Tenrikyo Dynamic Mission - WORLDLY COMMON - TRUTHS OF THE WORLD - "A Little Deeper" - Page 3
We are taught that since we are born without the knowledge and understanding of the truth of our origin in the parental heart it is not surprising that we don't know anything about it. That means that the instruction to ponder over the long journey of human kind is an instruction to ponder over the paths that human beings have walked without the sure guide that is the knowledge and understanding of the truth of our origin and compare it with the path of single hearted salvation that is now being offered by our original parent as a corrective for the unintended suffering that is dampening our intended experience of a joyous life.
Reflecting on the path of our species we find that curiosity and change have been constants in the unfolding human journey. We are the species that as soon as we can speak begin to ask why and in most cases are not satisfied with an answer that amounts to "just because". We love knowledge and as we accumulate knowledge we are able to use that accumulated knowledge as foundations upon which we can build basic true principles which we can enlarge upon and rationally act upon. This ability to create and test truths is a powerful tool that has evolved in our species and which allows us to exercise a very broad range of adaptive strategies to deal with environments and and conditions so that we can overcome the natural challenges that we face in our pursuit of the enjoyment of happiness and true satisfaction. Physically, when we compare the suite of adaptive tools that we humans have at our disposal against the adaptive limitations shown in the prototypes of our species we can see that physically and mentally we have been provided with the adaptive means to overcome most of the difficulties that the prototypes that came before us had to face with much less adaptive power available to them.
One of our favorite principles is the fundamental truth that everything happens for a reason. Building upon that truth we can use our worldly common imaginations to create truths that answer questions that we may have concerning our experience of the world as it appears to us and also to use the truths that we have accumulated to build a totally authentic experience of a true separate and unique self centered identity for ourselves.
Depending upon our individual points of view some of the changes that our species has passed through have yielded results that could be viewed as being for the good of our entire species and some can be viewed as yielding results that could be viewed as being bad or evil for our entire species. Some examples of changes for the betterment of our species might include the mastery of the use of fire or more recently the discovery of the relationship between good hygiene and good health. Some examples of changes that could yield bad or evil results for our entire species might include actions flowing from our belief that ever more deadly conflict is our human nature and flowing from that belief our propensity to turn the discovery of new knowledge into weapons to be used against each other. Then there is the notion that the earth that we stand upon and that has nurtured us from our beginning can sustain limitless exploitation. Both beliefs and the changes that flow from them more or less guaranteeing an outcome of self extinction.
Looking all over the world through all ages it is apparent that we human beings have overwhelmingly chosen to follow the path of the good as we perceive it as opposed to a path of evil. In doing so we human beings have identified a number of truths to use as foundations for our thinking as we go about our business and pursue the good in this life. The problem for our species then has been how to clearly identify and be able to distinguish good from evil for the entire species and the world as a whole as it has been demonstrated over and over again that our best and sincere efforts in securing the good have in many instances lead to the experience of evil, sometimes on a grand scale.
As I reflect upon the human journey throughout the world through all ages it occurs to me that our attempts to identify the causes of both good and evil have not been pondered from the point of view of what is good or evil for our entire species and the world that we occupy but from a much narrower view of what is good or evil from a fundamental point of view that considers all matters self-centeredly, that is, what I consider to be good or evil for me. That is the point of view that puts me first, then my family, then my tribe, then my nation, then my religion or philosophy and so forth. That should not be surprising as it is our self-centered point of view that is the foundation of our survival and of our experience of life itself. It is our self-centered point of view that defines us as separate and autonomous human beings.
In our pondering concerning the broader view of what is good or evil for all equally it has so far proven to be impossible to find a common ground among all of the self centered truths that inhabit human minds and which serve as foundations for our thinking and actions. With that in mind it is understandable that we may take the point of view that it is sufficient to view each matter self-centeredly with the hope and intention that things will work our for us in the present while others will have to fend for themselves.
If however things do not work out for us in the present then we may be interested in a change in our situation. The kinds of changes that we look forward to usually involve the desire to affect a change in our personal situation or the desire to affect a change in our personal situation by changing the world around us. It is also usually the case that illness and trouble often prompt an immediate desire to quickly change one's condition or situation.
Having shallowly pondered the state of the world in all times and ages it is time to turn my reflection inward and examine my own journey and my own worldly common thinking as it has shaped the truths of my world. Now, in the twenty-first century most of us have access to a much broader sense of the human journey as it unfolded all over the world and through all ages than the people living on the Yamato plain did in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. I am grateful to my parents for providing me with a Roman Catholic private school education for my first eight school years as it provided me with a number of truths that formed the basis of a good moral ethical foundation and also an appreciation for story telling as it is presented as true human history. Since my early education was mostly concerned with what is thought of as Western Christian Civilization it makes sense that it is within the true stories and views commonly called Western Civilization and the roots of that civilization that I will begin my thoughts about the human journey as it has unfolded all over the world and through all ages.
