Pantheism
New Age/Buddhism /Hinduism
Questions
Pantheism
How can one accept the existence of an infinite personal
What is the prime reality?
What is the nature of external
reality?
What is a human being?
Why is it possible to know
anything?
What is the basis for right and
wrong? (morality)
What happens to man at death?
What is the meaning of human
history?
transcendent God?
Monism – (The One) impersonal, infinite, not material
Brahman is the universe, has no attributes, indefinable
.
Universe flows out of Brahman
Hierarchy
Humans – animals – plants – matter most illusory
Atman - the soul/ essence of each human
The goal of human life is enlightenment – pass beyond selfawareness and be united with The One (a drop in a pail of water).
Some people can be enlightened (Buddha, guru – closest to
Brahman)
Intellectual knowledge or logic has no place or reality because
Brahman is indefinable
Concern over goodness or truth is low-level spirituality
No action ultimately good or evil, Brahman is beyond such
Ex helping a lady across the street or pushing her down are
equivalent
Ethical conduct is a tool to reaching enlightenment
The goal of man is to attain Nirvana
The impersonal spirit of man is real and needs to attain oneness
with the absolute
When attained, annihilation of self-existence
The cycle of human suffering and self comes to an end
Karma, present fate, (pleasure/pain) is a result of actions
Reincarnation – nothing is real, sin must be worked out
Events and time are illusions – events come and go in a
meaningless cycle
Events do not mean or prove anything
History is something to leave behind
Meaning is here and now.
New Age
First seen on a large scale in the rejection of middle class values
during the 60s in America
Denies the existence of transcendent god.
God is all, all is god
The new consciousness rejects reason as guide to reality.
Mystical experiences such as channeling, spirit possession, out-of –
body experiences, altered states of consciousness
Man is part of god
Human potential, divine power within self
Human consciousness is not contained in the skull, but in the
consciousness of the cosmos. There is a hope for evolutionary
change. Unlike pantheism, it places great value on the individual
Knowledge needs to be harmonized across all disciplines, ex.
Science is both material and spiritual as in ESP
Occultic view, evil is an illusion
Belief in absolute morality is wrong
Relativism, nothing is truer than anything else
Physical death is not the end of self.
Meaning is personal based on past life experiences as reported by
Shirley McClain.
Pantheism
A rejection of western rational thought through anti-rationalism, syncretism, quietism, lack of technology, and an uncomplicated lifestyle. Provides a radically different religious
framework. There is a oneness (higher consciousness) beyond god or the individual. Life is cyclical until you join the higher consciousness.
New Age
A system that is not completely formed, it can not answer all of the questions that frame a
worldview. Based on Eastern thought, human beings evolve toward higher consciousness and greater comprehensiveness. Ultimately, a new species will evolve. It borrows it's
substance from a variety of world views with the strongest connections to Naturalism, Pantheism and animism (countless spiritual beings but no god). It does place a great value on
the individual. Relativism is key to ethics - Nothing is any truer than anything else. Experience is private and supreme.
Problems
Irrational, but the East rejects rational thought
Demands a mode of thought different from West, hard to understand
To reach Nirvana may involve drug use to reach a higher consciousness, involves total life change