Media, Political Correctness and Religious Debate

Spirituality Religion
#21

[QUOTE=theseeker;46542]I somewhat agree here. It is very, very interesting how well Christianity fit into the system of capitalism. This is well argued for by both Weber and Marx (although in completely different ways and with opposing predispositions). It is equally interesting how bad Buddhism and Hinduism fits with the capitalist mode of thinking (see e.g. the twin verses in [I]The Dhammapada[/I] or most passages in [I]The Bhagavad Gita[/I]).[/QUOTE]

Not really caring one way or the other about any of this but from a historical perspective based on the excepted definition of Capitalism and Christianity it is not actually true that Capitalism fits Christianity.

Christianity

Capitalism

Speaking only of the big 3 in Christianity

Catholicism (Roman Catholic) does not fit Capitalism all that well I am not exactly sure about how well Eastern Orthodoxfits capitalism but Protestantism fits a little better and there are some versions of Protestantism that fit better than others.

But the big 3 do not make up all that is called Christianity

Major groupings within Christianity
And again I am not exactly sure how well the other religions that fall under Christianity fit with Capitalism. But then I am willing to bet there is no one else posting in this thread that is certain either so look at this as simply information.

#22

Are you a materialist SD!?

Heck, no :stuck_out_tongue:

I am a critical idealist(which Kant tried to be, but failed) I accept that the world ultimately is made out of mind-stuff and matter is just a solidification of that mind-stuff. In that sense I accept the world as a mind-matter continuum. In this sense I accept the a priority of mind over matter, giving greater importance to ideas than matter, but I do not ignore the importance of matter either. We cannot overlook the fact of embodiment, that is that although we are spiritual beings, we are embodied spiritual beings living in the world and therefore we have certain needs. The most obvious needs are our biological needs such as the needs for food, water and pleasure. We also have emotional and intellectual needs such as the need for knowledge and the need to be happy and find meaning. These needs can only be met by a society that is designed with this in mind.

All society is designed by human beings and all design presupposes ideas. In other words all societies are the products of a thought process. Capitalism is also a designed society, here the design reflects the thought process of the ruling class. I believe it was Marx who famously said the ruling ideas of society were the ideas of the ruling class in every epoch. This is why, ironically, capitalist society is no society at all, for no society as such exists, only individuals competing against each other. A truth that was expressed very boldly by Magarat Thatcher.

The notion of “society” is itself an abstract notion. What is this thing called “society”? In the real world one does not see anything but individuals each competing with other individuals to have their needs met. If you stripped the human being of all socialization the human being would be nothing more than an animal struggling against the mercy of nature to survive. Therefore the human being is constructed through socialization and therefore ones beingnes depends on social agency. The beingness of somebody born in the modern Western world is to see themselves as consumers, and this determines their interactions in society which is through competition.

In contrast, the beingness of one born in ancient Indian society(or in modern Indian society in traditional Hindu families) is the complete opposite. They see themselves as spiritual beings in harmony with greater spiritual power of the universe, and this determines their interactions in society which is through cooperation. In such a paradigm of beingness one does not only think of just themselves, but thinks of themselves in relation to others and the wider world. Thus no individual doership exists, everybody sees themselves as being part of a collective(collectivist as opposed to individualist)

The main reason we have so much conflict, war, violence and strife in the modern world is because we live in a “society” that is highly fragmented into groups and individuals, each with opposing interests. The reason that conflict, war, violence and strife was not as common in the dharmic Eastern world, was because society was highly united and everybody was working towards the collective good of society and felt it was their duty to do so.

Ultimately, the motive behind this was the desire for all livings beings to have all their needs met. The Hindu society was designed to fulfill four legitimate needs of human beings: material, intellectual, emotional and spiritual(artha, kama, dharma and moksha) Every human being has the need for food, water and shelter, the need to have knowledge, relationships and the need to find their position in society, as well as the need to be happy.

