10th
The Sphere of Spirituality
Dr. Mehrdad Massoudi suggested in his essay, “A Spherical Model of Spirituality: A Pluralistic Perspective on the World’s Religions,” that spirituality is innate, and all religious traditions provide inner paths of coming to know and realize the “Divine.” He used a three-dimensional spherical model to explain the interactions of various religions and their roads to the “Center,” or the “Divine.” He believed that for people, spirituality is essential, and they seek union with the “Divine.” All religions have inner paths to achieve the union, which lead to the same “Ultimate Source.”
According to Sufism, a sector of the Islamic faith, its faith could be generalized in a circular model, where the followers are on the circumference, and there are infinite ways through the radii to the Center. The author elaborated upon this model, and created a three-dimensional spherical one where there is an infinite number of circumferences that represent the different religions, and from them, an infinite number of ways to reach the Center, which represent the mystical paths that lead the followers to the Divine. One of the problems with the Sufi circular model was that it pertains only to its own religion, and they hold that the “Truth” is “God.” However, in some religions, such as Buddhism, there is no concept of “God.” The author suggests that even Buddhism, Jainism, and Taoism have the concept of the “Ultimate Meaning” that is the “Truth,” as the core of their religions, which he believed can be reflected in a center of the spherical model he created.
Dr. Massoudi explained that “those who believe that the Truth is the same among various religions can be classified as those who try to see the positive common denominator among different religions,” which he called the “Oneness of the Center” (351). This is the core concept from which Dr. Massoudi devised his Spherical Model; the notion that all religions have inner paths to realize the “Divine,” the “Truth,” or “God.”
This theory could cause problems for religious elitists, however, who believe that their religion is superior to all others. The Spherical Model shows that there is no “correct” or “one real way” to reach the Center or the Divine, which does not make their own religion as “special” as they would like it to be. The author held that “any religion with its Law is as good as any other religion with its own Law” (349). He also stated that “enlightenment is not the monopoly or property of any religion or any individual”- every religion is unique and yet not above any other. Religious Exclusivists deem people of other religions inferior, which lead to religious intolerance, racism, and horrific catastrophes such as the Holocaust.
The author wrote that tolerance is not enough; it “should be replaced by mutual respect” (353). This concept was reflected in the statement of Mahatma Gandhi- “There will be no lasting peace on earth unless we learn not merely to tolerate but even to respect the other faiths as our own.” When all of this world’s religions can be fit into a model such as the three-dimensional spherical model, people from all faiths can learn to respect each other, knowing that all religions seek the same thing- the “Divine” that is within us all.
Massoudi, Mehrdad, Dr. “A Spherical Model of Spirituality: A Pluralistic Perspective on the World’s Religions.” Journal of Ecumenical Studies (Summer-Fall 2004): 341-354.
