One of the reasons why I’m into theosophy is that it is an attempt at a universal spirituality. That is: it aims at finding the universal core in all religions and spiritual traditions.
Why is this important? Well – in this age of globalization no well informed adult can ignore that there are people outside our neighborhood, outside our country or continent. These people have to be a part of whatever divine plan we think is at work in humanity and the universe. That’s just self-evident, I think. [Though John Hick has made a career out of exploring that fact.]
But a lot of religion has not really caught up with such truths just yet.
Jiddu Krishnamurti approached this subject a bit differently. He focused on the fact that people are conditioned in different ways. This conditioning prevents them from really interacting well with not only people from outside their own community, but even people they know very well.
Which brings me to the second aspect of spiritual maturity: an ability to relate to all kinds of people. This is partly a matter of mood. One of my strengths is to be able to relate to all kinds of people, but I have found that to be very difficult sometimes anyhow. Especially when there was frustration in the relationship. Or when I had some practical point of self-interest. Perhaps it is not too surprising that it is easier to be nice to people when you aren’t dependent on them.
When it is said ‘God Bless America’ I wonder how many people think about the rest of the world that is implicitly excluded in that prayer. Didn’t God create the whole world? It’s an expression of what specialists in religion call ‘civic religion’. That is: religion which is part of public life, which informs a nation to make it one. Unfortunately that implies the implication that other nations aren’t blessed by God makes it easier to go out and wage war on them.
I give this as but one example of a type of religion that is not universal.
Only a universal religion or spiritual tradition can hope to help address the basic issues that face humanity. Those issues include the complications that arise from a global economy, for instance. The present economic crisis illustrates the problem perfectly. The EU came up with a united approach, whereas world leaders were NOT able to do so. That isn’t really a surprise as the USA still refuses to acknowledge the UN as a valid worldwide platform it should respect.
Another worldwide problem is the ecological crisis. I don’t just mean the climate, which is a result of our eating up of fossil fuels. I also mean the energy crisis at the bottom of that: we keep needing more and more energy and the hopes that alternatives can be developed isn’t too much beyond the drawing table yet. Though a start has been made.
What does all of this have to do with religion or spirituality? Well, each individual cannot be expected to solve these issues themselves. We are all dependent on economic forces, government and international corporations. So instead it is up to the group – humanity as a whole – to really start changing things. And that can only happen if individuals unite. Change can only come when a reasonable minority has made a change in consciousness – when it has become self evident that we need to recycle, that we need to have climate neutral ways of getting energy, that health needs to be a priority for companies etc.
Such a change in consciousness needs religion to back it up. Historically there hasn’t been a large movement of people without a religious component. Communism does not have a God, but it did raise its leaders up to mythic proportions – still does in countries like China.
My main point: problems that face humanity as a group can only be solved if humanity starts working together globally. And that cannot happen unless people are willing to look over the borders of states, religions, class, race, education etc.
We are in this together.
Great post. I love Krishnamurti’s work, and also Eckhart Tolle’s view of things. Particularly in A New Earth he approaches the problems humanity faces as a whole, and mentiones the global shift of consciousness as well.
I like the ideology. We also have a goal for universal spirituality for world peace. You can go through our website and can contact us for any discussion.
Given below is one message of my guru (shri datta swami). Please go through it.
regards
surya
World Religions:
If anyone says that his/her religion is the only path to God and that other paths lead to hell, I have one humble question. The question is for every religion without any trace of partiality. The simple question is: Today I have heard your Religion and if I follow that, I reach God and if I refuse I will go to the hell for my own fault. This is very much reasonable. But before your ancestors discovered our country, the literature or even the name of your religion was not known to our ancestor and he could not reach God for no fault of him. But your ancestor reached God through your religion at that time.
Even if I assume that My ancestor will take rebirth now and will follow your religion to reach God, such possibility is ruled out because you say that there is no rebirth for the soul. Thus my ancestor suffered forever for no fault of him and the responsibility for this falls on the partiality of God. Had the God been impartial, He could have revealed your religion to all the countries at a time. Had that happened, my ancestor might have also reached God as your ancestor. Therefore your statement proves your own God partial.
The only way left over to you to make your God impartial is that you must accept that your God appeared in all the countries at a time in various forms and preached your path in various languages. The same form did not appear everywhere and the same language does not exist everywhere. The syllabus and explanation are one and the same, though the media and teachers are different. Can you give any alternative reasonable answer to my question other than this? Certainly not! Any person of any religion to any other religion can pose this question.
