Understanding Concepts of Traditional Religions

A presentation by

Dr. Robert SiemannIntended for personal use only

Credo

• "Truth is to be discovered not by poring over old books  nor by spending endless hours in contemplation

•  but by asking questions and looking for answers. 

•  We seek through doubt, and by seeking we perceive the truth." 

•  Peter Abelard (c.1079-1142)

Pistis Sophia

• “To recognize knowledge as ignorance is noble,

To regard ignorance as knowledge is evil.”

Wisdom of the East

• “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” Gospel of Thomas

Credo

If the sun should rise for us tomorrow,

it is only because there are

individuals of good will

who choose to stand

between us and the devil.

Robert F. Kennedy

1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

Acknowledgements• Portions of this presentation were adapted from the following

sources.• Shamans Sorcerers and Saints by Brian Hayden• Shamanism by Mircea Eliade• Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity by Roy Rappaport• The Masks of God Primitive Mythology by Joseph Campbell• From Ritual to Romance by Jessie Weston• Quantum Philosophy by Roland Omnes• Veiled Reality by Bernard d’Espagnat• On Intelligence by Jeff Hawkins• A Mind of its Own by Cordelia Fine

Prologue

• “O Believers

do not walk in front of the Prophet.

Do not raise your voice above his” ----------- the Qur’an

• Why should God raise one human above all others?

Logos

• Understanding different religions is a very complex task. Particular ideas and concepts may overlap, reflect, oppose, or complement one another. In the real world generalizations may be helpful but rarely apply to every specific instance. Nevertheless we, as twenty-first century citizens, must take the first step towards understanding. It is very important to understand how other people think and what they value.

• While some like to emphasize the fundamental similarities of all religions, there are also many fundamental differences. Scholars have identified two clearly different major religious trends: “book religions” and “traditional religions”. We contrast these two trends.

Important aside

• The area in Europe which is now Germany was once known as the “Holy Roman Empire”. Goethe remarked that this region was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire. In other words, the term was merely a (useful) label but was not to be taken literally.

• In the same way the terms “traditional religion” and “book religion” are terms used by scholars but should not be taken too literally.

• Traditional religions are called that because almost always oral traditions are extremely important. Book religions are called that because almost always they have an important book. This distinction, however, is not essential.

• Having or not having a “book” is not what really matters.

Important aside

• What does matter is that the two types of religions have entirely different world-views and life-views. That is, two different ways of thinking and determining important values.

• We will use the usual terms of “traditional” and “book” but it might be better to simply envision them as “type 1” and “type 2”. This eliminates any preconceived notions.

Sacred and Profanebook religions

• The word sacred means worthy of respect and reverence because of some religious and/or historical significance. Sacred things are usually separate from us, possibly forbidden to directly come in contact with, and unchangeable and inviolable. The word profane denotes ordinary, common, and changeable things.

Sacred and Profanetraditional religions

• The word sacred means worthy of respect because of the presence of vital forces of creation, change, dynamism, life, energy, in an object, experience, or place. In contrast the word profane refers to things, which seem static, dull and lifeless.

World Viewbook religions

• That which is considered sacred or divine is generally to be found somewhere distant and separate from ordinary existence. The sacred or divine may be centralized and/or personified. Typically, God, or the gods are located someplace apart from the world such as in the heavens. This is particularly true for the Abrahamic religions and less so for the Vedic and Buddhist religions.

World Viewtraditional religions

• The sacred is everywhere. It is potentially immanent in everything: animals, plants, people, rocks, bodies of water, mountains, the sky, and the stars. The sacred essence can erupt from its dormant state and become manifest from any thing at any time.

• Moreover, under the right conditions using appropriate procedures involving perhaps rituals, objects, and/or special places or special times, people can establish direct contact with the sacred.

• This is a critical difference. The idea that the sacred was in everything was the single idea that was most repulsive to the prophets of YHVH in the TANAKH. The prophets were particularly incensed at the idea that God’s essence could be in a tree or stone or other natural object The rejection of this idea continues with mainstream Christianity and Islam.

