For the Buddha, Religion Did Not Mean Theology, Metaphysics, Dogma, or Faith

Once he began to seek an answer, Siddhartha did not rest until he found it. For six long years he searched and struggled, inflicting heroic experiments upon his body and mind. He would not go by what tradition had handed down: he would not accept what theology taught; he would not even trust reason and intellect. There was only one way in which he could know the truth, and that was to realize it for himself through hard self-discipline and even harder experience. For the Buddha, religion did not mean theology, metaphysics, dogma, or even faith. He sought personal experience, personal realization, which he finally achieved on the night of his enlightenment under the bodhi tree.

---Eknath Easwaran, in the Introduction to "Essence of the Dhammapada"---