Meaningless religion

 If we lived in a cartoon or anime world true religion would teach us how to access our real, flesh and blood, human world, that is, how to wake up from the enchantment of the cartoon world.  Short of not waking up, what would be the point of a cartoon religion for us?  It would only keep us glued to the cartoon world.

Turning now to the human world, if the true path of religion is supposed to show us what actually transcends this all-too-human world of birth and death, with a lot of suffering thrown in for good measure, what would be the ultimate benefit of a religion that didn’t teach a proper path to the transcendent or sold us on the idea of some rescuer God who, if we obey his many weird rules, might save us after we drop dead? 

There wouldn’t be any benefit as I see it.  Any religion that didn’t lay out a path to the transcendent would be meaningless.  Such a religion could only sell fear to increase its membership as in, “If you don’t believe in God, after you die you are going to go to hell to be tormented by God’s unmerciful counterpart, the Devil.”

Presently, looking at the evidence, we have a number of meaningless religions that don’t teach a path involving initial illumination (bodhicitta), the removal of defilements which obstruct the fullness of illumination (prajñaparamita), and complete perfection (samyaksambodhi), that is, actually seeing the world from the standpoint of ultimate reality.

Regrettably, the evidence also includes some practices of Buddhism when, for example, seated meditation is believed to be synonymous with the attainment of Buddhahood if we just sit still on a cushion.  Other such forms include chanting the title of a particular Sutra.  In truth, seated meditation or chanting the title of a Sutra amount to exercises in meaninglessness.  They don’t help us to see for ourselves what exactly transcends this corporeal body of birth and death. 

Comments

[Andre]

I think you raise some interesting points, but we have to ask ourselves, "What good is transcendence unless it is grounded in the here and now?" Lofty spiritual attainment can easily turn into the pursuit of bliss, rather than seeking Enlightenment for the sake of others in the immanent world we live in.

As far as "seated meditation [being] synonymous with the attainment of Buddhahood," I can only guess that you are referring to Soto Zen and Dogen's method of "just sitting." For Dogen, attaining realization can easily turn into just that, another attainment to latch onto. Striving for Enlightenment objectifies and reifies Awakening by turning it into a goal, some"thing" to be obtained--just another notch on our ego belt. For Dogen, sitting is the quintessential expression of Buddhahood. However, there is still work to be done; we need to clear out all of the delusion so that we can realize or actualize our Buddha nature. Or so his thinking goes.

I have reservations about transcendence itself. For instance, what are we transcending? Or are we just running away from the messiness of every day life? A Bodhisattva's goal is achieve Awakening to help others--not in some ethereal realm, but here on earth. I think that true transcendence transcends our need to transcend (a bit of a tongue twister), meaning we keep our awareness centered here instead of on some distant Nirvana (which only pushes it farther away). This way we can realize that, as the sutras say, Samsara is Nirvana.