From the perspective of my mystic experiences of Reality, (MER), The Upanishads, Vedanta, Bhagavad Ghita are flawed.
One way or another, they do acknowledge MER as seminal to their moral and ethical teachings in a roundabout way but only sometimes and never go into any detail.
They also seem to suggest books and learning from ‘the ancients’ of India can take you into MER.
True mystics will tell you MER is caught, not taught.
Sometimes you get an acknowledgement that some human beings were and already are in that state, but without any attempt at explaining the nature and likelihood of this phenomenon.
They also claim all religions are based on the findings of these ‘ancients’. They’re not!
Religions and the Upanishads, Vedanta, Bhagavad Ghita are humanised shadows of the real thing – Reality.
Reality as revealed in the MERs is the existent foundation of all things, then, now and forever.
Another flaw is the apparent necessity of the Upanishads, Vedanta, and Bhagavad Ghita to goad us into at least faith, hope and belief as a substitute for the real thing – MER.
They lace their message with promises of ecstatic bliss and worldly satisfactions. So do most religions, with notable exceptions I’ll leave to your personally experienced satisfaction of discovery on your particular path.
You cannot be goaded into MERs by worldly promises. Even drugs don’t give you the MER experience, not from the scary, unlikely mental experiences imbibers and scientists describe, not if my spontaneous experiences are true.
MER comes from a Reality way outside any such inducements. It is benign, anaesthetically suffusing, loving beyond human experience – not traumatic, goading or beyond our receptive abilities.
The other flaw in these works is their assumption that whatever the ‘ancients’ experienced is always for the betterment of humanity. If this was true there’s a long way for humanity to go before it tackles its historic circular repetition of its same old, same old history.
We are getting somewhere materially, technically, and are living longer, more healthily, are better clothed, housed, fed, watered, and ‘educated’, though some still aren’t, but we are not developed in the fullness of our real state of spirituality – yet spirituality is the very heart of all known and unknown existence, including us, if what the MERs reveal are true.
Clearly, Reality’s revelation of what lies beyond human experience has something else in mind for humans than anything even human exploration of the cosmos, science fiction or religions and modern or derived philosophies, including The Upanishads, Vedanta, Bhagavad Ghita, can dream of …
All Is Well.
mysticexperiences.net All posts can be freely reposted.
Mystical Experiences of Reality 
“humanised shadows of the real thing”
I find myself unable to disregard thousands of years of human experience and countless spiritual tracts. I find it possible to suppose that there is a kernel and truth in many of the spiritual texts, Eastern and Western and that such hints as are to be found therein may guide one on the path one wants to tread. May point out the way.
And some of the characters involved; I would not like to discount their experiences or to suppose that none of them saw the truth, the reality.
Paul of Tarsus may well have achieved some such insight as may the gentlemen on the road to Emmaus. Siddhartha Gautama may well have discovered the numinous as may countless others.
Even the insane writings of St John of Patmos may contain some grain of “truth”.
Of course, as you yourself have said, those who wrote down such happenings and those who spin doctored it all into some grand and theoretical description of what they thought might be reality may have been people with no direct insight or experience of the numinous.
And religion, often as not, became a toy in the hands of the greedy and the seekers of power and dominion over others. The venal and the violent, they indeed can justifiably be described and labelled as flawed.
But, “flawed” as these writings maybe, I would not like to dismiss them as useless flights of fancy.
Best wishes
A
LikeLike
Anthony, a guru warned us not to partake of the menu instead of the food.
As for “… the path one wants to tread”, this implies the deployment of the self instead of allowing enlightenment to choose you.
Would that explain why so many paths are fruitless – insisting on eating their menu not the food?
So far as
LikeLike
St John, Paul, the jolly Fat Buddha presumably ate the food. They or their followers told (or tried to tell us) us a little about how they did so. Indeed they gave us a menu, or perhaps a map.
Initially (unless of course one is struck down without choice – like Paul and yourself) one must make human choices to seek enlightenment. Enlightenment chose you – sadly, it never chose me (nor ever looked likely to) . hence I have had to find my own way! and menus and maps have been helpful.
And thus some of the flawed works you list above have been of some help to this particular un-chosen one!
best
A
LikeLike
“there’s a long way for humanity to go before it tackles its historic circular repetition of its same old, same old history”
Yes, none of these works, none of the spiritual leaders (who may or may not have had MERs) have ever made much difference to the human condition.
But then as you have so often said, perhaps in the scheme of things, in the grand truth of reality, human life and the horrible behavior of our species is an irrelevance.
Perhaps we are better off with than without such people and such writings, but in many, many thousands of years:
“The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.”
So perhaps you are right after all. And all such works have served no purpose. Flawed or otherwise.
LikeLike
“So perhaps you are right after all. And all such works have served no purpose. Flawed or otherwise.”
You sound unnessarily deflated Anthony! Is this because you have an emotional and intellectual, not to say slightly hedonistic attachment to the human condition as your criteria for life and its disappointing you?
Nothing spiritually relevant will be gained by this or by study and acceptance of the human condition, if my experiences are anything to go by. None of that is what Reality is all about. There are more important things afoot than being merely human!
It’s a sure sign you are ‘called’ to be a Seeker that you werrit at these false feet of clay, Anthony … LOL.
As ever, Keith.
LikeLike
“You sound unnecessarily deflated Anthony! ”
No, not at all. Merely reflecting as usual. My strong belief is that such works have value. My unfortunate secondary belief however, is that none of the good thoughts in such works (flawed or otherwise) have ever made any difference to our species. Do I care? Hmm….I’m no longer so sure.
As you know, I spend my days ignoring the vast majority of what passes as important in the absurd world we see around us.
Best
A
LikeLike
As St. Paul was told, according to the Christian bible:
“It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks*”.
* No double entendre intended, I’m sure …
Keith.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Here’s a description of Vedanta that reveals the source if whst it refers to as a ‘philosophy. Nothing there about the source being the actual mystical experience of Reality. All references in the Hinduwebsite.com from which I have taken this excerpt only refer to the passing on of ‘scholarship’ from one generation of scholar to another. So is wha we’re getting just secondhand, not actual mystical experience of Reality?
LikeLike
I forgot to include the promised excerpt. Here it is:
“The (Vedanta) school recognizes the six evidences or testimonies (pramanas) to ascertain truth or valid knowledge namely, pratyakṣa (perception), anumāa (inference), upamāa (comparison and analogy), arthāpatti (circumstantial evidence), anupalabdi (absence of evidence) and śabda (verbal testimony of expert knowledge). The validity of each is further determined by various other factors.”
From Hinduwebsite.com
LikeLike