the externalization and personification of these impulses as deities was a later development. When we "receive" the mantra from a TM teacher, what's really happening, I believe, is that the teacher is merely calling our attention to that particular vibration already present in the mind, but normally at such a subtle level that we don't realize it's there because our much noisier thought processes drown it out. (This all applies just to the "bija" or "seed" mantras used in TM, BTW.) Obviously, the idea that when one entertains the mantra one is "praying" to a deity would be absurd in this formulation. The fact that Hinduism associates the bija mantras with the dudes with four arms and necklaces of skulls and so on is of no relevance whatsoever to me as a non-Hindu. As to the mantras having "meaning," that's a tricky issue. When most people ask whether the mantras have meaning, they're asking about *semantic* meaning; that the mantras are "meaningless sounds" is an entirely accurate response to that question. They are not the "names" of deities either. If by "meaning" you mean "significance," that's quite different. But they don't "mean" the deities; the mantras are not symbols of the deities, the deities are symbols--gross forms-- of the mantras. If you were able to meditate deeply enough on one of the deities, ultimately you would arrive at the associated mantra. Bottom line, I think the whole notion of TM being "religious" or "a religion" is a big fat red herring. You can certainly *make* a religion out of it (and some do), but you can also understand it on a much more abstract and universal level. One isn't necessarily better than the other; it's a matter of which is more suitable to your individual temperament and background.
