[Faith-talk] Eastern Religions

Wed May 14 16:13:02 UTC 2014

Kirt,

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, I agree that eastern religion can comprise quite a range of concepts. I am largely influenced by the non-dual schools of Hinduism, particularly advaita vedanta. I don’t have as great of knowledge of Buddhism. In my experience, Buddhism tends to speak of emptiness, while Hinduism tends to speak of an all-encompassing being, which they call Brahman. I tend to agree with this latter school of thinking, though both can really be true. As I said, words cannot express it.

As for reincarnation, firstly it makes the most sense to me. We all come into this world at various points. Some people become materialistic, while others seem to naturally become spiritually enlightened at a very young age. People have different beliefs, different fears, different interests, which cannot all be explained by either genetics or their upbringing.

What’s the alternative? The atheist would say that we simply blink out of existence at the end of our life. I don’t believe this, but won’t go into detailed reasons here.

The other possibility is the Christian idea of heaven or hell. I find this inherently unjust. How can a person definitively discover truth and what is good, in a span of 70-80 years or less, to such a degree that they could potentially end up in a fiery place of torment for eternity? There is so much to learn in this world; we can’t possibly do everything we need to do, learn all the lessons we need to learn, in a few decades.

So reincarnation makes the most sense. We have thousands of lifetimes in which to learn everything we need to. There is no rush. there is no judgmental God who will send us to hell if we don’t believe the right things or aren’t righteous enough. It’s just one learning experience after another, until at last we discover our true nature, which I discussed in my prior email.

Besides this, I’ve been a fan of the work of Dr. Brian Weiss. If you’re not familiar with him, he was a traditional psychiatrist who used hypnosis in his therapies at times. Eventually he found that some of his patients naturally regressed into a time before they were born in their current life. Though he was very skeptical at first, pretty soon the evidence added up and he had to admit to reincarnation. I believed in it before reading his books, but his writings definitely helped.

I’ve also had past life regressions myself and had very strong experiences. This is not evidence per se, but it definitely helped me to make this all more than mere theory.

As for karma, I believe in the more traditional view of it. Again, there’s no God keeping a tally of all of our sins, but it is simply a reaction to our every thought, word and action in this world. Sometimes it returns almost immediately, and sometimes it won’t return for many lifetimes.

Eventually we realize that there is no doer at all, but that actions simply arise in consciousness and are effortlessly carried out. At this point no further karma can be incurred, because the doer, who is the object of such karma, has disappeared, and only the pure light of Truth, Brahman, Tat, Satchidananda, etc, is present.

I hope this answers your questions.

Brandon
On May 14, 2014, at 11:53 AM, Kirt <kirt.crazydude at gmail.com> wrote:

> Brandon,
> Icy much to admire and your perspective. However, from my study of eastern religions, not too shallow to be cursory but certainly not incredibly deep saying you are influenced by "eastern religion"is just about as useful for defining your specific beliefs as saying you are a "Christian."I know you have mentioned specific branches of thought that have inspired you but I'm curious which streams of Hinduism/Buddhism you identify with most. Also, when you speak of "Karma"are you referring to the Jain concept of karmic matter on your soul or the more traditional view that it is simply a force of nature? Also, what sort of empirical evidence do you have to justify your belief in reincarnation? Again, I'm not trying to offend, I'm just curious.
> Best,
> Kirt ,
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
>> On May 14, 2014, at 8:41 AM, Brandon Olivares via Faith-talk <faith-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>> 
>> Poppa Bear,
>> 
>> There are several answers to this. Obviously, truth is reality. What is, is truth. The question is, what really is?
>> 
>> For the purposes of ending suffering, which is why I think we are here, that doesn’t much matter. What matters is that we don’t argue with truth. Arguing with truth is the root of all suffering.
>> 
>> Let me give an example. Let’s say you apply for a job, but you aren’t accepted. If your reaction is anger and depression, or any other negative emotion, you are suffering. Why? Because truth is that you did not get the job, but you are trying to argue with reality. You are trying to say, “I should have gotten that job.” But you didn’t; there is no should about it. When you come to accept that you should not have gotten it, simply because you didn’t, you will no longer suffer, and can go on to apply to other jobs and either get accepted, or not.
>> 
>> So truth in this sense is simply, that which is. When we argue with that, we suffer. That which is will never change because we really want it to. It will be what it will be.
>> 
>> If your interest is deeper than that, and you want to find your own spiritual identity, then we can identify Truth further, but not much. My favorite sentence of the Tao Te Ching says:
>> 
>> “The tao that can be told
>> is not the eternal Tao
>> The name that can be named
>> is not the eternal Name.”
>> 
>> So, whatever you try to say of Truth, is simply false, because Truth (and I am using a capital T here to point out its transcendent nature), is beyond all words. Words are man-made, describing finite realities, but Truth is infinite. In Taoism, it is simply called the Tao, also often called the void, or nothingness, or darkness. In Hinduism, especially in advaita vedanta, it is called tat, which literally translates to “that.”
>> 
>> Truth is what I call God, but in reality God is a pretty poor term for it, because it is so abused in the west. People say, God is loving, God is just, God hates these people or those, we must kill in the name of God, etc. God is anthropomorphized— it (and I use it purposefully), is made into a person, a He usually. By so doing, God is made exclusive. He is not a she, and he only approves of certain things, but hates others.
>> 
>> But Tao, Tat, that which is, approves of all. It has no opinion, because it knows of no good or evil. It is simply being, or non-being, whichever. It does not matter. We are all part of that reality, our souls are really all specs within that larger beingness. There is no you or I or the other, but only Tat, Tao, Truth, filtering through our apparent perceptions. To me, it appears as one thing because of my totality of life experiences, while to you, it appears as another. To you, from what you have said, it appears as non-being, in the way that you do not know if God exists. But it also appears as how you see the world, which I don’t know you well enough to say. It might appear as love, or as hate, or as joy or despair. But all of it, the light and the dark alike, are all Tat, Tao, God, Truth, Reality. It is not better or worse that you are agnostic, nor that I am non-dualist, nor that someone else is Christian. It is how Truth manifests to that individual.
>> 
>> I hope this helps.
>> 
>> Brandon
>>> On May 14, 2014, at 9:59 AM, Poppa Bear <heavens4real at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hello Brandon, nice to have you on the list. I was wondering after reading
>>> your post, how do you define truth?
>>> 
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Faith-talk [mailto:faith-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Brandon
>>> Olivares via Faith-talk
>>> Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2014 5:45 AM
>>> To: Faith-talk, for the discussion of faith and religion
>>> Subject: [Faith-talk] Eastern Religions
>>> 
>>> Hello,
>>> 
>>> I've been reading with interest the various thoughts posted here. However,
>>> my own philosophy is in line with eastern thinking, such as Hinduism,
>>> Buddhism, and Taoism. I don't identify with any one religion, because I
>>> believe that a religion is just a series of labels that in the process of
>>> self realization, we have to one day surpass anyway. But I do read the
>>> writings of some of the masters. I myself believe in reincarnation and
>>> karma, which are staples of eastern religions, as well as non-duality, which
>>> is the believe that all things are one substance- that there is neither good
>>> nor evil, right nor wrong, being nor non-being, but the Truth includes and
>>> surpasses all of these man-made polarities.
>>> 
>>> Anyway, I just want to see if there is anyone here who has similar beliefs,
>>> or if there might be an interest in discussion of this sort of philosophy.
>>> 
>>> Thanks,
>>> Brandon
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>> 
>> 
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