Plan B Forum

My good stoat, thank you for the food for thought during my work day. As I was pondering, I happened to recall an Eastern Parable from India. You sound like you're familiar with the concept of reincarnation?, so I won't Westernize it for you (it's bad enough I have to type the whole thing out since I can't find an online version.) So, here goes;


Vishnu the Supreme Diety and his wife Lakshmi, were looking down on the Earth, observing mankind. When Lakshmi said to her husband, I see some devote monks praying and chanting themselves into divine trances; shouldn't you go and reward them for their religiousness? Vishnu said, 'Let us observe them closer' and he sand his wife, descended to the mortal world in the form of a wise sage and his disciple. They went to the outskirts of the village where the monks would beg and perform mystic rites. There they waited by the side of the road. Soon a farmer, driving his donkey cart of wares to market, noticed the divine sage, and clasping his hands respectably asked, "Holy one, will I sell many wares today."

Vishnu as the Sage, replied, "Yes my son, your cart will be emptied today and the next market day; after which you will attain a fine new donkey and your sales will increase tenfold."

This all came to pass, and afterward the farmer spread the word throughout the village that there was a divine sage with the gift of prophecy. Soon everyone was coming to consult him about their future. In a few days, the devote monks came chanting and singing up the road to the sage's spot by the side of the road. The head monk, namasted and explained to the sage, "I meditate in an icy stream for an hour in the winter; and meditate surrounded by raging bonfires for an hour in the summer; I pray and chant everyday my praises to God; my question wise guru is this: Will I achieve enlightenment?"

The old sage paused and considered carefully before answering, "Yes, you will. You will achieve enlightenment in five births."

"Five births?" repeated the monk, "Five births?" he muttered as he walked away.

All the monks asked the same question; and to some the sage said ten births, fifteen births or fifty births before they achieved enlightenment. The whole group departed much quieter than before.
Then, a poor peasant who had been watching the entire time, modestly approached the sage and asked, "Master, I have no time for meditation nor chanting; I must work the fields from dawn til dusk; I can not read any scripture, but I love God with all my heart. Pray, I beseech you, Will I achieve enlightenment?"

There was a long pause, while the sage deeply thought and pondered. Finally, he spoke and said, "Yes, you will achieve enlightenment ...in one thousand births."

The peasant was overjoyed, and danced and clapped, "I'll achieve enlightenment! I'll achieve enlightenment!" he happily crowed.

Suddenly, the sage, the disciple and the peasant were engulfed in divine flames and transported to the higher planes.


...




As Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu regained her former form, she asked her husband Vishnu, "Why did you reward the peasant? The monks were much more devote."

Vishnu answered, “The monks were proud of their piety. The peasant had true humility ...and only pure love in his heart.


I relay this tale as an illustration of religion compared to spirituality, they are not the same thing. The monks in the story were religious, while the peasant was spiritual.







It seems the significant leaders of spirituality were NOT following a church nor religion;

Jesus broke from Judaism

Mohammed broke from Christianity

Luther broke from Catholicism

Buddha broke from Hinduism

These are the people God talks to: the non-Dogmatic, those who follow their inner-faith, not just the outer trappings of religion.
As soon as spirituality becomes dogmatic, a way is broken open by a leader to rediscover the spiritual path to God.

As an individual, a person has the freedom to re-discover faith in themselves too, when their spiritual journey becomes rote and ritual, and not devotion; they can decide to reject dogma to seek guidance to Godhead some other way. The choices are not 'Dogma or Nothing', those are false choices.. The possibilities are endless and eternal .

A nice story, lo. Of the two I would always go with spirituality.

(a) I don't get the point of the story. It seems to me that one who will acheive enlightment (assuming that's something to be desired) in FEWER "births" would be better off than someone who would not achieve it until a greater number of births had transpired. Sooner vs. later?

(b) Hindu's generally don't believe in "God." By definition they are polytheistic.

(c) Most people who favor "spiritualism" versus "religion" are simply too lazy and selfish (won't give up the Sunday NYTimes) to go to Church, and too cheap to put money into the collection basket.

(d) The people I know who are "religious" are also quite spiritual. It's mainly outsiders who don't see that - because they won't engage, and because they don't want to.

You don't know shit about Hinduism. But hey it's never stopped you spouting crap before why stop now?

Yes Hindus, strive to get off the wheel of life in fewer births. The point of the monks reaction was they were so proud of themselves, they didn't think they had many lives left. The point of the peasants reaction was he so was happy to be achieving enlightenment it didn't matter when he got there.

Idries Shah has a lot of interesting writings on the difference between the two.

yrs,
rubato

Idries Shah was born in Simla, India, in 1924, of an aristocratic Afghan family, the Saadat of Paghman. He devoted much of his life to explaining the East to the West, and made a wide body of scholarship of Eastern traditional teachings available in the Western world.

A foremost authority on Sufism, Shah presented key Sufi concepts, stripped of cultural and religious accretions, to a Western audience. He maintained that much of the work of Western psychology was pioneered, centuries ago, by Sufis.

Very interesting thX, I'll look into his writings more.