ESSENCE OF SPIRITUAL CULTIVATION
The essence of spiritual cultivation is cultivating the spirit
Question 7
Following Siheng Mark advice on asking only one question, the most important question that comes to mind is this: What do you consider is the Essence of Spiritual Cultivation?
Sifu Angel G. Pérez Oliveras
Answer
The essence of spiritual cultivation is the spirit.
If the spirit if cultivated, there is spiritual cultivation. If the spirit is not culitvated, there is no spiritual cultivation.
Spiritual cultivation, therefore, is different from moral development, and also different from religious education.
These three disciplines -- spiritual cultivation, moral development and religious eductaion -- are often confused. Many people think, mistakenly, that a morally upright person is spiritually cultivated, or that a spiritually cultvated person is well versed in religious education.
A spiritually cultivated person is usually morally upright, but not necessarily so. A black magician, for example, has cultivated his spiriit to a high level, but he may not have high moral values. On the other hand, a morally upright person, like one who never lies and never steal, may or may not believe in the spirit.
Being spiritual and being religious are different. Our arts, for example, are spiritual, but they are non religions. Hence, a spiritual cultivated personly may or may not be religious, and a religiously educated person may or may not be spiritually cultivated.
As all religions deal witht the spirit, religious person therefore believe in the spirit. But whether they cultivate their spirit is another issue. Usually they are spiritually cultivated indirectly, like being devoted to God or divine beings, But if they are afraid of ghosts or are depressed, then they are not spiritually cultivated.
Spiritual cultivation may be divided into the following three categories:
- To live a happy and peaceful life here and now.
- To go to heaven in the afterlife.
- To merge with Cosmic Reality, called variously by people of different cultures as returning to God the Holly Spirit, attaining Enlightenment, or merging with Tao.
Spiritual cultivation may take many forms, like saying prayers, reciting sutras, devoting to the Divine, practicing chi kung and practicing high-level martial arts. But the principal method is meditation.
The term “meditation”, however, is a misleading term. It may suggests “to meditate” or “to think”. Thinking or intellectualizing is exactly what practitioners of some meditation disciplines, like ours, do not do.
The term originated from Christian meditation, which refers to reflecting on God’s words. This term was later applied to other spiritual cultvation systems that came from the East to the West, even when some of these systems, like Zen, discourage intellectualization.
The questions and answers are reproduced from the thread 10 Questions on the Essence of Spiritual Cultivation in the Shaolin Wahnam Discussion Forum.
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