Author Topic: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?  (Read 30576 times)

ekim

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 5812
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #200 on: February 18, 2016, 09:44:08 AM »
which recognises the neotenous nature of H. Sapiens. We are the ape that never grows up, we remain in extended childhood throughout our lives.
Perhaps some have the potential to evolve from or transcend that state.

Walt Zingmatilder

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 33188
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #201 on: February 18, 2016, 09:53:32 AM »
That would account for my occasional bouts of childish humour!  :)
Very occasional.

Leonard James

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12443
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #202 on: February 18, 2016, 11:53:17 AM »
And this post is no less condescending, Len.  There are many highly intelligent people who couldn't be described as " ... being in the child stage (mentally and emotionally...not physically)....", who have a religious faith.  The fact that some of them have been brought up in non-religious families, and others have rejected faith in their youth only to return to it later in life, indicates that the comment 'misled in their childhood, would be perfectly capable of thinking as adults' is somewhat moot.

Can you tell me  where a non-religious culture exists?

Walt Zingmatilder

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 33188
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #203 on: February 18, 2016, 12:07:50 PM »
Perhaps some have the potential to evolve from or transcend that state.
I think it's going the other way.............

Sriram

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8253
    • Spirituality & Science
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #204 on: February 18, 2016, 02:12:43 PM »
which recognises the neotenous nature of H. Sapiens. We are the ape that never grows up, we remain in extended childhood throughout our lives.

Spirituality is a natural process. It is something most people are naturally drawn towards. Nothing supernatural about it. We have evolved from animals to humans and will evolve further such that we will eradicate most of our animal traits. This is probably written in our DNA. It is a natural progression and development that we can't help moving towards.

Different people will adopt different ways of moving forward. This is what in Hinduism are called the Path of Devotion, The Path of Action and the Path of Wisdom.  Which path we will choose to follow will depend on our nature, mental and emotional state.

Even though we all grow up physically, many people tend to retain many of their childhood desires, fears and instabilities....because of their culture and social pressures. Such people will naturally tend to follow the devotional path because it is both nurturing and  punitive, like a parent.

Others who are skeptical of authority and of devotional processes (because of their culture and social pressures) will also tend to retain many of these tendencies all their life. They will probably not follow any spiritual path consciously but will indulge in activities and humanism that will take them forward never the less.

People who are mentally mature and neither in need of parental influences nor of self indulgence...will follow the path of wisdom which is secular and involves conscious self awareness and self discipline. 

Of course, these paths are not mutually exclusive and water tight. Most people will have a mix of all three with one of them dominating over the others.

Nor are any of these paths lower or higher than the others. they are just different processes and suitable for people of different natures. 

Cheers.

Sriram





« Last Edit: February 18, 2016, 02:14:52 PM by Sriram »

Shaker

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15639
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #205 on: February 18, 2016, 03:18:57 PM »
We have evolved from animals to humans and will evolve further such that we will eradicate most of our animal traits.
I hope you realise that this is arrant cobblers. We haven't "evolved from animals to humans"; we're still animals - animals which have evolved from earlier ancestors, but still animals. Only the desperate desire on the part of some people to deny this copper-bottomed fact led them to create a 'special' category called humans who are supposedly set apart from the rest. The evolutionary kinship of all life on Earth is a fact, but the vast majority of humans go about their days either not knowing of it or, even when they are aware of it, purposely ignoring it.

I don't think much of this idea that we're supposed to try to deny our animality; that leads to the sort of moronic human exceptionialism (beloved of much religion and theistic religion especially) which sees humans as not merely quantitatively but qualitatively different, and in every case that has been the pseudo-justification for every kind of use and abuse of other animals ever perpetrated.
« Last Edit: February 18, 2016, 03:22:57 PM by Shaker »
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Bubbles

  • Guest
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #206 on: February 18, 2016, 04:01:27 PM »
I hope you realise that this is arrant cobblers. We haven't "evolved from animals to humans"; we're still animals - animals which have evolved from earlier ancestors, but still animals. Only the desperate desire on the part of some people to deny this copper-bottomed fact led them to create a 'special' category called humans who are supposedly set apart from the rest. The evolutionary kinship of all life on Earth is a fact, but the vast majority of humans go about their days either not knowing of it or, even when they are aware of it, purposely ignoring it.

