Chapter 31 trinity religion

Religion is a belief.Multiple religions are multiple beliefs.Saying "one kind" means that religion is related to belief; but the scope of belief is wide and the scope of religion is narrow.The meaning of belief can be very broad, such as adding a belt to the collar of a man, and adding a heel to a woman's shoe, it is considered to be a little more beautiful than when it is not added, and it can also be said to be a kind of belief.However, it is usually said that faith refers to the large size, that is, something that can guide life in general.It is called "what", not "reason", because it is often impossible to use reason to prove that it must be true, correct, and effective, and reasoning is not even allowed.There are many kinds of beliefs, which are mysterious and far away. For example, Han people believe in the five elements, and Song people believe in Taiji diagrams. They are mysterious but close. For Paradise, and so on, all.To rise or condense a belief into a religion requires certain conditions that ordinary beliefs do not have, namely; first, a deep degree of belief.As the idiom describes, you will not realize it until you die.Among the miscellaneous gods in China, there are Stove King and Chenglong, and some of them naturally come from Yuxin, but there are "Fighting the Stove King" and "Fighting the City God" in the traditional repertoire, which proves that this is use, and the nature is witchcraft rather than religion.Belief in God, like Christianity, is different. There is happiness in life, which is said to be bestowed by God, and there is pain, which is said to be God’s intention to make oneself experience, so we should be grateful.Second, there must be a "supreme" object.The so-called supremacy means having all the ideals of goodness and no bits and pieces of badness, such as God is "omnipotent, all-powerful and good", Buddha is "unsurpassed and fully enlightened", and so on.Third, there must be rituals of worship.Usually, the body, the five bodies cast on the ground, the mouth, and the mouth has two functions: the body can strengthen the confidence; for the supremacy, it can express sincerity and allegiance, so that the blessing can be more assured.Fourth, be organized.From the perspective of the cause, it is like flocking together, and from the perspective of function, it is like a wall with a whip, which can prevent running out and supervise each other.Its manifestation is that the individual must have a name after joining, such as nuns, monks, etc.;In this way, religion becomes a more definite and stronger belief.

As mentioned above, faith often cannot be proved by reason, and reason is not even allowed.People, at least subjective wishes.They are both rational and accustomed to reasoning, so why do they allow religion, or expand some of it.Allow multiple beliefs that are difficult to justify to exist and prevail?The reason is simply that we ourselves are not yet omniscient, so that we cannot answer many immediate questions that we are eager to understand, and most importantly, we cannot control our own destiny.As for what you want, there are doubts, even if you work hard, you can finally understand it; life, and finally there will be no undesired and irresistible things that suddenly come to you.Obviously, this desire is destined to fail, what should I do?It is extremely difficult to give up "desire" (Buddhists have this ideal); as a last resort, we have to seek help from mystery.There is so much suffering in the world, but it is better to be able to go to heaven after death and sit beside God, than to have no such belief and only have despair when dying, right?In the same way, when thinking about the imminent disaster, it is always better to believe that the Guanyin Bodhisattva will bless and save the danger from danger than mourning without warning.So religion exists because we are still weak and want to live a more secure life, so we have to rely on it as a backing.

