> FWIW, according to Patañjali, shraddhaa (usually > translated to 'faith') seems to be a /conditio > sine qua non/ for samaadhi... > Well, yes, you have to have a certain amount of faith that the goal exists: samadhi. We don't know for sure that a state of samadhi exists, unless we experience it ourselves, but until that point, we have to consider what we do know and how we know it.
We take verbal testimony as one source of valid knowledge. How else would someone even know about the enlightenment tradtion unless you hear about it from others. "The most valuable practice in the sphere of dhyana is the simple system of transcendental meditation. Transcendental meditation belongs to the sphere of dhyana, but at the same time transcends that sphere and gives rise to the state of transcendental consciousness, samadhi. After this state has been gained the attention returns to the sphere of dhyana, which is a sphere of activity." (CBG p. 486)
