The Little Purple Notebook On How To Escape From This Universe
Copyleft � 1998 by Maximilian J. Sandor, Ph.D.
Subscription Information: Maria Loren
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Website:
http://transmillennium.net/pnohteftu/
Towards a New Platform for Religions and Liberation Philosophies
While a multitude of New Age religions, cults, and philosophies emerge at
the end of this millennium, the shapes of traditional religions are
changing to allow increasingly individual liberation as a focus for its
followers.
It seems a daunting task to keep track of the directions in which the
various schools are going and, more than ever, it becomes increasingly
difficult to tell the sheeps from the goats.
What can be rightfully called a religion? What can be expected to work
towards liberation rather than the coffers of its leaders? Are there limits
of tolerance, limits of acceptance as a genuine path towards spiritual
unfolding?
The schools of Baha'i and Buddhism have been praised as being the most
tolerant forms of religion, meaning they respect all other forms of
religion as such. Some others, like the Islam, have been critized of
demanding to kill anyone who 'doesn't believe'.
Yet, even Gotamo Siddharto, 'the Buddha', made it very clear that tolerance
doesn't mean a recognition of the validity of another path and he openly
outlined the fallacies of some of the religious schools that prevailed
during his time in India.
To complicate the picture, the published history of mankind shows a
repeated pattern of unholy alliances of religious leaders and governments.
This circumstance has led many honest and earnest spiritual seekers to
distance their own ideas from the concept of 'religion' altogether.
'Individual liberation', for them, became incompatible with 'religion' at
all - the title of this article has the extension '...and Liberation
Philosophies'
for this very reason.
While theories and practices of religions and liberation philosophies are
now splitting up and drift apart, the parts they do have in common become
clearer at the same time.
From an observation of these common parts, the following new platform for a
mutual understanding and acceptance of divers religions and liberation
philosophies has been derived:
INTEGRITY
A liberation philosophy strives for wholesomeness. The
core of traditional Western religions is the unity with
their god (whatever name they may give it).
Integrity, being integer, whole and clear, is thus a
sliding scale that culminates in invididual liberation.
Without integrity, religions and liberation philosophies
alike, would not be worth its name.
CONSISTENCY
Since liberation is aimed at a (very!) long-term solution
to the problems that arise by being within this Universe,
its foundation must necessarily be invariant over time
and space. In other words, 'truth' is the same, whether
here or on Alpha Centauris, whether yesterday or tomorrow.
This does not mean that 'truth' would appear the same to
everyone or that its formulation would not be bound to
the context of the time and culture in which it was
formulated - it just means that the theorems of
a religion of philosophy do not arbitrarily change
within time and space.
COHERENCY
While a recognized 'truth' should be invariant in time
and space, it should also be free of internal contradictions.
Since any such recognized truth will be an abstraction
in the process of its perception, the mandate of coherency
extends to all its derivations as well.
If a view from a 'higher' domain is being called an 'integration'
of the recognized truth, its representation in this 'higher'
domain should be free of internal contradictions as well.
Likewise, if a view from a 'lower' domain is being called a
'differentiation' of the recognized truth, its representation
in this 'lower' domain should also be free of any internal
contradictions.
This triad of coherency, consistency, integrity follows the rules of a
'triangle relationship', for example:
If integrity is lowered, consistency and coherency will decrease as
well. If coherency raises in a given philosophical system, consistency
and integrity will increase, etc.
It would be an illusion to expect that a platform like the triad of
coherency, consistency, integrity would play a significant role in global
politics. The mingled interests of bank accounts, political rulership, and
personal pride are prohibiting any sane approach to a true mutual
understanding of divers religions and philosophies.
However, this triad can be used quite well to gauge the validity of any
one teaching for one's own purposes.
Because, even though the ideal scenario would be to find one's own
liberation completely by oneself, it is extremely helpful, to say the
least, to look around and learn from others.
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Copyleft � 1998 by Maximilian J. Sandor, Ph.D.
