A friend wrote in with this quote from Freud "The more I study religion the more I become convinced it's about mankind's unconscious desire to worship his egoistical Self". Now isnt that interesting - Man creates God in his own image possibly for the reason cited by the father of psycho-analysis! Every religion seems to do this - except perhaps Islam which refuses to put a shape on Allah but his intermediary Prophet Mohammed is ofcourse human in form. Freud's explanation is perhaps also the basis for all the wars that are fought in the name of religion - the ego is at the centre of it all!
Buddha preached that adherents of Buddhism should avoid focus on a form but by design or default, practitioners of Buddhism seem to hold the human form of Buddha in their minds while in prayer and prove Freud right! On the other hand Buddhism advocates detachment from all things material and mental thereby implicitly advocating atheism. Buddhists are therefore perhaps the closest to rationalism compared to adherents of other religions.
My quarrel is with ritualism - it is rampant in most religions - one wonders why. My pet theory is that it provides the priests of those religions with work in that they are the ones people look to to learn the specific rituals of that religion. Thus, there is employment for such priests and they in turn advocate orthodoxy and strict adherence to ritual as a means of self-preservation of the priest class. Nice way to ensure that you and your ilk are taken care of by the believers for their entire life! Once again Buddhism scores here because priests in that religion are supposed to live on alms (bhiksha) but then organised religious structures are quickly developed and hierarchies develop within the priest fraternity even among Buddhists and put paid to the concept of living entirely off alms! Guess its too tedious to have to live by alms alone - it doesnt leave the priests with enough time to perpetuate ritual! Religion therefore is 'of the priest, for the priest and by the priest'!
Buddha preached that adherents of Buddhism should avoid focus on a form but by design or default, practitioners of Buddhism seem to hold the human form of Buddha in their minds while in prayer and prove Freud right! On the other hand Buddhism advocates detachment from all things material and mental thereby implicitly advocating atheism. Buddhists are therefore perhaps the closest to rationalism compared to adherents of other religions.
My quarrel is with ritualism - it is rampant in most religions - one wonders why. My pet theory is that it provides the priests of those religions with work in that they are the ones people look to to learn the specific rituals of that religion. Thus, there is employment for such priests and they in turn advocate orthodoxy and strict adherence to ritual as a means of self-preservation of the priest class. Nice way to ensure that you and your ilk are taken care of by the believers for their entire life! Once again Buddhism scores here because priests in that religion are supposed to live on alms (bhiksha) but then organised religious structures are quickly developed and hierarchies develop within the priest fraternity even among Buddhists and put paid to the concept of living entirely off alms! Guess its too tedious to have to live by alms alone - it doesnt leave the priests with enough time to perpetuate ritual! Religion therefore is 'of the priest, for the priest and by the priest'!
The book of Genesis of the Atheist begins with ... "In the beginning Man created God" !!!
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