I don't think much of this idea that we're supposed to try to deny our animality; that leads to the sort of moronic human exceptionialism (beloved of much religion and theistic religion especially) which sees humans as not merely quantitatively but qualitatively different, and in every case that has been the pseudo-justification for every kind of use and abuse of other animals ever perpetrated.

It reminds me of this poem by Alfred Noyes  ;D


The New Duckling
'I want to be new,' said the duckling.
'O, ho!' said the wise old owl,
While the guinea-hen cluttered off chuckling
To tell all the rest of the fowl.

'I should like a more elegant figure,'
That child of a duck went on.
'I should like to grow bigger and bigger,
Until I could swallow a swan.

'I _won't_ be the bond slave of habit,
I _won't_ have these webs on my toes.
I want to run round like a rabbit,
A rabbit as red as a rose.

'I _don't_ want to waddle like mother,
Or quack like my silly old dad.
I want to be utterly other,
And _frightfully_ modern and mad.'

'Do you know,' said the turkey, 'you're quacking!
There's a fox creeping up thro' the rye;
And, if you're not utterly lacking,
You'll make for that duck-pond. Good-bye!'

'I won't,' said the duckling. 'I'll lift him
A beautiful song, like a sheep;
And when I have--as it were--biffed him,
I'll give him my feathers to keep.'

Now the curious end of this fable,
So far as the rest ascertained,
Though they searched from the barn to the stable,
Was that _only his feathers remained_.

So he _wasn't_ the bond slave of habit,
And he _didn't_ have webs on his toes;
And _perhaps_ he runs round like a rabbit,
A rabbit as red as a rose.

Alfred Noyes :


Wanting to be something more   ;)


 ;D

Sriram

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8253
    • Spirituality & Science
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #207 on: February 18, 2016, 04:17:21 PM »
I hope you realise that this is arrant cobblers. We haven't "evolved from animals to humans"; we're still animals - animals which have evolved from earlier ancestors, but still animals. Only the desperate desire on the part of some people to deny this copper-bottomed fact led them to create a 'special' category called humans who are supposedly set apart from the rest. The evolutionary kinship of all life on Earth is a fact, but the vast majority of humans go about their days either not knowing of it or, even when they are aware of it, purposely ignoring it.

I don't think much of this idea that we're supposed to try to deny our animality; that leads to the sort of moronic human exceptionialism (beloved of much religion and theistic religion especially) which sees humans as not merely quantitatively but qualitatively different, and in every case that has been the pseudo-justification for every kind of use and abuse of other animals ever perpetrated.


Ok...I'll bite this one time.

Scientific classification is not what I am talking about. We ARE humans and we ARE very very different from all other animals in most ways.  We don't call ourselves Neanderthals just because we share a common past with them, do we?!

I know we have many similarities with animals because of our common origin but.... whether you like it or not...that is what we have been trying to eliminate all through history with our 'civilized societies'.

In fact that is what civilization is all about......becoming less animal. We have tried to develop our more human qualities such as humanism, compassion, self discipline, art and culture more and more in civilized societies.  That is also what is considered as spiritual.   

Animal abuse has not been perpetrated in Indian societies. Hinduism in fact recognizes that we all have an animal past. It is believed that we all have lived as animals in some past life....and share common experiences with them. Vegetarianism is common in India.

Calling ourselves animals wrongly re-emphasizes our past that we have branched away from long ago. We are never going back! It is regressive to continue to think of ourselves as animals (and never mind scientists). 

Bubbles

  • Guest
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #208 on: February 18, 2016, 04:27:23 PM »
A spiritual experience


Quote

The beauty of the trees, the softness of the air, the fragrance of the grass, speaks to me.
The summit of the mountain, the thunder of the sky, the rhythm of the sea, speaks to me.
The faintness of the stars, the freshness of the morning, the dew drop on the flower, speaks to me.
The strength of fire, the taste of salmon, the trail of the sun, and the life that never goes away they speak to me.
And my heart soars.

Chief Dan George

http://paganpoet.com/native-american-quotes-sayings-and-proverbs/


I don't think you need religion to relate to that one  :)

Shaker

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15639
Re: Can you have a spiritual experience without religion?
« Reply #209 on: February 18, 2016, 05:00:58 PM »
A spiritual experience

I don't think you need religion to relate to that one  :)
Pantheism, AFAIC.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Bubbles

  • Guest