Theos-Talk Archives (May 2008 Message tt00872)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Anand" <AnandGholap@...> wrote:

 
> Word God does not exist in original Hebrew Old Testament. Yahweh was
> the word which was used in Hebrew Old Testament. 
> English translation of Yahweh is God. 


What I meant was that the notion of God, for the western world, is 
very much conditioned by the Judeo-Christian notion of God. Consider, 
for example, the very first sentence in the Bible: "In the beginning 
God created the heaven and the earth." (Genesis, 1:1) Since the Bible 
has been in 'print' for many, many centuries, and the text translated 
to many languages, the notion has spread far and wide. 
 

> > If you are born in a Christian or Hindu or Muslim or Jewish 
family, 
> > do you have much choice? Normally, a child will be educated and 
> > condiotioned according to the religion of his or her parents. I 
think 
> > that if you search for statistics of religious affiliation today, 
you 
> > would be surprised with the number of Buddhists in the world. I 
am 
> > sure it is nowadays over a billion people. In Australian, 
Buddhism is 
> > the fastest growing religion, particularly among young people who 
> > have declared themselves frustrated and utterly disappointed with 
> > Christianity and its many dogmatic aspects. 

> Below I am giving the statistics. Now tell me why there are only 6 %
> people in the world are Buddhists, whereas vast majority of mankind
> believe in religions with God as central idea ? 
> Christians 33.32% (of which Roman Catholics 16.99%, Protestants 
5.78%,
> Orthodox 3.53%, Anglicans 1.25%), Muslims 21.01%, Hindus 13.26%,
> Buddhists 5.84%, Sikhs 0.35%, Jews 0.23%, Baha'is 0.12%, other
> religions 11.78%, non-religious 11.77%, atheists 2.32% (2007 est.)


Thank you for the statistics. There may a number of historical 
reasons for them. Let me attempt to list some:

1. Buddhism was never the religion of a colonial empire.
2. There is no practice of forced conversion in Buddhism.
3. Buddhism did not flourish in India because the dominant 
Brahmanical caste rejected it and opposed it systematically.
4. Buddhism is not a belief-based religion, but an insight-based one.

In the words of the Mahachohan, 

"Mystical Christianity, that is to say that Christianity which 
teaches self-redemption through our own seventh principle?this 
liberated Para-Atma (Augoeides) called by some Christ, by others 
Buddha, and equivalent to regeneration or rebirth in spirit?will be 
found just the same truth as the Nirvana of Buddhism. All of us have 
to get rid of our own Ego, the illusory apparent self, to recognize 
our true self in a transcendental divine life. But if we would not be 
selfish, we must strive to make other people see that truth, to 
recognize the reality of that transcendental self, the Buddha, the 
Christ or God of every preacher. This is why even exoteric Buddhism 
is the surest path to lead men towards the one esoteric truth."

Note that he equates 'God' with the transcendental self in us, and 
not with an external, blood-thirsty tribal deity that suffers from 
destructive mood swings.

 
> > This may be a very dangerous notion: "religion  for more advanced 
> > souls". Who is the judge? Who can judge? What are the criteria? 
> 
> It is not a dangerous idea. It is a fact. When person evolves, he
> automatically gets attracted towards more advanced religion like
> Theosophy. 


So you now declare that Theosophy is a religion. Did you read CWL's 
thoughts on the subject:

"In Theosophy we strongly deprecate the attitude of blind belief, for 
we say that it has been the cause of a vast amount of the evil of the 
world. On this point the teaching of the Eastern Masters is emphatic, 
for they regard superstition as one of the fetters which it is 
absolutely necessary that a man should cast off before he can hope to 
make any progress on the occult Path. They also regard doubt as a 
fetter, but they say that the only way to get rid of doubt is not by 
blind faith, but by the acquisition of knowledge. It would be quite 
useless for a man to exchange blind faith in orthodox Christianity 
for a similar blind faith in those who happened to be writing or 
speaking on Theosophy.  To say: "Thus saith Madame Blavatsky or Mrs. 
Besant," is after all only a small advance on saying: "Thus saith S. 
Paul of S. John."" ("The Attitude of the Enquirer", The Adyar 
Bulletin, February 1911)


> If a 
> > person finds inspiration and clarity in any teaching that is 
their 
> > business. When the Portuguese arrived in Brazil in 1500, the 
jesuit 
> > fathers that came with them gave them permission to kill native 
> > aborigenes because, according to their theology, the aborigenes 
did 
> > not have a soul! As a result, one of the Portuguese explorers 
once 
> > came back from a jungle incursion bringing nothing less than 
7,000 
> > ears that his men had cut off from the aborigenes they had 
killed. In 
> > other words, the jesuits' "God" was nothing less than a gigantic 
> > killing machine. 

> You have wrong ideas about jesuits. Bible askes to make disciples 
of all 
> nations and it does not tell that some people don't have souls. Most
> of the jesuits know it. One jesuit mentioned by you may have wrong
> ideas, but it is his mistake, not the mistake of jesuit 
organization.


It was not one jesuit. It was the official theological instruction of 
the jesuits that came to Brazil with the Portuguese colonizers. One 
of the core elements of the Christian theology at that time was 
that "there is no salvation outside the Christian faith". Many 
Christian groups still uphold it today. Therefore the native indians 
in Brazil were already "pre-doomed" before 'civilisation' arrived. 

An incalculable amount of violence and butchery was done throughout 
history in the name of an anthropomorphic, Eurocentric, 
bloodthirsty, 'God'. If you doubt, have a look at the Holy 
Inquisition files which are being made available.

 
> Few years back I think you had given reference where HPB rejected
> Buddhist no-God theory and accepts existence of God. May be you can
> bring that reference again.


If you refer to my article on the subject it can be seen here:

http://www.austheos.org.au/magazine/pedro-god.htm


Pedro