TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns. See the end of the post for the full meaning and implications of that.
REALIZING WITHOUT DOGMA, WITHOUT CONTINUOUS SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, AND WITHOUT A PREOCCUPATION WITH “THE NATURE OF REALITY AND THINGS NOUMENAL:
The bondage of world concern, self-concern,
material concern, religious concerns, and spiritual concerns
Over the years when the suggestion has been offered that it is possible to realize without dogma, without continuous spiritual practices, and without a preoccupation with the nature of reality and things noumenal, the ones who reject that suggestion outright, the ones who become emotionally intoxicated and respond with invectives and profanities and "personal" attacks, and the ones who work themselves into a state where they would love to be able to do something violent to me, have been those identifying as "Christians who also happen to be on the path."
Their prevalence among those reacting may be because the blog is being posted in the U.S. where Christians dominate the religious (and political and business) landscape and because the Muslims who have attacked the pointers offered on this blog are obviously present but in far fewer numbers.
When self-identified Christians feel threatened and attack both the writer as well as the suggestion that it is possible to realize without dogma, without continuous spiritual practices, and without a preoccupation with the nature of reality and things noumenal, it has been pointed out that Christ - in the end - left organized religion and gave up teaching dogma and shared non-dual pointers during the last years of his manifestation.
He stopped speaking in buildings dedicated to worship, such as temples and synagogues, and instead offered his talks on hillsides and in private homes. He had nothing more to do with organized religion and their trappings and their "places of worship" and their supposedly holy writings, yet his self-identified "followers" are attached to all of that which he modeled for them to abandon.
Were he to have been asked at the end, he too would have agreed that it is possible to realize without dogma, without continuous spiritual practices, and without a preoccupation with the nature of reality and things noumenal.
To continue:
The Advaitin poet Shakespeare may have written a play entitled “much ado about nothing” in the late 1500’s1599. Maharaj in the late 1900’s said: that when a person is being driven by the mind, “it exaggerates.” He advised seekers to “live without self-concern.”
Maharaj: “Don't concern yourself with others, take care of yourself.”
Yet many over the years have protested:
Unimportant? Much ado about nothing? The heck you say! What about my father and others who fought the Germans and Japanese. You think they did not make a difference? They killed Hitler.
The reply” “Actually, Hitler killed himself. But again, the point is this:
Maharaj said: “There have been thousands of avatars and great men, and important personalities. Has a single one of them been able to do anything to change the natural course of events in the world?”
Of course, his answer was “No," and the historical record - especially the historical records left by the always-trying-to-control-other-nations-U.S. - provides evidence of the accuracy of his observation:
Did Hitler's demise “change the natural course of events” (or, more accurately, humankind’s most unnatural course of events)?
Absolutely not. Over a quarter of a billion people have been killed since the end of WWII and the number may be higher. Howe many have died in nations with “Hitler-like” leaders seen atrocities within their borders since the death of Hitler? Over a quarter of a billion people have been killed since the end of WWII, and the number may be higher. Consider China and Russia’s actions and U.S. involvement all around the globe.
Consider the killings in Korea, Cambodia, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Rwanda, and all across the African continent. And consider the popularity of such concepts as eugenics and white supremacy and Nazism which are presently on display in the U.S.
Consider The Reagan Wars: Reagan's conviction that the Soviet Union lurked behind all the world's evils led him to embrace a series of unsavory allies on the principle that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." In the name of anticommunism, Reagan supported the regimes of brutal authoritarian dictators in Haiti and the Philippines.
He supported the white supremacist government of South Africa in its efforts to suppress the country's growing anti-apartheid movement. He funded and armed right-wing "death squads" that rampaged through El Salvador and Nicaragua, massacring leftist foes and innocent civilians alike. He sent lethal weaponry to both the Islamic fundamentalist government of Iran and to the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
He even invaded Grenada. Only in Afghanistan did one of Reagan's covert foreign interventions inflict real harm upon the Soviet Union, but in hindsight we can see that Reagan's Afghanistan policy ended up inflicting real harm upon the United States as well because he armed a group to fight Russians in that country, a group which would later become known as Al-Qaeda.
The Bush / Cheney War in Iraq: The Iraq War began with the 2003 invasion led by the United States. The invasion toppled the government of a former U.S. ally, Saddam Hussein. The conflict continued for much of the next decade as an insurgency emerged to oppose the occupying forces and the post-invasion Iraqi government set up by the U.S. It is estimated that as many as 600,000 or more estimated Iraqis were killed in the first three to four years of conflict.
