The majority of teaching on spirituality considers sex to be a distraction and an obstacle to spiritual progress.
The minority that promotes sex suffers from a big problem - there are doubts raised because the teaching seems to be self-serving. There is one group where the guru/master gets way more sex than seems appropriate. Is he just teaching these things to get sex? Is he a fraud?
In another group, all the members get lots of sex. Are they there just for the sex? Is it all a big orgy?
Anything that’s a part of human life (like sex) can easily be tied to spirituality–even if the spiritual response is to repress it. Sex is the means by which men in women not only bond but reproduce–it is the means by which life perpetuates and evolves. Christianity, for example, though in most cases castigating sexuality as dirty and sinful, holds sex up, in the few remaining cases, as the most sacred act a man and a woman can perform. And why? Because it is the genesis of new life, the creation of a soul.
I am not suggesting that mundane matters are sinful or unnecessary, just that they are lower on the scale of spiritual development than are such experiences as personal awakenings from emptying the mind of excess clutter. Origin (SIC)castrated himself for the sake of “religious” purity, but later repented having done so. Body hatred is unwarranted in spiritual development. The Shaker sect died out because they believed sexual intercourse is a sin.
They are Greek terms used specifically in Christianity and even considering this, agape in modern Greek doesn’t mean the same thing as it means in the Bible.
I would tend to disagree as I would suggest that the spiritualists goal is to transform mundane matters into supramundane matters (not to abandon them).
Very much agree as marriage and the resultant child birth are considered as holy sacraments in some Christian faiths and this marriage is considered as equal to the monastic life (not lesser than).
So, what does agape mean nowadays? How has its meaning changed?
Wouldn’t you think that the really enlightened ones would choose to remain on this Earth of ours, rather than ascending, being that they would be so consciously aware of all of the work which needs to be done here?
What good is enlightenment if nothing beneficial comes out of it - except for vanity and narcissism?
Chakra Superstar
Define your perception of “image” here.
As for the rest, I daresay that man’s consciousness actually is in great need of construction, re-construction, demolition, et cetera. but that is just my point of view.
Man’s consciousness has been developing, evolving and flowing from the very beginning of what we consider to be time - and also backpedaling at times.
If what you say above is truth, what need is there for philosophy, psychology, the sciences and everything else where we seek knowledge and truth?
Also, are you saying that’s God image is comprised of psychopaths, sociopaths, murderers, rapists, pedophiles?
I’d agree. For instance there are the cases of two St. Teresas. One of Avila, who beat her own flesh in search of visions of unity with God and one of Calcutta, who devoted her life to helping others. Your question should be asked of any monk, Eastern or Western. It should be asked of any person obsessed with spirituality as opposed to tending to the dire needs of others.
Those would be the Mahayana Buddhists, those who believe in universal compassion and salvation.
The original Buddhism was Theravada Buddhism. ← The is the monastic path, the way of secluding one’s self from the world so as to become detached from it.
In my own personal opinion, one has to achieve this level of detachment in order for love and compassion to shine through, but this depends on whether one naturally has love and compassion to give when all cultural conditioning and values and brainwashing has been washed away. I think most people would feel some kind of motivation to return to the world from the monastery in order to do some good and help others find peace, but we’re all different and there may be some who simply settle into the nothingness that Theravada Buddhism promises.
In common usage contexts it has changed in the same way as English has changed and then it’s meaning changes if you are talking to a devout Christian.
Nothingness would be an extreme view which is not the middle way.
Tell me what you know about Theravada Buddhism.
What do you want to know?
What qualifies you to make the statement you did: “Nothingness would be an extreme view which is not the middle way.”
I have read quite a lot on Buddhism and on many other religions.
Thanissaro Bhikku: Emptiness as a mental state, in the early canons, means a mode of perception in which one neither adds anything to nor takes anything away from what is present, noting simply, “There is this.”
Ah, and what is the middle way?