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Exploring religion.
There are many different definitions of religion (EGs:
Religion [W] or
Religion [Dictionary.com/...]), but here is my
definition:
A religion is a system of faith. Hence, a religion involves two things: faith (belief in a
kind of reality) and a system (of moral codes, practices, and institutions).
- A person who emphasizes faith is spiritual. EG: Dogs and saints without religions are
spiritual.
- A person who emphasizes a system is dogmatic. EG: Convenience believers are dogmatic.
- A person who emphasizes both is religious. EG: Saints with religion are religious.
- A person who emphasizes neither is non-religious. EG: Babies and agnostics are
non-religious.
Religions deal with issues such as:
- Creation.
- The divine, the supernatural, unseen realities, after life, etc.
- People, past, present, future, environment, living, dying, etc.
- Morality and ethics including distinctions between Moral Absolutism (morals are inherent)
and Moral Relativism (morals are context dependent).
- Meaning, happiness, completeness, purpose, fulfillment.
Religious practices often include the following:
- prayer; meditation; confessions; mantras;
- chanting; hymns; psalms; songs; dancing;
- sacrifice and burning: incense; smoking; food, drink; animals; plants; people;
- rituals; pilgrimages; gatherings; ceremonies;
- holidays; festivals; feasts;
- temples; churches; shrines;
- idols; prayer beads; icons;
Here are is personal view on religion in brief:
- I am an agnostic --not an atheist.
- I am pragmatic and secular --not cynical or anti-religious.
- I am a naturalist but I acknowledge emergent experiences, complex experiences, and
unexplained experiences that may truthfully feel spiritual. I believe that
individuals and groups are at different stages in their own personal spiritual
and emotional
journeys, so I am generally tolerant and respectful of where people are. I
believe that we can benefit from exploring and comparing different
religions --and that it is part of our rich human heritage to do so.
- I believe that there are cultural, and social and/or emotional
benefits to committing to a non-secular religious system, but I also
believe that humanity is very young and that we will have many faiths
for a long time yet, thus it would be beneficial for people of different
faiths to participate in a broader secular system. I believe that government should be neutral on religion and that religious convictions
must be translated into secular and ethical terms when becoming policy.
- I was was born and raised a Catholic Christian, but I am only a nominal Catholic
Christian. I believe that there are many who participate in their faith
more for cultural, social, and/or emotional reasons than for literal
mystical reasons.
Religions are distinguished by several approaches including the following:
- Distinguish religions by the number of deities:
- Atheists. # of deities = 0.
- Monotheists. # of deities = 1.
- Deists. God created but does not intervene or for all purposes does not exist
anymore.
- Eutheists. God is and is good.
- Dystheists. God is and is bad.
- Satanists. God is and has a bad part or bad counter part.
- Gnostics. God is but most people mistakenly worship demiurges
that are not the real God.
- Maltheists. God is and is bad with other details.
- Polytheists. # of deities > 1.
- Animists. Supernatural beings/souls inhabit all objects and beings.
- Shamanists. Supernatural beings/souls are on the other side of the
axis mundi (world axis) and they affect this world. The concept
of axis mundi is common amongst nearly all cultures. The axis mundi is
often represented with a rope, tree, vine, ladder, staff, tai chi (yin
yang) symbol (Unicode x262F (9775): ☯), caduceus (staff with two
entwined snakes, Unicode x2624 (9764): ☤).
- Monolatrists. # of deities > 1, but the worshipper worships only one
particular god and this god affects his life.
- Kathenotheist. # of deities > 1, but the worshipper worships only
one particular god at a time and this god affects his life at that time.
- Suitheists. # of deities >1. The worshipper is himself a god --he
may have his own worshippers who may or may not be deities too.
- Agnostics. # deities = undetermined or indeterminate.
- Other.
- Henotheists. # of deities = 1 supreme god + other minor deities. In one sense (God +
Saints = deities).
- Pantheistic. God = the Universe = immanent. This may also be seen as # of
deities = 0
or 1 or 2+.
- Panentheistic. God = immanent + more. That is God also transcends the Universe.
- Non-theistic. The existence or nature of God or deities isn't an issue.
- Distinguish religions by essence. Where are the borders of religion, metaphysics, and
physics?
- Nihilism. All is nothing. Everything is meaningless, purposeless,
valueless.
- Monoism. All is of one essence, substance, or energy.
- Materialism = Physicalism. Everything is matter (body, mass, brain, etc.).
- Idealism. Everything is ideas (spirit, mind, language, etc.).
