Truth vs Falsehood (54 page)

The problematic issues are the consequences of seemingly outdated ecclesiastical doctrines that have contributed to the church’s decline. Churches are decreasing in number and often five or six in a diocese close up and consolidate. In some areas, due to massive lawsuits, bankruptcy is being declared. The church has declined in moral stature and public opinion due to serious scandals for which the public expects more than a passing insincere ‘regret’ for injuring the lives of many thousands of innocent children. High-profile felonious offenders, instead of being defrocked, are merely shifted to another clerical post with consequent public outrage.

Inasmuch as both poverty and environmental pollution are consequences of overpopulation, the church’s overall position on contraception at calibration level 180 contributes unnecessarily to the world problem inasmuch as contraception calibrates at 205, and the spirit does not enter the embryo until the third month of gestation. Overall, the problematic rigid ecclesiastic positions result in a world full of nonpracticing ex-Catholics. (It took the church four hundred years to retract the excommunication of Galileo.)

Big institutions, including governments, over time often fall into bureaucratic paralysis and ineptitude and become nonfunctional due to sheer complexity (i.e., Sanskrit
tamas
). The major split in the Christian church resulted from disagreement over church authority, based on disagreement over interpretations of the theology of the Trinity. Consequently, the church separated into the Roman and Eastern Orthodox divisions.

Subsequently, the Church of Rome was perceived to be in error in some of its practices, which led to the onset of Protestantism, the Reformation, and the removal of the belief in the infallibility of the Papacy. The Protestant Reformation was furthered by the invention of Guttenberg’s printing press, which provided the availability of the Scriptures to the masses that had been previously limited to the clergy and written only in Latin. Protestantism supported the spreading of the Gospel and its translation into the languages of all countries.

In the calibrations, the numerical differences between the various branches of Christianity do not reflect ‘better than’ or ‘worse than’ but instead signify the level at which truth is to be explained and therefore the accord with an attendant audience. The major denominations, which calibrate primarily in the 400s, include rationality, reason, and intellectual level of expression comprehensible by most people.

The downside of Christianity was the most extreme at the time of the Inquisition, when religiosity degenerated into hysteria and fear. The technical, legal basis for declaring a heretic was actually not the belief held but the refusal to give it up when ordered to do so by church authority (e.g., the example of Galileo). Paradoxically, some aspects of the church came to represent the opposite of the teachings of its founder, whose essence was based on seeing sin as due to ignorance, and mercy and forgiveness as overriding principles, which Jesus demonstrated under the most extreme conditions possible.

Church institutions become vulnerable to error because the human ego is vulnerable (i.e., spiritual ego). Mystics, on the other hand, do not get embroiled in worldly affairs and therefore are not seduced by vulnerable positionalities (i.e., nonduality of ego transcendence).

Religious groups such as Universalist, Nondenominational, Religious Science, and Unity tend to be liberal, easy-going, and nondogmatic. They are upbeat in that they emphasize the pathway to God through Love, Joy, Peace, and Goodwill rather than through guilt, shame, and penance, which is the downside of older, more ‘Gothic’ Christian religions, both Catholic and Protestant. The liberal ‘New Thought’ religions emphasize tolerance, acceptance, forgiveness, and compassion towards self and others as well as toward other religions. Just as Protestantism was a protest against the downside of Catholicism, these church groups are a development that rejects the downside of Protestantism, which was often overbalanced on the side of ‘hating sin’ or being obsessed with it instead of transcending it by spiritual virtue. Interestingly, Mardi Gras calibrates at 189 and Lent at only 190.

Questions sometimes arise regarding the Mormon Church of the Latter Day Saints (LDS) because of controversy regarding its origins, practices, and the supposed discoveries of documents by Mark Hoffman. The “Salamander Letters” were proven to be bogus as were other supposedly historical documents allegedly discovered by Hoffman, who apparently was a clever counterfeiter. Joseph Smith calibrates over 400 and the LDS Church itself at 405 (consistently verified). Extremist polygamous sects, however, calibrate at 135-140, and polygamy has been outlawed by the Mormon Church since the late 1800s. Despite whatever errors may be involved historically or theologically, the calibration at 405 reflects that Mormons accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, which in itself raises the overall level.

Buddhism

The Buddha lived five hundred years before Christ on the border of Nepal in a primarily Hindu culture. As the well-known history says, he was born of royalty and raised in an artificially protected environment by his family that did not want him to be soiled or disturbed by the downside of ordinary civilization. When he escaped this artificial protection and wandered into the streets of the city, he was shocked when he witnessed the suffering of old age, poverty, sickness, and death for the first time. This activated in him an intense desire to reach the ultimate truth of life. He sought out Hindu sages and spiritual groups for study and meditation but, in the end, realized their limitations and left them. By legend, in his determination to reach the ultimate truth, he rejected the then available Hindu teachers and instead sat alone beneath the bodhi tree in intensive meditation. With one-pointedness of mind and intensity of purpose, he progressively surrendered the illusions of the ego (
maya
). As he drew closer to the ultimate enlightenment, he was beset by demons and went through physical agony, feeling as though his bones had been broken (analogous to Jesus’ sweating blood in the Garden of Gethsemane and the physical agonies of many of history’s greatest and most celebrated mystics).

