Let there be no religious myopia

No 373 of Living Life Series 1

This post is motivated by inputs of real life case histories from Elder Ling an active missionary of the lord saint Lord Bo Tien even at age 76 +

Elder Ling Diung Kwong
a retired Police Inspector
Singapore

It is alright to be religious but so long as we are yet fully enlightened and not  one of the saints and amongst the saints, we must guard against religious bigotry. Bigotry is such that man sees only one angle and forget to look at more angles and pronounce that he is right and others wrong.

It is one thing to have faith and confidence in a saint of a temple but let not this blind us to see only the light that comes out of a tunnel and not the light of the whole wide sky. Elder Ling has come across believers who believe in the word of God and saint and who take what said by man on behalf of saint as gospel truth. Such is the magnitude of faith and absorption in the spirituality so much so that believers often cast themselves in the narrow world they create though still in the real world of man.

They have tunnel vision of life and even when sick would rather seek the instruction of the man they cherish as speaking for divinity. If the instruction is to seek only spiritual healing and to leave the hospital bed though sick, then if the sick man does so out of sheer faith, what would happen to him. He would perish and yet not be wiser as to where he went wrong and he would be perplexed as to why divinity has failed him.

Lord Bo Tien reiterates the need to have balanced approach in life and his image with him seated with both feet astride the elements illustrates what he teaches on wholesome or balanced yin yang approach to life.

In Lord Bo Tien's 1984 Anniversary Message, "he pointed out to the Taoist Octagon or Pakua, which showed two fish-like symbols the yin and the yang. Both must exist and if there was only one, then there will be no balance and peace. Man must seek the inner peace through balance of yin and yang. A temple or organisation must find balance in the yin and yang elements of people that constitute the temple. Only then will there be peace and harmony."

Lord Bo Tien

For every angle of approach to an issue, there are perhaps many other angles that should not be ignored. Let us be more complete and whole in approach. The lord refers to this in yin yang terms.

The various angles to an issue fall into passive and active aspects or what others refer to as feminine and masculine or even positive and negative. But his human intermediary the late Senior Brother P. Philip in the closing years of his life referred yin and yang as passivity and activity and that perhaps is closest to the meaning of yin and yang. (reference page 15 of  book LORD BO TIEN'S GUIDANCE)

Published in year 2000 by Bo Tien Temple
Singapore** for its 32nd anniversary
with Forward by Bro Peter Kong Meng Sin
the then incumbent temple Chairman.
The book was complied with advice
of the late Senior Bro Philip Png
and extracts of the early literary contributions 
of Dr. H H Xiao and
of the late Commonwealth Colombo Plan
scholar and Kedah state civil engineer
Brother Tay Chong Sim.
Many of the near verbatim transcriptions
of Lord Bo Tien Chinese Hokkien messages
were by Brother William Chew
who was the Hon. Gen Secretary
of the Bo Tien mission-related temple
at Jurong Singapore
  

Balance does not mean one yin and one yang but can be judicious mix of a few of either with one or even two of the other. So if one is very sick, one must seek medical help but one needs to seek divine providence to open the way. Sometimes it is more of one or the other. There is no magic formula but when the balance is reached, there is solution and presto, "lo" and behold resolution of the sickness in the most optimum way that brings peace and ease even if there is no immortality in sight.

What is said with regards to serious sickness, applies also to to any human problem or contingency. There are many who think that their way or sect is right and others wrong. There too are those who think that good works alone and getting acclaim from men of repute for their good works is the end-all. There are those who think that purifying their souls and nothing else matters. All these can be considered religious myopia.

Let everyone reflect on the issues the next time they sit in quiet meditation as part and parcel of the divine approach that Lord Bo Tien wants us to cultivate - 静坐，学法，救世，救万人。Jing zuo, xue fa, jiu shi, jiu wan ren.

Elder Ling shares with inner truth netizen real-life case histories of religious myopia. There is the need for there to be no religious myopia which sometimes border on ill-conceived bigotry. But men who inevitably end up with religious myopia should by all means seek solace by opening divine door but they should not close other doors when they open the divine door.

Let us feel for those with religious myopia who may be scorned at by some men as superstitious men or even bigots. Forgive them and feel sorry for them.  They know not what they do and suffer at the hands of their own folly which they did not bargain for and which they least expect. Help them before they become victims of their religious myopia.

God have mercy on them for they know not what they do. That be so and so be it.



 Bo Tien Temple Singapore**