Hi Ann,

That’s an interesting perspective. Agree that spiritual devotion is always an inherently subjective experience – it only appears to be dualistic/hierarchical when there is the sense of separation. Ramakrishna’s quote “I don’t want to be sugar, I just want to taste sugar” encapsulates the approach many of us take to “worship”. It's the place most of us stop at as a form of resistance to union with the Divine.

For context, this blog post manifested from attending two "kirtans", where the speakers presented a perspective on the chanting of "Shivaya" that was rooted in a dualistic teaching before commencing the mantra. This stance came as a surprise, given that these were not ritually "religious" settings like a temple. Interestingly, only this particular interpretation of chanting “Shivaya” was offered, rather than the nondual understandings found in many spiritual traditions, as discussed in the article, including the profound nondual meaning behind the very syllables "Shi-va-ya."

In my opinion, religious frameworks tend to be more inherently hierarchical and dualistic compared to spiritual philosophies that lean towards nondual metaphysics. So when solely a dualistic (and religious) exposition of such teachings is presented to folks aligning more with spiritual exploration, it can lead to confusion or a disconnection from the deeper, universal symbolism and significance.

Interestingly, there is a lot of interesting work that’s been done on people who identify as “spiritual” or “religious”. There is a great paper available online (*coughs* Sci-hub) by Saroglou and Pichon in 2005 looked at the willingness of "religious" versus "spiritual" individuals to help others. Their findings revealed an interesting contrast – those identified as more "religious" exhibited a greater inclination to assist friends and family, yet a decreased likelihood of helping strangers. On the other hand, those identifying more as "spiritual" demonstrated an equal readiness to help across both groups. I have also personally experienced this to often be the case with folks from both camps.

I agree emphatically with your view that true worship transcends notions of hierarchy. As you eloquently put it, worship is an expression of the highest love, which by its very nature defies hierarchies. The example of loving life partners is an interesting one. The analogy i’ve sometimes used and likened it to is a Mother's love for a child, which is (in many cases) unconditional. In love for a partner, there is often some expected form of reciprocity i.e. “I’ll love you so long as you are faithful to me” etc. That obviously isn’t always the case, but seems to be in many relationships.

Have not read “Flatland” but am a fan of the sci-fi genre, so i’ll add that one to the “to read” list. Many thanks for the recommendation.

Jai Ma!