the best things in life aren't things
Posts tagged religion
Zeitgeist – Divide & Conquer is the Motto
The last thing the men behind the curtain want is a conscious informed public capable of critical thinking. Which is why a continually fraudulent zeitgeist is output via religion, the mass media, and the educational system. They seek to keep you in a distracted, naive bubble. And they are doing a damn good job of it.
Zeitgeist, The Movie’ and ‘Zeitgeist: Addendum’ were created as Not-for-Profit expressions to communicate what the author felt were highly important social understandings which most humans are generally not aware of. The first film focuses on suppressed historical & modern information about currently dominant social institutions, while also exploring what could be in store for humanity if the power structures at large continue their patterns of self-interest, corruption, and consolidation.
The second film, Zeitgeist: Addendum, attempts to locate the root causes of this pervasive social corruption, while offering a solution. This solution is not based on politics, morality, laws, or any other “establishment” notions of human affairs, but rather on a modern, non-superstitious based understanding of what we are and how we align with nature, to which we are a part. The work advocates a new social system which is updated to present day knowledge, highly influenced by the life long work of Jacque Fresco and The Venus Project.
For more information as well as subtitled versions, click here.
Buddhas for Burning
3 years ago
in Buddhism
I think we have understood that dogmas in a world of constant mutation are necessarily false? And since we know that everything we formulate in words, that is, seen dualistically, is inevitably deformed, we can readily understand that all doctrines, religious, philosophical, scientific, cannot represent more than a reflection of truth.
Men and women who seek doctrines, study them, endeavour to follow them, are impeding their own progress. The Masters, from the Buddha down, in their frequent condemnation of ‘discoursing’ have made that clear, and in declaring that there must be no attachment to, or identification with, the Dharma itself (or any dharma), that even the teaching of the Buddha himself must be discarded, have left no room for doubt on that score.
Doctrines, scriptures, sutras, essays, are not to be regarded as systems to be followed. They merely contribute to understanding. They should be for us a source of stimulation, and nothing more.
We must create each his own dharma, understanding, and may use those of others to help us to that end; they have no other value for us. Adopted, rather than used as a stimulus, they are a hindrance. As the Zen master stated to the monk whom he found studying a sutra, ‘Do not let the sutra upset you – upset the sutra yourself instead.’ Some Masters expressed themselves more forcibly, as when they recommended that Buddhas (statues of) were for burning and on a cold day used one as firewood, and in advising, ‘If you meet the Buddha, turn aside and look the other way.’ Such statements shock the sense of reverence inculcated by the devotional religions, but their meaning, their aim, their importance, are evident.
(© RKP, 1960)