Kui-Shan

I liked the way this passage described what a zen master is like. I thought the analogy to a clam, implying that whenever he speaks, you hear nothing but his insides and what he is. There are no hidden motives, no concern with petty or serious things, only life. Only the present and the good that can be seen in it.

I think it is a very attainable goal to reach the state of detachement from all worldly things to the point where just the world itself around you pleases you, regardless of other circumstances. I think this would be a great way of life and I would love to experience it or at least talk to people who live this way. I also think it is interesting the way he implies that a zen master does not care to be a zen master since he has lost all desire and identity, he simply is.

Isaac of Ninevah

I think some very good points are brought up in this passage. I like how the author says "one plus one equals one". I think this is very true in our everyday lives and something that most people often don't realize. When you experience joy or happiness or something good, it is purely the opposite of that which you have experienced in the past which makes the present feeling so good.

"Sunny days wouldn't be special if it wasn't for rain, joy wouldn't feel so good if it wasn't for pain"

I also like the points brought up about how someone who truly has faith and trust in God does not see the bad as being negative, nor see the good as being positive. It only is. And without one, the other doesn't exist, thus a true believer in God's will never wishes he had more joy, nor wishes he had less pain, he simply accepts what it is and learns to appreciate and deal with every part of it, in the comfort of the fact that they are both necessary, no matter which he is being dealt at the time.

Symeon the new theologian

This reading had some good analogies and descriptions of what knowing and seeing God is like. I really liked the analogy of how some people accept the vision of God and see God as a real thing that is everywhere around them, like someone seeing water when stepping into a pool or a lake. But for the people who are fully submerged in water, all there is is water, and this is how it is for believers who are fully submerged in the vision of God. Everything around them is God, they can't even see anything else, and so nothing else matters.

Al-Muhasibi

I felt this passage did a good job describing and depicting what it is like for someone who truly is under the will of God and who truly sees him for all his greatness without needed to physically see him. It essentially is the heart of a true believer which al-muhasibi is describing here. I can identify with the line "so that it (the mind) is no longer concerned with this world and what is in it". This is exactly how I feel alot of the time...as though nothing here will ever satisfy me or make me truly content, so nothing here really matters in the end. People are so concerned with material things, with possessions, with accomplishments, etc, but what will they have when they die? Nothing but their soul and the memories they left in the people they touched while they were here. It doesn't really matter what your job is, your status, your popularity, your wealth...none of it is important, simply things that entertain your mind while you are here, distracting you from the good and purposeful things you could be doing with your life and time here on earth.

Albert Einstein

In this passage, several good points are made. He explains how those who cannot be struck with awe and amazement at something 'mystical' or inexplicable are 'as good as dead'. People who believe that science can and will explain everything, and that there is nothing left permanently beyond human understanding are truly blinded by their own egotistical arrogance. Man is humbled every day by the universe, by miracles, by life, by God. We become so concerned with ourselves that we dismiss these things as things that we can explain and understand through science and with our own minds, when the reality is that there are some things we will never and can never understand. Religion starts with the acceptance that some things are bigger than us, and more complex than we could ever grasp. It begins with the humility to realize that we are only human, and that there are forces acting infinitely beyond our understanding. Those who feel that God is something that should make sense to us, or that we can make sense out of his actions, are as ignorant and arrogant in those beliefs as the people who blindly follow the God and heavenly rules which are professed to them by their community or parents without giving it a second thought.

Henry David Thoreau

I think this passage was trying to point out the importance of things like art, poetry, philosophy...all of the thoughtful and emotional sides of life which people often like to think of as surreal and petty in the grand scheme of things. In our society we put very little value on these types of things, using and appreciating them only as entertainment (ie. movies, paintings, music, etc). We delusion our selves with our idea of what 'reality' is, without realizing that even still much of what we see as 'reality', isn't reality by the way we are trying to distinguish it. He points out that if we were to eliminate all of these feelings and emotions and subjective ways of thinking, we would be left with nothing, or at least nothing recognizable to us. These things are what make us human and what make up life, and are as real as the earth beneath our feet.