What we need to realise is just how bad the Abrahamic design is and how it is responsible for the dire state of our world and 3000 years of brutality and replace it with the better dharmic design which is based purely on creating a society that is best suited to fulfilling all our needs and actualizing the human potential, and which has lead to the mass-production of enlightened teachers and masters and great material, intellectual and spiritual prosperity in India.

#23

Yoga helps me with my state of mind. I don’t believe that something like religion should have an effect on that.

#24

(Off-topic but way too interesting)

SD:

Yes, but does not these ideas materialize, gain a life of it’s own and impacts upon other peoples’ ideas? Say that capitalism is the idea that a person can gain infinite wealth by subtracting surplus value from labour. In it’s original shape, it might have been an idea, or maybe the outcome of a bunch of ideas and historical processes (the revolt against feudalism for instance). But in reality, it is a working structure that wields material consequences over masses of people (even a world population). It might even be fair to say that this material structure create new ideas: maybe more people within this structure that originally was an idea want to accumulate more wealth? If this is the case (which I argue is highly likely), then the ideas of people spring from an outer material reality!

Hegel has once again been turned up-side-down! :stuck_out_tongue:

Is idealism then the view that “that” or “God” has planned all this?

#25

To me, some of these dharmas go hand in hand with core Christian values: e.g. family, the role of the genders. As the “seeker” I am, please enlighten me into the grade to which Hindu scriptures actually promote these values. I’m very curious of the matter.

There are similarities, but the differences are greater. In the Abrahamic institution of the family the wife is seen as completely subordinate and inferior to the husband. The husband is not only the provider for the woman, but he is her master and she his slave who cooks and cleans for him and obeys him. The woman is after all seen as nothing more than an appendage to the man in Abrahamic mythos(Eve is made from a rib of a man) Historically, she had no rights at all.

In the dharmic institution of family, the wife is seen as the goddess of the family and the husband as the god(this is why all Hindu deities are presented as couples) and both are seen as essential to the effective functioning of the family. In this case the woman is not just a mere appendage to the husband, but an equal partner in the family. She differs only from the husband in the function that she plays. The husband goes out and earns an income and works hard, but it is the wife who utilizes that income and makes decisions on how to best use it to maintain harmony in the home. It is still a custom in traditional Hindu families for the man to hand his income directly to his wife, which she then locks up in the safe and spends. In Hindu law, both the husband and the wife had rights. The wife had rights to own property, to divorce, to remarry and to the inheritance of her husband.

Again it should become apparent how in the Abrahamic world relationships are always in the form of ruler and ruled/exploiter and exploited/employer and employed, and conversely the dharmic world relationships are always in the form of functions of parts to maintain harmony of the whole. In ancient Hindu society it makes complete logical sense for why the wife who is distinguished from the husband by her softness, paitence and emotions and the fact that she gave birth would assume the function of the homemaker, and he having the opposite qualities would be the breadwinner.

However, dharmic is not rigid but organic, so nothing is defined in terms of absolutes. In a family where the wife is best suited to the function of being the breadwinner and the man the homemaker, then the roles would reverse. In the Indian film “Mother India” which is a great example of Hindu feminism, the husband of the family gets crippled by an accident, and as a result the wife has to take on the responsibility of working.

You can read more about how various dharmas were classified for different members in Hindu society, including husbands and wife, in Kautaliyas Arthashastra.

#26

Surya believes in that alleged caste system where everything was once seemingly perfect. Regardless of this being true or not, the dharma he mentions is a very important thing to understand. Dharma, as it seems, is the purpose of a person, which is determined according to the intrinsic qualities he/she bears.

We should have such society that it should encourage individuals to discover their dharmas. In my experience, this requires embodiment into the existing order of the world. This involves engaging the world with intuition, empathy and resonance, and seemingly, in that alleged caste system, the society was designed in that way: centered to spiritual development, every person’s fulfilling of dharma is supported by the society itself.

If a person has a gift of absolute pitch, it is likely that this society ecnourages him/her to become a musician. It is best that he/she should be a musician, because there is this existing gift!