- Neutral Monoism. Everything is energy. Sort of moot given that matter = energy via E
= mc2.
- Fideism. Faith alone is sufficient because if "faith" were proven, then faith is
unnecessary.
- Nominalism. Universals do not exist, just Individuals. Antonym to Realism.
- Dualism. Duality may indicate two substances, or a thing with a double nature, or a
thing distinct from another thing.
- Cartesian duality. Mind/Spirit/Idea v Body/Matter. Of course with two substances,
you have the problem of "problem of interactionism".
- Yin Yang. Many things happen to have duality.
- Realism. Universals (properties, relations, types, or classes) exist independently
of any Individuals (objects in programming-speak). Universals were called "forms" or
"ideas" in Plato's The Republic. Antonym to Nominalism.
- Pluralism. There are many kinds of essences.
- Shunyata (Sanskrit for "emptiness"). Neither nihilism, monoism, dualism, or pluralism. The absence
of self. Form = emptiness. Being. Non-duality. "not two, not one". Taoist wu wei
("not doing"), not passivity, but predicate (action, verb) without a subject (noun, doer).
- Distinguish the religious (metaphysical, supernatural) from the non-religious (physical, natural) upon the basis of
scientific observation.
- Empiricism, Rationalism, Positivism, Skepticism, and the Scientific Method. Truth should
be determined by
{ reasoning, observation, factual analysis, a posteriori
knowledge ("after the fact"), inductive reasoning (arguments are cogent,
conclusion is likely), etc. }.
- Humanism. Anthropocentric Rationalists who focus on humans and human activity, as
opposed to animals, plants, nature, etc.
- Most "religions" determine truth by
{ faith, dogma, a priori knowledge ("before the fact"), deductive reasoning
(arguments are binding, conclusion is certain), etc. }.
- Some natural natural groupings of faiths:
- Abrahamic faiths. EGs: Judaism, Christianity,
Islam, Bahai, Druze, Mandaeanism, Sikhism, and Rastafari.
- Vedic faiths. Indo-Aryan faiths preceding Dharmic faiths.
- Dharmic faiths have the concept of dharma. EGs: Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Sikhism.
In dharmic faiths, entities participate in the world in samsara
(the cycles of existence) until they they achieve nirvana (a
realization of the nature of reality. Related Hindu words: moksha
("liberation") and mukti ("release")) --usually through bodhi
(enlightenment)-- and can hence break the cycle of samsara to eventually
fully pass away (parinirvana).
One does or can live by dharma (in Sanskirt) = dhamma
(in Pali), which can various meanings such as life/being as it is or
life/being as following laws or life/being following the samsara cycle.
Furthermore, there are three characteristics of existence, aka
"Dharma Seals" = ti-lakkhana (in Pali) = tri-laksana (in
Sanskrit).
- Dukka (in Pali) = dukha (in Sanskrit). This is
pain, suffering, non-satisfaction, discomfort, stress, etc.
- Annica (in Pali) = anitya (in Sanskrit) =
wúcháng (in Chinese) = mujō (in Japanese). This is
impermanence, flux, change.
- Anatta (in Pali) = anātman (in Sanskrit). This is
the lacking of soul, permanence, self, personality, and self-nature.
Later synonym: shunyata (in Sanskrit) = suññatā (in
Pali) = emptiness.
- Indigenous faiths, historical faiths, and faith that try to revive them.
Often some form of animism or neo-paganism.
- Syncretic faiths blend other faiths or consider all faiths to have
commonality.
- Revealed v Non-revealed faiths. Non-revealed faiths have no divine
representative.
- Other faiths.
- Distinguish religions by organizational, institutional, or historical structures.
See
Major_world_religions [W].
- Typical top religions by population:
- Christianity
- Islam
- Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist
- Hinduism
- Chinese traditional religion
- Buddhism
- Primal indigenous
- African Traditional and Diasporic
- Sikhism. Between Hinduism and Islam.
- Juche. North Korean ideology.
- Spiritism.
- Judaism
- Bahá'í Faith. A syncretic monotheistic religion that believes in
the progressive revelation via major prophets including the Abrahamic,
Buddha, and Zoroaster.
- Jainism
- Shinto. "The Way of the gods". Animistic. Kami = divine beings,
gods, God, deities, spirits. Amaterasu, the sun-goddess, is the most
famous kami and is often represented by a mirror.
- Cao Dai. Vietnamese monotheistic.
- Zoroastrianism. Persian ancient monotheistic religion.
2007-04-13t22:05:11Z
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