It seems to me that in the era that is commonly referred to as pre-history it is likely that our earliest ancestors became aware of their physical limitations through their experience of illness, trouble, unfulfilled desires and death. For those early human ancestors awareness of those physical limitations reasonably led to speculation concerning the existence of powers greater than their own. To make some sense of their relationship to those powers, creative imaginations stepped up and provided true stories that could be handed down from generation to generation and which on the whole tend to provide reasonable answers - reasonable that is depending upon the cultural foundations that the answers are built upon - to the following questions:
Who am I?
Where did I come from?
What is my purpose in being alive?
What can I do to ensure my happiness?
What is in my future?
What do I have to do to get higher powers on my side?
Taken as a whole all of these questions deal with the topic of causality and each of the questions above can be answered in a variety of different true ways depending upon the time, place and maturity of the person or persons providing the answers. Since we are here concerned with the promise advanced through the Tenrikyo dynamic mission to utilized all means to reveal the original cause of all things in detail it won't hurt to take a moment and refresh that intention as we begin a discussion of some of the causal answers that were programed into my mind as a child.
As a child I was taught and learned answers, both reasonable and true, to all of the questions asked above. I was taught the truth that I was created by the one and only God - the God of the Hebrews - in God's own image and likeness, the truth that my body was borrowed from God and the truth that I was to be a steward of my body and my life. Further I was taught the truth that God our father - often portrayed as a man with a long white beard - is omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent. I memorized the Ten Commandments and the truths that flowed from them. I learned the truth that everything was created in seven days. I was made aware that challenges to the truth that the world was created in seven days began to rise up in the nineteenth century and were being answered and rationalized as matters of faith verses science, I was taught however and knew the truth of the primal couple, Adam and Eve, marveled at the truth that Eve could have been created out of Adam's rib and accepted the truths of the paternalism that flowed from that truth. I even more or less knew the truth of where the Garden of Eden and Noah's Ark were currently located. I recall being able to recite the Cardinal and Venial sins and the scary truths of eternal damnation that flowed from getting involved with them. Those are of course just a few of the true concepts and ideas that flowed from imaginations both divine, ancient and contemporary that were taught to children in my school. Each of those concepts and ideas serving as a true foundation for various true teachings that answered all of the questions posed above as well as providing for the hoped for basis of an orderly society.
Over all, the truths that inhabited my childhood mind could be described as creating a strong bias toward acknowledging the supernatural as a real and true force in the world. I learned the truths of heaven and of hell and the truths of angels, saints and demons. The truth that God could and would give miraculous aid to specific individuals or societies and the truth that God could and would also judge and punish both individuals or entire societies.
I learned the truth that the God of my culture was the one true God and that the beliefs held by my society were the ultimate and final truth. There is some comfort in being a member of a culture that possesses the one truth. I was aware that though through time there have been many human societies that also possessed their own version of the ultimate and final truth I could safely rely on and assume the truth that they had just got it wrong. At no time was there any thought given to the depths of devotion and the marvels, magic and miracles that appeared in the experiences and annals of the truths of those other societies. It was safe to assume that those truths were myths, errors and in my particular culture probably the work of the Devil.
After giving thought to the subject it seems that as a society progresses and accumulates truths those accumulated truths can then be used to prove the truth of each other. For instance there had to be an actual Garden of Eden because that is where Adam and Eve met or the true status of women could be derived and rationalized from the truth that women were created out of Adam's rib and the truth that since a women tempted Adam with an apple women were responsible for original sin and so on.
Though the truths of omnipotence, omnipresence and omnipotence could each be viewed as valuable subjects to be pondered deeply - in fact they are ideal subjects for kindergartners and first graders whose minds are as yet not filled with other truths - they were however in many if not most cases seeds planted in fields that were to be left untended, often for a lifetime. I imagine that they were left unattended because the "real" interesting stuff was yet to come. Enter the truths of emperors, kings, queens, knights and the stories of wonders and miracles, victories and defeats in the incessant wars between the "high Mountains" that make up the bulk of the tales of the human journey, all told of course from the point of view -"Kara"- of the most violent and selfish of our species who like everyone else lacked the knowledge and understanding of the true origin of their minds but just as there are outstanding performers in all walks of life, such as great athletes or musicians and the like there were and continue to be outstanding champions of greed and self centered thinking.
More metaphors: We are the "high mountains" and the central principle, "central pillar" of our thinking is the natural selfishness necessary for the self-preservation of our species, that has in some self centered imaginations run wild as bottomless greed. It is this unintended situation that is the regret of our original parent and it is this unintended situation that our original parent has set out to repair by revealing the truth of our origin and the knowledge and understanding that flows from that one truth to any mind that wishes to learn of it and that has been completely purified in service to that goal.