At long last, the weakened ego collapsed, the mind became silent, and then the Buddha Nature of universal, nonlinear Oneness as the unmanifest, yet the Source of All Existence, was revealed in its stunning glory. This is actually a ‘condition’ and not a state of mind because mind itself is transcended, revealing the Self, the divine Purusha, Divinity Immanent, the Presence of Divinity as the substrate, the Unmanifest (i.e., Godhead) out of which arises all Creation. Later Buddhism is represented by two main schools, Hinayana (the lesser vehicle) and Mahayana (the greater vehicle), which differ in emphasis.

The teachings of the Buddha spread into the Far East, out of which Zen Buddhism became the best known in the West. Buddhism is benign and views other religions as limitations rather than as rivals. Later, Buddhist sects arose in response to the influence of various teachers and sages. Also, analogous to Christianity, there arose the conceptualization of the Buddha as savior, intercessor, and advocate, as expressed in Lotus Land Buddhism, which is a more practical goal, considering the extreme negativity of human life on this planet during this “Kali Yuga,” or rotation of the zodiac. For practical reasons, a devotee strives for sinlessness and purity; therefore, at death, the spirit enters the celestial realm of the Lotus Land, equivalent to Christian heaven, where the Christ-like Buddha intervenes. From Lotus Land, or heaven, which is beyond the extreme negativity of the earthly life, progression of the spirit to Enlightenment is a practicality. Lotus Land and Heaven are viewed as a celestial, spiritual reality earned by karmic merit.

As an offshoot, Tantric Buddhism developed, which became involved with linear conceptualizations, other energy fields, and their esotericism. Thus, it represents a reinvolvement in the linear domain and calibrates lower than pure Buddhism. Paradoxically, although the Buddha proclaimed, “Make no images of me,” statues and figurines of the Buddha are a major product available worldwide. By his statement, the Buddha attempted to preclude idolatry, and indeed, the issue of icons was central to the split between Eastern Orthodox and Roman Christian churches. This preclusion of images and icons is also common to Islam as well as Judaism.

In practice, most communities are quite hospitable to Buddhist groups and commonly help them celebrate the building of a
stupa
, or holy shrine. The Buddhist compassion for all of life earns it respect, and Buddhist teachings are made familiar to ministerial students in schools of Divinity, such as the Unity School of Christianity. The Dalai Lama is widely respected, as is his quote: “It is not enough for religious people to only be involved with prayer; rather, they are morally obliged to contribute all they can to solving the world’s problems.” This quote, in just one sentence, clarifies why Mahayana Buddhism, which is concerned with the enlightenment of all sentient beings, calibrates higher (960) than Hinayana Buddhism (890), which is focused primarily on just one’s own enlightenment.

The mutual respect between Christianity and Buddhism is also reflected in the formation of
avant-garde
groups of monks who, tongue-in-cheek, call their groups’ orientation “Zen Catholicism.” Oddly, Zen, which is actually a branch of Mahayana, calibrates somewhat lower overall than Mahayana itself. The reason is still unclear except that it perhaps became an ‘institution’. Some current American rishis also misidentify satori states, which are temporary, with enlightenment, which is permanent. Zen in the West is at 755.

Hinduism Ancient

The Yogas

Others

Hinduism, and its expression as the classic yogas, is the most ancient religion and reached high levels of perfection probably before 5,000-7,000 B.C. The entire culture and way of life in India reflect religiosity. Funeral pyres are seen along the banks of the Ganges River, along with rites honoring Shiva, and millions of Indians bathe in the waters. The pantheon is confusing to Westerners, and Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva reflect various aspects of God. These are further reflected in the lesser gods, such as Durga and Ganesh, the elephant god. The inclusive mentality of India is not well understood from the traditional Western viewpoint of the Newtonian paradigm of reality with its customary, circumscribed, logical construction. In Hindu culture, Divinity is expressed more as a holographic panoply of points of observation, and the reflection is the consequence of the point of view of the observer. Thus, God is not a definable or a limited concept, as signified by the triune of Brahma, Vishna, and Shiva.

Because Divinity is the source of all that exists, it is reflected in all that exists; therefore, it can be seen in painting, art, nature, dance, the feminine, the masculine, the animal, and the changes of nature. The illusory, apparent creation and dissolution of phenomena are displayed by the well-known Dance of Shiva, which is represented worldwide in that famous statue that depicts the effect of the selection of the point of view on what is observed, i.e., whether a phenomenon is constructive or destructive is merely a reflection of whether the event is desired or not desired, and neither construction nor destruction is innate to reality (i.e., limited to
res cogitans
).

The various yogas are not general theological belief systems but generically denote the main pathways to God and the realization of the self as Divinity Immanent. This is in contrast to most Christians who believe that God is transcendent, whereas, contrastingly, the core of Hassidism reflects the awareness that Divinity is present in all that exists.

The yogas address the primary pathways to spiritual realization through the heart and devotion, or past the mind,
Advaita
, and nonduality, and through selfless service, purification, karma yoga, and meditation. These facilitate the rising of spiritual energy up through the chakra system to the crown chakra, and then on up through the purely spiritual energy bodies (Causal, Buddhic, Christ, and Atmic), which have in turn foci of energy analogous to the chakras (i.e., spiritual vision ensues from the ‘opening of the third eye of the Buddhic body’).

The Hindu religion is so broad and all encompassing that it benignly welcomes all spiritual seekers for it has the tolerance and confidence born of the sheer ancientness of reaffirmation by a series of mystics over millennia.