L. Paul Bremer, Iraq’s American ruler in 2003, along with the U.S. policy he enforced, were key contributors to the original insurgency after the U.S. invaded Iraq on bogus, fabricated charges.. At a stroke of Bremer’s pen, 400,000 members of the defeated Iraqi army were barred from government employment and denied their pensions but were allowed to keep their guns. Those forces became “The Islamic State” (a.k.a., “The Islamic State of Iraq” and “al-Sham” or ISIS).
Now, consider those banging on their wars drums to attack Iran and consider the way that the Israeli government is treating the Palestinians whose homeland was taken from them in 1947.
So killing Hitler changed the course of events in the world? Hardly.
Thus the suggestion offered by Maharaj and here as well can be paraphrased in this consideration: “Physician heal thyself.” There might be a difference in the way the rest of your relative existence unfolds as well as in the relative existence of those dealing with you. But overall? Nada.
And post-manifestation when there is no relative existence to affect one way or the other? Even more Nada.
Vietnam . . . add in much ado about nothing
Maharaj: “Stop misusing your mind and all will be well with you. You need not set it right -- it will set itself right, as soon as you give up all concern with the past and the future and live entirely in the now.”
Maharaj made clear that there are no half-measures in regards to reaching a sense of unimportance and understanding that all which happens in the relative existence is much ado about nothing: “Either you become totally self-concerned, or totally un-self-concerned.”
His invitation: “Give up the bondage of self-concern”
and
“Abandon all self-concern”
and
“Worry not about the material or spiritual.”
Humans concerned with self or with seeking Self or with their identification with Self blow everything all out of proportion. The Obsessive-Compulsive Personality disorder is running rampant, and seekers and non-seekers alike – still trapped in the mind – will obsess (that is, endlessly think about something and think about something and think about something) and then they will act compulsively (that is, driven by the hidden agendas of their personality identifications of the agenda of their Self identification).
All is so magnified and such anal behavior is inspired by their OCD that the invitation offered to some seekers who have come here has been to "throw away your microscope and pick up a telescope and turn it around and view all thorough it to get a proper perspective. Stop magnifying and de-magnify instead”
and
“It has nothing to do with either "high esteem" or "low esteem" to suggest that you stop over-estimating your worth or value and fixate in a sense of unimportance. Besides, “low-self-esteem and high-self-esteem are still about nothing more than the self. As for one with “Self-Esteem,” the view here is that “sometimes, no company is far preferable to certain company that might want to show up.”
In the end, much ado about something and magnifying and obsessing and behaving compulsively and having a sense of importance and self-concern and Self concern and dogma and spiritual workaholism and endless inquiry and Inquiry and bondage and an absence can all be traced to the present of a mind, and any and every mind is filled with nonsense and ignorance and insanity.
To be free, be free of the mind.
To be free of the mind, be free of its content, namely, ideas, concepts, perspectives, perceptions, misperceptions, notions, etc., which can all be encapsulated with the term “beliefs.”
Want to be free of the mind? Believe nothing. Every belief is one more link in the chains that bind, and all those chains are mental chains.
To be continued.
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns.
THE EXPLANATION
If looked at as nouns, they point to illusions and are, therefore, a total waste of time to even discuss; if looked at as verbs which are resulting in certain sane but rare behaviors among humanity, then they are worthy of some attention during the relative existence.
Meaning? There are members of certain groups who say things such as "My concept of God in the past was of a weak God, an absentee God, A Santa Claus-type God, a mean, punishing, vindictive God, etc. Today, I am in close contact with a loving and caring God whom I worship and praise and glorify and give thanks to."
The reply to that usually goes like this: "If you are in contact with a God that wants to be worshipped and praised and glorified, then you're dealing with someone like yourself - a narcissist - and hanging out with narcissists will never bring an end to your narcissism (that narcissism evidenced by the fact that you think you are "godly").
Next, in the phrase 'loving and caring God,' any supposed God that truly had her or his act together would tell you that the totally irrelevant part of that phrase is 'God' and that the only part that is relevant is the "loving and caring" part.
"That is, a non-narcissistic god / goddess would say, "I care not an iota about being worshipped and praised and glorified by you or anyone else. How arrogant and insecure and needy would I have to be to want that? Forget the man-made, dreamed up noun 'God' and focus on the 'God as a verb' understanding and then go forth and let loving and caring be verbs - not adjectives - and let them generate the act of love and the act of caring and let those actions manifest through you."
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places but are states of mind, nothing more than concepts dreamed up by men."
--Pope John Paul II
"There is no hell."
--Pope Francis, the current pope
[in an interview with journalist Eugenio Scalfari,
a writer used by the Pope to issue off the record
teachings
which are part of the Papal Magisterium]
