The Difference Between Knowledge and Knowing
The pursuit of understanding both objective and subjective realty have divided religions into a veritable Pandora's box of dogma, war and human strife
. One religion attempts to sanction off its wisdom from another, though there are infinite parallels and similarities between them.Our objective sciences look at the world through the eyes and our subjective sciences, including religions, attempt to see the world through a sense ofbeing. The irony of such parsing is that we are really attempting to understand the same all-encompassing reality. The external world is a reflection of the inner world and vice versa.
The further into space we explore and the deeper we delve into our oceans, or look into our bodies on microscopic levels, we realize that the capacity for manifestation is seemingly unbounded. As soon as one phenomenon in science is realized, another is discovered and documented, ad infinitum, until the world is full of inestimable variations of the miracle of life and matter. The faster we seem to discover the mysteries of the world, the faster more mysteries seem to come. Our incessant curiosity and discovery lead only to more questions than answers, indeed, the more you know, the more you realize you don't know. The only problem with this speed of discovery is that, on the one hand we are growing and learning at unprecedented rates, and on the other, our religious or spiritual sense is becoming vastly outdated and unreliable in the face of modern life.We simply have not evolved our consciousness as fast as our technology.Old religions seem willing to do whatever it takes to slow down the pace of the world's forward thrust.
Though religion has also calmed the woe of many people, it needs to become aligned with modern thinking. Although many Eastern religions preach slowing down and turning within, they often forget that our world is hurtling forward just like a new sun through space. No intention and no will of God' will stop the momentum. Western religions are often no better. They expect people to rely on outdated paradigms that do not take our new world phenomenon into consideration. Many old religions never took into account there were things we just did not know and still do not. They never made room for the unknowable. They never left room for the mystery that is part of the Universe. As long as we are part of this existence, we, by definition, cannot merely be objective observers to it. Most religions never said, "There are things we do not know and cannot teach you. The mysteries of the universe have to be discovered individually." What we consider knowledge is not really knowing. Whatever we discover today is just a small piece of the infinite puzzle. That is the nature of infinity. You can never know it completely.
In some ways, we are still like the Catholic church when they responded to Galileo's report that the earth was not flat. We want to kill the messenger and deny the new reality. Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism, Christianity and Judaism all smack of dogmatic beliefs. How many of them say "My God knows all." How can this be? That is one of the paradoxes of Knowing. It allows room for all versions of reality. In the meantime, though, how do we find a unified understanding of the world with so much ostensibly dogmatic information being perpetuated?
First, we admit that there are mysteries in the world, and quite possibly always will be. We admit thatour beliefs can and should change over time as we evolve as individuals and therefore, as a society.
Second, we admit that some metaphors are used in our archetypal history to prove a greater point, and others are not metaphors at all, but offer a different perspective completely.
For instance, reincarnation was simply an accepted phenomenon based on faith alone in the past, but new information is coming forward which may prove that previous lives are not only possible, but sometimes remembered by children. The University of Virginia has over 2000 documented cases now.
Third, we accept that our current perception of reality is vastly limited. We realize that science is also beginning to prove that consciousness can lie outside the grey matter of the brain.
Fourth, whatever word your culture uses for the concept of soul', there are new experiments in the field of information theory which define and preserve data through information fields. It is being discovered, through these new experiments, that data is never created or destroyed, only recombined. The soul, therefore is likely a storehouse for this information both pre-birth and post-death.
Finally, we realize that though science is discovering wisdom in its new frontiers, it has yet todefine wisdom. Wisdom or True Knowledge is that which hasauthentic meaning and is without erroneous meaning. In its purest form, wisdom is not academic, but experiential. We know true wisdom when it proves to be timeless. We know a rose is a rose, we do not need to believe in it. True Wisdom is like this. Knowledge, exploration and curiosity are important prerequisites to obtaining Wisdom, but in the end we must be sure to steer clear from compartmentalizing our efforts.
The following quote from the Center for the Study of Science and Religion is disheartening, if not completely mistaken in my view:"Sciences respond to a felt need to understand the world, and religions respond to a felt need for the world to have meaning. From these different starting points, one issue emerges at the junction of any science and any religion: are these felt needs commensurate? That is, is the universe a moral place, so that the natural order is relevant to human lives and human values; do faith and family, love and charity mirror any larger meaning than the meanings we give to them? Today, to a first approximation, the answer to these questions from any religion is Yes, and the answer from any science is No." I beg one to consider that science has shown in numerous ways how the Universe is a place where morals, including love and charity are vastly important. Consider the latest research that theThe Institute for Research on Unlimited Love published concerning altruism. Humans who give to others live longer. Consider the work of the Japanese scientists, Dr. Masaru Emoto who has conducted countless research on the affects of love and peace on water, as well as the human body. Dr. Hiroshi Motoyama is conducting research on the electromagnetic fields of the chakras. Science and religion, now, more than ever need to stop compartmentalizing themselves within their communities and reach out to see the overlap in their attempts to define the world. True Knowledge is not partial to any religion, science, culture, or nation. It is Infinite and without time. True wisdom transcends all boxes we would try to put it into.
(c) 2009 Christina Sarich
www.yogaforthenewworld.blogspot.com
The Difference Between Knowledge and Knowing
By: Christina
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