If a person has a gift of sensing the purposes/natures of things via intuitive observation, it is better that he/she should be a philosopher, a teacher, a guru, who will help elevating the consciousness of society.

In such system, there is no depletion of resources, there is no competition with others, because of the simple fact that, the search of dharma is being searched in the existing order of the world.

[I]In contrast,[/I] capitalism is a blasphemy. This society rendres every soul that has ever stepped in the world as a lost soul. Today, I hear a lot that people say ‘I don’t know what to do. I’m bored. I don’t have a purpose in life.’ And the answer comes swiftly: let’s go to shopping! and so on. It is like as if everyone is spread out, detached from the existing order of the world. Capitalism is a system of symbols, external realities where people are situated in tumult and chaos. There is no embodiment, hence the actualization of Dharma seems impossible. People feel lost, and increasingly, each passing day, people are getting tired of this nihilistic feeling. Recent psychological and sociological researches suggested that many people living in big cities has begun to prefer creative activities, instead of listening to and watching the symbolic warmongering and consumptious advertisement of media and television night after night. Although, younger adults still plug themselves in computers and do internet surfing - a retreat into symbolic realms.

Is there any meaning left at all? It seems impossible in this society to actualize one’s dharma, considering that even one’s own community is trying to supplant one’s dharmic potential due to the pressing needs of the current society. Religions have also become dogs that are cornered and now barking all over. In fact everyone is barking like dogs nowadays; there is none who is luminous and yet singing with awareness!

#27

theseeker,

If we look at this cosmologically in terms of order of manfiestation then it is mind that is more fundamental than matter, in the same way the spider is more fundamental than the web it projects. The web can be withdrawn back inwards but the spider will still remain. Similarly, as a critical idealist, I hold the view that matter is merely a manifestation of mind, and when matter ceases to exist, mind remains. Therefore, the body dying does not entail the death of the mind.

Nonetheless, because mind and matter are really the same substance of consciousness but different modifications of it, they have the power to influence one another and interact. It is easy to prove how simply taking a physical substance can cause the mind to alter. Similarly, it is easy to show that all knowledge that we attain is posteriori. I first have to see an elephant to know what an elephant is. All of the knowledge I have has been learned.
However, there are somethings I have not learned, but was a priori: I did not learn of ideals such as truth, justice, beauty, order, these are innate. I learned various interpretations of these, but the actual categories themselves I did not learn.

Similarly, although our ideas come to us only after we have interacted with material world, the a priori categories are already there in our mind. In Hegelian language the historical process of the evolution of being towards absolute being is not actually a real process, because being is already absolute and the historical process is really a process of remembering and realizing it.

Dharma is a remembering that the human being experiences with its interaction with the world. Through trial and error the human being gropes in the dark trying to create systems of society by which it can fulfill its needs, and then gradually replaces it with better systems. However, the very fact that it knows what is “better” is a priori. This is why dharma is said to be eternal. There is a right way to do everything in Hinduism. A right way to live, a right way to breath, a right way to think, a right way to have sex :smiley:

A dharmic society is the right way of life. It is the one that is perfect harmony with the laws of existence.

#28

There are similarities, but the differences are greater. In the Abrahamic institution of the family the wife is seen as completely subordinate and inferior to the husband. The husband is not only the provider for the woman, but he is her master and she his slave who cooks and cleans for him and obeys him. The woman is after all seen as nothing more than an appendage to the man in Abrahamic mythos(Eve is made from a rib of a man) Historically, she had no rights at all.

Is this Islam? It’s not Christianity, for sure. You keep lumping these two diverse religions and cultures together.

And for the record, in my limited life experience in the evil Christian west, I have rarely seen a household where the woman did not rule the roost.

#29

Thomas has a point though. Christianity has been rather tolerant to women. But it matters not, whether milder or tougher, both Judaism, Islam, and Christiandom poisoned human embodiment, forcing us to take shelter in symbolic realms.