Moreover every religion states that their God only created this world. Unfortunately this world is one only and every God cannot create the same world. There are no many worlds to justify that each God created His own world. Therefore any human being with an iota of commonsense has to agree that there is only one impartial God who created this one world and He came in different forms to different countries and preached the same path in all the languages simultaneously at one time.
Let this logic sword of the divine knowledge cut the rigid conservatism of the religious fans in this world to establish the Universal Peace. I need not beg all these religious followers to be united and harmonious to each other for the sake of world peace. Such begging appeals are made enough in the past. The religious fans feel that there is no unity really in the religions but they have to be united since their kind hearts melted by these appeals. Thus a temporary change was only brought. At the maximum one generation of the followers got united. The next generation fights with each other because they feel that there is no real unity in them due to lack of the real unity in their religious scriptures.
A permanent solution for this does not lie in the begging appeals, which may or may not unite the followers. Even if the appeals unite such unity is not permanent. If the real unity in all the religious scriptures is exposed through the logical divine knowledge, the followers have to be united for generations together. Therefore, My attack is not on the hearts of the followers through love and kindness. My attack is on all the religious scriptures through intellectual logical analysis of divine knowledge. The unity of hearts through love can be only temporary. The unity of brains through intellectual analytical divine knowledge will be permanent. Hearts agree but brains realize. Agreement is temporary, but realization is permanent. Thus this is My first blow of My divine Conch shell for the permanent unity of all the religions aiming at eternal Universal Peace.
Thank you Surya for the words by your guru. I’ve been grappling with such thoughts about world religions for years and in a sense came to much of the same conclusion on my own (but in less eloquent words and thoughts). How do you reconcile the loving God of a religion you have grown up in with the many religions around the world. The answer for me is that a loving, divine God gave every human the message of love, kindness and forgiveness in whatever form that could receive it. Some forms are known and many unknown and for some the message is blocked for whatever reason and that is how I explain evil.
Message of shri datta swami:
Lord comes in human form in every human generation to preach and give His direct presence. If the Lord comes in only one human generation, God becomes partial to that human generation because other human generations are not blessed with such opportunity. To see, to touch, to talk and to live with the human incarnation, He comes down as per the prayers of the devotees. The Lord comes to preach and so He will come in human form only like Krishna, Jesus, Prophet etc.
Lord Datta means God given to the world in human form for the upliftment of humanity and hence, He is the highest as far as humanity is concerned from the point of convenience in worship. He is the only means of reaching/serving/pleasing the Lord. Lord Jesus stressed the same when He told ‘I am the only way’ and Lord Krishna said it through ‘Vasudevah Sarvamiti…’ in the Gita. Such, Lord in human form is called the human incarnation.
The ‘I’ in the above statement of Jesus refers to the human incarnation of Lord only, who comes in every generation otherwise, He becomes partial for a generation of people, place and time. The scriptures of both Christianity & Hinduism i.e., Bible and Gita support the human incarnation concept through the statements ‘God-in-flesh and Manushim Tanumaasritam…’ respectively. Even in Islam also, Mohammed is treated as a Prophet, which definitely means, He is above normal human beings because all the human beings are not treated as Prophets.
to be contd …
at lotus feet of swami
surya
Nature of Lord is Nature of Teacher:
Lord Datta is essentially a teacher. His very nature is the nature of a teacher. If you study the nature of teacher, you have understood the very nature of Datta. The aim of mother, father and teacher is only the welfare of the child. But, mother and father may become lenient due to their blind intensive love on the child. But, the love of a teacher (Guru) is never blind and is always aimed at the welfare of student. The love of father and mother may sometimes spoil the welfare of the child. Therefore, Datta treats all the living beings in the creation as His students and not as His issues. Therefore, the teacher is more than father and mother.
The Lord created fruits for both good and bad actions. Why should He create a fruit for an action? Let there be acts without fruits. The child does mischief, but the mother or father does not punish. In that case, there is no fruit for that action. Similarly, let the Lord not punish our sins. If you expect like this, the answer is that the Lord does not behave like father or mother but behaves only as a teacher. The child gets spoiled if the mischief is tolerated. We are seeing this in the world. The teacher will never tolerate the spoiling of the child and therefore, He will not tolerate the mischief.
So, God comes down and preaches the truth to guide His issues in the right direction and this saves them.
at lotus feet of swami
surya