Religion is the root of all evil.

Buddhism is only agnostic when it is applied to Christian Judao theology.

The Buddhists, following the traditions of their Indian fore-fathers, saw the universe as infinite in time and space, and filled with an infinite number of worlds like our own. Below these is the realm of desire (kama-dhatu) which contains six domains (gatis), each with its own kinds of beings:
1. Devas or gods.
2. Asuras or titans (or jealous gods, or demigods),
3. Manusyas or humans.
4. Tiryaks or animals.
5. Pretas or hungry ghosts.
6. Narakas or demons (hell beings)

Ref http://www.ship.edu/%7Ecgboeree/buddhacosmo.html

I disagree. One can never prove the truth of any religion. One has to believe and have faith that it is true. This is how each religion controls its followers, “we have no proof that our religion is true. However, it is based on faith and if you believe, you will receive.”

 

You are misinformed i'm afraid. Unfortunately misinterpretation of eastern religions and philosophies is commonplace in the west, it's definitely best to get sources from a variety of places, and probably best to treat the scholary interpretations of buddhism with skepticism.

In most schools of buddhism the 6 realms are only used metaphorically to represent states of being one can pass into at anytime;
"In the Buddhist depiction different karmic actions contribute to one's metaphorical existence in different realms, or rather, different actions contribute to one's characteristics similarity to those of the realms. Leading from the human realm to the oustide of the wheel depicts the Buddhist path. (Epstein 1995, p.15-16)"

Coming from Buddhists themselves, you may find this interesting, the vast majority of buddhists (certainly in the west) cosnider themselves agnostic, athiest or ignostic; http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index.php?showtopic=33814&pid=531217&st=120&#entry531217

I do not believe in a creator god, I do not believe in literal six realms of existence in other dimensions with super-beings/demi-gods, and I consider myself a practicing buddhist (in that I meditate, use the eightfold path as a guide, and have gone on retreats in asia...though I wouldn't use the label in everyday speech away from the internet as it brings a lot of negative connotations and misunderstandings, still buddhist is what best fits my understanding).

The six realms are used as metaphors, they each represent a negative quality;

1: Gods - Pride
2: Demi-Gods: Jealousy
3: Humans: Desire
4: Animals: Ignorance
5: Hungry Ghosts: Greed
6: Hell Beings: Anger/Hate

So when we get jealous we are said to be in the realm of demi-gods, when we are angry we are said to have entered and 'born into' (again, metaphorical meaning) a hell-realm, and so forth.

Here are some more sources, websites and books explaining buddhism as an agnostic or an ignostic 'religion';
God in Buddhism

Buddhism has often been called an atheistic religion, but this is misleading. The true Buddhist position is more that of standing aside from questions about God. The Judaeo-Christian religions postulate a God who creates the world, but Buddhism is unconcerned with such questions; for Buddhism, the world is simply there, given. It has the properties it has, and that is all we can say about it. In fact, gods do figure in Buddhist tradition, being inherited from Hinduism, but they are not creators; they are part of the cosmos, subject to death like other beings. And it is unnecessary to be concerned with them; as a monk once remarked to Richard Gombrich, "Gods are nothing to do with religion". It is thus perfectly possible to be an atheistic Buddhist, whereas it is difficult to be an atheistic Christian (although some modern theologians seem to have come close to achieving this feat). However, given the Buddhist attitude to dependence on beliefs, agnosticism might be the better option for the Buddhist.

For Christians, the problem of reconciling God's omnipotence with his benevolence is notoriously difficult. For Buddhists there is no such problem; the world is simply what it is and we don't have to explain or justify the existence of suffering within it.



