In full disclosure, out of personal curiosity I have studied and participated (including sub-sects) in several religious belief structures including Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and while not having taken part in Jewish religions, have examined Judaism and various aspects of the faiths followed by differing, various Jewish communities.
All of this, rather than making me an expert or even follower of a particular religion, has resulted in my rejecting formalized religion and seeking a Spiritual "source" to which to address myself, which seems to get lost once you apply the tenets and protocols of man-prescribed methods and beliefs demanded by churches and their "way of doing things". Each insisting on their particular (man-preached) interpretation as being the ONLY path to salvation.
If, like me, you sit and chat with believers of various religions and give them the right and freedoms to believe in their own way, then are you as shocked by one Christian group vehemently saying, in effect: "my Jesus is better than your Jesus and you will go hell for not adoring him, OUR way! (Usually the way of his/her pastor in his/her church and denomination presents the main deity).
And in a very similar way, having lived among Moslems for decades - and they are more splintered than Shia or Sunni, they have their own conflicts and insist their version of Islam is the ONLY way and that any other form will end you in "Jehanna/hell", so their Mohammad is better than your Mohammad.
As a three year old child, I startled my parents by asking if they would take me into the mountains and let me "think" for a few days and nights inside a cave. (I did not know the word for meditate).
Being highly spiritually advanced they understood and suggested that I could do this in my carpeted living quarters and they would order the servants not to disturb me, not even to bring me food until I called.
"That's not the same" was my protest.
While I could read and write (simple things) by the age of two, what I felt came from deep inside me not from acquired knowledge.
To make me happy they did take me into a nearby mountain range, armed guards to protect us from leopards, hung a hammock for me and camped at a distance.
All went well the first night but at breakfast a wasp landed on my sandwich, stung the inside of my mouth when I tried inadvertently to eat it and while it did not swell up dangerously (nearest doctor 50 miles away over dirt roads), they persuaded me to return home.
This prologue is intended to rationalize the posting of the link below, which I came across yesterday and found to be mentally interesting as a research item not as a proposal to adopt what they post there. Nor do I espouse it without reservations.
Take your time and browse around out of curiosity - unless it conflicts with and threatens your blind beliefs that a certain Jesus or Mohammad or other deity is better than anyone else's of the same name. Nothing here intends to change your mind only expand how others view life and religion.
What I have found is that formalizzed religion, to maintain and retain it's control over followers, tries to stifle and kill the spiritual path of reaching the "spiritual source" of all faith and religion.
Without such partisan mindsets I feel it all emanates from the same energy source along different circuits.
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/kersey_graves/16/
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