A spirituality that sees mankind as central, one that is focussed on human beings and their spiritual development rather than God, is very common nowadays. It practically always goes with a generalised leftist attitude and fails the litmus tests proposed by Bruce Charlton which examine an individual's discernment and ability to see what is actually happening in the world today. It seeks personal benefit here and now in the form of an increased sense of well-being and peace rather than to put the soul right with God on his terms and irrespective of what that might bring as regards pain and suffering to the individual. It is really a form of psychological therapy rather than true religion.
The word sacrifice means to make holy and is etymologically related to sacred. Humanistic spirituality is not sacrificial but sacrilegious in that it attempts to steal sacred things that by right belong to God and appropriate them by the self on the human level. It pursues the religious path for what it can get from it, from a desire for heaven rather than a love of God. This false motive corrupts the entire spiritual approach so even if such a person engages in traditional spiritual practices such as prayer or meditation or ritual of whatever sort the work is tainted. This does not mean it won't bring results or that the results may not seem to them to be authentic spiritual experiences, but they will be empty of real spiritual benefit and merely feed the ego.
The desire for spiritual experience is understandable but should quickly be outgrown. We do not come to Earth to have spiritual experiences but to learn and so, generally speaking, such experiences will come to the seeker at the beginning of his journey to give him encouragement and the sense that what he aspires to really does exist but thereafter he may not be favoured. To seek to repeat past experiences is the sign of a spiritual sensualist.
Human-centred spirituality is actually an aspect of materialism. It is the spirituality of the materialist, a person whose whole mindset is formed by materialism and whose motivations relate to the earthly self and the satisfaction of its goals and desires but who has simply broadened his horizons to include a wider range of experiences. He is seeking to be fed and wants to bring the spiritual down to his soul rather than take his soul up to the spiritual. The first commandment will always be to love God with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul. Anthropocentric spirituality is the spirituality of the world.
@William - The thing is, I think that even an anthropocentric spirituality would (sooner or later) lead to God if it was pursued honestly and sincerely.
ReplyDeleteIt would entail identifying and challenging many assumptions - such as that there is nothing after death, no God, no spiritual realm... but I think these could potentially be reached if only the quest was continued.
What really dooms the anthropocentric spirituality is its superficiality, laziness and dishonesty!
Yes, when it comes down to it motivation is all important.
ReplyDeleteI think that if a sincere desire for truth--truth at all costs--is the driver in any exploration, then ultimately the endeavor will seemingly lead to God, though it was not the endeavor or path itself, but rather the individual's underlying motive and intent. I've gone through silly phases while making my way out of the matrix, much like what you're speaking of in this post. But if I now mentioned God, Christianity or Jesus to any of the people I met in those scenes, they would not appreciate the disruption of their fantasy. I think some people have the desire for truth-at-all-costs still in tact. For some, it's corrupted. While perhaps others never had it to begin with.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the clarifying post.
I agree, jana. If the motivation is truth that will clear away many of the problems and put the individual on the right path. On the other hand, I do think that that needs to be reinforced by love as one proceeds. And love always needs to grow.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHey,
ReplyDeleteI’ve asked you this already on a different post, but perhaps you didn’t notice the comment. Anyways, I’m interested in hearing your opinion about the growing interest and usage of psychedelic drugs? I follow a few people involved in the spiritual community, if you will, and some of them swear by the use of such substances - especially the younger ones.
So the general notion of such practice is something like the following - some of the most profound mystical states and realizations(for an average spiritual seeker atleast) can only be accessed by the use of psychedelics. One example is so called “God-realization”(5-Meo-DMT comes to mind) which basically induces an experience in which you recognize yourself as being literally God and this is the deepest realization one can attain.
I personally always feel that even if the insights gained from such practices can be indeed valid, we can’t access them in a sober state for a reason and in trying so might end up unable to integrate gained wisdom which would subsequently lead to something C. G. Jung called “inflation of the self”. I personally experienced this many times even without taking any drugs(excessive immersion in Advaita philosophy was enough to induce similar states).
Anyways, since I found out that you have experimented with psychedelics yourself in another post of yours, I was really curious what you have to say about similar practices, and whether they could legitimately open us to something that’s normally inaccessible with meditation, prayer etc.
Thanks!
Sorry if I missed that before, Vytautas, but I will certainly answer it now.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, can you really imagine any of the great saints and sages taking or recommending psychedelics? Would Jesus, would the Buddha? The very question should supply the answer. Of course they wouldn't. Attaining higher states of consciousness is not what the spiritual path is about. That is a side effect. The real goal of spirituality is to become spiritual, in other words to sanctify the self, I can tell you quite categorically that anyone who recommends drugs as a way of spiritual development is ignorant. It's like burgling a house instead of going in by the front door as the owner. It's cheating God, thinking you know better than him. Your feeling that this practice is ultimately ego boosting is correct. It is fundamentally an immoral thing to do because it seeks to gain reward without work, undeserved reward.
That having beens said, it is possible that drugs can demonstrate the reality of higher states of consciousness and point the way in that regard. But that having been realised they should be abandoned because they will just lead to attachment, greed and selfishness. We are here on Earth to learn. Higher states of consciousness exist on higher levels but we come to the material world to learn the lessons of challenge, difficulty and even pain and suffering. Seeking to bypass those will prove a waste of our time here.