Essence of the Tantric Path

Originally posted by sonhouse
The problem I see with this path is this: What if all 7 billion humans practiced this way? There would be no food produced, no cloth, no protection against predators, etc. We would shortly die of starvation.

That is what I mean by the obsession of religion. Meditating your way through life is hiding from life with assurances the next life will be oh so ...[text shortened]... his path is not for everyone', which makes it elitist, we are too good for the general public.

Well, apparently a certain civilization has survived for a couple of milennia on the philosophy, so maybe it's not so much in the philosophy itself, but in what you erroneously perceive to be its practical application.

Originally posted by sonhouse
The problem I see with this path is this: What if all 7 billion humans practiced this way? There would be no food produced, no cloth, no protection against predators, etc. We would shortly die of starvation.

That is what I mean by the obsession of religion. Meditating your way through life is hiding from life with assurances the next life will be oh so ...[text shortened]... his path is not for everyone', which makes it elitist, we are too good for the general public.

There are four ways prescribed in Hindu spiritualism to realise God. By doing one's duty/work as sincerely as if doing it for God is one of them. We can practice Bhakti i.e. Devotion. That is worship God as and when we want/can. The third one is to study/apply one's mind to one's liberation by thinking over scriptures like the Bhagavat Geeta. The fourth one is that of doing Yogic practices like meditation. Hinduism has left the choice of the path to the individual. Hinduism has also laid down that one has to first complete one's studentship for the way one will earn one's livelihood,then be a householder till the children are married off,then gradually ease into detachment from worldly concerns, then only be a Sannyasi i.e.retreat from the world to devote to God. Any person who wants to be sannyasi can be so at any stage but then cannot turn back.

Originally posted by Kunsoo
Well, apparently a certain civilization has survived for a couple of milennia on the philosophy, so maybe it's not so much in the philosophy itself, but in what you erroneously perceive to be its practical application.

Sonhouse's perception is limited by his ignorance of Hindu spiritualism and compounded by hatred of all religions plus a contempt for every believer in God.

Originally posted by black beetle
Join in, form is emptiness, emptiness is form. When I begun to understand I ended up ignorant😵

Oh, ain't it fun! 🙂 🙂

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
There are four ways prescribed in Hindu spiritualism to realise God. By doing one's duty/work as sincerely as if doing it for God is one of them. We can practice Bhakti i.e. Devotion. That is worship God as and when we want/can. The third one is to study/apply one's mind to one's liberation by thinking over scriptures like the Bhagavat Geeta. The fourth o God. Any person who wants to be sannyasi can be so at any stage but then cannot turn back.

I've always been rather partial to the "Eastern religions" for a variety of reasons, not least of which being that they seem more philosophical in nature, more meditative, and not reliant on fear, hellfire and brimstone, or a denial of one's humanity. I'm incapable of believing in any kind of "living god" concept, but I find my awe of the universe to be sufficient for a proper sense of mysticism.

Originally posted by Kunsoo
Well, apparently a certain civilization has survived for a couple of milennia on the philosophy, so maybe it's not so much in the philosophy itself, but in what you erroneously perceive to be its practical application.

Not only survived but contributed richly to Humanity's treasures of Philosophy,Science,Culture.

Originally posted by Soothfast
I've always been rather partial to the "Eastern religions" for a variety of reasons, not least of which because they seem more philosophical in nature, more meditative, and not reliant on hellfire and brimstone or a denial of one's humanity. I'm incapable of believing in any kind of "living god" concept, but I find my awe of the universe to be sufficient for a sense of mysticism.

Excellent! To start with, a quote from Gandhiji: All religions are true. All religions contain some errors. All religions are as dear to me as is my Hinduism.

Originally posted by sonhouse
The problem I see with this path is this: What if all 7 billion humans practiced this way? There would be no food produced, no cloth, no protection against predators, etc. We would shortly die of starvation.

That is what I mean by the obsession of religion. Meditating your way through life is hiding from life with assurances the next life will be oh so ...[text shortened]... his path is not for everyone', which makes it elitist, we are too good for the general public.

I think you may have a poorly informed idea of India, my friend.

India, with its ancient civilisation, greatly built on forms of Hinduism, its ability to share relatively peacefully many different forms of religion, its ability to support one of the most populated countries on earth, not with huge wealth but with sufficient nourishment, its long and contributing intellectual foundations, particularly in mathematics and advanced philosophy, its highly complex and extremely precise Sanskrit language, its beautiful clothing, its colourful communities and traditions and its ability to live more harmoniously with nature than a great proportion of the rest of the world, make it much more than you appear to realise. It can also play cricket very well! But the subtleties of that game eludes many Americans, which I will overlook.

Its burgeoning population unfortunately is beginning to put stress on the natural environment. It has religious conflicts, but not as much you would expect with all the differences. It, like any land, is not perfect but we can always learn from each other. I have no Indian heritage, unfortunately.
There is rabid religion and reasonable religion, we need to discern the difference. India has a high proportion of the latter.

Vive la difference!

