reading around the net, thought i'd share this

The Essence

Of the definition of spirituality is first of all the concept of soul, the not materially to determine principle on the basis of which we live, important. It is called the essence of our being. Spirituality without a soul doesn't make any sense. The concept of the soul is used to contrast the human with the animal interest. If we are not just of animal interest we might be talking of human values, of remembrance, of compassion and conscience; or in one word of the soul. This animal interest is also called material interest. Someone pursuing the animal interest is involved in material actions. In fact this is the evolutionary beginning of the story of humanity. Undoubtedly we originated from God. But what God would that be, that has shaped this peculiar ape? What happened to us? If we fail to understand this, we will not be in touch with our history and therefore be alienated from the remembrance of what is to make up for the conscience of the soul. Therefore: how have we become human in the first place? The evolutionist will say that it has happened by natural selection: a conscientious ape would be more of an evolutionary success than one without such a compassionate remembrance. The creationist will say that we have been created after an ideal template called God, after the example of a Lordship that descended from heaven to redeem us from our sins. Of course both are right. The vedic scriptures confirm this, but the ideal template is not of any specific form. To the Hindu the Lord can take the form of a fish (Matsya) or a boar (Varaha), He can be the sun and sungod, the moon or the celestial sky, He can have a human form or a spiritual form like a Vishnu with four arms. As such we are created not as a form but as a spirit. The template is not about form, the template for the essence of our spirituality is an ideal spirit. If we would be turtles with the ability to speak and manipulate matter, we would have had the same questions and answers (In fact the tortoise is part of the vedic make up). Seen this way the controversy about the creationist or evolutionist view of our origin is of less importance.

If the question is where the ideal of the spirit comes from, the question is much more easy to answer: from our suffering in the material world, whether we are turtles or apes, we know of the desire not to suffer. And that desire shapes our minds into what we call the spirit of God, the Holy spirit or the mind of idealism that any materialist knows to call an illusion after the newest disappointment about material endeavors. And that is the God, the spirit and the ideal that molded us into what we are now. Our present state though is not one of clarity: the world is confused and uncertain about its survival and cultural future. Are we going downhill or will we rise from the ashes of our gruesome experiences of war and social decay? Many still have the question whether the soul, that leading ideal of human values, really exists at all. Many still see from the evolutionary point of view the social darwinist concept of society only: to belong to the survival of the fittest with a necktie and an automobile is the reality. The question remains: why do we see our selves in animalistic opposition beyond the rational control as depicted above? Why don't we have a worldorder that is founded on an integral vision of our historic and present human reality. Again the answer must be sought in the direction of the definition of soul that guarantees our human values: only a conflict about these values can be able to obscure a clear vision of the future. Only from this clarity, of not having a conflict at this foundation in the values of the soul, we can speak of an enlightened spirituality and liberated society.