Another great thread here!
Radical, thank you for your thinking and questioning as well as your open- minded responses to other peoples' posts. You are making it real clear, in my opinion, that even if you don't fully agree with what someone has said, you have looked at what they've said, you've thought about it carefully, and you can pick out the parts that do make sense. You've really stimulated some good discussion here!
In a way, this reminds me of some differences between people's approaches to conventional religions. Some folks seem to really want to get down to the nitty gritty and prove something is true, based on ancient or more recent writings, and other folks want to jump right in and experience the potentials of their spirituality, leaving the details not as distinctly defined. So the first group might become very scholarly and knowledgeable about a religion's text, traditional and current thinking, devoting quite a bit of their spiritual time on this. The second group might spend their spiritual time in prayer, meditation and doing whatever they are moved to do in order to feel confident that they are living their religion the way they feel best expresses their spiritual values.
It may well be that the difference lies primarily in people's personalities, experiences or environments. Although I think the second way I described is probably a more immediate or direct approach, I think the first way, for the truly devout/interested/motivated/dedicated will work just as well. I think that eventually the folks who feel they need to intellectually know everything first will be led to personal spiritual experience through their seeking of intellectual understanding. And the second group will probably be led to seeking more textual or intellectual knowledge through their more experientially based spiritual activities.
One thing I'd want to suggest to you, in full respect for your approach, which I see as highly intellectually accountable, a very fine thing there, is to find a way you can actually try some of this. Not in ways like flying or manifesting a million dollars by Sunday--rather in ways that are meaningful to you in every day life as it is for you right now-----say, something within your own routines, relationships, environment. I'm not suggesting that you put off or stop your thinking abt this the way you are. I'm rather suggesting that maybe some more personal experience, in small ways, might lead your intellectual quest into some interesting areas.
(Someone came up with an analogy regarding driving a car. Especially these days, we surely don't know exactly how when we turn the key in the ignition, put the car into gear, back out of a parking spot, head out to the highway and drive 30 miles, the whole thing happens and we get there, that motor starts, the power train, transmission, steering and all the rest work and we get there. That doesn't mean it's not a smart idea to know as much as we can about our own vehicles, and it's sure good that some folks decide to become educated as mechanics, but we don't have to know the details of auto mechanics to get where we are going...)
I'd be most interested in hearing of your experiences if you should try this.. as well as your further intellectual explorations....As I see from this and other forums, I am quite sure that others will also.
All best
Ati