The soul

The question of the soul is a difficult one for most religions today, since it appears to entail some form of philosophical dualism, which is hard to maintain in the face of our modern awareness of the critical importance of the brain as the basis of mind and personality. However, a materialist understanding of the mind doesn't pose any real difficulty for Buddhists. Indeed, one could go further, for one of the central teachings of the Buddha was that there is no persisting Self. Of course, on the practical level we all do have a personality, which persists, with changes, throughout our lives; but the Buddha decisively rejected the view that there is some over-arching Self or Spirit beyond this. As has often been remarked, the Buddha's teaching about this is remarkably similar to the view of the philosopher David Hume. Among modern philosophers, Derek Parfitt and Galen Strawson have noted the relevance of Buddhism to their ideas. The psychologist Susan Blackmore, likewise, finds her view of the mind to have much in common with Buddhism.

http://www.accampbell.uklinux.net/essays/skeptic/buddhism.html

http://www.amazon.com/Buddhism-with..._bbs_sr_1/002-1224777-1332834?ie=UTF8&s=books

Hope this helps you out.

 

Question for you;
You say one can never find any truth in religion. So similary can one ever find truth in philosophy, ideology or doctrine? If yes then why? How does it make it different from rationalising ideas in religious concepts and ideas?

For example there is no proof that communism is 'true' (as it works as intended) and thus can be said too be a belief based on blind faith. "It's based on faith and if you believe, you will recieve (from the party comrade!)".
What about Hedonism? What about Athiesm? What about Epicurism? Surely you need a varying degree of blind faith for all of those (even modern science)? Is there a 100% perfect philosophical, dogmatic or religious system or method in existence? No. Does this make every single dogma, ideology, concept etc totaly invalid and the root of all 'evil' too? Following your logic it must, unless you can distingish what makes religion anymore fundamentally flawed than other dogmas, ideologies and thoughts, which I don't believe you can't (since its our own selfish wanting that is at the root of it all, not the dogmas themselves).

 

Why does everything have to be so polarized? Why can’t we just accept the fact that we don’t know. The whole point I’m trying to make is mankind is never going to advance any further with a world full of people following the Gods in their heads. Religion is pure selfishness disguised as selflessness. When you only answer to God and surrender to your Gods master plan, then you forsake this planet and destroy it with human selfishness. The closest thing to a miracle that I can see is the fact that this world even exist at all, and most of us will spend our whole life dreaming of some imaginary perfect world.

 

Im guessing you were inspired by Richard 'Last Atheist Alive' Dawkins latest propaganda 'documentary': 'The Root of All Evil?'

Dawkins actually protested the Title and for the same reasons you would want to abandon yours - the very concept of 'Evil'.
Without Deism (at least) you really have a pretty wacky problem when you suggest anything is 'evil'.
Forget that, you gotta try and decide how you can even use the word 'Bad'.
By what standards do you get 'evil' from?
You must be borrowing that concept from religion I assume?

Of course, saying 'Religion' is like saying 'Politics'.
What do you mean, Hitler or Abe Lincoln, Democracy or Dictatorship?
Do I get to say 'Government' is 'Evil' and then cite Caligula and Pol Pot.
See.. I showed how Government is bad.
BS.

But fortunately most all religions have caused worldwide goodness and prosperity, social graces and benefits for society at large.
Still true today.

 

Oh yes, the world is in a wonderful state right now all because of religion!



How many millions of lives have been destroyed by religiously supported wars, genocides, and terrorist attacks? Well over 10 million just in the past century.



Sacrifice this planet all in the name of heaven, still true today, sure is!

 

All excellent points.

All i'm trying to say is stop blaming the fact that we as humans decide to distort, manipulate, corrupt or just plain misunderstand and misinterpret fundamentally good ideas (about life, the universe and everything!) to suit our own selfish desires on the dogmas, religions and ideologies themselves.

I don't consider any religion or philosophy we see today as being completely true to itself (even my own), but I don't feel it means that the original ideas are inherently 'evil', if people choose to take an idea and twist and distort it, or they can't grasp it in a way that is beneficial, then that's there problem, it's humanities problem. I don't see how people can justify blaming dogmas, because that's blaming something that is superficial and ignores a deeper rooted cause (e.g accepting concepts on 'blind faith', not correctly understanding, distorting concepts through selfishness). Intellectualism is flawed.

