Please note: The post listed is for the previous week which is already there.
To be successful in _selfless service, the aspirant must be able to sublimate the ego through developing patience…
P 182-252
3-List the important points you got out of the reading.
• The similarities between sub-Saharan religion and Kemet. Such as, there is one God (Supreme Being), God expresses as lesser divinities, God and the universe are one, the three stages of religion, rites of passage, etc.
• Concept of the Devil – African religions ascribes evil and suffering to disruptive spirits and unrighteous living. The Christian and Jewish faiths see evil or Satan as the antithesis of God. Also, sin is the idea of separation between one’s self and God, the state of ignorance about one’s own spiritual essence (see more on this in item 4).
• Maat Philosophy and Ubuntu and how Ubuntu is very compatible with Maat and the concept of humanism or social awareness and caring. This is portrayed in the story that I like to share on Ubuntu,
At the Festival of Peace, in Florianopolis, South Brazil, the journalist and philosopher Lia Diskin related a beautiful and touching story of a tribe in Africa she called Ubuntu. She explained how an anthropologist had been studying the habits and customs of this tribe, and when he finished his work, had to wait for transportation that would take him to the airport to return home. He’d always been surrounded by the children of the tribe, so to help pass the time before he left, he proposed a game for the children to play.
He’d bought lots of candy and sweets in the city, so he put everything in a basket with a beautiful ribbon attached. He placed it under a solitary tree, and then he called the kids together. He drew a line on the ground and explained that they should wait behind the line for his signal. And that when he said “Go!” they should rush over to the basket, and the first to arrive there would win all the candies.
When he said “Go!” they all unexpectedly held each other’s hands and ran off towards the tree as a group. Once there, they simply shared the candy with each other and happily ate it. The anthropologist was very surprised. He asked them why they had all gone together, especially if the first one to arrive at the tree could have won everything in the basket – all the sweets.
A young girl simply replied: “How can one of us be happy if all the others are sad?” The anthropologist was dumbfounded! For months and months he’d been studying the tribe, yet it was only now that he really understood their true essence…
• African mystical philosophy is not merely a primitive superstition. It is based on the mystical experience of Sages and Saints throughout the history of Africa. These experiences were codified in the form of religion myths and shamanic (spiritualist) rituals that were designed to promote these experiences in others.
4-Which items if any are you in need of revising as to the history you previously learned. (Optional: how do you think this will affect how you relate to others who have not had this education or who come to you with alternative histories or understandings of the implications of the history as presented in this class which have proofs and references for what is in the textbook?)
This is not so much a revising as to the history previously learned but a better understanding. The definition of sin implies that we are born in sin – due to separation of the divine state and ignorance of the divine nature of the self. As you know in Christianity, Psalm 51:5 – “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me” Has some truth to it.
5-What is the most remarkable thing you learned in this lesson and how do you think if will affect: A-Your development as a human being and member of society; and B-How will it affect the way you relate to yourself and a spiritual aspirant.
The most remarkable thing that I learned in the small number less than 20% of the people in Africa still practice traditional African religion. This lets me know how fortunate I am to be able to practice Shetaut Neter and not take this opportunity lightly.