World Viewtraditional religions

• The universe is a vibrant living entity (or multiverse to use a theoretical physics term). This multiverse does not depend on anything external to itself but emerges and maintains itself via self-consistency and complementarity. As a vast network of information it seeks in a very real sense to know and understand itself and explore its many possibilities. This concept has become a very important part of the Vedic and the Buddhist traditions.

• Humans being part of this vibrant entity should experience joy, celebration and wonder. The cosmos communicates with individuals, and individuals are never alone. Such a view is sometimes called cosmic consciousness or cosmic religiosity.

• The sacred is everywhere in the universe and nothing is completely profane.

Profanity is but an illusion of our own ignorance, the slumber of our senses or the madness of our false ideas.

The Sacred

• For traditional religions,the sacred resides in the universe and nature. In fact it is all around us and freely accessible by anyone.

• For the mainstream Abrahamic religions the sacred resides in a single personal (anthropomorphic?) and extremely powerful entity (God of Abraham). God is removed from the traditional realm of the natural world and is in a separate almost totally inaccessible far away somewhere. Cosmic religiosity is explicitly rejected.

• For the mainstream Abrahamic religions,the universe is created by and dependent on God.

Sacredness and DivinityAn Important Question

• Does that which is divine determine that which is sacred?

Or

• Does that which is sacred determine that which is divine?

Or

• ?

Life Attitudebook religions

• There is a tendency to view the world as a somber and solemn place, or one that should be. The major philosophical themes are that if we endure the sufferings inflicted by fortune and society here, we will be rewarded in an afterlife. The world is a painful place and therefore we should try to arrange our spiritual development so that we can get out of this existence. The world is bad; things are bad; the flesh is sinful. Denigrate the world; mortify the flesh; emphasize an afterlife.

Life Attitudetraditional religions

• Try to connect people in this life to the sacred forces of the universe in a celebratory fashion. Despite frequent adversity, traditional religious people experience a strong connection to the land, the plants, and the animals. These experiences are celebrated and viewed positively in many ways. People interact with the universe on an individual basis and frequently communicate with nature, enhancing subjective feelings of being alive. Rituals with food, drink, music, and dance especially epitomize this.

Sacred Scipturesbook religions

• Sacred canon of scripture that describes religious entities and events and usually provides a moral code.

• Once things are written down and canonized they become immutable. The words of sacred scripture can wield absolute power for eternity. Words become more important than thinking or experience.

• “Nothing is to be accepted except on the authority of scripture, since greater is that authority than all the powers of the human mind.” --- St. Augustine

Sacred Scripturetraditional religions

• No written canon of scripture but traditions are passed on from generation to generation in mainly oral form. There is no set of official beliefs or creed. Most importantly, traditional religions are passed as experiential traditions. Religion is not a set of beliefs rather it is a set of experiences and knowledge. This more closely models the fluidity observed of sacred forces.

• Customs and practices undergo subtle changes, as they are transmitted orally and new situations encountered. Outdated, inappropriate, or irrelevant ideas or practices can be discreetly dropped and new ones incorporated.

• Stories used are teachings to be interpreted as signposts pointing to the experience of life and sacred forces. They are not to be taken literally.

Sacred Timebook religions

• Important sacred stories are presented as historical events which ordinary people can never directly experience.

Sacred Timetraditional religions

• Important sacred experiences do not occur in the past but in the here and now. For example, the Vernal Equinox is a real time seasonal event which can be directly experienced by everyone. Similarly, stories (like Harry Potter) occur in symbolic time and can be experienced directly by anyone.

Religious Elitebook religions

  The structure of book religions usually leads to the development of a

privileged religious elite. Only the religious elite has special or sometimes exclusive access to sacred powers. This is particularly true for the mainstream Abrahamic religions.

