George Peram's List: Religion

• • very interesting book reading it recommended.
• create your own path. As William Blake beautifully said, “I must invent my own systems or else be enslaved by other men’s.” If we are successful, things may turn out the way Walt Whitman predicted, “There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done . . . A new order shall arise . . . and every man shall be his own priest.”
• “If you encoun­ter the Buddha, kill him.” Kill the Buddha?!? Buddhists certainly seem to have a weird way to revere their founder. What’s this crazy Chinese talking about? Far from being a blasphemous statement, Lin Chi’s words are a metaphorical rejection of the dogmatism that inevitably results once we’ve put our teacher on a pedestal.
• a warning that has gone unheeded by many Buddhists throughout history

• he Japanese Zen monk Ikkyū could write:

   

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• • good comparison of Buddhism  and other religions...
• Without a bridge
  Clouds climb effortlessly
  To heaven;
  No need to rely on
  Anything Gotama Buddha taught.
• “Do not accept what you hear by report, do not accept tradition, do not accept a statement because it is found in our books, nor because it is in ac­cord with your belief, nor because it is the saying of your teacher .
• Be lamps onto yourselves.
• Chuang Tzu will give you none of that. Instead, what he brings forth to light the path is doubt—what Alan Watts called “the wisdom of insecurity”
• This is a clear example that not all religious traditions shove dogma down our throats. Rather, some encourage us to embrace doubt, question all conclusions we are offered, and experiment on our own.

9 more annotations...

• The Bible, however, emphasizes rationality and precision. So much so that the historical books have been used to reconstruct history and geography with great accuracy. Chronologies have been constructed with great precision.
• "The Bible, however, emphasizes rationality and precision. So much so that the historical books have been used to reconstruct history and geography with great accuracy. Chronologies have been constructed with great precision."
  I think this is not true because the ancient geographical maps used in almost every book has mentioned some major part of current Turkey as Armenia.In the Bibilcal period, Turkey was not even existing, but unfortunately in the ancient maps used in the Bible( current) Turkey is mentioned. It seems this is not accuracy and could be considered in my opinion blasphemy and misrepresentation. According to every impartial historian and all of ancient historians one of the existing nations or countries at that geographical area was Armenia. By the way Armenia was the first kingdom that officially adopted Christianity as an official religion on 310.
  Other than this point I fully agree with author and his analysis.

• The Bible, however, emphasizes rationality and precision. So much so that the historical books have been used to reconstruct history and geography with great accuracy. Chronologies have been constructed with great precision. But such precision also prevents people from arbitrary interpretation.