Does using physical rituals to cleanse the spiritual indicate a deficit in abstract reasoning?
I’m not religious by any stretch of the imagination, and if I possess any sense of the spiritual, it would have to be when I’m listening to a symphony or viewing a particularly beautiful work of art. One could argue, then, that these very simple acts comfort the mind and produce enzymes which are healthy for the body. In terms of physical activities like yoga or meditation or exercise, or dancing or even playing an instrument, all of these things could be ritualized to a degree and can absolutely have a profound effect on the mind and body in very positive ways. “Cleansing the Spirit” in my view, then, is a poetic way of expressing the result of such activities, rather than any indication of a deficit in abstract reasoning.
Physical rituals are the only way we can demonstrate what is in our hearts to others and show our respects to anything we try to.Spiritual rituals are in our heart and more deeply needed to show our respects to the lord. I am trying to cleanse my spirit. It is so hard with all of the physical occurence around me. Such a hard struggle to balance. I pray everyday to shift the tables over to my spiritual aspect and escape this physical existence that proves no worth tho me anymore. I am striving for better inner perfection to be ready to go home. When I do I don’t ever want to come back here and be challenged like this again.
No, not at all. It took a while for me to figure this out. I was talking to an American Hindu priest, about why he did his prayers in Sanskrit. Didn’t the God he was praying to understand English? He pointed out that the language he used had nothing to do with God’s understanding, or even his understanding. What it did was help him draw a line between his mundane reality and the meditative state he went into when he prayed. Rituals are not for the benefit of the divine – they are mechanisms we use to put ourselves into a different mental state. They work, not because the divine smiles at the ritual and grants us grace – they work because we choose rituals that work for us to put us in the right frame of mind. This is why the same ritual works for one person, but doesn’t work for the next person. It is a question of belief – not the “I was told to believe this so it must be true” type of belief (that’s faith) – but the real core “I did this and it worked for me” type of belief. Rituals
