Religious views on the self vary widely. The

self The self is an individual as the object of that individual’s own reflective consciousness. Since the ''self'' is a reference by a subject to the same subject, this reference is necessarily subjective. The sense of having a self—or ''selfhoo ...

is a complex and core subject in many forms of spirituality. Considering the self leads to questions about who we are and the nature of our own importance.

General discussion

According to psychologist

James Marcia James E. Marcia is a clinical and developmental psychologist. He previously taught at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada and the State University of New York at Buffalo in Upstate New York. He is also active in clinical private pr ...

, identity comes from both political and religious views. Marcia also identified exploration and commitment as interactive parts of identity formation, which includes religious identity. Erik Erikson compared faith with doubt and found that healthy adults take heed to their spiritual side.Kiesling, Chris; Montgomery, Marylin; Sorell, Gwendolyn; Colwell, Ronald. "Identity and Spirituality: A Psychosocial Exploration of the Sense of Spiritual Self" One description of spirituality is the self's search for "ultimate meaning" through an independent comprehension of the sacred. Spiritual identity appears when the symbolic religious and spiritual of a culture is found by individuals in the setting of their own life. There can be different types of spiritual self because it is determined on one's life and experiences. Another definition of spiritual identity is " a persistent sense of self that addresses ultimate questions about the nature, purpose, and meaning of life, resulting in behaviors that are consonant with the individual’s core values." Another description of mind, body, soul, and spirit is a holism of one inner self being of one whole. It all combines together as one whole instead of different parts. Individuals one thoughts, one feeling, one breathing is all completed and occurs as one whole.

Views in Eastern religions

Some Eastern philosophies reject the self as a

delusion A delusion is a false fixed belief that is not amenable to change in light of conflicting evidence. As a pathology, it is distinct from a belief based on false or incomplete information, confabulation, dogma, illusion, hallucination, or som ...

. In Buddhist psychology, the attachment to

is an illusion that serves as the main cause of suffering and unhappiness.

Christian views

Evelyn Underhill

Catholic mystic

Evelyn Underhill Evelyn Underhill (6 December 1875 – 15 June 1941) was an English Anglo-Catholic writer and pacifist known for her numerous works on religion and spiritual practice, in particular Christian mysticism. Her best-known is ''Mysticism'', published ...

Evelyn Underhill, "Mysticism: A Study in Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness, Section III, P. 55. wrote:

Albert Outler

According to

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

theologian

Albert Outler Albert Cook Outler (November 17, 1908 – September 1, 1989) was a 20th-century American Methodist historian, theologian, and pastor. He was a professor at Duke University, Yale University, and Southern Methodist University. He was a key figure i ...

, the "desperately wicked self" is the sinful self that has chosen to be "curved back upon itself", but ever with the potential of changing and (by God's grace) turning toward "'new life', opened out to love of God and neighbor".See Albert Outler as quoted in "Outler on the Holy Spirit" by George Aikinson, Bristol House, 2004 p. 54. and p. 87.

Ken Wilber's view

American author

Ken Wilber Kenneth Earl Wilber II (born January 31, 1949) is an American philosopher and writer on transpersonal psychology and his own integral theory, a philosophy which suggests the synthesis of all human knowledge and experience. Life and career Wilbe ...

describes the Witnessing (or Observing) Self in the following terms: :"This observing Self is usually called the Self with a capital ''S'', or the Witness, or pure Presence, or pure

Awareness Awareness is the state of being conscious of something. More specifically, it is the ability to directly know and perceive, to feel, or to be cognizant of events. Another definition describes it as a state wherein a subject is aware of some infor ...

, or

Consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience and awareness of internal and external existence. However, the lack of definitions has led to millennia of analyses, explanations and debates by philosophers, theologians, linguisticians, and scien ...

as such, and this Self as transparent Witness is a direct ray of the living

Divine Divinity or the divine are things that are either related to, devoted to, or proceeding from a deity.divine< ...

. The ultimate "I AM" is

Christ Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...

, is

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...

, is

Emptiness Emptiness as a human condition is a sense of generalized boredom, social alienation and apathy. Feelings of emptiness often accompany dysthymia, depression, loneliness, anhedonia, despair, or other mental/emotional disorders, including schizoid ...

itself: such is the startling testimony of the world's great mystics and sages."Ken Wilber, ''A Brief History of Everything'', ch. 12, p.197-199 He adds that the self is not an Emergent, but an aspect present from the start as the basic form of awareness, but which becomes increasingly obvious and self-aware "as growth and transcendence matures." As Depth increases, consciousness shines forth more noticeably, until: :"shed

ing Ing, ING or ing may refer to: Art and media * '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film * i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group * The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes'' * "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 1992 ...

its lesser identification with both the body and the mind ... in each case from matter to body to mind to Spirit... consciousness or the observing Self sheds an exclusive identity with a lesser and shallower dimension, and opens up to deeper and higher and wider occasions, until it opens up to its own ultimate ground in Spirit itself. And the stages of transpersonal growth and development are basically the stages of following this Observing Self to its ultimate abode, which is pure Spirit or pure Emptiness, the ground, path and fruition of the entire display."

References

{{Reflist, 2 Conceptions of self Religious existentialism