  Because a vast chasm separates humanity and nature from the sacred,

some sort of Intermediary is needed in the form of Teacher/Prophet/Founder.  The Teacher/Prophet/Founder comes to humanity as Lord or Master or even

Redeemer to reconnect us with the sacred. Sin and repentance is his usual message. The Teacher/Prophet/Founder is unique in history and forever remains distinct from the rest of humanity in many different ways such as having a special sacred lineage or sacred abilities. Sacred scripture, as given or inspired by the Teacher/Prophet/Founder is viewed as the “Word of God”.

 

Religious Elitebook religions

• An institution forms, with some real or alleged association with the Teacher/Prophet/Founder, to control access to and correctly “interpret the word of God”. This institution frequently claims that it is “infallible” and is only “carrying out the Will of God”.

• Important sacred stories are presented as historical events which ordinary people can never directly experience. However the religious elite ,legitimizing their authority, claim they are the rightful successors of people who did directly experience these events.

• The religious elite often make special efforts to awe worshipers with wondrous architecture and landscaping or the riches of clothes or ornaments. This provides, to ordinary people, an artificial substitute for a true sacred experience.

Religious Elitebook religions

• The overall result is that access to the sacred, for ordinary people, is now to be found and controlled through the institutional hierarchy and its elite members, procedures and interpretations. 

• Harry Potter, for example, is abhorred by religious conservatives because he directly contacts sacred forces.

Religious Elitetraditional religions

• The unstructured nature of traditional religions makes it difficult to develop a privileged religious elite.

• There is no Teacher/Prophet/Founder who originally specifies the religion and no institutional authority that maintains it.

• Some people may be more capable of easily contacting sacred forces than others. But the sacred is really freely accessible and available to everyone.

• Important sacred experiences do not occur in the past but in the here and now. For example, the Vernal Equinox is a real time seasonal event which can be directly experienced by everyone. Similarly, stories (like Harry Potter) occur in symbolic time and can be experienced directly by anyone.

Sacred Ecstatic Experiences ( SEE )

• altered states of awareness transcending conventional consciousness and connecting with sacred forces

• non-ordinary ways of experiencing the energies of the living universe

• may occur at many different levels from mild to epiphany to enlightenment to

transcendent mystic union• mostly euphoric but may also be painful

Sacred Ecstatic Experiencesbook religions

• Individual ecstatic experiences tend to be frowned upon, discouraged, or cloistered away. There appears to be an underlying fear that private contacts with the sacred (even by standard clergy) might lead to uncontrollable or dangerous behavior. Religious authorities try to limit direct experiences of the sacred to only the most important religious people.

Sacred Ecstatic Experiencestraditional religions

• Entering into an ecstatic state is the religious experience. It is a direct connection with the sacred forces of the universe and is therefore encouraged and highly desirable for all persons.

Sacredness of Foodbook religions

• Ordinary everyday eating for sustenance is entirely nonreligious. For example in modern societies the consumption of meat is taken for granted. We have become separated from any sacred aspects of eating animals, animal products, or plants.

Sacredness of Foodtraditional religions

• Eating is a sacred act connecting the individual to natural forces. One should be thankful to an animal for providing milk for example. One should always remember that if we eat something in order to live then something else has had to die. Food and drink are important parts of ritual feasts and are thought to be favorable for contacting sacred forces. The killing of animals and the eating of meat are thought of as a powerful event that usually only takes place during ritual feasts.

Sacredness of Music and Dancebook religions

• Some forms of music and dance tend to be considered profane or even dangerous unless closely supervised and controlled by religious authorities

Sacredness of Music and Dancetraditional religions

• All forms of music and dance are important parts of rituals to contact sacred forces.

Goals and Moralitybook religions

• The primary goal of one’s life should be to live in a state of purity or grace, without sin, so that one may be united with the sacred forces after death. Religion then becomes a codified ethical system for achieving this goal. Book religions are above all else moral systems.

Goals and Moralitybook religions

• Moral issues are particularly strong in the mainstream Abrahamic religions.

• God demands absolute faith from followers and compliance with His Will no matter how unreasonable it might seem.