Muhammad

This passage contains a few verses and small clips of verses from the Quran. I particularly like the one "Do not despise the world, for the world too is God". So often we look down on the world and talk about what awful immoral things the world is doing and whatnot, and this reminds us that even that, is God. It is all God's will and everything is the way it is for a reason. Though we may not understand it, we must come to terms with it if we ever wish to be happy within ourselves, instead of constantly trying to renounce it and force it to change.

Another good quote from here is "My servant does not cease to come near me until I love him", saying that you never stop getting closer to God until you are one with him. No matter how far you stray you are always on the path to God, and you will always be led naturally towards him. It also goes on to point out that when you truly know God, he is every part of you. You become God, and God becomes you, when you surrender to his will and know him.

The Gospel of Thomas

The gospel of Thomas is a collection of some of Jesus's teachings, mostly in regards to the kingdom of heaven. I particularly like the one that says that God already layed the Kingdom out across the earth, and among us, we are just too blind to see it. People tend to be blinded by society, by greed, by lust, by hate, and by fear, and we don't see what good and what greatness lies right in front of us. Instead we chase false hopes and ignorant desires, perpetuating our own suffering.

I also think it is interesting how, today, we have a sort of view as if the majority of people we know will all go to heaven, including ourselves. We don't think of it in the terms that Jesus put it when he stated that the wide gate is easy, and it is only the few that find and make it through the narrow, harder gate, implying that in reality very few of us will actually make it to heaven, because so many of us choose to avoid that path.

Jesus of Nazareth

This passage outlined some of Jesus's major teachings about the Kingdom of God. It cannot be explained through a definition or description, but rather through metaphors and similes. Jesus speaks of it in this way in order to convey the message of it to us in a way that is understandable.

One of the most interesting, I thought, was the story of the two sons. It really seems like a metaphor for life, to me. The way the son was tempted and followed the path of greed and materialism, and then realized down the road how unhappy this truly made him, and how he suffered for it. Now, with his eyes clear, he went back and asked for forgiveness of his ignorance and his selfishness, and was welcomed with running arms by his father, and by God. I believe everybody follows a path like this. Nobody is born a man of God.

I believe when we are born we are, in sense, released by God, and must find our way back to him in our life.

Chuang-Tzu

I like the way chuang-tzu points out and criticizes people for thinking they 'know' things, or feeling they are advanced or better than others, or 'sophistocated', etc. The way he sort of sucks you into this 'intelligent' and philosophical train of thought in the first paragraph, and then ridicules you in a sense for even trying to follow along.

Chuang tzu puts religion and philosophy into their most basic states, pointing out that everything around us is important, not our own knowledge or personal identities. He reminds us that if we are ever to find peace within ourselves, we must create peace between ourselves and our nature, because without that harmony, we are constantly at war with our environment. These teachings are similar to the hindu teachings I think, in that we are individually very small and insignificant, but in the grand scheme of things, all together we form one gigantic harmonious world.

Pai-Chang

What I don't like about readings like this one, is when a religious teaching tells describes an event that will happen or could happen in your life such as this. A great or life-changing event, described in details as much as possible only makes it likely that our minds will artificially create it, and we will miss the true meaning and occurance of it. Similar to the way some christian religions talk about speaking in tongue's and whatnot as spirits or God is speaking through you, and then all of a sudden everyone around has these occurences, I feel that these kind of descriptions and expectations about religion that we build for people only distract from the real thing, if and when it were ever going to happen.

I feel, in speaking about enlightenment and reaching a free mind, that the phrase, "you'll know when it happens" describes what to expect in a more appropriate and more purposeful, beneficial manner.

