About self realization and religion path
Question
When you talk about brahmacharya and methods to realize the absolute, for the inteligent person it doesnt mean religion itself is the only way right? isnt better to go beyond religion? If you said all religious path could bring someone to the absolute then the absolute is beyond religion.
Many of the wisest individuals that ever existed in this earth like for example the Buddha himself, the Buddha was not religious but a spiritual philosopher, he never believe this or believe that, same thing with Plato and his succesors in the platonic school, all of them were philosophers and spoke about "philosophy" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonism#Philosophy to attain the absolute, it was not religion of worshipping gods or spirits. It was a philosophy without connection to a particular set of worship. This philosophy is perhaps the only one in the west that goes to the essence of things. The essence then is wrapped in religion and sects.
Answer
1. What is religion? It is a path, a lifestyle and a set of mental perspectives which one follows, so as to eventually align his mind into the Atman (self), away from the Ego, which is ignorance.
2. All religions in the true sense advocate self-realization and nothing else. That is the only objective, whatever be the name given to the religion.
3. Therefore, all those who strive to realize the self are religious about that objective, which itself is a kind of religion. Hence, there are as many religions as there are people, each following a unique way to reach the self.
So the question of being religious or not does not exist.
ॐ तत् सत्
(That Supreme being is the absolute truth)