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Phantom of the Opera wrote:
>
> When I chanced upon this newsgroup a while back, I thought I
> found a forum for people interested in exchanging ideas and
> experiences with Hinduism. Little did I realize until recently
> that what is Hinduism to a lot of active "posters" is the
> upholding of their traditional opinions.
That happens a lot, often producing more heat than light. Sometimes, it
is fun, and can even lead to new learning -- often it becomes tedious,
and the actual spiritual content becomes less and less. I share your
interest in wanting to learn from the experiences and ideas of others
who are actively engaged in living their Hinduism with a view to
achieving realization. But...different strokes for different folks.
>I do agree that once
> in a while, there are articles of more disinterested nature.
> But more often than not, what I am reading is whether
> Prabhupada is more qualified than Mr.X, or whether Vivekananda
> is more crdible than someoneelse or whether the Advaitist
> interprettaion of some text is more prone to bias than the
> Vaishnavite one, etc etc etc etc
It sometimes sounds more like an academic debate in a religious studies
class. It's worthwhile to understand the differences among the various
approaches, but....
My own experience has been that God, however we perceive Him, Her, It,
is truly so big, so grand, as Arjuna learned first hand when Krishna
Bhagavan Ji showed His cosmic self, that grace, love, realization can
and does flow through any and all traditions and approaches. Our ego
always wants to confine, define, refine and usually there isn't anything
fine about it because the point gets lost.
> I'd like to know however, how and why it matters who is right
> and who is wrong as long as you haven't seen God/Brahman/Krishna/Om
> face to face.
I like your emphasis. If spirituality and not religious studies is our
interest, we need to move into the realm of experience and dare to seek
the vision of God. It's interesting that the young Vivekanandaji,
though he was an arrogant and proud young man, had his priorities
straight when he went through Calcutta looking for a teacher, a guruji
to take him to realization.
Vivekanandaji asked each guru/swami/teacher he met, "Have you seen
God?" When they all said "no," he was out of there in a hurry. Then he
met Ramakrishna Paramahamsaji, and asked him. The young man was
startled when this simple-appearing sage replied "yes, as clearly as I
see you." There's a message there for each of us -- seek to see God for
ourselves, to experience the Divine reality. When you do, many of these
debates loose their meaning, or become a sport.
God is real, and waits to be known by whatever name, in whatever form,
is dearest to you.
The sufi mystics often speak of wine as a metaphor for the learning, the
experience. A sufi might sum up my many words in these few words: Why
be so concerned about the biochemistry of wine-making that you never
bother to taste the wine.
Daly
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