When I think about the historical and ongoing process of creating worldly common truths of the world it seems there is a constantly repeating cycle of stronger imaginations "capturing" and informing lesser imaginations. Mine by the way is a "lesser imagination", as left to myself I would not be able to reproduce the marvels of the twenty-first century and would have to fall back on what any boy scout knows for my survival. Further and without question, as a youth, my imagination accepted as real and true all of the stories that were programed and conditioned into me. Upon reflection none of those stories were of my own creation but they all appealed to my child like sense of the powerful, wondrous and miraculous. Adding to the power of those stories was the fact that it seemed as though all of the grown ups around me also accepted those stories as factual and true too. It was a time when the air was thick with stories and miracles and wonders, empires and emperors, kings and queens, knights and heroes. People who ruled by "divine right" and the great mass of people who followed them and the truths of the world that they endorsed. Such stories were commonplace and of course truths of the world varied from place to place and culture to culture. At no time, at least in my education, was there any effort or encouragement to practice separating and distinguishing the fruits of the self centered imagination (worldly common thoughts and truths) from the original consciousness - the true origin of the mind - that they rise up within.
Societies at large tend to reward people who stick to and use authorized stories to form truths of the world as the foundation for what is perceived to be a "healthy" and true world view. Unfortunately the down side of many of the authorized truths of the world that were and are current in my community is that they tend to generate a rather narrow and at times very dangerous world view. Though intending and often succeeding in producing a civilizing influence, adherence to worldly common truths and the model stories that were used as their foundation over time made it difficult and in some cases impossible to tell the difference between truths as they originally and naturally are and truths as they are imagined to be. When I think about the Model Story of Miki Nakayama in this regard it is clear that she really and truly suffered from the consequences of worldly common truths of the world which after awakening as the mind of the parent of origin She later exposed as non-existent truths and as a result was freed from their hold and the suffering that accompanied them.
Thinking about the long human journey it is apparent that some of the "stories" that flowed from creative human imaginations became the foundation stories for various human societies and civilizations. Some of the stories being the foundation of what can be called national myths and others being foundation stories for what are to be considered as being "natural truths" or moral and ethical truths. Upon reflection it appears that an important part of conditioning an imagination is the notion that the older the story the more authentic and true it is. For the imaginations that were captured by them those stories became "worldly common truths of the world" and for many if not most human beings such true stories continue to have a powerful hold on our imaginations. The Tenrikyo Dynamic on the other hand views old moral and ethical stories as being both true and appropriate for the infancy and childhood of our species but - at least in the moment of awakening - an obstacle to the awakening of a human being who would know and understand the the original cause of all things as it is given to the totally purified mind like clear water.
Regrettably the powerful hold that worldly common truths have on human imaginations is an unintended source of limitation. It has been demonstrated over and over again that it is very difficult for us to reason beyond the worldly common truths that inhabit and limit our imaginations. Though such worldly common truths are limitations, it is also the case that such limitations are always projected as intending to work for and be the source of great good for the human beings that adhere to them. Depending upon the circumstances it has also been shown that such limitations can also be a source of great evil. The teaching that is the Tenrikyo Dynamic then works to quickly and briefly free our imaginations from their conditioning, treating the old and ancient as temporary truths for a temporary purpose, appropriate for the infancy and childhood of our species while tirelessly hastening and facilitating our maturity and the free and unlimited workings that flow from the knowledge and understanding of the true origin of our mind, the original cause of all things.
The problem then is that both good and evil have tended to grow proportionately as our human civilizations have progressed. Looking all over the world and through all ages I would say that the human experience has been overwhelmingly biased toward the good. Progressing along with the good however there has also been an increase in our capacity to do evil. At this point in time we have the capability to create great good for everyone in the world equally and also the capacity to destroy our species as well as a great deal of our environment along with it. When looked at it is obvious that there exists a confrontation of opinions as regards what is good and what is evil as all parties to conflict imagine themselves to be aligned with the good and have at their disposal reasoned worldly common truths to support their true beliefs and true opinions.
Worldly common truth and thinking is based on true beliefs and opinions. The teaching that reveals the true origin of the human mind is based on the quick work of actually exposing the origin of all worldly common truths and beliefs as they rise out of the original consciousness. In this regard the Tenrikyo Dynamic differs from most worldly common truths in that we are encouraged to "ponder deeply" and settle our imaginations as opposed to the usual worldly common approach of "believing deeply" and holding onto our worldly common truths.
Looking all over the world and through all ages it appears that the true of the origin of our mind has not and will not be found among any of the conflicting true stories, true opinions and true beliefs that have occupied worldly common thinking. Recognizing that, I think that I will have to go deeper still to get at the true origin of my mind and the original cause of any and everything.
| Worldly Common pg. 1 | Worldly Common pg. 2 - "In the Shallow Water" | "Worldly Common pg. 3 - A Little Deeper" |
| Worldly Common pg. 4- "Foundations and Principles" | Worldly Common pg. 5 "Oh!" |
|Worldly Common pg. 6 "Me My Mine" | Worldly Common pg.7 "Borrowed" | Worldly Common pg. 8 "Lent" |
Worldly Common pg. 9 "One Light Reflected" | Worldly Common pg. 10 "What I have Learned" |