Shouldn't we be blaming 'evil' on our own inability to look inside ourselves and get to grips with our own selfishness rather than constantly blaming endless amounts of dogma?

So then aren't we, by always blaming religious/philosophical dogma, displaying the very selfishness you accredit to religion?

 

I don’t think so. I never claimed to be anything other than a human being, I’m an animal, I’m lazy, I’m greedy and I’m selfish just like everyone else. Only difference is I’m willing to admit it and I don’t have spiritual delusions of eternal might controlling my life.

Religion is the root of all evil and man is the seed. How does that saying go, “Admitting you have a problem is the first step…”. Well, religion is an absolute and unwavering state of denial.

 

Again your intellectual dishonesty.
'Religion'.
So I have also guffawed over all the destruction that 'Government' has put on the Earth.
Lets keep using your 'logic' and show that 'Entertainment' is a terrible thing... look at how many lives were lost in the Coliseums!

No.
It doesnt work that way.

Now to the extent people have gone and done evil despite their religions is a good question.
Horrific wars/invasion 'in the name of' Buddhism just dont work to impune Buddhism.
If anything they went to show what happens when you do NOT follow the religious teachings.

But anyways,
We still have a first problem here: By what measure or standard are you using the concept 'Evil'?
Where do you get the very notion of 'Evil' from?

Please explain?

 

It must be nice to choose how you want to interrupt an ancient religious belief just to suit your needs.

I want to go to heaven but do I have to follow all the 10 commandments?

Come on. That can’t be right.

This is how it starts.

When does it end?

 

The way some of you guys look at religion as a singular thing is wrong, its a plural thing. It has been around for ages, it has evolved from beliefs of certain places, like christianity, islam, and judaism has evolved from mesopotamian influences, zorastranism(sp?), same for hinduism,buddhism exc. Its not one thing, its a variety of things.

 

You accuse me of intellectual dishonesty and you can’t see any link between government and religion? Our civil structures and laws are mostly based on religion and when leaders need support for wars they always convince their people that God is on their side. It’s funny how most soldiers in most wars thought THEIR God was on THEIR side and their reward would be heaven. Take religion out of the picture and wars loose their fuel real fast.

So how many lives were lost in the Coliseums? must be in the 10's of millions if you even bother to bring it up.

You don’t get it, just like you didn’t “see” my explanation of evil from the beginning. Religion was invented by man as an excuse to do “evil”, cleverly disguised as a standard of “good”. I’ve hear this over and over from the religious and I’ll keep saying it, the deeply religious always say they only answer to God. God only exists in their head so they really only answer to themselves. When you only answer to yourself then respect for others and the entire planet earth goes completely out the window. Spread this sick mental attitude to millions and you have yourself the recipe for just about every war that’s ever happened on earth.

 

Ok, well its clear to me you dont have the faintest clue what you are talking about and its the usual 'giveaway' when someone suggests that 'most wars were done in the name of religion'.
Something secular agnostic historians (or just non-idiots who read books) would know is outright nonsense.

But forgetting the totally ignorant grasp of history and sociology here...

I ask you again where you are getting the concept of 'evil' from and why you keep using it as if it was a real thing?

Try explaining that before you go onto your silly theories.
Where are you getting this idea of 'evil' from?

Answer?

 

Like I already told you, read the second paragraph of this thread!

You don’t need to ready any books to see what’s painfully obvious to anyone with an opened mind. All the books in the world won’t help you develop a common sense. A world blinded by faith is not going to have many texts linking religion to these atrocities because religion has such a strong hold on society. Just a few generations ago, before Internet and television, churches were the hub of nearly every community. That’s common sense, I don’t need a book to tell me that. Any blasphemers would be outcast or killed like an animal. More common sense, I don't need a book to tell me that one either! So go read your old biased "run around" books that avoid the truth.

There’s a country in Africa that depicts a bible on its national flag. By no coincidence, it also shows an assault rifle. By no coincidence they have the lowest life expectancy in the world.