• Specific commandments are made and expected to be obeyed. God is wrathful and insists on correct behavior and correct thought. Evil and adversity simply become tests of one’s faith. Humans are the servants or slaves of God and live in constant fear of His punishments.

• Adopted and extended from Zoroastrian Persian Duality, a strong emphasis is placed on good versus evil struggles. The struggle is always between strictly good and strictly evil with no in between.Of course “us” are always on the good God’s side while “them” are on the evil anti-God side. Strong good versus evil dualism makes fanatics absolutely sure they are right and makes martyrdom not only viable but encouraged.

Goals and Moralitytraditional religions

• Traditional religions are not moral systems.• The main goal of one’s life is to be in contact with sacred

forces during this life and to celebrate this connection. Techniques for achieving this goal are the most important elements of traditional religions. One technique is ritual but one should be open to other especially new techniques. In addition, the other goals of traditional religious practitioners are usually practical rather than moral. They seek to influence cosmic forces for the benefit of themselves or their communities for healing, fertility, or protection.

• Higher level ethics, morality, and philosophy are of secondary interest or inconsequential.

Goals and Moralitytraditional religions

• However, there is a strong implication and expectation that contact with sacred forces should be used for good. Similarly, intent, motivation, and control are important.

• Many traditional stories speak of selfish, malicious or uncontrolled misuse leading to destruction .

• Both Harry Potter and Voldemort directly contact sacred forces but for different reasons and hence experience different final results.

Central Mysteriesbook religions

• The central mysteries revolve around actions of the deities or moral aspects of the universe (especially why evil or pain exists).

Central Mysteriestraditional religions

• The central mystery is life itself -- where it comes from, where it goes, what affects it, and how it transforms and is continuous from year to year and from generation to generation.

Participationbook religions

• Participation tends to be more of a spectator event with a few clergy manipulating sacred objects and conducting rituals in front of a massed congregation. The officiating clergy rarely if ever enter into ecstatic states. Rituals are routine and run by the book. As long as the right words are said and the right actions taken, the ritual is a success. There is very little if any emotional involvement.

Participationtraditional religions

• In traditional religions, broad segments of the community participate fully.

• In particular women participate just as fully as men.• While not everybody may enter ecstatic states, many

sometimes do. People either experience ecstatic or altered states themselves, play music, sing, dance, eat sacred foods, keep rhythm, make or wear masks and costumes, and so on. Rituals are structured so that they are welcoming and open for everyone’s active participation. There is a strong emotional involvement and transformation of consciousness of the participants.

Exclusivitybook religions

• Book religions are ethical systems and tend to consider other belief systems as not fully ethical or valid. Generally they tend to be intolerant of other systems even when they do not actively try to eliminate the others. Therefore book religions transcend ethnic groups and tend to be proselytizing.

Exclusivitybook religions

• With the prophets of YHVH, religious based wars appear for the first time in known history. While it was certainly true that other tribal groups had patron deities that members prayed to for success in warfare, wars were always fought for more mundane purposes such as land, riches, slaves etc. The gods were simply implored to help. People were now told to fight and plunder simply because YHVH had commanded it. The justification for elimination of enemies was based on their beliefs, not their economic assets. This practice, unfortunately, continues to this day.

Exclusivitytraditional religions

• In contrast traditional religions easily accept other religions as being equally valid and are very tolerant of other beliefs.

Techniques for Sacred Ecstatic Experiences

• The goal is to transcend the (common ordinary) models (distortions?) of reality formed in the neocortex (new mammalian) part of the brain and force new interpretations and/or rely more on the paleocortex (old mammalian ) and the reptilian parts.

