Technically, What is a religion?

#theMephobia

Humans created the religions

Religions created the gods

Humans, religions, and gods

Shared lands and shared minds!

As Hindus, Muslims, and Christians

The above 5 lines are taken from a Malayalam movie song penned by Vayalar Ramavarma for the movie, “Achanum Bappayum”(Malayalam) in the year 1972 and the meaning is relevant to this day.

Today, a person wears a cap and he is Muslim. A person wears a white or brown Cassock, he is Christian. A person wears a Saffron robe and he is Hindu. A person wears a brown robe and he is Buddhist. A person who wears a white thread around his body is a Hindu. A lady who wears a Burkha or Purdah and she is Muslim. There are even symbols categorized into various religions.

Is Religion a fashion statement? If not, then what is it?

A friend of mine was telling me, he is a Christian by birth! I couldn’t digest that. Christian by birth? So, you entered the world from your mother’s womb and you are Christian?

The thought which pokes my mind is, “Technically, what is a religion”?

I thought a lot about it and thus I was able to recollect a statement made by my friend which is, “the one who follows Christ, is a Christian. The one who follows Buddha is a Buddhist. The one who follows Mohammed Nabi is a Muslim. The one who follows a Hindu sage is a Hindu”

But it cant be considered as a satisfying answer. So if you follow Jesus Christ and you are a Christian, my question is What did Jesus Christ practice and what was his religion and so is the case with Buddha, Nabi, Any Hindu sage, etc what were their religion and what did they practice.

Buddha said, “Desires are the root cause of all the problems”

Sree Narayana Guru said, “When you perceive everything as not apart from you or distinct from you or separate from you, thus there is no room for disappointment or desire to the vision of oneness.”

Jesus Christ said, “The one who speeches with pride is not a Christian! But the one who follows me. In my name, indication sacrifices all his/her worldly attachments — sacrifices his/her parents, siblings, wealth and all other fortunes, who comes behind me, only he/she is a Christian.”

Prophet Mohammed Nabi said, “ Oh Humans! if you want to be a Muslim, it is necessary to attain virtue. If one wants to attain virtue or attain heaven, then that person must sacrifice those things that are dear to him/her. For a child, his or her parents are dear and vice versa; siblings are dear and vice versa; spouse, wealth, luxury and other possessions are all dear to the person. If only you sacrifice all of them or are detached from all of them, only then you are a Muslim.”

We are living those days when we sacrifice animals in the name of Religion and am pretty sure that the readers would not find it awkward at all. Well, Human sacrifice is also happening, why feel surprised about animal sacrifice. Isn’t it? I still do not understand the logic and reminds me what Socrates said, “Don’t talk of Peace and Love when you have a dead animal on your plate”.

My intention to write this article was not to pinpoint all these. Let me justify the title, “Technically, what is a religion”?

Technically, Religion is the following:

The base of religion is your spinal cord. If you are not aware, you got to know that in the spine there are two holes namely Ida and Pingala on either side of the spine. Ida is the right channel and Pingala is the left channel meant for all the nerves to pass. Apart from them, there is a channel in the center known as Sushumna. It is through these 3 channels that the energy moves in different ways.

At the base of the spine, there is Muladhara chakra or Root chakra and as we go upward there are other chakras as mentioned below.

#1 Muladhara Chakra- (Root)

#2 Svadhishthana Chakra- (Sacral)

#3 Manipura Chakra- (Solar Plexus)

#4 Anahata Chakra- (Heart)

#5 Vishuddha Chakra- (Throat)

#6 Ajna Chakra- (Third Eye)

#7 Sahasrara Chakra — (Crown of Head)

The first three chakras right from the base of the spine towards up, if denoted like a triangle where the lower base has the highest width denotes the utmost negative energy in your body. While as you progress up, the intensity of negative energy or the width decreases until the third chakra which is Manipura chakra. The next chakra has the lowest level of positive energy and as it progresses towards the next chakras, the level of positive energy increases till it reaches the highest state of positivity which is the Sahasrara Chakra. Another term for positivity is Divinity. So, the lowest chakra i.e Muladhara Chakra is the lowest level of divinity while the highest state of divinity is Sahasrara Chakra.

On that note, a religious person aims to climb the chakras from the lowest state of positivity to the highest state of positivity. Why? To know who you are? Here is a vital point, we all are in the same world or the same universe. But we all have a different perception. What we are inside is what we see outside. In short, it is your reflection. So, if your chakra position is in the lowest state, you will see what it reflects. If a person is in the highest state of negativity, his or her perception would be full of anger or fear or hatred. While someone with the highest state of positivity would be in complete peace. The highest state of divinity is an experience and non-verbal, a state where the religious person is not just a person but the universe itself which means equal to God. The lowest state of divinity is nothing but verbal and verbal alone and technically the reason for that is that he or she considers the whole universe as separate from him or her while the one in the highest state of divinity considers the whole universe as nothing else but he or her alone.

Swami Vivekananda said, “Man progresses from the lowest truth to the highest”. Technically, the lowest truth would be your position in Muladhara Chakra or Root Chakra and the highest would be Sahasrara or Crown of the head.

Another explanation he gave was, “Man would progress from being subjective to objective”. So all the subjective opinions were the reflection of what they were technically inside and in the end, they realized the objective state which is that the whole universe is they.

A journey from being selfish to selfless!

A journey from being greedy to generous!

A journey from leading life within the senses to lead a life beyond the senses.

When you consider this whole universe as separate, there occurs a duality. But what if you consider this whole universe as yourself or God, there is no duality. Technically, religion is a medium to eliminate duality. So when there is duality, what happens? Some of the dualities are Sin and Virtue, Good and Bad, Life and Death, Peace and War, Love and Violence, God and Devil and the list goes on.

When you are in a state with no duality, All is God with no duality or discrimination of any kind.

Technically, what are the ways to climb from the state of negative energy towards the positive or rather attain the highest state of self-realization? Concentration is the tool to elevate towards the highest state of divinity or positivity and meditation is the widely accepted or followed practice. Whatever increases your concentration, is a trustworthy medium.

If you think that as a person belonging to any religion, you did not come across anything of the sort that was mentioned above, all these are mentioned in your sacred texts but before that, you must also know that religious books are not meant for all. All the sacred text underlines a warning that only the qualified or eligible should read the text. So who is eligible and why is that so. The eligible ones are those whose energy level is at least in the Anahata or Heart Chakra. Because only such people would have a better level of positivity or divinity such that they could understand what is written. The logic behind that is if a person with the highest divinity has written a text, so the one with the same density as that of the author will be able to grasp it and others will not. There is a simple example of that: In the name of religion, so many animals are being sacrificed and yes, citing that it is written in the holy texts. I agree. But here is the difference! When the ineligible handled it, they started killing animals in the name of religion and the true meaning as grasped by the eligible ones and the author of that text is that to progress as a human, you have to sacrifice your animal traits. What are animal traits? An animal is all about its attachment to sense pleasures. The holy texts ask the eligible ones to sacrifice their crave for sense pleasures because only then they can reach the highest state of divinity.

All the chaos that is happening in the name of religion is because of the ineligible ones who ignored the warning mentioned in the sacred texts. The warning was written by the ones who have experienced the highest state of divinity, hence they were no less than God. And they knew what kind of problem it would create. Well, we all are a witness. Even Terrorism is happening as a result of that.

Religion is the path of Self Realization. The Realization of yourself from the lower state of divinity towards the highest state of divinity.

Religion is about what you practice and technically what you do to increase your power of concentration!

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