World Religion Simplified

Exoteric / Intrateric*

RELIGION AS CREED	/	RELIGION AS QUEST
Shared belief, faith, dogma.	/	Individual existential inquiry.
Exemplified by doctrines.	/	Exemplified by individual teaching/example.
Dualistic.	/	Monistic.
Natural/Supernatural, this world/the next......	/	One life, universe, everything.
The "outer," i.e. everyday consciousness.	/	The "inner," the contemplative or meditative.
Cognitive: Beliefs most anyone can understand.	/	Intuitive: "The Secret waits for the insight."
Personal self salvation.	/	Impersonal non-egoic enlightenment.
Temporal: Beginnings and endings.	/	The timeless: "To see eternity in a grain of sand."
Organized religion: Essential.	/	Organized religion: Oxymoron.
Doubt: Something to be delivered from.	/	"Greater the doubt the greater the enlightenment."
Authoritarian: One God, one Book.	/	"He who knows does not speak..."
Religion is a period.	/	Religion is a question mark.
Prophets are needed to know the way.	/	"Put no head higher than your own."
Heaven & Hell: Elsewhere, else-when, out there.	/	Metaphors all: "What-is" is here, now, ineffable.
Literalistic TRUTH!	/	"Just a tacit understanding and no more."
Ethics requires religion—you need it to be good.	/	Ethics, like logic, has nothing to do with religion.
Deep concern over our propensity to sin.	/	Deep concern over our capacity for error.
Tends towards either/or thinking.	/	Tends towards and/both thinking.
Fosters and supports "the culture of belief."	/	Compatible with "the culture of inquiry."
Science is properly exoteric.	/	Exoteric religion is false religion.
Mind against heart, heart against mind.	/	Xin (heart-mind).
Life after death.	/	Death after life.

Something of the East is contained within the West, e.g. gnosticism (prior to being exterminated by the early Church), Kabbalah, Sufism, the heretic mystics (Eckhart, Blake, John of the Cross), Schopenhauer, Spinoza, Transcendentalists (Thoreau, Emerson), and the existentialist philosophers and writers from at least Melville and Hawthorne on. The closest analog in the West to what would be called religion in the East is Existentialism—the individual undertaking an existential inquiry unguided by authority, so think "religion = existential quest" and the "intrateric" side will make more sense. And there is more than a bit of the exoteric in the East: e.g. organized doctrinal religion, "spiritual" pundits, authoritarian gurus, explanatory fictions (e.g. reincarnation), even scriptural literalists (e.g. Nichiren Buddhists) whose presumptuous certitude would put the West's Jehovah's Witnesses to shame.

Most religionists have one foot on the exoteric side and one on the intrateric side with more weight one side than the other. Some manage to stand on one leg only. The issue for religion is that to straddle both sides requires compartmentalization of the mind as the two are not reconcilable. This accounts for the tendency to favor one side or the other and compartmentalize. To fully reconcile opposites requires standing on one leg or the other. For humans who are bipedal this is a problem, as we need both legs.

Science is by nature exoteric. It is also a quest, but one that is shared. There is no intrateric science. If the religionist embraces exoteric religion, then they will have to compartmentalize whatever science they may embrace. Two parts of the brain will alternately control one exoteric leg and mobility will be impaired. Alternatively, one exoteric science leg and one intrateric religion leg would not have irreconcilable differences, and a human having both could walk on two legs. Fritjof Capra, in his Tao of Physics said, "Science does not need mysticism and mysticism does not need science, but man needs both."

Mysticism = intrateric religion. He did not say, "Science does not need religious belief, and religious belief does not need science, but man needs both." Exoteric religious claims and science claims do not happily coexist. What would a mind based on science and mysticism look like?

SCIENCE AS QUEST	/	RELIGION AS QUEST
Shared theories, hypotheses, conjectures.	/	Individual existential inquiry.
Exemplified by collaborative effort.	/	Exemplified by individual teaching/example.
Dualistic because conceptual.	/	Monistic.
Nature, this world/observable universe.	/	One life, universe, everything.
The "outer," i.e. shared, observable phenomena.	/	The "inner," the contemplative or meditative.
Cognitive: Claims others can test/understand.	/	Intuitive: "The Secret waits for the insight."
Collectively shared understanding.	/	Impersonal non-egoic enlightenment.
Temporal: Beginnings and endings.	/	The timeless: "To see eternity in a grain of sand."
Organized science: Essential.	/	Organized religion: Oxymoron.
Doubt: Something to be embraced.	/	"Greater the doubt the greater the enlightenment."
Knowledge based on evidence and reason.	/	"He who knows does not speak..."
Science is a question mark.	/	Religion is a question mark.
"Guess then test."	/	"Put no head higher than your own."
Concepts all: Claims subject to doubt and change.	/	Metaphors all: "What-is" is here, now, ineffable.
Provisional claims subject to error.	/	"Just a tacit understanding and no more."
Ethics is best informed by science.	/	Ethics, like logic, has nothing to do with religion.
Deep concern over our capacity for error.	/	Deep concern over our capacity for error.
Tends towards categorical thinking.	/	Tends towards and/both thinking.
Fosters and supports "the culture of inquiry."	/	Compatible with "the culture of inquiry."
Science is properly exoteric.	/	Exoteric religion is false religion.
Mind is other than heart.	/	Xin (heart-mind).
Life involves death.	/	Death after life.

 

Notes:

The division of world religions into those based on creed and those based on quest was made by Huston Smith, a religious studies scholar best known for his book  The World's Religions: Our Great Wisdom Traditions (originally titled The Religions of Man) which remains a popular introduction to comparative religion.

*In his excellent "The Perennial Philosophy," Aldous Huxley divided world religions along much the same lines as Huston Smith, but called them "exoteric" and "esoteric." Exoteric refers to the outer world as observable by all. The word "esoteric" is the opposite, yet has some unfortunate connotations today and so has been replaced here with "intrateric," which refers to one's own thoughts, feelings, and perceptions as you alone can observe them. Intrateric knowledge is always in the here and now before it can be converted into a concept (exoteric all) to be thought about and possibly shared. Exoteric seeing involves the endeavor to think well, while intrateric seeing involves what is commonly called mindfulness, which can lead to "insight."

"The Secret waits for the insight of eyes unclouded by longing; Those that are bound by desire see only the outward container." is from the Tao Te Ching. "To see eternity in a grain of sand" is Blake. "Greater the doubt the greater the enlightenment" is a likely Zen Hakuinism. "He who knows does not speak, he who speaks does not know; who knows this knowledge without knowing?" comes from Zhuangzi commenting on Laozi. "Put no head higher than your own" is from that fellow affectionately known as Buddha. "Just a tacit understanding and no more," Huineng's comment on the transcendent-of-all-concepts insight, sometimes picturesquely called "enlightenment."

Intrateric religious joke: A man was walking alone down a forest path. The Devil and his assistant were following at a distance. The man bends over and picks up something. The Devil's assistant, horrified, exclaims, "Oh no, Master! The man has discovered Truth!" The Devil smiles and says, "Don't worry, I'll help him organize it." (As told by J. Krishnamurti.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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