Physical or Psychophysical Techniques

• Fatigue and sleep deprivation• Sensory deprivation or sensory over stimulation• Fasting and dehydration• Physical or emotional pain and stress• Rhythmic breathing or hyperventilation• Hypothermia or hypothermia• Physical or emotional trauma• Deep percussion, driving rhythms, sound patterns, dance• Extreme relaxation or hyperactivity• Sex• Drugs• Blood loss

Mental Techniques

• Disorientation and confusion• Trying impossible mental tasks• Blurring one’s sense of self – masks and role playing• Monotonous repetition• Meditation and prayer• Ritual• Extreme motivation• Extreme involvement or devotion to something• Thinking in ways which transcend ordinary common

sense such as --- Theoretical Physics, pure Mathematics, doing (as

opposed to learning about) Science

Talking with a Treea subtle but profound experience• One can learn a lot from a tree but a tree

is a quiet and patient being. To hear what it has to say, one must also be quiet and patient. Try to put aside what you have previously thought or felt about trees. Your goal is to transcend common ordinary experience. Follow these steps and you may have a sacred ecstatic experience.

Adapted from Shamans Sorcerers and Saints by Brian Hayden

• 1. Obtain a blanket and some water.• 2. Find a tree where you can be alone and undisturbed by other people, noises, or events for about 30 minutes. Older trees tend to have

more to say.• 3. Go up to the tree and introduce yourself in a normal conversational voice.• 4. Examine the tree closely.• How old does it appear?• Does it look healthy?• Are there any signs of trauma?• What does it smell like?• 5. Stand against the tree for a few minutes. – What kinds of feelings are experienced?• 6. Lie down on the blanket and look up at the tree. – What kinds of feelings are experienced?• 7. Inform the tree that you want to talk and that you have brought a small gift.• 8. Pour the water around the tree and find a position on the blanket, which will be comfortable.• 9. Look again at the tree and relax and then close your eyes and relax even further.• 10. It is important to relax as much as possible with no tension in your muscles etc.• 11.When you feel relaxed, bring your attention once more to the tree and see what kinds of impressions occur. – Impressions may be

visual, emotions, or thoughts.• 12.If any extraneous thoughts occur then bring your focus gently but firmly back to the tree.• 13. Any experiences concerning the tree may be very subtle at first, but keep waiting and watching until some impression forms and then

try to follow them.• 14. Above all stay relaxed.• 15.How do you feel? – Happy, sad, serene, anxious, tired, energetic?• 16. What is your overall impression of the tree and of its feelings, of its concerns and experiences as another living being? • 17. How does the tree relate to you or other things in its environment?• 18. After you have explored your own feeling and impressions as fully as you can, thank the tree and gradually become aware of the

noises and so on that are in the surroundings.• 19. Gradually bring your mind back to an awareness of the rest of the world around you.• 20. Remember or record your impressions.

Another example

• This example encompasses several mental techniques. Relax and then close your eyes and relax even further and then listen very carefully.

Adapted from Shamans Sorcerers and Saints by Brian Hayden

• Listen very carefully to what I say:• The talking is the important thing, nothing but the talking;• For the talking is truth and yet not the truth.• The talking is the word and the word is one. The word is many.• The talking is everywhere, yet it is nowhere.• The talking turns back on itself, but is not talking, and must go forward.• There is talking in the earth and on the earth and through the earth.• But there is only one true talking –• The talking that I am talking,• And I am talking that talk to you now,• Listening to my talking, going forward, feeling backward.• Can you hear me walking in my talking?• Listening in my talking?• The forces that are balking at my talking,• Moving through and few, flowing and glowing,• Surging and herding, crying to climb the divine.• Can you see my talking, smell the flocking?• Birds are walking, giraffes are gawking.• Break the sound of the talking,• Taste the sap from the earth.• Open the table, walk the window, pop the name, run the letter.• Come. Sit by me. Let blue run through your fingers.• And, the talk will begin.• For the talking is the important thing, nothing but the talking.

Shamanism

• Shamanism has extremely ancient roots, probably almost as old as human consciousness itself. It may be the oldest or at least one of the oldest types of religious techniques in human history.

• The word shaman comes from the Siberian Tungus term saman which may be derived from the Tungus word sa which means “to know”. The shaman intimately knows and can sometimes influence the sacred forces of the living universe experienced in traditional religions.