#30

[QUOTE=Surya Deva;46584]theseeker,

If we look at this cosmologically in terms of order of manfiestation then it is mind that is more fundamental than matter, in the same way the spider is more fundamental than the web it projects. The web can be withdrawn back inwards but the spider will still remain. [/QUOTE]Interesting post. At the time being, using your metaphor, I just want to add the following:

Flies get caught in the spider’s web. :smiley:

And cheers for the post on the dharma and the differences between Hindu and Christian values as regards gender and family.

#31

[QUOTE=thomas;46585]Is this Islam? It’s not Christianity, for sure. You keep lumping these two diverse religions and cultures together.

And for the record, in my limited life experience in the evil Christian west, I have rarely seen a household where the woman did not rule the roost.[/QUOTE]

Thomas, Christianity is the ONLY religion where witch-burnings took place, ordained by the clergy and millions of women were burned at the stake. I can provide you quote after quote about what the clergy members said about women. They were treated with utter disdain.

#32

A screwed-up sect did that witch burning, not “Christianity.”

You confuse the behavior of sinners and the confused with the religion.

I don’t care what you qouote from Protestants and those who are misled, crazy, or evil. They are not speaking for Christianity, but for themselves and their own delusions.

If you want to know what true Christianity teaches about how women should be treated, go the the Catholic Catechism, please.

#33

Your true christianity only seems to exist in your own mind Thomas :smiley:

A sign of maturity and honesty is to be able to face up to the truth. So far the evidence that has been presented against your religion has been overwhelming, to say the least.
You might find it easy to dismiss massive genocides perpetrated by the clergy of your religion, I obviously don’t :smiley:

#34

200 ‘witches’ killed in India each year – report

A Brief History of Witchcraft Persecutions before Salem

Witch-hunt(not just for Christians anymore)

#35

It is interesting how none of the links mention witch-hunts in India in premodern times, but are full of mentions of witch hunts for the West in premodern times.

Did anybody mention to you India has not been a Hindu country for the last 300 years? :smiley:

#36

[QUOTE=Surya Deva;46603]It is interesting how none of the links mention witch-hunts in India in premodern times, but are full of mentions of witch hunts for the West in premodern times.

Did anybody mention to you India has not been a Hindu country for the last 300 years? :D[/QUOTE]

Did anybody mention to you I don’t care.

I just posted applicable links bubba that is all

#37

[QUOTE=Surya Deva;46597]Your true christianity only seems to exist in your own mind Thomas :smiley:

A sign of maturity and honesty is to be able to face up to the truth. So far the evidence that has been presented against your religion has been overwhelming, to say the least.
You might find it easy to dismiss massive genocides perpetrated by the clergy of your religion, I obviously don’t :D[/QUOTE]

Um…no.

You do the equivalent of me tracking down a womanizing swami and pointing to him and blaming it all on Hindusism, and saying that’s what Hinduism is all about.

You only look for the bad. Christianity is huge and it’s old and you will find bad Christians, especially when that’s what you want to find.

But you have zero interest in what the true teachings are.

#38

[QUOTE=thomas;46605]
But you have zero interest in what the true teachings are.[/QUOTE]

FINALLY!!!

#39

[QUOTE=thomas;46605]Um…no.

You do the equivalent of me tracking down a womanizing swami and pointing to him and blaming it all on Hindusism, and saying that’s what Hinduism is all about.

You only look for the bad. Christianity is huge and it’s old and you will find bad Christians, especially when that’s what you want to find.

But you have zero interest in what the true teachings are.[/QUOTE]

You seem be the only good Christian Thomas :smiley:

I am sorry but you are simply somebody who is denial about your own history and want to pretend like it does not represent you. Unfortunatey, it was your own clergies, popes and “saints” that ordained it. It is estimated about 6 million women were burned at the stake. This is hardly an isolated incident, this is genocide - systematic, calculated genocide.

#40

Six million women burned at the stake?

That’s a good one, and totally false.

But did you know that Christians were made into human torches in the arenas in Rome?

And thank you for the compliment, but I do not consider myself to be a “good Christian,” but one barely hanging in there. There are many good Christians, though.