This is intended to be an accurate account of a Buddhist monk's travels from China to India and back in the mid-seventh century. The Tang emperor was so impressed with the account, he asked the monk (Xuangzang) to create this historical record.
In addition to accurately describing the imports, exports, geography, and culture, it also goes on at length about dealing with "naga kings" (dragons inhabiting lakes), saints flying around with supernatural power, reincarnation, reputed temple miracles, collected stories of Buddhist enlightenment or attainment, and so on.
It's a similar experience to reading the Illiad or the Odyssey, in that it gives you a perspective on how people give credibility to the fantastic, when there is no evidence.
I would also add, in no particular order:
- wisdom of the desert (merton's translation of the sayings of the desert fathers)
- pilgrim at tinker creek; annie dillard
- goatwalking, jim corbett
- Impostors of God: Inquiries into our favorite Idols, william stringfellow
- the new testament, trans. by david bentley hart
- the sabbath, Abraham Joshua Heschel
- zen flesh, zen bones
- moral man, immoral society -- neibuhr
- principia discordia
- the poetry and sermons of john donne
- many other poets.
"The Book of Mormon", Smith
A good overview is The Kundalini Guide [1]. Some of the stuff defies explanation from a western perspective, but the strange stuff is mentioned throughout history and across traditions, so..?
There are also a few academic papers on kundalini now. Just search on nih.
Finally, after 20 years of trying different schools I'm now having the most success with the free lessons on AYP [2] if you want something practical.
That's the best way IMO since without understanding enlightenment as a real phenomenon, people can get quite confused. And what's the point in just reading a travel guide when you can visit for yourself?
[1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kundalini-Guide-Companion-Journey-C...
"The Sparrow"
"Lord of Light"
"The Immortal"
"Hyperion"
"The Last Question"
"Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?"
"Stranger in a Strange Land"
"The City and the Stars"
"Childhood's End"
"Anathem"
"Eifelheim"
"A Case of Conscience"
"VALIS" trilogy
"The Book of Strange New Things"
"Behold The Man"
"The God Engines"
"Book of the New Sun"
"The Parable of the Sower"
"The Dosadi Experiment"
"Grass"
"Project Pope"
"Calculating God"
"Factoring Humanity"
"Jesus on Mars"
"Surface Detail
The religion I fall into has lots of stories where starting from first person/prophet everyone was making the same prophecy about the last one. I sometimes wondered how it works from an external non-religious but still curious view because religion doesn't have answer to this line of questioning (except God) and demands belief.
Your question just made me realise that prophecy is a thing people have wrote about which is new for me.
https://www.amazon.com/Alphabet-That-Changed-World-Conscious...
Seeing the process of starting a religion laid so bare is helpful in understanding successful operators of the past like Paul the Apostle, Muhammad, Smith, etc.
- "Letters from the Desert" by Carlo Carretto
- "Being the Body" by Charles Colson
- "Fire in Our Hearts" by Mike Farrant
- "Total Freedom" by Jiddu Krishnamurti
- "Muhammad - a Prophet for Our Time" by Karen Armstrong
Its a thick book which kinda illuminated for me how many of these types of things humans have come up with and how over time one set of them influences the next.
The Dazzle Of Day by Molly Gloss. A downbeat beautiful meditation on a spaceship crewed by Quakers.
Early Theological Writings, Hegel. Specifically 'The spirit of Christianity and it's Fate'.
...or would we?
We did and still do rid ourselves of old religious bonds but we do not seem to have become more free for that, the opposite seems to be true. The 'god-shaped hole' which is left after leaving those 'old religions' did not get filled with objectivity and reason. It seems to have become a fertile bed for even more dogmatic ideologies which have many of the downsides of religion but offer none of the upsides. Many of these 'ersatz-religions' are distinctly anti-western, some go even further by being anti-human. There is no salvation to be found among them, man was born in sin and repentance will not save him. There is no heaven awaiting those who try to follow the 'correct' path, only a different version of hell.
What all this has taught me is that religion did not appear out of a vacuum but out of necessity. To keep society as sane as possible there is a need for a higher authority - whether real or imagined - which (or who) stands above all us mortals, even above the most mighty of kings and the most powerful of warlords. It is to that higher authority and his set of commandments that even those highest rulers need to be subservient to so as to keep them from usurping the power to do as they please without recourse. This can only work if enough people consider the will of the higher authority to overrule that of their 'earthly' rulers so the message needs to be spread and someone needs to get that ball rolling - a prophet, so to say.
Maybe a time will come when we as a species can live together without the need for a higher being to keep us from violating the commandments but that time has not yet arrived so: choose your god(s) but choose them wisely. You do not need to believe in the actual existence of the deity/deities in question but you - being rational - should be able to reason yourself into a position where acting as if he/they exist(s) is the better choice. You do not have to follow mortal leaders who claim they know what your god wants but you can listen to what the wiser among them have to say and find your own way towards a fulfilling life.