I am going to suggest an alternate possibility to your comment that the ideal is necessarily the symbolism of a God(s).
Not sure I said 'necessarily', but go on ...
... Science moves more and more towards the concept that we live in a vibrating universe. Everything in our reality is vibration. Scholars such as Plato described it as sound. Not a bad analogy since we know sound is nothing more than vibrations that our bodies translate into said sound.
And in the Bible God 'said', and then we have 'Aum' ... I'm not saying the Ancients were aware ... actually ... perhaps what I am saying were the ancients comprehended, in perhaps an inchoate and naive way, what science has taken thousands of years to discover for itself ... but that's just a contemplation, not a statement ...
When one concentrates on the vibration of everything, one can begin to understand the power of such, and perhaps begin to manipulate it.
Well the idea of manipulation is, I suppose, from the scientific side, although there are plenty here who 'manipulate'
sacra doctrina to suit their own designs.
The traditional idea is, as I'm sure you know, to 'attune' oneself to 'the music of the spheres'. The modern notion is that the spheres are obliged to listen to my 'music'.
These vibrations, from a religious viewpoint, can be said to emanate from Gods. But that is not the only possibility. The vibrations of our reality may be simply the substance of our reality. No divine presence required.
Quite. I agree wholeheartedly, which is why I have argued against 'Intelligent Design' as a poof of God, whilst I regard classical ID as a statement of faith.
Scholars from the past (and present) have varying definitions of this fundamental aspect of reality. To have read and know of these theories is important to come to a personal understanding. One never knows which definition will be the key that unlocks an individual's way of 'getting it'.
I agree, with the proviso that consumerism has tricked people into believing that, on the basis that there are many keys ... invent your own.
The flaw of the West, and I would propose all of humanity, is that too many have no interest or respect in what has come before. We have this incredible database of human wisdom and folly that has been recorded going back at least 5,000 years. And most people don't care about anything older than yesterday.
Oh, so true!
I stand in awe of the Greek philosopher who stuck two sticks in the ground, and worked out from the angle of their shadows that the world was round and roughly 24,000 miles in diameter. I am in awe of Euclid. I'm in awe of Einstein and Dirac and many many others.
Today, people assume that because they have knowledge at their fingertips, they are better than their forebears. They are 'more advanced'. They have 'progressed'. They are dazzled by the glamour of the tech at their disposal.
But has anything changed, really?
Read the comedies of the Greeks. The satires. The tragedies. The love poetry. The eulogies. Can we say it better today?
No. It's timeless.
Nothing has changed
essentially. We are exactly the same. We have more facts to hand, more things on mind, more distractions. More diversions. And so we're more lost and confused than ever.