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بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمنِ الرَّحِيمِ

Many people will say that this book is one of Karen Armstrong’s weaker books, since it’s one of her first. That may be the case, but the first chapter and the intro and really good. I’ll probably get many a posts in by the time I finish this book.

(see citation below)

Chapter 1

“Some Buddhists might object to this comparison because they find the concept of “God” too limiting to express their conception of the ultimate reality. This is largely because theists use the word “God” in a limited way to refer to a being who is not very different from us. Like the sages of the Upainshads, the Buddha insisted that nirvana could not be define or discussed as though it were any other human reality.

Attaining nirvana is not like “going to heaven” as Christians understand it. The Buddha always refused to answer questions about nirvana because they were “improper” or “inappropriate.” We could not define nirvana because our words and concepts are tied to the world of sense and flux. Experience was the only reliable “proof.” His disciples would know that nirvana simply exists because their practice of the good life would enable them to glimpse it.”

Wow, just wow. This is one thing that in an age of positivism seems so far fetched, yet it strikes me as obvious. To believe that NOTHING exists beyond our comprehension is simply arrogant and asinine. As soon as we attach words, feelings, etc. and try to conceptualize the unseen there seems to be this emptiness, this lack of completeness that many seem to find unfulfilling in religion, and in an age of positivism, seems to make “sense”.

I’ll probably edit this and add more later – but no time now.