Friday, May 29, 2015

21 Discipleship

21 Discipleship.pdf


22 Pre-requisite for a spiritual seeker

22 Pre-requisite for a spiritual seeker.pdf


Saturday, May 23, 2015

Meditation the Spiritual Practice

20 Meditation the Spiritual Practice


Thursday, May 14, 2015

19 The Shabd Creator and Supporter of All

19 The Shabd Creator and Supporter of All.pdf


Tuesday, May 12, 2015

The Science of Caodai (Cao Đài)


Caodaism (Vietnamese: Đạo Cao Đài, Chữ nôm: 道高臺) is a monotheistic religion officially established in the city of Tây Ninh in southern Vietnam in 1926.[1] The full name of the religion is Đại Đạo Tam Kỳ Phổ Độ ("The Great Faith [for the] Third Universal Redemption").[1]
Cao Đài (Vietnamese: [kāːw ɗâːj,kaʊ daɪ] ( listen), literally the "Highest Lord" or "Highest Power")[1] is the utmost deity, originating the universe, worshipped by the Caodaists.[1][2] Caodaists often use the term Đức Cao Đài (Venerable High Lord) as the abbreviated name for the creator of the universe, whose full title is "Cao Đài Tiên Ông Đại Bồ Tát Ma Ha Tát" ("The Highest Power [the] Ancient Immortal [and] Great Bodhisattva"). The symbol of the faith is the Left Eye of God, representing the yang (masculine, ordaining, positive and expansive) activity of the male creator, which is balanced by the yin (âm) activity of Mother Goddess, the Queen Mother of the West (Diêu Trì Kim Mẫu, Tây Vương Mẫu), the feminine, nurturing and restorative mother of humanity[34].[35][3]
Adherents engage in ethical practices such as prayer, veneration of ancestors, nonviolence, and vegetarianism with the goal of union with God and freedom from saṃsāra[citation needed]. Estimates of the number of Caodaists in Vietnam vary; current government figures give 3.2 million for Caodaists affiliated to the Tây Ninh church, with numbers rising up to 4 to 6 million if other branches are added.[4][5][6][7] An additional number of adherents in the tens of thousands, primarily ethnic Vietnamese, live in the United States, Europe, and Australia. The design of Caodaist temples, shape and coloring, is quite standard around the world and includes the incorporation of sacred images, symbols, and colors.[8]

Friday, May 8, 2015

Observe the Law of this Age

18 Observe the Law of this Age

Saturday, May 2, 2015

The Science of Confucianism

Confucianism, also known as Ruism,[1][2] is an ethical and philosophical system, on occasion described as a religion,[note 1] developed from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius (551–479 BCE). Confucianism originated as an "ethical-sociopolitical teaching" during the Spring and Autumn Period, but later developed metaphysical and cosmological elements in the Han Dynasty.[5] Following the official abandonment of Legalism in China after the Qin Dynasty, Confucianism became the official state ideology of the Han. Nonetheless, from the Han period onwards, most Chinese emperors have used a mix of Legalism and Confucianism as their ruling doctrine. The disintegration of the Han in the second century CE opened the way for the soteriological doctrines of Buddhism and Taoism to dominate intellectual life at that time. A Confucian revival began during the Tang dynasty. In the late Tang, Confucianism developed aspects on the model of Buddhism and Taoism and was reformulated as Neo-Confucianism. This reinvigorated form was adopted as the basis of the imperial exams and the core philosophy of the scholar official class in the Song dynasty. The abolition of the examination system in 1905 marked the end of official Confucianism. The New Culture intellectuals of the early twentieth century blamed Confucianism for China's weaknesses. They searched for new doctrines to replace Confucian teachings, some of these new ideologies include the "Three Principles of the People" with the establishment of the Republic of China, and then Maoism under the People's Republic of China. In the late twentieth century, some people credited Confucianism with the rise of the East Asian economy and it enjoyed a rise in popularity both in China and abroad. The core of Confucianism is humanistic,[6] or what the philosopher Herbert Fingarette calls "the secular as sacred". Confucianism focuses on the practical order inscribed in a this-worldly awareness of the Tian and a proper respect of the gods (shen),[7] with particular emphasis on the importance of the family, rather than on a transcendent divine or a soteriology.[8] This stance rests on the belief that human beings are teachable, improvable, and perfectible through personal and communal endeavor especially self-cultivation and self-creation. Confucian thought focuses on the cultivation of virtue and maintenance of ethics. Some of the basic Confucian ethical concepts and practices include rén, yì, and lǐ, and zhì. Ren is an obligation of altruism and humaneness for other individuals. Yi is the upholding of righteousness and the moral disposition to do good. Li is a system of ritual norms and propriety that determines how a person should properly act in everyday life. Zhi is the ability to see what is right and fair, or the converse, in the behaviors exhibited by others. Confucianism holds one in contempt, either passively or actively, for failure to uphold the cardinal moral values of ren and yi. Historically, cultures and countries strongly influenced by Confucianism include mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Korea, Japan, and Vietnam, as well as various territories settled predominantly by Chinese people, such as Singapore. In the 20th century, Confucianism’s influence was greatly reduced. More recently, there have been talks of a "Confucian Revival" in the academia and the scholarly community.[9]

Kung Fu Nuns provides help to quake victim in Nepal