Wednesday, June 02, 2004
The Stages of Belief
I am trying to construct a paradigm to help understand the various stages and varieties (or at least some) of religious/spiritual belief. What I have come up with is tentative, at best, and is not intended to be a final classification or description.
1. The beginning stage is that of unquestioning belief. This level embraces various groups, from the naive primitive accepting the worship practices of the tribe, to the believer in modern society, who accepts the authority of his received tradition, without challenging or confronting its premises. The obedient followers of the "church," (of whatever stripe) as well as the "born agains" of certain traditions fall here. These represent those who long for authority to bequeathe them a final truth, which requires no effort of mental scrutiny on their part.
Truth here is very simple. All is divided into black vs. white, good vs. evil, and us vs. them. They often consider themselves the chosen ones, and some in contemporary times insist that the end of the world will soon occur, themselves being the sole remnant which to be "saved." Often these are very good people individually--they will help you in your need, succor you when you are ill, etc. But their credo brooks no violation of belief or prescribed code of behavior.
2. Here are those who have outgrown or renounced their early heritage, and have found nothing to replace it. Some rank high on the intellectual scale. Often they become the "scoffers and skeptics," who belittle and deride anyone who takes the spiritual search as well as the actuality of the divine seriously. They are in fact very hurt by their loss of an earlier idealism, which lurks in their consciousness as a kind of betrayal. They defend themselves by their scorn.
Another category of the "disillusioned idealist" includes many of the great contributors to overall social good. These have lost their early naieve faith, and now commit themselves to the betterment of human kind, actually enacting the precepts of most religious systems without embracing the philocophy. They are the "secular humanists" who so disturb the committed believers.
Yet another group consists of those who still grieve consciously for the loss of their original faith, now lost forever. They yearn for some sort of renewed commitment, but have found none.
And still another segment turns from "relidion" in the traditional sense to "spirituality" as pictured by many of the "New Age" adherents. Often these categorically reject all systems which emphasize the negatives--suffering, pain, the possibility of personal disaster--and insist that reality has no shadow. All is love and light at every moment, and to verify this, just think it so.
3. A final category embraces those who, by some miracle of grace, transcend these earlier mind states and find a basis for belief, though the premise of this conviction is never spelled out in full. This is the high mystic path, founded on a stable mental foundation, which neither rejects nor insists on its own claims for authenticity, but follows the dictates of the heart. These possess, in Thoreau's words, an "innocence purified by experience." They are neither naive nor among the totally disillusioned. They are firm in their faith that "something is there," and serve as both observer and receptor of the gifts it brings.
To arrive at this state may take a lifetime of yearning and preparation. No one can bestow it on another. A major life transforming experience may be evoke such transfiguration. Yet more and more are reporting such awakenings, which some tie to the ongoing evolution of consciousness.
Is kundalini its engine? To doubt after such transcendent awareness becomes near impossible. Certainly, the kundalini experience carries one to a new level of perception, of conviction, and of gratitude. But no one can yet fully explain the mechanism or meaning of the kundalini transformation. As Yests observed, "Man can enbody truth but never know it." This, I think, is the true definition of the mystical experience--which offers proof on the level of feeling which no assault of intellect can diminish or destroy.
1. The beginning stage is that of unquestioning belief. This level embraces various groups, from the naive primitive accepting the worship practices of the tribe, to the believer in modern society, who accepts the authority of his received tradition, without challenging or confronting its premises. The obedient followers of the "church," (of whatever stripe) as well as the "born agains" of certain traditions fall here. These represent those who long for authority to bequeathe them a final truth, which requires no effort of mental scrutiny on their part.
Truth here is very simple. All is divided into black vs. white, good vs. evil, and us vs. them. They often consider themselves the chosen ones, and some in contemporary times insist that the end of the world will soon occur, themselves being the sole remnant which to be "saved." Often these are very good people individually--they will help you in your need, succor you when you are ill, etc. But their credo brooks no violation of belief or prescribed code of behavior.
2. Here are those who have outgrown or renounced their early heritage, and have found nothing to replace it. Some rank high on the intellectual scale. Often they become the "scoffers and skeptics," who belittle and deride anyone who takes the spiritual search as well as the actuality of the divine seriously. They are in fact very hurt by their loss of an earlier idealism, which lurks in their consciousness as a kind of betrayal. They defend themselves by their scorn.
Another category of the "disillusioned idealist" includes many of the great contributors to overall social good. These have lost their early naieve faith, and now commit themselves to the betterment of human kind, actually enacting the precepts of most religious systems without embracing the philocophy. They are the "secular humanists" who so disturb the committed believers.
Yet another group consists of those who still grieve consciously for the loss of their original faith, now lost forever. They yearn for some sort of renewed commitment, but have found none.
And still another segment turns from "relidion" in the traditional sense to "spirituality" as pictured by many of the "New Age" adherents. Often these categorically reject all systems which emphasize the negatives--suffering, pain, the possibility of personal disaster--and insist that reality has no shadow. All is love and light at every moment, and to verify this, just think it so.
3. A final category embraces those who, by some miracle of grace, transcend these earlier mind states and find a basis for belief, though the premise of this conviction is never spelled out in full. This is the high mystic path, founded on a stable mental foundation, which neither rejects nor insists on its own claims for authenticity, but follows the dictates of the heart. These possess, in Thoreau's words, an "innocence purified by experience." They are neither naive nor among the totally disillusioned. They are firm in their faith that "something is there," and serve as both observer and receptor of the gifts it brings.
To arrive at this state may take a lifetime of yearning and preparation. No one can bestow it on another. A major life transforming experience may be evoke such transfiguration. Yet more and more are reporting such awakenings, which some tie to the ongoing evolution of consciousness.
Is kundalini its engine? To doubt after such transcendent awareness becomes near impossible. Certainly, the kundalini experience carries one to a new level of perception, of conviction, and of gratitude. But no one can yet fully explain the mechanism or meaning of the kundalini transformation. As Yests observed, "Man can enbody truth but never know it." This, I think, is the true definition of the mystical experience--which offers proof on the level of feeling which no assault of intellect can diminish or destroy.