Originally posted by Taoman
I think you may have a poorly informed idea of India, my friend.

India, with its ancient civilisation, greatly built on forms of Hinduism, its ability to share relatively peacefully many different forms of religion, its ability to support one of the most populated countries on earth, not with huge wealth but with sufficient nourishment, its long and contr ...[text shortened]... ed to discern the difference. India has a high proportion of the latter.

Vive la difference!

Many thanks for the spirited defence of my country,its ancient treasure of Philosophy,Science,Culture, Chess not being a negligible invention. Incidentally my doubts reg. Sunyata being the ultimate aim remain. Our yogis declare that the emptiness is just a bridge between Dhyan being achieved and the realisation of God. Also after the cessation of the activities of the mind when Dhyan is achieved, how the realisation of God can be called a noise of the mind?

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
There are four ways prescribed in Hindu spiritualism to realise God. By doing one's duty/work as sincerely as if doing it for God is one of them. We can practice Bhakti i.e. Devotion. That is worship God as and when we want/can. The third one is to study/apply one's mind to one's liberation by thinking over scriptures like the Bhagavat Geeta. The fourth o God. Any person who wants to be sannyasi can be so at any stage but then cannot turn back.

Ok, I can see that working. I was thinking you can't just detach yourself from the world without a support structure, even detached you have to eat. Mainly I hate religions that lead to war for religious reasons, I don't hate people of religion. Most of them I think are merely deluded. There is of course, nothing I can do about it, it is what it is and the experiment in religion will run its course or not.

The only thing I can say in my own mind is I don't think some god will come down and save our sorry assses if we screw up so bad we off ourselves through man-made climate change, or natural climate change, or biological or nuclear war or if some kind of alien like in science fiction comes down and fries us all, all of the above CAN kill us all. If that happens I don't think some god will come down and say, turn back time to the 15th century or something to start over.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
Many thanks for the spirited defence of my country,its ancient treasure of Philosophy,Science,Culture, Chess not being a negligible invention. Incidentally my doubts reg. Sunyata being the ultimate aim remain. Our yogis declare that the emptiness is just a bridge between Dhyan being achieved and the realisation of God. Also after the cessation of the acti ...[text shortened]... f the mind when Dhyan is achieved, how the realisation of God can be called a noise of the mind?

Sunyata is neither an aim nor an "ultimate aim", but a tool, a means to understand the nature of the reality; the point is simply that the reality is “sunyata of svabhava”. There is no distinction between dravyasat and prajnaptisat; the substance of svabhava lacks of inherent existence, thus svabhava does not arise by any causal process and therefore it is independent of any other object. Therefore (Madhyamaka, Zen, Dzogchen) sunyata exists solely as long as svabhava (as a substance) is mistakenly projected onto the objects; sunyata is not some kind of primordial reality that must be understood either the way the Saints of your religion appear to understand it, or the way the Western theists of the three Abrahamic religions appear to “understand” the “existence” of the so called Creator. Sunyata is just a corrective view of the common false view regarding the way the world exists. In fact, the realization of the non-existence of svabhava is the way to the liberation from suffering because it is a cognitive default that destroys on the spot the Noise (whatever the insufficiently sophisticated religions and philosophical systems might postulate when their basis is associated with the so called inherent existence of Self)
😵

Originally posted by sonhouse
Ok, I can see that working. I was thinking you can't just detach yourself from the world without a support structure, even detached you have to eat. Mainly I hate religions that lead to war for religious reasons, I don't hate people of religion. Most of them I think are merely deluded. There is of course, nothing I can do about it, it is what it is and the ...[text shortened]... e god will come down and say, turn back time to the 15th century or something to start over.

Neither do I. More sophisticated religious thinking recognises the Whole, including manifestation and dissolution of whole Universes, let alone planets. And on a physical level I am not too optimistic at present about ours. What you correctly paint is a form of adolescent religion that still afflicts human thinking. Its "God" as "Father Christmas".

I am philosophical and express it sometimes religiously and feel properly practised religion is helpful to the inner part of man, as long as it is based on more than fairy tales and is tolerant. Intolerance is the antithesis of any true religion.

Much of Hindu religious practice uses imaginal forms in a poetic, aural and artistic ways and appear to me as the best modes for expressing religio-philosophical subtleties in "applied" ways of daily life.
In both Hinduism and Buddhism and other forms of non-dualism, it all starts and ends with Consciousness/Awareness/Mind. It differs from the prevailing scientific view that mind arises from matter and states that a transcendent Awareness (a term I prefer) or Mind is the Ground and basis of all physical manifestation. Can't finally prove it, but that is what makes the most sense of all the known stuff to me, including quantum physics.

One translation of Shiva Sutras, sutra 1 by Jaideva Singh: (Expanded in English to get the wider meanings of the Sanskrit words)

"Awareness which has absolute freedom of knowledge and activity is the Self or nature of Reality."

Hindus would prefer the word "Self", Buddhists would feel better with "nature".
Ultimately it cannot be finally expressed or held as we are That. It is like trying to see your own eyeball directly.