Connecting Dots of Belief

There was something undefined and complete, coming into existence before Heaven and Earth.  How still it was and formless, standing alone, and undergoing no change, reaching everywhere and in no danger (of being exhausted)! It may be regarded as the Mother of all things.
Lao Tzu (Chapter/Verse 25 Taoe Te Ching as translated by James Legge)


Connecting the Tao with other Religious Beliefs

Hmm! I read that last night before going to bed and it seemed to apply to our idea of foreground and background of existence.  Heaven and Earth, as we know them or believe them to be, are the foreground of this still, formless, solitary, changeless, infinite and fearless background. They are things on the canvas of what Buddhists refer to as emptiness.  All else is 'created' from this space

We may name this background, this "Great Being" God or the Creator, but Lao Tzu states he did not know Its name  so he just called it the Tao or the Way. 

Is it not the same? In many religious beliefs... God is the way, right...the direction to follow? God is also "Great"...meaning the higher power? In the order of supremacy described by Lao Tzu in this chapter ...we have man...than kings or sages...followed by Earth...then Heaven and finally the Tao...the highest power...  "The Great". Is that not the hierarchy  most western religious beliefs are built on?

Man takes his law from the Earth; the Earth takes its law from Heaven; Heaven takes its law from the Tao. The law of the Tao is its being what it is. (Lao Tzu)

We get back to the profound rule of accepting "it is what it is" because God is "I am Who I am"(Exodus 3:14, ESV). 

We, as mentally dominated creatures, go around naming things that maybe we are not meant to name. We reduce the "Greatness" of what simply is... to concepts we separate and protect from other concepts but ....could the truth behind labels  be universal?

Hmmm! That is what came to my mind as I read this...but what do I know, lol?

All is well!

References


Exodus 3:14, Holy Bible, English Standard Version

Lao Tzu  as translated by James Legge (1891) Tao Te Ching. Retrieved from https://www.sacred-texts.com/tao/taote.htm