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| On 2006-10-12 05:05:55 -0700, norbu_tragri@yahoo.com said:
> .. Hinduism teaches that people are inherently good but under
> the sway of illusion/maya and evil...There are some serious differences
> there...but not as much as the in the notion that people are born evil.
Thank you for that Norbu.
This idea of humans being intrinsically good a huge difference between
Eastern and Western religious discourse. A concept such as the
forbidden fruit is foreign to Vedic practices that tend to emphasize
the positive even when faced with great violence as we read of Arjuna
in the BG.
In the same way, xtian mystics developed self mortification as a way to
become closer to god. For them the body represented a sinful animal
part of the self. The body is a place of hunger, sexual yearnings,
predator instincts, and so on, all labeled as sins. For the xtian the
body is to be shamed. Hence, Adam and Eve and their desire to cover
themselves after eating the fruit.
Buddha tried the path of mortification for 6 years before he realized
its disadvantage. Asana practice survives to this day as way to honor
the spiritual potentiality of the cells of the body.
By disavowing this primal concept of the body as sin, and man as
intrinsically evil, we are left with a philosophy couched in humanity,
gentleness, and finding harmony with nature as nature.
--
~Stu
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