This kind of backing has advantages. Apart from helplessness and comfort, it also has a social role, which is to enhance moral strength.Almost all religions have a common feature, which is to imagine that there is a noble and pure realm of happiness and painlessness beyond or above the world. Become a virtuous person.The essence of this virtue is nothing but altruism, such as Christianity's opposition to "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth", and Buddhism's "boundless vow to save all living beings".This kind of virtue, when traced to the root, comes from seeking something, which seems to be inferior to giving without expecting anything in return.In fact, this is not the case, because secular virtue is not inaction. This can be said from the perspective that the inner is peace of mind, and the outer is honor. Even the sages will not regard these as indifferent.In such calculations, religion has the upper hand, because the desire is farther, more obvious, and therefore more powerful. ．In short, we must admit that religion is equally useful in improving morality and cultivation.But it's not without its drawbacks.There are two types of light and heavy.Lightness is a superstition that does not expand.The so-called non-expansion means to believe in oneself and not to force others to believe (propaganda but only asking for the bait of those who wish to take the bait is not considered coercion).But even so, we have to distance ourselves from humanism.Humanism talks about right and wrong, based on reason; religion, otherwise, is God (or other synonyms), or the reason under God.This inevitably hinders the efforts to seek truth, or hinders progress.This is most evident in the West in the Middle Ages.Religion cannot always tolerate dissidents taking a step forward.Another serious disadvantage is the superstition of expansion.This is not only believing in oneself, but also forcing others to believe.To say coercion is to use all kinds of irresistible forces against dissidents who still do not believe after propaganda, so that they can "express their belief." The so-called irresistible forces are not easy to enumerate. , For example, there are light ones, such as reprimand, insults, etc. There are intermediate ones, starvation, imprisonment, etc. There are heavy or heavy ones, such as distribution, execution, etc. Why does religion have such great power? It is combined with political power , became the state religion. After that, truth and justice became the only and exclusive, because there is force (or violence) as the backing, dissidents no longer have the freedom of unbelief. As a result, as analyzed above, humanism There will be no more territory. Even if you have insight into your heart, there are still people who are different from you. You can only be silent when there is no one else. No one dares to ask right from wrong, or talk about reason, and the impact will be too great.

This makes us have to think about the relationship between religion and science.The historical situation shows that there is a trade-off between the two: when religion is powerful, it is difficult for scientific knowledge to grow and spread; if scientific knowledge can grow and spread, religion has to reluctantly shrink its territory.The ebb and flow relationship between the two comes from different aspects: different demands, religion is to save the soul, and science is to appease the flesh; Belief is based on evidence; the origin of family business is different, religion is the revelation of God, science is to distinguish cause and effect, and gradually accumulate; the corresponding attitudes are different, religion is always correct, science is new and old, and the new ones come from behind.In this way, coupled with the evidence of the reality of recent centuries, it can be inferred that the situation must be that the power of scientific knowledge is gradually increasing, and the power of religion is gradually decreasing, but it is only decreasing and will not disappear.The reason has already been mentioned above. There are many far-reaching questions, such as the reality of the universe and the purpose of life, which science has yet to answer satisfactorily. Humans always want to live a happy life, but they cannot control their own destiny.There is hope, and it is urgent, and science cannot or cannot provide it temporarily, so we have to let religion open the door, and let those who are willing to take care of it come to take care of it.This time, at least I think, will be quite long, perhaps even as long as the human race.

Religion always exists, how should we deal with it from the standpoint of the group?Almost all current constitutions recognize freedom of religion.I say "almost" because there is still a problem hidden in it. Is it allowed to expand the freedom of this regulation into a principle? If it is allowed, it will become the freedom of "belief". Is this good?Whether it is good or not is a theoretical question, and whether it is allowed or not is a practical question, and it cannot be explained clearly in a few words.Here we still limit ourselves to religion, and we should recognize the freedom of belief, because, as analyzed above, we are still weak, and some people (perhaps not very few) have the extravagant hope of peace of mind, which cannot be satisfied by science and group organization. He should be allowed to seek satisfaction in other mysterious places.It’s useless if you don’t allow it. For example, if you smashed the temple and banned the chanting of Amitabha Buddha’s name, and he changed the vocal recitation to silent recitation, his confidence might be stronger.But there must be a limit to this permission, or a limitation, and it is not allowed to "force" unbelievers to believe in any form.In any of these forms, there are not very serious ones, such as requiring morning and evening to read Heavenly Father and Brother, and some very serious ones, such as being burned to death for not believing in the Trinity, to give an extreme example.Naturally, if religious power is not combined with political power and becomes the state religion, it will not have such great power.This situation makes us understand a very important truth: between science and religion, political power should be as close to science as possible and alienated from religion.This is implemented in practice, which means more reasoning and less faith.Speaking of reasoning, it is obvious that it is a delicate seedling. If it wants to survive and grow, it must have suitable soil, climate, irrigation, and so on.The content is very complicated, but it can be summed up in a word, if you don't plan for long-term stability, you will be fine. If you plan to rely on science and reason, it is always safer.