From: coonstot@quads.uchicago.edu (charles orville onstott)
Subject: Re: MINDWALKING Buddhists, oh my!
Reply-To: coonstot@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 04:54:00 GMT

In article <C0Cot6.7wq@umassd.edu> pmsc13sg@UMASSD.EDU writes:
>In article <72358@cup.portal.com>, Tagi@cup.portal.com (Thyagi Morgoth 
>NagaSiva) writes:
>
>
>Also, I have no interest in mysticism except to identify 
>its destructive lack of objectivity.

Yes, and in so doing not only do you thrown any sense of objectivity
out the window by blatantly ignoring historical facts that prove
contrary to your view and maintaining yourself in a position
of ignorance which does not speak highly of either yourself nor
your dominatrix.

>	Buddhists think life is suffering because we have values which we 
>should sacrifice. This is also the Jewish-Platonic-Christian-Kantian view.

On the contrary, Christianity supports not only the suffering elements
of life but the joy and delight of of living in the world.  Unfortunately
for you, you remain in a position as to prevent yourself from considering
other forms of Christian theology which are not consistant with
your bland "christian" label.  Perhaps I could suggest the 
theology of Paul Tillich to begin with--a modern theologian
who might have something quite a bit different to say about 
Christianity than you.

[Additional Blatherings about Mysticism Omitted]

  You have convinced me of but one thing:  you are utterly ignorant
of the breadth and depth of the corpus of works, from all cultures,
labled "mysticism."  You blatantly refuse to acknowledge other
forms of mysticism, and your treatment of Buddhism itself is
cheap and ignorant.  Perhaps if you actually read mystical texts,
instead of Ayn Rand on Mysticism, you might learn something--namely,
that mysticism is hardly a danger in the way you percieve it.  Instead,
I see a danger in your ignorance and your pretention to understand
mysticism, which is obvious from your overgernalized epithet of
"mysticism" which seems to me to target things that you don't like more
than anything historically, theologically or culturally accurate.  If
Randianism means remaining in this form of ignorance, overgeneralization
and refusal to see the merits, fruits and gatherings of such a beautiful
tradition of thought, I can only imagine her treatment of other
areas.  What I see, Mr. Grossman, is an inherent danger in your
philosophy as it absolutely contradicts the function of scholarly
work, of serius lucabration, of a commitment to truth and accuracy,
and an attempt to honestly evaluate a system of thought in a cohernt
fashion.  If anyone is dangerous, I hardly would consider the
undeniably scholarly work of many mystics who tried to advance
a view of the world they thought not only fulfilling, self-actualizing, 
but beneficial to others however wrong in final analysis any of them
may have been; instead, Mr. Grossman, I would consider you dangerous
from your blatantly categorical approach to a rich and diverse history
which not only denies specific differences among various mystical
traditions but reveals your refusal to actually learn something.


>Stephen Grossman <PMSC13SG@UMASS.EDU>
>================================================================================

BCnya,
  Charles O. Onstott, III

-- 
Charles O. Onstott, III                         (coonstot@midway.uchicago.edu)
Graduate Student in Religion and the Human Sciences
The University of Chicago Divinity School
           "For [the study of] history, too, has its fashions."  (Anouilh)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta