Mysticism
Reaching Beyond Religion

Actually in many cases this may be true, but to look beyond the veil of mystery for a moment, it can be said that what we are discussing is the thread of truth which runs through all the religions and philosophies. Thus mysticism is about being one with the whole, ie. a spiritual insider.

If we take away the rituals, mythology, dogmas and traditions from a religion, what is left is the core belief or basis of that religion. When this is done, the similarities between the great religions are surprising.

In fact the personal faith and mystic experience of followers of each of the great religions is basically the same. (Of course the leaders in these religions would go to great lengths to argue against this proposition!) However all the great religions have at their core an essence of spiritual awareness.

The mystic experience is the pursuit of achieving ultimate reality, the divine, spiritual truth, or God through direct experience, intuition, or insight, ie. enlightenment.

A person delving in these areas may be called a Mystic. He or she may or may not be a member of an organized religion. Personally, I have discovered that in order to experience the clarity of spiritual truth, it is preferable (but not necessary), to be separate from any religious movement.

The problem with religion is that all religions are basically political movements at heart. As soon as we establish an organization with leaders and followers - we have power games and structures. The message becomes one of control and organization instead of personal enlightenment. It tends to separate people from the core meaning of the religion ie. outsiders looking in. People can then be manipulated or required to pay for the privilege of entry.

To quote Steven Weinberg:

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.

Having said all that, true spiritual awareness is alive and well in all the religions. I have met Christians , Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Taoists and Hindus - all who were enlightened beings, that is - they were enlightened by their spiritual awareness, not by their religion as such. What their religion provided them was the framework for faith, devotion and growth and separateness from daily life.

Spiritual awareness, which by its very nature encompasses love for all others, is not something which can be written down. It is something which is learnt through desire and practice, and is best embarked upon as an individual journey,Religion by its very nature, is often a force preventing enlightenment from being pursued!

Religions based purely on the history of one or another great teacher are just that - histories - the story of the Master is not what is sacred! What is sacred is the teachings of the Master.

Of course it is easy for non spiritual people to learn and quote the writings of a book and to declare them to be holy, but knowing is not enlightenment.

Enlightenment - regardless of the religion - is the acquisition of wisdom and understanding of spirituality, enabling clarity of perception. Thus an enlightened person is one who is making a spiritual journey.

Note : wisdom is not the acquisition of knowledge. Wisdom is the application of understanding, of which of course knowledge is just one component.

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