Yeheil Mikhal of Zlotchov

I believe this passage really is just talking about how we as people tend to be very selfish and self-oriented. Like it says we view ourselves as individually important and often more important than the rest of people. We put ourselves first as if there is any real benefit to doing so. We need to take some time to understand and realize that we are one in the same. Though we may be unique in ourselves, we are all a part of God and we are all united under the same spirit. Just as a country's people become patriotic and find unity, we must learn to, as a people, find unity in the fact that we are all quite literally God's children. We are God's creation, as is everything around us. Like the passage says, without God, we are nothing. But, in realizing this, we become something. We become a part of something bigger, and "like a drop that has fallen into the great sea and is one with the waters of the sea" we lose our own existence and become infinite, through the grace of God.

Shmelke of Nikolsburg

I liked this passage because it is a question I have often faced and a question that most people don't really know the answer to, even though they exercise their opinion of the right thing to do every day.

I have realized that it is not my place to make people act right, or to punish them or condemn them for doing wrong. It is my place to try to inform them of their wrong doing, but not to be a judge. God, and only God, can judge us.

This passage answers the question in an equally insightful way in that it points out how unwise it is to hate people and to punish or retaliate against people who do wrong. When we realize we are all in essence a part of God and therefore one being, we see that it is stupid to hurt eachother, even if we believe it is justified, because we are only hurting ourselves further. As the saying goes, two wrongs don't make a right.

Tu-Shun

This passage makes the point of how we are all one. Not only with eachother, but with everything around us and every other aspect of reality as well. When we change, it is not really us that change, but the entire world and universe that changes as a single being. We are all different parts and pieces with different functions and purposes, but in reality, we are all the same- parts of something far bigger and incomprehensible to us.

We like to think of ourselves as individuals, and as our own beings, when in reality, we are nothing more than parts that make up a whole. When one of us changes, the whole changes. It does not matter who changes, it does not matter what changes. The change that occurs is never a change in an individual, but rather a change in reality, and a change in the universe.

I feel these are the points the reading is trying to make, and I feel they are very true and very relevant to our lives and understanding ourselves.

The Upanishads

The way that this reading depicts and describes God is very similar to the way I have conceptualized and come to understand God myself. Those who don't believe in God often claim that there is no proof of existence, and I would argue that to understand God is to understand that God does not follow what we call "logic" necessarily. God is greater and more complex, more profound than anything our minds could possibly get around and simplify, and until someone understands this they will never truly understand the concept of God. In this way I completely agree and relate to what is being said in this passage, and I feel it is a concept that very few people (at least the ones I've spoken with regarding it) have really seen or understood.

Chief Seattle

Chief Seattle makes many interesting points about life and the nature around us. I admire the way he can talk about the land beneath his feet, and the fact that his ancestors, and their ancestors have all walked and lived, struggled and thrived, on that very same land. The oneness with a place that has such meaning to it is very powerful to me, like the connection to where Jesus was born, or where Muhammad rose to heaven or traveled to mecca.

Modern society has lost touch with the idea that there is any meaning to the lives before us. People are seldom remembered vividly or actively throughout the lives of their grandchildren, and never in their grandchildren's children. It is sad that while we learn of major events of the past which we call history, we have no sense of our own histories and our own pasts. We know what is deemed necessary to know by the rest of the world or country, and no longer put much, if any at all, importance on knowing who we are and who and where we come from.

Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha

In readings like this, the hypocrisies that white Christian's displayed is undeniable. They preach love and good values, but in reality practice more hate and exhibit more poor moral standards than the Native people who they call savages.

The words of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha couldn't be more true. Their eyes are wide opened, while those of their oppressors are shut, as it is in almost any case involving an oppressor and his or her victims.

The persevering kindness and selflessness of the Native Americans in itself, to me, is an indicator of their heart. After being betrayed, lied to, and mistreated by the white settlers, they continue to try to work with them and be open-minded to what they are saying. It is truly disgusting, in my opinion, the way the chief is treated after his speech when trying to extend a hand of understanding to the Christian minister.