The kind of priorities that the promise of heaven bestows, I guess they do put you out of your misery one way or another.

 

Actually, ideology inspired mass murders skyrocketed into popularity at just about the same time 'religion' lost its place as the community hub.
Hitler, Stalin, Mao and even after them, as Churches emptied, incarcaration for the skyrocketing murder rate has gone up too.
But
In fact, almost every war in human civilisation is over one thing, the same thing over and over and over...
Land.
Specifically the resources IN the land but its land.
Thats almost ALL wars in human history.
Welcome to History 101.
... errr.. actually you should have learned that by about the age of 10 if you were educated properly.
(agreed, schools are crap too often)

oh, and you really shouldnt bother trying to bluff lol.. its pretty gay when its so freaking obvious you dont have a fucking clue #1 about the most basic history you knob.

But get off it.
Stop hiding in intellectual cowardice and face YOUR problem: Where are you getting this concept of 'evil' from?

You also have used concepts of 'wrong'?
Why are you using that concept and where do you get it from?

You seem to be suggesting that 'right thru might' is something 'bad'?
Where are you getting that moral standard from?

Dont be a coward.. answer these questions?

Im going to assume you cannot and admit a problem with your post until I see some attempt to answer this:
Where do you get the concept of 'evil' from?

 

Your fanatical rage must be taking over because you’re making a complete ass of yourself.



You know as well as I do where the concept of evil comes from, big deal. I’ve also proclaimed “Oh my God!” several thousand times in my lifetime. Merry Christmas and Happy Easter! You must be ever so proud of your clever self. I also follow a Christian calendar. So what!? What does it all mean? Only that I live in a society built around religious concepts. Nothing more nothing less, time for man to evolve society into something better. That’s all I’m saying. So stop clouding the subject with “run around” nonsense.

 

No running around here.
I think what you are running around saying is that you have borrowed the concept of 'evil' from some world view that you do not have or believe in.
At least you were able to admit it after all.
For you, there is no 'wrong' or 'right'.

 

relaxx, you are using 'evil' , a religious concept to argue against religion...Your argument has been flawed from the moment you posted this.

 

This is the whole fucking point!

The same explaination is being given throughout this thread, over and over, yet we just keep going round and round in circles...People here are just so fanatically against anything remotely sounding like a 'religion' they are refusing to acknowledge any argument to the contary and resort to pathetic taunting...What is the point? It's like talking to a brick wall.

Religion is a concept. Like ideologies are concepts. Like philosophies are concepts. Nobody here has given evidence to how religious concepts are any more negative than ideological/philsophical concepts.
And i'll tell you now, you wont be able too. Why? Because the difference between them is entirely a matter of opinion, or a point of view, open to everyones unique interpretation.
You could argue to me religion is defined as something that requires blind faith and adherence to an unproven system. But then I could easily say to you then communism must also be a religion.
Staying with that example, you go to any leftist message board or forum on the internet and you'll find that there is a massive difference in how people define communism...You will have the left-authoritarians claiming that 'true communism' is a system resembling Stalins Soviet union, others will claim 'true communism' to be something akin to Mao's China, and yet others will tell you that no, neither were a true respresentation of 'Communism', and we have yet to really see a truly communist system as it's based on socially liberal principles...
And we can see this within any ideology, any religion or doctrine. Hundreds of different sects and schools within Buddhism, all with there own interpretation of what some Indian prince taught a couple thousands of years ago...Moderate muslims, sufis, muslim extremists...religious taoists, philosophical taoists...We even have different interpretations of 'democracy and how to implement it, you need look no further than Neo-Conservatism and the events in the Middle-east for this...

relaxx, you have a religion but you don't even know it...The religion of anti-religion!

Tragic.

 

Okay, so you have given us plenty of information about what you don't like, what you think is the cause of the worlds 'evil' and suffering...So tell us about this: "time for man to evolve society into something better" comment. What would that be?