Salvation and the Meaning of Life

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Chapter 12

• Salvation and the Meaning of Life

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The sage leans on the sun and moon, tucks the
universe under his arm, merges himself with
things, leaves the confusion and muddle as it is,
and looks on slaves as exalted. Ordinary men
strain and struggle the sage is stupid and
blockish. He takes part in ten thousand ages and
achieves simplicity and oneness. For him , all
the ten thousand things are what they are, and
thus they enfold each other. --Taoism Chuang
Tzu
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The creation of craving leads successively to
that of grasping, of becoming, of birth, of old
age and death, of grief, lamentation, pain,
sadness and despair--that is to say to the
cessation of all this mass of ill. It is thus
that cessation is Nirvana. --Buddhism Questions
of King Malinda
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These are they who are drawn nigh (to Allah), In
the gardens of bliss. . . . On throne decorated,
Reclining on them, facing one another. Round
about them shall go youths never altering in age,
With goblets and ewers and a cup of pure drink .
. . And fruits And Pure, beautiful ones, The like
of the hidden pearls A reward for what they
used to do. --Islam Holy Koran 5611-23
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Good Thunder now took one of my arms, Kicking
Bear the other, and we began to dance. The song
we sang was like this Who do you think he is
that comes? It s one who sees his mother! It
is what the dead would sing when entering the
other world and looking for their relatives who
had gone there before them. --Native American
Religion Black Elk Speaks
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For by grace you have been saved through faith,
and this is not your own doing it is the gift of
God--not the result of works, so that no one may
boast. --Christianity Ephesians 28-9.
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By the purified mind alone is the indivisible
Brahman to be attained. Brahman alone
is--nothing else is. He who sees the manifold
universe, and not the one reality, goes evermore
from death to death. --Hinduism Katha Upanishad
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The Islamic depiction of heaven in the third
quotation is rather sensual, even sexual. Does
this seem ideal as the literal, ultimate goal of
religious salvation? How would you interpret
such a depiction? Contrast it with Black Elk
meeting his ancestors.
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The famous picture from the Sistine Chapel shows
the Final Judgment, in which people are taken
to heaven or to hell, based upon divine judgment.
Do the ideas of heaven and hell seem fair to
you? does it seem mean of a god to condemn, or
is it merely justice?
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How is Nirvana described in the Buddhist work?
Do you think this is another way to describe the
kind of heaven we find in the Islamic or
Christian stories? How is it different? Is it
attractive?
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The Taoist idea described in the first quotation
seems to be concerned with a free and easy life.
Similarly, the depiction of the Chinese gods
shows the ideal values of Prosperity, Longevity,
and Posterity. Are such ideals religious?
What do they suggest about Western conceptions
of heaven or hell?
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What do you think St. Paul means by grace in
the fifth quotation? What is the point of his
contrasting it with works? Compare both
concepts to the purified mind described in the
Upanishads. What is achieved by these three
things? How are different?
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One may find a kind of sensuality in the Islamic
depiction of heaven, and the Taoist image of a
free life may seem very worldly. Now look at the
Wheel of Life. Note that for the Buddhist, all
life, including the five realms of rebirth
(depicted in the circle), are held in the claws
of the demon of time. Generally, is the world
something we should seek to escape from, or are
its pleasures something religions should help us
achieve?
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In the Final Judgment picture, you get a sense
that we all have one chance to make it into
heaven or not. Yet the picture of reincarnation
suggests lifetime after lifetime. Can you
reconcile these views of life? How do they
change one s view of the afterlife?
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Salvation and the Meaning of Life

• Religions try to answer questions about the
  meaning of life.
• There is a logical connection between the meaning
  of life and Ultimate Reality.
• For religion, the meaning of life is rooted in
  being connected to the Sacred.

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Soteriological Goals

• This-Worldly Salvation (Confucianism, Taoism,
  Judaism)
• Other-Worldly Salvation (Christianity, Nirvana in
  Hinduism and Buddhism)
• Blended?

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Soteriological Means

• Salvation by Works
• Salvation by Grace
• Salvation by Knowledge
• How should we view religious conversion in the
  global age?

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Example ONE EpiscopalianThe U2 Eucharist