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On Religion IIReligions: Manmade Or Divine?All religions are man-made to assume anything else is to exceed the bounds of logic. Most religions claim to have been given directly from a divine source. Perhaps this is true so far as the originators were concerned. Any experience that our limited minds cannot explain becomes supernatural in nature. I am not discounting these original events for which some will say they were the result of illness or were drug induced. I believe in a universal force or power that some name God, Goddess, or some other deity name. Despite my beliefs, I still say religions are man-made because once the experience was presented to other people by the experiencer, the interpretation of what that person saw or heard began. I don’t mean to belittle mystic experiences. The problem is for a true mystic to explain his or her experience familiar words must be used. It is similar to a physicist trying to explain nuclear physics to child. The mystic’s visual images must be simplified and in the process lose their full meaning. Any true mystical experience will be meaningful only to that mystic and as soon as the experience is described, its deeper meaning becomes shallow. And, as future followers read or hear about the experience, it is again changed because in each person’s mind the words and symbols form different images based on that individual’s education and life experience. As the event is mulled over and repeated to others, words are changed so as to make the event clear to the rest of us who are incapable, in the estimation of the mystic’s followers, of understanding the divine. Of course, this required that someone decide what was meant and this is where the event ceased being divine and became man-made. As time pasted, what was experienced became enhanced by other followers who either thought they understood better the meanings than the one before them or decided that for personal reasons some meanings had to be changed to suite different situations. Each of these original events became, in time, multiple religions with similar teachings but differing precepts and each felt their way was the only true way. As time when on it was necessary for the religion to grow or die. Growth required changes in structure and in beliefs. Growth also required a group of people responsible for that religion and its tenets. As is human nature, this group came to see itself as their deity’s representatives and enforcers. Further, they usually declared that anyone disagreeing with their doctrine were heretics and their deity insisted these heretics be punished - even unto death if they deemed it necessary. To assume that the One would promote one religion to represent Its multifaceted nature is the height of human egotism. Further, to assume any deity capable of creating and controlling just the small part of the universe we can see or understand would waste all that effort just for one reasonably intelligent life form is also unthinkable. Religion must be a personal experience; otherwise, we are fooling ourselves. Organized religions have their place but not as an enforcer of a person’s beliefs. Some will accept what they are taught without questions, others will rebel against strict rules and dogma. Both are correct if both are following their heart and not their needs and wants. We are here to discover our true nature; this cannot be accomplished by living someone else’s religious beliefs. The religions of this world are too limited. They are for the most part still planet based. While it is great to assume that all objects are connected to the One, that One must be greater than the known universe and greater still than any future discoveries. Any deity must be truly universal because when we fly into outer space that presence must still be there regardless of the distance. Our religions still have the same problem early religions had: they are too localized. You cannot accept or understand a truly universal deity without first accepting that what we know is only a small portion of what is left to learn. For our deity to be universal, we must realize that other life forms surely exist within this universe and perhaps in different timelines and dimensions. Any religious doctrine or dogma must withstand and infinity of possibilities. To assume that one planet, one life form is special to this universal deity is blindness infected with egotism. We can be no more special than thousands or millions of possible life forms throughout this universe. To this deity, all life forms are special, all are as they should be - one is not superior to another even though one may appear smarter, more advanced, or more caring. Any religion must accept each life form as perfect for its function, each life form as being in the process of becoming, and any life form not growing as dying. Author: Don Miller
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2002 Articles |
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